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The nonprofit Woodmen of the World, a financial services group has filed a lawsuit against U.S. Bank National Association for $29.7 million in investments it claims U.S. Bank lost.  Woodmen has accused U.S. bank of breach of contract, gross negligence, breach of fiduciary duty, fraudulent misrepresentation and fraudulent concealment.  It is alleged that a portion of Woodmen’s money was invested in high risk securities, which were not doing as well as U.S. Bank led them to believe.  According to the Associated Press, these high risk securities were mortgage-backed securities which have been at the center of our countries financial troubles.To read the rest of this article, please follow the hyperlink to the Avvo web-page.

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The Community Preservation Corporation, a 35-year-old nonprofit lender that specializes in issuing mortgages to landlords of small buildings and properties receiving public subsidies, is offering $1 billion in credit to New York State apartment building owners.The group’s new “green financing initiative” offers mortgages or refinancing to landlords who fix wasteful energy and water systems in their buildings.To read the rest of this article, please follow the hyperlink to The New York Times web-page.

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The U.S. government has filed a lawsuit against a non profit out of New York that aimed at promoting Persian philanthropic causes, but it turned out to be a front for the Iranian government.  The U.S. attorney for that district is seeking forfeiture of a Manhattan office building tower used by the Alavi Foundation.  For two decades their operations have been controlled by Iranian officials and recent accusations have caused this lawsuit to come about.To read the entire article, please follow the hyperlink to the UPI web-page.

The best way to avoid such a problem is good governance that provides clear controls and accountability within the organization. 

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For the last part of my five part series, I am going to be talking about tax deductible entertainment expenses and the rules you must follow.  This for the person who really pays for the expense, either you or your employer if they reimburse you. There is a limit that applies to meal and entertainment in this category and it is where you are only allowed to deduct 50% of the expenses you incur.  There are also two classifications of these expenses.  There are the ones which are directly related to business and which are covered.  Then there are the expenses which are associated with business and these expenses must serve a specific business purpose to be deductible.  That could be obtaining new business or continuing existing business.  These expenses can get very complicated so I suggest that you speak with a CPA if you wish to get very in depth.  Good luck with deducting some of your business expenses and I hope it can help you to save a little money on your taxes.

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Here is part four of my five part series on tax deductible business expenses.  So, today we are going to talk about education expenses.  This is an expense that many people have a good chance of coming across at some point in their career.  If you are someone who is planning on going back to school at some point to get a higher degree this is going to be very important for you.  But, as like any other tax law, you can not just go deducting any expense related to going to school.  There are two rules you must follow.  The first is to deduct the expenses you must be going back to school to maintain or improve existing skills required in the present job that you have.  Let’s use for an example that you are an accountant who works specifically with the taxes of your company and you wanted to go back to school to get your Masters.  Now if you went back and got your Masters degree in taxation, those expenses would be deductible, but if you went to get a law degree that would not be deductible.  The other rule that you must follow to be able to deduct these expenses is if you are going back to school to meet requirements expressed by your employer or requirements of the law so that you can retain your employment status.  This means that if your employer wants everyone in your line of work to have there Masters degree and you only have your Bachelors, the costs to go back to school would be deductible.  If you are trying to meet the minimum education requirements for your current job or you are getting the degree for a different trade or business you can not deduct those costs.  I hope this information can help you to save some money on your taxes and maybe give you some new insight.  But, again as I had stated before if you have any in depth questions please contact a CPA in your area who can probably be of more help or ask the IRS.

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Here is part three of the five part series on business expenses that you can deduct on your tax returns.  Moving Expenses are on today’s agenda for something that you are allowed to deduct as a business expense.  These expenses are deductible if the move is in connection with commencement of work at a new principle place of work.  To be eligible for this you must meet two different tests.  The first is the distance test.  So, to meet this test the new job location must be at least 50 miles father from the taxpayer’s old residence than the old residence was from the former place of employment.  To meet this you must work at the new job for 39 weeks in the first 12 month period or 78 weeks during the first two years.  If you meet both of these tests than your expenses are deductible.  When deducting your expenses you are allowed to only include the cost of moving your household goods and personal effects and traveling from your former residence to your new one.  The traveling includes your lodging but not your meals experienced along the way.  If this is a situation which you encounter over time, and many people will, you now know what you can and can not deduct on your tax return.

