six minutes after five with us, Paul Seminera, Randy Jury, and Stephanie, I'm sorry, I'm with Stephanie Smith, and Steve Jewfrey. Is there anybody I missed? It's amazing what this program does, isn't it, there's no hiding. So welcome, everybody. Sarah, any amendments to the agenda? Nope, just what I put in last night. So the agenda as sent last night should be fine. OK, OK. So with that, and only three minutes late, I'd like to recognize Stephanie Smith from the State Hazard Mitigation Officer for Vermont Emergency Management. She's going to tell us about the process and the costs for the town participating in the FEMA buyout of 28 Bridge Road. Stephanie, you're on. Hi, thank you. So yes, I'm Stephanie Smith. I'm the State Hazard Mitigation Officer.  She has since left, so I'm filling in for her and new in this position. But there were a couple of questions about the buyout, so I want to make sure that I can give you a quick overview, and then I want to make sure that you guys have time to ask me any questions that you have about how this process works. So the grant has already been awarded, which is good. That typically takes a decent amount of time, so it's been awarded. On our end, our finance advisor had reached out for a couple of things she needed, and the next step on our end is really to get a sub-grant agreement in place between the state and the town so that we can do reimbursements. And in terms of the funding for the town, so there's no cost to participate in for the town. And the town is actually eligible for 5% of the total project costs in funding to administer the grant. So Sarah's time putting in administering the grant can be reimbursed up to 5% of the total award. The process for that has changed slightly, so I've been working with FEMA on exactly how they want to see that request come from the town. So you haven't made that request yet, but I'll be letting you know how to access that funding so that the town can have the money to manage the work. And then one of the questions is around how the funding is actually distributed. So once that sub-grant agreement is in place with the state, it's typically a reimbursement-based program. So you'll do the appraisal, for example, is the first thing that will happen. The town will hire someone to do an appraisal of the property. And that appraisal, typically the town would pay for that and then would request reimbursement from the state. So the state would supply 75%. And then we have match funding for this. So the community would get the 25% match as well. And there is an option, if you guys are concerned about fronting that cost, there is an option to request funding in advance. So before you pay the invoice, you can reach out to our finance office and get funding in advance so that the town doesn't actually have to have to put forward any of that funding if that's a concern. I'll just interrupt you for a second. Yes, go ahead. And maybe you're going to get to it. I'm sorry to steal your thunder. We're not worried about the cost of the appraisal. OK. You can cover that. But if it comes to asbestos abatement or filling in septic systems or who knows what else. We've been through this before. That's where it could be a pretty substantial bill. So yeah, we're definitely interested in knowing about that. What is the expected, in the normal course of events, what's the expected turnaround time? We submit the paid invoice. Is it 30 days? I believe it's actually five business days for the reimbursement. But if there is a larger bill that comes in, it can be advanced. So you wouldn't have to. If there ends up being asbestos and there's a large bill, first, we would have to request a cost overrun from FEMA if it's in addition to what we've budgeted for, if we need additional funding. Yeah, I understand that. But then it could be advanced if it ended up being a larger bill. Yeah. So the summary of this is, if everything goes as planned, there should be no cost to the town. And if we don't choose to go for the advanced process, which we might not do on a smaller bill but might do on a larger bill, we could expect a turnaround on the money within 10 days. Yes, that's correct. That should make you smile, Dorinda. Checking barely clear in that period of time. Yeah, she's smiling. Questions? More members? Well, what about, does Sarah have any questions? Because Sarah has always been managing these things. And there's a lot of steps. So she's really the person most familiar with getting the stuff done. Peter, can I talk? Yes. OK. So Stephanie, I guess my concern is when I'm reading the grant, it says the federal award is $102,000, which is 75% of the total approved project cost of $136,000. Does that how much does that go toward Jennifer Evans toward the property owner? Or is that supposed to? I mean, what does that $136 cover? Yeah, so I can send you. Do you have the application with the budget that breaks it down? I can send it to you. I don't have the application. I have the statement that you gave the terms and conditions. OK, so I can send you the original