This past month, much to my surprise, the Wichita city council ruled against a re-zoning request that would have allowed Wal-Mart to build a third store here in town. Wal-Mart already has numerous Supercenters here in Wichita but most are on the edge of town; this was a more central location. I found out about it a few days before the vote and wrote to the council members to let them know that I didn't think Wal-Mart ran the kind of business that had the interests of Wichita in mind. I would not consider myself a wholly anti-Wal-Mart citizen (here are some that are) but definitely lean more that direction.
I wish I could say that our city council sided with the grass-roots efforts to keep Wal-Mart at bay but my reading of the minutes from that meeting (starting on page 98) lead me to believe that the council was more interested in getting the issue settled rather than give Wal-Mart time to work its PR machine to change the mind of the public. Regardless, the re-zoning request was turned down 5-0 and Wal-Mart was kept out of that particular location.
All that leaves is the rest of the city to defend.
Tuesday, January 23, 2007
Friday, January 19, 2007
Wednesday, January 17, 2007
Audit #2 Wrap-Up
This second audit turned out to be MUCH simpler than the first. To prepare for this audit, I used the same procedure as last time:
-Assemble all tax related documents from last year.
-Redo the math and make sure the total claimed on the tax return matches the total from all charitable contribution receipts.
-For each charitable contribution, match the donation receipt with a withdrawal from an account (checking, credit card...)
-Compile all this data in a nice spreadsheet to make the job of the examiner easier.
This self-audit revealed a small error I had made in the return and after thinking it over a bit, I decided to highlight this on the spread-sheet rather than hope nobody would ask about it. Honesty with the IRS seemed the most trouble-free course of action. (It turns out that the examiner asked up-front if I had found any errors during my preparation. Unless I wanted to lie, this question pretty much made irrelevant and rationalization I might have had for not mentioning the error. )
I made my way through security and on my ride up the elevator with the examiner, our conversation revealed that I had just been here eight months ago for my 2004 audit. This surprised him and he made a point of mentioning this to his supervisor who was going to sit-in on the audit.
We went through the cursory is-there-any-income-you-are-forgetting-to-tell-us-about questions (Any income from gambling? Trusts? Bartering? Garage sales?) and then proceeded to dig into the issue at hand: charitable contributions. I handed the examiner my spread-sheet and after unfolding it, he spent several seconds looking stunned. I don't know what he was expecting to see but the number of transactions he was going to have to check must have seemed daunting. He slowly turning around in his desk to grab a calculator and, with a sigh, started to ask me about the first item on my list.
At this point, his supervisor jumped in.
"What did you say your 2004 audit covered?"
Same as this one, charitable contributions.
"How did the 2004 audit turn out?"
No change to the filing was made.
"Tell us about the mistake that you found in your filing."
Due to the weird way my church reports my financial donations with them, I accidently counted $65 I paid for men's retreat as a charitable contribution. A closer examination of the receipt clearly shows that this was not a tax-deductable contribution.
"$65? That's it? If that's the extent of the error, I don't see any reason we need to continue with this. Do you have the 'case closed' letter they gave you at the end of the last audit?"
Now I was the one who was stunned. I slowly turned to my stack of folders to find my records from the 2004 audit. I handed the examiner the letter, he went to make photo-copies, and that was that.
As the supervisor explained, the IRS customarily does not examine the same person for the same item two years in a row. My impression was that this practice was not governed by law, but more by some internally-established procedures. If there had been other items of examination in the audit, they would have proceeded checking those and my charitable contributions. He said the computer that figures out who needs to get audited doesn't take into account any previous audits and when it saw my abnormally high charitable contributions, it flagged me and I got a letter. This also means that if I get flagged again in 2006, instead of scheduling an appointment I can simply call the examiner and let him know I've already been examined twice for this item.
With that, I was done. In and out in under an hour. Best of all, I don't have to file any kind of amendment to my return for that silly mistake I made. The fact that I don't have to do any extra paper-work is reward enough for me.
-Assemble all tax related documents from last year.
-Redo the math and make sure the total claimed on the tax return matches the total from all charitable contribution receipts.
-For each charitable contribution, match the donation receipt with a withdrawal from an account (checking, credit card...)
-Compile all this data in a nice spreadsheet to make the job of the examiner easier.
This self-audit revealed a small error I had made in the return and after thinking it over a bit, I decided to highlight this on the spread-sheet rather than hope nobody would ask about it. Honesty with the IRS seemed the most trouble-free course of action. (It turns out that the examiner asked up-front if I had found any errors during my preparation. Unless I wanted to lie, this question pretty much made irrelevant and rationalization I might have had for not mentioning the error. )
I made my way through security and on my ride up the elevator with the examiner, our conversation revealed that I had just been here eight months ago for my 2004 audit. This surprised him and he made a point of mentioning this to his supervisor who was going to sit-in on the audit.
