Tax Forms

Re "Controller 'pulls trigger,' suspends state tax refunds," Jan. 17, and "Gov. says budget is No. 1 goal," Jan. 16 Can I charge the state of California penalties for its late payment of my tax refund? My family also has budget problems, so I would like to suspend all state tax payments at this time and offer an IOU that is free of interest and penalties. When my wife and I decide how to solve our budget problem, I would be happy to send what we owe in taxes. Steve Shaevel Woodland Hills -- So California Controller John Chiang has decided to suspend state tax refunds.

Re "Cutting politics out of the cuts," Opinion, April 10 Robert Krol implies in his Op-Ed article that we should avoid tax increases and implement budget cuts instead. A lot of times, the difference between tax increases and budget cuts is an imaginary one. When we cut the budget, we implicitly tax people who have to cover the difference. A case in point is educational cuts: What sounds like avoiding a tax increase is really taxing the parents who have to contribute to fundraisers to keep the schools running.

I can't imagine what the Internet is coming to when the Internal Revenue Service, of all people, turns up on the World Wide Web with one of the cooler Web sites I've run across in a while. Such is tax season in 1996. Nor is the IRS alone in offering tax help online. It turns out that income tax forms, tax advice and other tax-related material abound on the Internet as well as on all the major online services. You can even file your taxes electronically, although that's another story.

Her mind reeling from confusing tax forms--W-2s, 1040s, 540EZs and 1099Rs--Terri Grando did what any number-phobic person would do this tax season. She handed over her stack of forms, receipts and instructions to an expert. But this year, instead of paying an accountant $50 or more, the Thousand Oaks resident took her tax forms to the city's Goebel Senior Center--one of about 27 sites across the county where volunteers are helping prepare simple tax returns for free.

Rick Herrick normally spends his weekends cruising around town on his black and aqua Harley Davidson, with little on his mind other than to enjoy the sights and sounds from his prized bike. But Sunday, the 46-year-old Anaheim truck driver had to take a detour to the H&R Block office on Chapman Avenue.

With Monday's tax filing deadline looming, here some hints for those who have not filed yet: FORMS It's probably too late to request them from the Internal Revenue Service, but federal and state tax forms are usually available at libraries and post offices. If the form you need is not there, a tax preparer might provide you with one. Or you could buy a 1996 tax guide with forms.

For Sam and Dolores Adato, seeing a tax counselor at the Wilkinson Senior Center came straight down to the bottom line. It was free. "I can't see spending $150 doing something I can do for nothing," said Sam Adato, 64, of Woodland Hills, who works part-time as a private security officer. "It's not a complicated tax return."

Fed up with filling out tax forms? Try this: Join a religious order whose members take a vow of poverty. Priests, nuns, monks and brothers who take vows of poverty don't pay taxes as long as they work for a church institution. They rely on their superiors for a modest living allowance, which isn't taxable. But the regular parish priest, minister, rabbi and imam--who draw salaries and do not take vows of poverty--pay taxes like everyone else.

When it came to taxes, 1995 was a year of sound and fury. In a much-ballyhooed bill, Congress promised to give tax breaks to families, to beat back taxes on capital gains and to make tax-favored individual retirement accounts available to all. It also vowed to do away with the so-called marriage penalty and to eliminate the Social Security tax that pushes middle-income seniors into a high tax bracket. Yet in the end, no agreement on these ambitious plans was reached with President Clinton.