application, which has the different line items broken down. So the actual, for the property appraisal, let's see, for the purchase of the property, we were estimating about $110,000, which is what will go to the property owner. But it'll depend on the appraisal. That's what we've budgeted. But depending on what the appraisal comes back as, that's what we have budgeted for that amount. So you have $110,000. And then, so that's my concern. So my concern is that you've got $110,000 budgeted for. Is that supposed to represent 75% of what you're going to give the property owner? Or is that the total amount you're going to give the property owner? Well, the budget was for the total. OK, yes. So she walks away with $100,000. That leaves us with $26,000 and maybe another $34,000 to deconstruct, to send out RFPs for an asbestos. I know there's going to be asbestos. Remove the asbestos. This is why I wanted you to talk to the Select Board, because that number, $136,000, doesn't come close to deconstructing a house, removing the material. You know where I'm going, right? That's a big project. Yes. Yes, so we have in the budget right now, $2,000 for lead and asbestos survey and removal, if that's needed. If that figure does go well above that, depending on what we find out before you actually do the lead and asbestos work, so based on the survey, if it looks like it's going to be $10,000, we can request additional funding from FEMA. That's where I want to stop you, because when we did this last time, the bids we got for asbestos removal were $40,000. And that was for a sink and a little bit on a roof. OK. Number 2,000 doesn't seem to go anywhere near $40,000 to me. And that was seven years ago. Right. So it's possible that it comes in higher. And part of how these grants work, it's voluntary for the homeowner. It's voluntary for the town. And if there's something that happens that they just decide it's too much and you don't want to go forward, you can make that decision at some point. It helps that we have the ability to cover the match. For this, usually homeowners are more concerned if they're the ones paying for the match, which is sometimes the case, if the cost ends up being too high. But if we have a survey come back and it says it's going to be $40,000 and asbestos removal, we'll have to go back to FEMA and talk to them about it at that point before any of the work actually happens to get that approved. Excuse me. Do we get estimates for all this work before we actually start? So we know that we're OK before we begin? Yes. So the appraisal is usually the first step. But after that, you would be doing a lead and asbestos survey. If that's a concern. Before closing, Stephanie, would we do the lead and asbestos survey before closing? And then? I think it usually is before closing. I can let me check on that and I'll get back to you. Because my concern is that the property owner is going to walk away with a chunk of change to do what she needs to do. And the town is going to be stuck with a very, very expensive project that it now owns. The town will now own the house. And now the town is going to have to mitigate the asbestos, remove the asbestos, just deconstruct the house, remove the house, fill in the septic. And that's way, way more than $26,000. OK. So I will say the town has a chance to back out. But the town won't know whether or not to back out. Right. If the property is already purchased, it's too late at that point. So I'll find out if that typically would take place before. I think it could and that would not be a problem. But let me. Actually, it has to. Yes, it has to because they need a clean site letter for the purchase. Well, that's not how it works. Last time we transferred the property and then we started the asbestos room and the survey. OK, well, yeah. Let me let me dig a little bit on that and make sure that that's going to work out the way that makes more sense to you, which I fully support and understand. So just don't want to be responsible for sticking the town with a big expensive project. Yes, I understand the wages of our town clerk and select quarter system. I'm sorry. No, I didn't actually hear what you said. I guess I guess, you know, we're we're looking you in the eye over the over the computer line here and, you know, we need to be comfortable and we're going to be OK in this. This is not the year for us to have some surprise finance surprise financial disaster for all the reasons that we're all aware of. So when do we when do we need? When is the first go, no, go thing on this? I well, the first the first step is typically once we have our sub grant agreement in place to do the appraisal and then the property owner needs to be happy with that amount and ready to move forward at that point. OK, and then I'll I'll find out about whether we can we could do the lead in asbestos, at least surveying right after that. So have we what remind me what the status is right now? Have we have we accepted the grant? No. So it's. The sub grant agreement is not in place yet. So I think I just looked up. Looks like my are the woman who manages our financial sent out a couple of questions that she needs answered to put the sub grant agreement together, so I'm not sure if Sarah, if you've responded to those yet. But the next step is the sub grant agreement. So you'll get a chance to look that over. Make sure that everything makes sense to you and sign that. Before before moving forward. OK, and you have to have that in place to do any of the reimbursement. So that's that's the next step. Yeah, other questions. Anyone has a question?  