We went through the cursory is-there-any-income-you-are-forgetting-to-tell-us-about questions (Any income from gambling? Trusts? Bartering? Garage sales?) and then proceeded to dig into the issue at hand: charitable contributions. I handed the examiner my spread-sheet and after unfolding it, he spent several seconds looking stunned. I don't know what he was expecting to see but the number of transactions he was going to have to check must have seemed daunting. He slowly turning around in his desk to grab a calculator and, with a sigh, started to ask me about the first item on my list.
At this point, his supervisor jumped in.
"What did you say your 2004 audit covered?"
Same as this one, charitable contributions.
"How did the 2004 audit turn out?"
No change to the filing was made.
"Tell us about the mistake that you found in your filing."
Due to the weird way my church reports my financial donations with them, I accidently counted $65 I paid for men's retreat as a charitable contribution. A closer examination of the receipt clearly shows that this was not a tax-deductable contribution.
"$65? That's it? If that's the extent of the error, I don't see any reason we need to continue with this. Do you have the 'case closed' letter they gave you at the end of the last audit?"
Now I was the one who was stunned. I slowly turned to my stack of folders to find my records from the 2004 audit. I handed the examiner the letter, he went to make photo-copies, and that was that.
As the supervisor explained, the IRS customarily does not examine the same person for the same item two years in a row. My impression was that this practice was not governed by law, but more by some internally-established procedures. If there had been other items of examination in the audit, they would have proceeded checking those and my charitable contributions. He said the computer that figures out who needs to get audited doesn't take into account any previous audits and when it saw my abnormally high charitable contributions, it flagged me and I got a letter. This also means that if I get flagged again in 2006, instead of scheduling an appointment I can simply call the examiner and let him know I've already been examined twice for this item.
With that, I was done. In and out in under an hour. Best of all, I don't have to file any kind of amendment to my return for that silly mistake I made. The fact that I don't have to do any extra paper-work is reward enough for me.
Sunday, January 14, 2007
Hail, Sleet, Snow, and Freezing Rain
In the words of the National Weather Service, Wichita has been experiencing a "wintery mix" of precipitation this weekend. As a variety of precipitation has been falling from the sky an old debate between my wife and I has once again emerged: what exactly is sleet?
My stance has been that sleet is the same as hail and the term is a regional one. We in the northwest call it hail, in the midwest it is called sleet. My wife's view has been that hail MUST be larger and must come from a thunderstorm, thus, any winter-time small balls of ice must be sleet. After much thought and a little bit of digging on the internet, I am here to say that while there is validity to both views, hers is more correct.
Both sleet and hail are balls of frozen water; in this sense, I am correct. My wife, though, is correct in that the process for these two forming is quite different. Sleet is rain that has frozen on the way down. Hail DOES form during thunderstorms and is also frozen water but it circulates in the thunder clouds, gaining mass until the winds cannot keep it aloft any longer. Sleet must be small, hail can be large.
For the sake of complete-ness, snow is water vapor that freezes directly to a crystal, freezing rain is liquid rain that freezes on contact with a cold surface.
In the final assessment, Wichita has experienced sleet, snow, and freezing rain but will have to wait for this spring for the hail.
My stance has been that sleet is the same as hail and the term is a regional one. We in the northwest call it hail, in the midwest it is called sleet. My wife's view has been that hail MUST be larger and must come from a thunderstorm, thus, any winter-time small balls of ice must be sleet. After much thought and a little bit of digging on the internet, I am here to say that while there is validity to both views, hers is more correct.
Both sleet and hail are balls of frozen water; in this sense, I am correct. My wife, though, is correct in that the process for these two forming is quite different. Sleet is rain that has frozen on the way down. Hail DOES form during thunderstorms and is also frozen water but it circulates in the thunder clouds, gaining mass until the winds cannot keep it aloft any longer. Sleet must be small, hail can be large.
For the sake of complete-ness, snow is water vapor that freezes directly to a crystal, freezing rain is liquid rain that freezes on contact with a cold surface.
In the final assessment, Wichita has experienced sleet, snow, and freezing rain but will have to wait for this spring for the hail.
Thursday, January 11, 2007
Power On Start-Up
At my brother's request, I measured the power consumption of my computer during start-up. As I kind of guessed, power usage is relatively variable, anywhere from 65W to 105W. Using my finely honed real-time, eyeball-powered skills, I would say the average during the whole process was around 90W.
Wednesday, January 10, 2007
Scooter Flat
I got my first flat tire on my scooter this morning. I don't think that flat was there when I started but coming around a corner not far form home I was certain something was up with the rear tire. I pulled over and confirmed my suspicions. I wasn't too far from home so I decided to just push the bike back; this took more time and effort than I would have guessed.
