Recent developments: new approach to IRS liaison meetings and 2010 Tax Relief Act.

• Author: Josephs, Stuart R.
• Position: FedTax

CalCPA has conducted annual liaison meetings with IRS officials from the Western part of the United States for nearly 40 years. For each of these meetings. CalCPA's Committee on Taxation solicited questions from CalCPA members for submission to the IRS--after a very thorough and intensive screening, review and editing process performed by the committee's Federal Subcommittee.

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The questions provided to the IRS were answered at the liaison meeting, usually held in November. Through the 2009 meeting, the IRS provided written responses to these questions at the meeting, which were then made available to all CalCPA members.

However, for last year's Nov. 17 meeting, written answers were no longer provided. Instead, the IRS subsequently distributed minutes of the meeting, which contain summaries of the responses to the questions considered at the meeting and can be found at www.calcpa.org/11.17minutes.

New IRS Approach and Format

The IRS has adopted a new national approach for responding to practitioners' questions and a new format for the liaison meetings it holds throughout the country with many professional organizations. CalCPA's 2010 meeting was the last meeting in which the IRS responded to pre-submitted questions.

Under this new approach, the IRS would like to receive questions as they arise throughout the year regarding policies, practices and procedural matters or specific situations that may be indicative of systemic issues. The Issue Management Resolution System (IMRS; should be used to identify these and other nationwide trends that may necessitate changes. Questions should be submitted through your local Stakeholder Liaison (see sidebar). If you would like more information on IMRS, visit www.calcpa.org/IMRS.

Future Meetings

For the next meeting, scheduled for Nov. 16, the IRS will address significant issues that it has identified in advance following the same format used for meetings with all other professional groups nationwide.

However, CalCPA has been invited to identify our own issues and suggest them to the IRS for possible consideration and discussion at this meeting. CalCPA has developed a new Agenda Topic Form for suggesting significant IRS issues. See the News & Trends item, Page 5, this issue for further details.

2010 Tax Relief Act

The following are highlights of this law (P.L. 111-312) enacted Dec. 17, 2010.

Regular Income Tax Rates

The regular income tax rates for individuals, estates and...