And then the owner gets whatever the rest of the money is. And what if the lien is more than what the house for whatever reason, you know, had a home equity or something like that? I don't think we've ever dealt with what if it's more? So we'd have to we'd have to handle that if that ended up being the case. But it's the same. The closing process is very similar to any sort of closing. So we will cut a check for seventy five percent of the property purchase. We'll work with the those who are the the match that's being covered. They'll cut the check for the for the remainder and they'll have to pay off any mortgages that they have on the property from that amount. They've got to give us a clear title. Yes. Yeah. Did we, Sarah, did we lose money the last time we did this? No, but we the reason why I'm hesitating is because the bids for the asbestos were so high, and that's why I keep focusing on that. When we got to forty thousand dollars, everybody, the two we had three bidders, two were forty thousand dollars almost on the nose. And one was Jason Merrill, which was twenty thousand dollars. And we went with Jason because we didn't want to be in a place where we were not going to be reimbursed for the forty thousand dollars. And I'm not saying that Jason cut corners, but he probably would not have done what he what the other guys would have done. We got a real nasty gram from the state of Vermont saying next time we're going to be watching you in on asbestos removal. It's like, OK, so I just I that's why I'm concerned because that case, the deal was done. The homeowner walked away with the check and the town had this huge responsibility. And we were very nervous about not being able to get it paid, especially now in this case, we're at the end of the grant run. Well, I'll say there's there's funding additional. If we if we need to request additional funding from FEMA, we do have funding in this grant round to cover. We had a couple of other buyouts that dropped out. So we have a decent amount of funding available if there is a need for an overrun. OK, well, all I'd like to say is again, reminding everybody that. The reason we got into this is to solve a to solve a problem. It's been a problem for the town. It's been a problem for the homeowner.  So it's worth resolving. We don't need another park over there, Mary. I don't think so. There won't be a second. There won't be a second Skinner Park. I had to take my I just I think it's worthwhile doing. I just want to make sure I just want to be careful every step of the way and watch this like a hawk, Sarah and Dorinda and me to make sure that, you know, and Stephanie to make sure that it's working out the way we expected to work. So with that, I think we I think we we wait to get the sub grant agreement. We review that. And if it is what we expect it to be, we sign it. And then we take it step by step after there after that. How soon will the sub grant become with Stephanie? It's it might be a little bit of time yet. I'll have to check in with Melissa, but I'll remind her for this one. I, Sarah, did you get back to Melissa's email? Did you see her email come through? I did. It was a while ago. And I think there were some really basic questions about guns and things like that, which I thought we answered.  So OK, I will. So I'll check in with Melissa if she has everything she needs. I'll just I'll make sure she has everything she needs so she can move forward and then we can we can get that to you guys. OK. Anything else? Thank you, Stephanie. Right. Thank you. You have further questions. I'm still here and you didn't have to drive too far to do this. Did you know it was perfect? And Sarah, I'm around any time you have questions that pop up and we can walk through this one step at a time as we go. All right. Thank you so much for coming to the meeting. I really appreciate it. Yeah. Thank you. Bye. Bye. Thank you. Bye bye. OK. More discussion about class four section of Notch Road, Paul Seminera. Unmute yourself, Paul. Well, that leaves her out. Where are Paul? I think he disappeared. Up. There he is. No video, but voice. That's all right. You there, Paul? Not working. My reception is not great. So I might kill. Well, maybe put your picture back up and hear you kill a video and see if that makes it better visual here. The video is killed. Yeah, we don't like looking at you. How are you doing now? Paul, Paul, Paul was coming back. I guess you're the lucky one. Yeah, why don't I step in? Well, you're trying to come back. OK, let's let's