My wife gave me a ride to and from work and when I got home I took a closer look. I can't identify what caused the flat but I was thankful to see that getting the rear wheel off won't be as difficult as I would have imagined. Hopefully this weekend I'll be able to get everything working again.
My wife gave me a ride to and from work and when I got home I took a closer look. I can't identify what caused the flat but I was thankful to see that getting the rear wheel off won't be as difficult as I would have imagined. Hopefully this weekend I'll be able to get everything working again.
Sunday, January 07, 2007
You know you're a nerd when....
This Christmas, I requested and received something that many of you will find highly nerdy and not all that interesting: an electrical power meter. I have long wondered just how much various items around the house use (home electronics, mainly) and I now have a way to measure and see for myself.
First up, the computer. Instead of shutting my computer (iMac G5) down every time I am done using it, I put it into "sleep" mode. The display turns off, the disks spin down and the computer appears to be off except for a pulsing heart-beat-like light below the display. Power consumed in this state: 9W. Considering most house-hold incandescent lamps are 60W or greater, this is not much power at all. Overnight in the state, my computer consumed 0.08 kW-hrs. Even at $0.10/kW-hr, this is only pennies a month to avoid the hassle of shutting down and restarting my computer every time I want to use it.
Other misc. measurements I made on the computer:
-The display can be set to turn off after a period of disuse. The display consumes about 15W at full brightness. This is a lot less than I expected considering...
-During my normal usage, my computer consumes about 70W. This varies quite a bit depending on what I'm doing but the normal email, web-surfing, typing all weigh in about the same.
-When I'm doing processor intensive work like photo-editing or DVD-rendering the computer consumes about 110W.
I'll be measuring other stuff and probably (maybe) post on it later but I'll leave you with this one highly practical tidbit: those compact florescent lamps REALLY DO use a lot less energy than incandescent bulbs. The ones I've measured have all met their advertised power consumption. These light sources consume only 14W and provide the light of a 60W incandescent. Do us all a favor and go out and get yourself some of these for all the high-usage areas of your home. They'll probably pay for themselves over the life of the bulb and provide the warm fuzzy that you get when you save energy.
Well, at least I do.
First up, the computer. Instead of shutting my computer (iMac G5) down every time I am done using it, I put it into "sleep" mode. The display turns off, the disks spin down and the computer appears to be off except for a pulsing heart-beat-like light below the display. Power consumed in this state: 9W. Considering most house-hold incandescent lamps are 60W or greater, this is not much power at all. Overnight in the state, my computer consumed 0.08 kW-hrs. Even at $0.10/kW-hr, this is only pennies a month to avoid the hassle of shutting down and restarting my computer every time I want to use it.
Other misc. measurements I made on the computer:
-The display can be set to turn off after a period of disuse. The display consumes about 15W at full brightness. This is a lot less than I expected considering...
-During my normal usage, my computer consumes about 70W. This varies quite a bit depending on what I'm doing but the normal email, web-surfing, typing all weigh in about the same.
-When I'm doing processor intensive work like photo-editing or DVD-rendering the computer consumes about 110W.
I'll be measuring other stuff and probably (maybe) post on it later but I'll leave you with this one highly practical tidbit: those compact florescent lamps REALLY DO use a lot less energy than incandescent bulbs. The ones I've measured have all met their advertised power consumption. These light sources consume only 14W and provide the light of a 60W incandescent. Do us all a favor and go out and get yourself some of these for all the high-usage areas of your home. They'll probably pay for themselves over the life of the bulb and provide the warm fuzzy that you get when you save energy.
Well, at least I do.
Thursday, January 04, 2007
Audit #2
Our mail was on hold while we were out on Christmas break and, due to Gerald Ford's death, we didn't get our mail until Wednesday. Waiting in the stack on my desk was a little letter from our friendly neighborhood IRS office.
Yes, once again, I am being audited.
The last audit was for my charitable contributions during the 2004 tax year. This audit is for contributions during 2005. I guess the good news is that I haven't filed my 2006 return so I can't be audited for it. Yet.
I don't know what to make of this. Katie thinks that once you're audited, you stay on the IRS watch list. I'm skeptical but don't have a better guess at this point. I haven't started to assemble the documents yet but I'm not very worried. Additionally, since I've done this before, I have a pretty good idea what to expect.
Two audits, eight months.
Sheesh.
Yes, once again, I am being audited.
The last audit was for my charitable contributions during the 2004 tax year. This audit is for contributions during 2005. I guess the good news is that I haven't filed my 2006 return so I can't be audited for it. Yet.
I don't know what to make of this. Katie thinks that once you're audited, you stay on the IRS watch list. I'm skeptical but don't have a better guess at this point. I haven't started to assemble the documents yet but I'm not very worried. Additionally, since I've done this before, I have a pretty good idea what to expect.
Two audits, eight months.
Sheesh.
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