1 BEFORE THE CALIFORNIA STATE BOARD OF EQUALIZATION 2 450 N STREET 3 SACRAMENTO, CALIFORNIA 4 5 6 7 REPORTER'S TRANSCRIPT 8 JULY 28, 2015 9 10 11 PUBLIC COMMENT 12 WILLIAM CONNELL 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 Reported by: Juli Price Jackson 23 No. CSR 5214 24 25 26 27 28 1 1 P R E S E N T 2 3 For the Board Jerome E. Horton of Equalization: Chairman 4 5 Sen. George Runner (Ret.) Vice-Chairman 6 7 Fiona Ma, CPA Member 8 9 Diane L. Harkey Member 10 11 Yvette Stowers Appearing for Betty T. 12 Yee, State Controller (per Government Code 13 Section 7.9) 14 Joann Richmond 15 Chief, Board Proceedings Division 16 17 18 ---oOo--- 19 For Staff: Randy Ferris Chief Counsel 20 21 Speaker: William Connell 22 23 ---o0o--- 24 25 26 27 28 2 1 450 N STREET 2 SACRAMENTO, CALIFORNIA 3 JULY 28, 2015 4 ---oOo--- 5 MR. HORTON: Ms. Richmond, what is ourfirst 6 matter today? 7 MS. RICHMOND: Would you -- good morning, 8 Chairman and Members. 9 Would you like to take our public commnet 10 first or go to the Legislative -- 11 MR. HORTON: Let's take up the public 12 comments. 13 Mr. Connell, would you please come forward, 14 please? 15 Welcome to the Board of Equalization, sir. 16 ---o0o--- 17 WILLIAM CONNELL 18 ---o0o--- 19 MR. CONNELL: Good morning. How are you? 20 MR. HORTON: Good morning. You have three 21 minutes. 22 MR. CONNELL: That's all I'll need. 23 I want to thank Mr. Gau's office for 24 assisting in trying to locate all of the veteran 25 vendors who have some money coming back. 26 I'll leave this here with you (indicating). 27 This is the last two letters I received from the 28 State Board. One has 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 3 1 11, 12, 13, 14 -- there's 15 entities that weren't 2 contacted the first two go-rounds. We found them. 3 He's corrected that. 4 One more entity would be the City of Santa 5 Barbara has never been notified. As I understand, 6 no city or no county has been notified that a 7 veteran vendor is to do so without the payment of 8 the license or without the payment of any sales and 9 use tax. 10 You haven't told any of our cities or 11 counties that the veterans have this exemption 12 coming. Has to be a small box on the application 13 form for your business license, "Are you a veteran?" 14 Four words. This way all of these new guys coming 15 back know that they don't have to pay for the 16 license. And they're not required to collect nor 17 remit sales tax. 18 It's very simple, but you're missing all 19 these newly civil -- newly military introducing back 20 to civilian life. 21 The other issue is the California Veterans' 22 Handbook given out by business license, tax, and fee 23 waiver. Never in the history of the State of 24 California has the word waiver been used when 25 speaking of the veterans' tax exemption statute. 26 A tax exemption is completely different 27 than a waiver. It's completely inaccurate. 28 One of the individual entities that was not 4 1 contacted was our Am Vets Department of California. 2 There seems to be a little disconnect between what 3 legislation is and what is being given out to our 4 veterans -- misinformation. 5 Can you please somehow assist in that, 6 whether it's a phone call over to the Department of 7 Veterans Affairs, "Hey, something's wrong here." 8 They can pull it down off the site, but somebody 9 with some juice has to tell them to do so. 10 MS. MA: What page is that? 11 MR. CONNELL: It's page 16 -- and I got 12 that without my glasses. 13 Now, I'm going to be in Sacramento for a 14 day or two. I'd like very much to meet with Mr. Gau 15 once again and with Todd Gilman, if possible. 16 And how do I arrange that? 17 MR. HORTON: Why don't we open up for 18 discussion? 19 Member Ma. 20 MS. MA: Yeah, I'm more than happy to work 21 with you, Mr. Connell -- 22 MR. CONNELL: Thank you. 23 MS. MA: -- on these issues. 