Secretary of the Louisiana Department of Revenue and former Jones Walker LLP State & Local Tax Partner, Kimberly Robinson, sat down with our own Bill Backstrom and Jay Adams to discuss a few of the items that she will discuss at the Jones Walker SALT Team’s annual seminar in Houston, Texas on Thursday, October 6, 2016. … Continue Reading
The Louisiana Department of Revenue issued Revenue Information Bulletin No. 16-034 (July 14, 2016) to address the taxability of items of tangible personal property purchased or leased for use outside of Louisiana and offshore. Louisiana Revised Statute 47:305(E) provides that it is not the intention of any taxing authority to levy a tax upon articles … Continue Reading
Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards has released his Call for the Second Special Session in 2016. The special session will begin at 6:30 p.m. on June 6, 2016, which is 30 minutes after the regular session ends. The special session will end on June 23, 2016. The Call focuses on the Governor’s tax plan, which was released … Continue Reading
Originally published by Tax Law360. Taxation by states of out-of-state online retail sales remains a hotly contested issue. Louisiana is now part of that national sales tax nexus conversation. In March of 2016, during a special legislative session called by new Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards (D) to address the State’s current budget shortfalls, the … Continue Reading
Today, Louisiana Governor Edwards called for a special session of the Louisiana Legislature to begin on February 14, 2016 and end no later than March 9, 2016. The session has been called to address the current year $700 million budget deficit and a number of tax issues, including: Amend the Constitution “relative to deductible items … Continue Reading
It is somewhat rare for the Louisiana Supreme Court to entertain three tax cases in one year. It is even rarer for the Court to hear three state and local tax cases in back-to-back sessions. However, that is exactly what the Court will be doing! On January 25th and 26th, the Court will hear oral … Continue Reading
Louisiana Governor Edwards’ Transition Committee on Fiscal Matters released its much-anticipated report on the Louisiana budget and taxes. In order to address Louisiana’s structural deficit, the Transition Committee offered the following options to reform the Louisiana tax system: Reduce Louisiana’s individual income tax rates across the board, if the voters agree to eliminate the deduction … Continue Reading
The Louisiana Department of Revenue has just issued a press release announcing that the 2015 tax amnesty program, scheduled to begin yesterday, November 16, 2015, has been delayed until December 1, 2015. The 30-day tax amnesty period will now run from December 1, 2015 until December 31, 2015. The delay results from an error in some … Continue Reading
Today, the 2015 tax amnesty program begins and will continue through December 15, 2015. In connection with the program, on November 3 the Louisiana Department of Revenue issued its Revenue Information Bulletin (RIB) No. 2015-037 providing taxpayers with specific information on this year’s amnesty. Notably, unlike the language of Act 822 (2014 Reg. Sess.) upon which the 2015 … Continue Reading
State & Local Tax Partners, Jesse R. “Jay” Adams, III, William M. Backstrom,Jr., John F. Fletcher, and Kimberly Lewis Robinson, were all quoted in the recent Bloomberg BNA article, “Corporate Taxpayers Face Changes in Louisiana, Mississippi, Attorneys Say.” The partners discuss how legislative sessions in 2014 and 2015 and some notable cases have brought significant changes … Continue Reading
On Monday, October 2, Judge Michael Caldwell of the Nineteenth Judicial District Court for the Parish of East Baton Rouge ruled that the Louisiana Chemical Association (the “LCA”) has standing to challenge the constitutionality of House Concurrent Resolution No. 8 (“HCR 8”). Specifically, the court found that the LCA is permitted to sue on behalf … Continue Reading
House Concurrent Resolution No. 8 (“HCR 8”) suspends certain tax exemptions on “business utilities” for the tax periods beginning on or after July 1, 2015 through August 5, 2016. Pursuant to HCR 8, businesses will pay a one percent (1%) sales and use tax on their purchases of utilities. The types of business utilities, as interpreted by … Continue Reading
There’s a children’s book, “The Goose That Almost Got Cooked,” which tells the story of a Canadian goose who takes a break from her flight south for the winter to rest at a lovely farm where the other geese are fed three meals a day. The Canadian goose thinks this is the life until discovering one … Continue Reading
Don’t blink! Pay close attention, because things are moving quickly right now at the Louisiana Legislature! The Senate Revenue and Fiscal Affairs Committee met Monday, May 11th to hear a series of tax bills, including bills to implement combined reporting and an add-back provision for corporate income tax and clean-up provisions for the Louisiana Board … Continue Reading
The Louisiana House of Representatives took a major step yesterday in addressing the $1.6 billion budget hole for the 2016 fiscal year. All in, the House moved forward approximately $664 million in revenue raising bills, in spite of many protests by business and industry representatives. While the stated goal of many legislators was to have the burden … Continue Reading
The Mississippi Supreme Court last week in Vincent J. Castigliola, Jr. v. Mississippi Department of Revenue, No. 2013-SA-001574-SCT (April 30, 2015), reversed a lower court judgment which had upheld the Department of Revenue’s imposition of use tax upon the out-of-state purchase of a yacht by a Mississippi resident. In doing so the Court provided taxpayers with very … Continue Reading
We anticipated it was going to be a busy day for the folks at the Louisiana Legislature on Monday. And they certainly didn’t disappoint! Tornadoes, thunderstorms, floods, and power outages couldn’t stop the Louisiana House Ways & Means Committee from meeting late into the night yesterday to discuss – and pass through – many tax bills, all in … Continue Reading
In the above video, Jones Walker SALT partner Jay Adams explains a few highlights from recent Louisiana legislation regarding the new “local” Board of Tax Appeals (BTA) available to taxpayers for matters involving local sales/use tax assessments and refund claims, as well as possible new traps for taxpayers relating to appeals of local sales/use tax refund … Continue Reading
In our prior post on the case of Pot-O-Gold Rentals, LLC v. City of Baton Rouge, we noted that we were hoping the Louisiana Supreme Court would hear this case in order to “clean up the mess” regarding the reach of the Louisiana lease tax and the scope of taxable “gross proceeds” (a term which … Continue Reading
ACTION ITEM: Importantly, with regard to all older local sales/use tax refund claims filed on or before July 4, 2013, where the local collector has failed to act on the claim, those pending refund claims must be appealed to the BTA before January 1, 2015. As we noted in a prior post, the Louisiana legislature … Continue Reading
Something new has been cooking in the Louisiana tax law kitchen! The Louisiana Supreme Court was recently asked to entertain the separate ideas of fraud and, for the first time, the economic substance doctrine in deciding a tax case in the State. Louisiana is certainly used to heat (as can be seen by its food … Continue Reading
The Louisiana legislature and the Louisiana Board of Tax Appeals (the “BTA”) have been busy! On June 12, 2014, Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal signed into law HB 863 (Act 640), which expands the jurisdiction of the Louisiana Board of Tax Appeals (the “BTA”) and changes a number of state and local tax procedures; most importantly, … Continue Reading
Mississippi taxpayers are seeing green! On August 7, 2014, the Mississippi Supreme Court invalidated a sales and use tax regulation in Mississippi Department of Revenue v. Mississippi Power Company, No. 2013-CA-01234-SCT (Miss. Aug. 7, 2014). In that case, the Mississippi Department of Revenue (the “MDOR”) attempted to impose more restrictive requirements in the regulation, Miss. Reg. 35.IV.7.03(302), than the terms … Continue Reading