As always read the IRS bulletin to the changes that may occur between tax years.  Congress is always playing with rules in the tax code. 

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You can get your cabernet and pinot from North Carolina-based bartender Doc Hendley, but you’ll also get a side of water and some sobering news.

Wine to Water, Hendley’s nonprofit, raises funds through wine tasting events in order to bring clean water to people in developing countries. It was after traveling the world and learning about the global water crisis that the 30-year-old realized he could combine his bartending and people skills by hosting eye-opening wine tastings at the venues where he worked.

To read the entire article, please follow the hyperlink to the Huffington Post web-page.

Now that’s taking ones passion and making an impact.

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This is the second part of the segment I am writing about business expenses on your tax returns, I am going to talk about travel expenses.  Travel Expenses are defined by the IRS code as transportation expenses and meals and lodging while away from home in the pursuit of a trade or business. Now this away from home must be overnight for this to count.  A day trip for work would not count as travel expenses.  Now when a temporary assignment comes up as some people might experience, those expenses incurred while traveling will be deductible.  If you question how long a temporary assignment is, you are probably not alone.  It is anything that is 12 months or less, so the majority of assignments away from your tax home will count as temporary at least for tax ramifications.

There are some restrictions to travel expenses that you may come across.  If you are traveling to a convention, it must be directly related to your trade or business.  Travel as a form of education is not deductible, however, if the education qualifies as a deduction then travel is allowed.  I will discuss education expenses later in this five part segment. When many people go on a business trip they also include some personal time in with it.  There are certain rules you need to follow if you want to deduct any of the costs associated with this type of travel.

First, if you are traveling domestically the trip must be primarily for business in order for the expenses to be deductible.  If you are traveling outside of the United States some special rules apply. First your transportation expense must be allocated between business and personal days if you are a) away from home for seven days or less or b) less than 25 percent of the time was for personal purposes.   No allocation is required if you did not have control over planning the arrangements or if the trip was primarily for pleasure no deduction is allowed.  A good thing to know is that travel days count as business days and weekends, legal holidays, and intervening days are considered business days provided that both the preceding and succeeding days were business days.

With this information you should now know what you need to know if order to get your correct amount of travel expenses deducted from you next tax return. But as always check the instructions since the IRS rules and requirements can be updated.

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The FBI is looking into the spending practices at Centro Familia, a Wheaton nonprofit group that runs a bilingual preschool, trains day-care providers and receives about $450,000 annually in contracts from Montgomery County, the organization’s executive director has acknowledged.

A bureau agent visited the organization’s office last week and interviewed at least one of its staff members. Centro Familia, which is well-connected in Montgomery political circles, has also been under scrutiny by the county’s independent inspector general and the county’s health and human services department. FBI Special Agent Richard Wolf of the Baltimore field office said he could not comment.To read the entire article, please follow the hyperlink to The Washington Post webpage.

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When it comes to business expenses the list can go on and on. But over the next few days I will be covering a handful that you are able to deduct when you file your taxes.  Today, I will cover transportation expenses that you might encounter. Now the IRS classifies transportation expenses to include only the cost of transporting the employee from one place to another in the course of employment when the employee is not away from home in travel status. This deduction will be an itemized deduction from AGI.  Now something that would not be allowed is the cost of commuting to work.  These costs that you incur can not be deducted, however if you work two jobs the cost of going from one to the other can be deducted.  The costs of going to a temporary work station are allowed to be deducted. If you are using your personal automobile for this driving to and from places there are two ways in which you could find out what your deduction is.  The first and less common way the the Actual Cost Method.  First you must figure out the percentage of business use that you use your car for in the fiscal year.  Then you would add up all of your expenses and multiply that by the percentage of business use and that will be your deduction.  This can get very tricky so the more used method is the Automatic Mileage Method.  When using this method you first keep a running total of all the business miles you drive during the year.  Then at the end of the year you take that total and multiply it by the mileage rate which for 2009 is $.55 per mile. The total that you get here would be your driving deduction.  If you would like to get extremely in depth information on this or any other tax information, consult your local CPA in your area.