24 MR. CONNELL: Okay. So, I can -- do you 25 have one of your staff members -- 26 MS. MA: Yes. 27 MR. CONNELL: -- that I can -- 28 MS. MA: Jim, Jim Cool, where is Jim? 5 1 He's coming around the back, so, you can 2 contact Jim Cool. He'll will work with you 3 directly. 4 MR. CONNELL: Directly on that? 5 MS. MA: Yeah. 6 MR. CONNELL: Now, the other thing is that 7 I never started this legislative tit for tat. It 8 was started in 1999 by the State Board trying to 9 change the original act, eliminate the commas. 10 I finished it off I thought perfectly. Got 11 the exemption in the sales tax use law, got the 12 extension of the exemption to 2022. 13 And then I went back and I got the money 14 back that should never been taken in the first 15 place. 16 Is there anything else that I have to do so 17 that I'll be be able to meet my financial 18 responsibilities of what I have spent over the last 19 23 years just trying to get a simple question to why 20 won't you honor the veterans' tax exemption statute? 21 It was a mistake made years ago -- many -- 22 I just want to know what I have to do to be made 23 whole again? As the forms that I was given first of 24 this year, I filled them all out. I returned them 25 to the Taxpayers' Rights Advocate's office, 26 submitted to him, and said, "You guys figure out 27 what 22 years of a guy's's life, holding on to 28 about -- I don't know what it was, 20 grand, less 6 1 what was already given back to me, less what I spent 2 on attorneys, travel. 3 My credit rating was shot because you 4 liened and and levied all of my accounts. You 5 closed me down twice. 6 I'm still standing. And I got it just the 7 just way it's supposed to be for all of our other 8 veterans that are now coming home. 9 And now I'm looking at myself. What do I 10 do? Whose door do I knock on? And when can I sit 11 down and logically go over -- "Well, Mr. Connell, 12 there is a law that says that disabled American 13 veterans don't have to collect or remit sales tax," 14 just like it was in 1993, when I first came before 15 the Board. 16 So, I'm only talking 22 years. I'm a very 17 patient man. I know I was right then, a thousand 18 percent right now. How do I go about becoming made 19 whole again now? 20 That's my question. 21 MS. MA: Okay. Yes, Mr. Connell, No. 1, 22 Jim is in the back of the room and he will be your 23 direct contact. 24 And I think Mr. Ferris can also perhaps 25 discuss his options. 26 MR. FERRIS: Good morning. Yeah, the forum 27 for addressing those concerns is the Government 28 Claim and Victim Compensation Board. 7 1 MR. CONNELL: Well, I wouldn't consider 2 myself a victim. I just consider myself an American 3 who was sticking up for what he was owed. 4 MR. FERRIS: You have a claim against the 5 government. 6 MR. CONNELL: Yeah, I do. 7 MR. FERRIS: Yeah. 8 MS. MA: Well, that's just the name of the 9 fund and the Board. 10 MR. CONNELL: How do I -- where do I fill 11 it out? 12 MS. MA: We will assist you. 13 MR. CONNELL: I appreciate that because I 14 don't know what an Assembly bill's worth. I don't 15 know what a Senate bill's worth -- multiple Senate 16 bills. 17 It's been quite trying financially on me. 18 So, I'd just like to try to take care of that while 19 I'm up here for the next couple of days. So, we 20 could meet and you could direct me? 21 MR. FERRIS: Sure. 22 MR. HORTON: God bless all of you. God 23 bless America. 24 MR. HORTON: Thank you. 25 ---o0o--- 26 27 28 8 1 REPORTER'S CERTIFICATE. 2 3 State of California ) 4 ) ss 5 County of Sacramento ) 6 7 I, JULI PRICE JACKSON, Hearing Reporter for 8 the California State Board of Equalization certify 9 that on JULY 28, 2015 I recorded verbatim, in 10 shorthand, to the best of my ability, the 11 proceedings in the above-entitled hearing; that I 12 transcribed the shorthand writing into typewriting; 13 and that the preceding pages 1 through 8 constitute 14 a complete and accurate transcription of the 15 shorthand writing. 16 17 Dated: September 14, 2015 18 19 ____________________________ 20 JULI PRICE JACKSON 21 Hearing Reporter 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 9