By Linda Dean Cooper
In yesterday’s article “Taxpayers Pay for Select BoCC Employees Commute To and From Work” questions concerning IRS guidelines and commissioner email addresses were mentioned in the FB comments.
Levy County Board of County Commissioners Personnel Policies & Procedures dated August 3, 2004, #402A, paragraph 4, addresses the IRS fringes benefits status. It is as follows:
“Before assignment of a vehicle a memo of understanding will be signed by the employee, specifying the IRS benefit that will be charged back to that employee based on the current IRS definitions for vehicle use.
In addition to these procedures, County employees who are assigned County owned vehicles must comply with all other County policies, and state and federal laws applicable to the utilization of such vehicles.
FRINGE BENEFIT STATUS:
Employees who commute in vehicles other than “qualified non-personal use vehicles” will be considered to be receiving taxable fringe benefit income subject to federal income and employment (FICA) taxes. Based upon current IRS regulations, the taxable fringe benefit for these employees will be computed upon $3.00 per commuting round trip.
This taxable benefit will be added to the taxable income of affected employees on a bi-weekly basis beginning ______________________. Unless affected employees notify the Board’s Finance Office otherwise, 10 round trips or $30.00 will be added to each employee’s compensation bi-weekly. Appropriate Federal income and FICA taxes will be withheld from this amount. Employees who report a lesser amount of trips will be charged for those trips based upon the $3.00 round trip rate.
The employee has the right to forego his/her use of an employer provided transportation at any time; however, the employee shall be responsible for any charges resulting from the time period in which employer provided transportation was used.“
Personnel policies and procedures #402 and 402A documents are posted on Spotlight’s website in a previous article. The policy effective date is August 3, 2004, an antiqued 20-year-old policy. A Spotlight article written on December 15, “EMS – Public Or Private? BoCC Ignored Rising Costs To Be Offset By Increased Taxes” exposes a 10-year-old billing fee schedule that Public Safety Director Mitch Harrell has ignored during his tenure and requests write-offs over $1 million annually.
For those who requested BoCC email addresses:
District1@levycounty.org Charlie Kennedy
District2@levycounty.org Rock Meeks
District3@levycounty.org Dessiree Mills
District4@levycounty.org Tim Hodge
District5@levycounty.org Johnny Hiers
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Posted December 31, 2024
