A few months ago, I posted about how I have uncovered that the State of California has some unlawful schemes to collect extra tax dollars from taxpayers (https://saidit.net/s/corruption/comments/zkw/update_on_californias_unlawful_schemes_to_collect/). Here is an update:
TLDR of the Schemes:
The Franchise Tax Board, California's income tax collection agency), is illegally putting your estimated tax payments into a general slush fund instead of into your account (https://gwsandiego.net/blog/?p=82). The money isn’t put into your account until you file your return for that year; basically, the State of CA is temporarily embezzling your money (https://www.ftb.ca.gov/about-ftb/meetings/taxpayer-bill-of-rights/2018_grab_response.pdf). If you file late, they harass you for payments that would not be owed/impose penalties that would not have been assessed had the money been applied to your account in accordance with the law.
The FTB “accidentally” misapplies estimated tax payments to previous years and sends you a refund, leaving the current year underfunded. Like the withholding scheme, if you file your returns late, penalties are falsely imposed. Where it gets suspicious is that it takes months to send the refunds. The refunds are difficult to identify – you just get a check in the mail from the State of CA with no letter. The refunds have interest added or are broken up into multiple years (issuing a separate check for each year), so you don’t immediately identify that this mystery money may be a refunded tax payment. The FTB has an unusually difficult time locating these particular “lost” payments, taking months and years to locate. Once located, they will accept another payment from you and retroactively apply it to your account for the date that the original payment was made, thus correcting the underfunding problem. But it takes them months to apply the money. And the accounting ledgers tied to these “misapplied” payments are inaccurate, with missing line items and incorrect dates (https://gwsandiego.net/blog/?p=120).
TLDR of the Multiple Angles I am Pursuing to Get This Illegal Activity Stopped:
Speech:
In December 2019, I made another speech at the Annual Taxpayer Bill of Rights Meeting. It is clear, concise and damning. Here is the 11-minute video: https://gwsandiego.net/blog/?p=179 and here is the text: https://gwsandiego.net/blog/?p=151.
The FTB had the right to publicly rebut me during the meeting, but they waived their right. The fact that they did not deny the allegations says it all. Here is the FTB’s written response: https://www.ftb.ca.gov/about-ftb/meetings/taxpayer-bill-of-rights/2019-Grab-Response.pdf
Here is my analysis of their response: https://gwsandiego.net/blog/?p=196
Lawsuit:
FTB’s response was basically a big F-U, so I have filed a lawsuit against them in Superior Court of CA: https://gwsandiego.net/blog/?p=217
The brief clearly lays out the mechanisms of the two racketeering schemes that I have uncovered. It also clearly identifies the unethical and underhanded tactics that the Office of Tax Appeals* utilizes in order to cover up FTB’s criminal activity.
Side NoteThe OTA is an administrative court that handles FTB appeals. Up until January 2018, the Board of Equalization (https://boe.ca.gov) heard FTB appeals. The BOE appeal process was casual, with no attorney needed, but a free student lawyer was available through the TAAP program if you wanted one. The judges were elected officials who were eager to please their constituents, so they often sided with the taxpayers.
In January 2018, Governor Brown and State Controller Betty Yee launched the OTA. This is a real court where you need a lawyer. They also moved TAAP to be overseen by the FTB (https://www.ftb.ca.gov/help/disagree-or-resolve-an-issue/tax-appeals-assistance-program.html). So now, the FTB gets to decide whether you get a lawyer or not, and that lawyer is fighting against his own employer to get you your money back. More details here: https://gwsandiego.net/blog/?p=6
Legislature:
I have 5 legislative ideas that will help curb the tax agencies ability to execute corrupt practices and provide more accountability in oversight: https://gwsandiego.net/blog/?page_id=61. I sent a copy of my suit to every legislator on the Senate and Assembly Tax Committees with a request that they put my legislative ideas on the table this year.
The feedback that I have gotten from the legislators is they are uninterested in hearing one person whine about unfair fees. They said in order to be credible, I need to gather a posse.
Help Me Gather A Posse:
Please join my posse. To be honest, I am not sure what to do once I have a posse, but I will figure it out as I go. I’m guessing the next step is to launch petitions for each item, so send me an email at FTBFighter@protonmail.com if you are up for signing a petition or something along those lines to support my legislative ideas.
Please share my video all over the place to spread the word about the FTB’s corruption, and ask others to join my posse, too.
Christi Grab
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