have Steve start and see if he can get back in. There he is again. Paul, Paul, Paul, you guys there? Yes, we are. Can you guys hear me? Yes. No, you're OK. Sorry, the lead is helping anything over here in the notch. So I apologize. I can hear you guys. OK, well. Listen in, we're going to have Steve fill in for you. Still not. No. No, you're not. You're not coming in very good yet. Yeah, looking out. So let me let me just breathe. Melody is great when it works. Can you hear me yet? Yeah. Here's the big question. When can we get back to the normal in-person meetings at a socially safe, safe distance? That's why my biggest gripe. I don't know what you're coming in. I can see us sitting at our lounge chairs out in the parking lot behind the town hall. There you go. I'm up in my dear stand as high as my property goes. So here we are. All right. OK, well, go ahead, Paul. Well, I'm going to, Steve, do you want to just go ahead and do a quick brief of everything or do you want me to get started? What's up to you? Well, we're talking about the Notch Road stuffers.  We had discussed at the Well Life Management, the state area of trying to expand that parking lot a little bit to accommodate a few more cars. Paul and I looked at that. I think that would be easily done to accommodate just a few more cars. Paul's going to mark it out and then have another meeting with the state guy. That's Tim Appleton. And then the other thing that we had decided to do is to put in a small parking area down near the entrance to the pit. We can put in a small area there pretty darn quick with very little cost to accommodate six cars. So we thought we would do that and talk to us about he will be doing something for signage. Who will, Steve? You agree? Who? Lee Rosberg. I can't hear him. You can't hear me? No, I can hear you. OK. Who can't you hear? Can't hear anyone. Uh-oh. You must have spiked us. So that's the brief overview anyway. So we would have a net gain of eight parking spaces. Two up of the existing parking spot and six down at the pit. That's correct. Yep. And signage. Eight or nine depends on how people parked that area up the wildlife management. If people came in there and paid attention, they could probably get six or seven cars in there. But all of a sudden they're six feet apart and there's only five cars in there. But we think, yes, we can have an additional eight or nine vehicles between the two. Steve, I'm going to piggyback off to you. But so one of the board board, our other plan with this is in the next month is to come out. Oh, this is not working. We're running out of a timeline that we'd like to present to the class for a second, but not. We know that there's. Paul. Yes. You're not coming in very good at all, Will. We're just going to, you just come in broken up and then all of a sudden you're clear, but we're not getting anything that you're seeing. Oh, OK. So I think, Paul. Just to summarize what Steve said, the idea is to try and improve the situation up there, spending very little time and very little money. We don't have time and we don't have money. So we're going to try and make the situation better the best we can. Can we and hope that the Conservation Commission can create a trail from the pit parking lot possibly up around the pit and get permission from the landowner to go across their land so that there would be a hiking trail that didn't involve hiking up the road. But whether that can happen or not, I don't know, but that would be a goal because there is a lot of potential in the future to create even more parking where the town pit is. Plus, you get an extra half a mile uphill. What happened to the guy who volunteered to let there be parking his property? He changed his tone. Yeah, and where he was talking about allowing us to create that parking and turn around really was an advantageous for us. But I think there's some potential for long range. And in that last meeting, I'll just briefly touch on it that that we had with the state there enthused about creating a different parking area in the future up above that would in a joint parking area with us that would happen sometime in the future. But we don't know. Well, there's all money problems. That would likely involve upgrading the road, whether we would actually make it a class three road or whether we would just improve, probably more likely we would just improve the class four road to make it viable to drive up there. Yeah. But all that stuff is down the road. What we're doing is trying to make the situation better and spend a little money and a little time. Yeah. Great. OK. So I might still continue here because I don't think we're going to hear from Paul. We had that the form, town highway form. Overall, it was a good meeting. There was a lot that came out of it. Paul was going to talk about a bunch of the items. And he took that very serious and he thought that was a good meeting. We had a lot of suggestions about different things. I won't go into all of the particulars, but I will say one thing on my part, one of the suggestions that came out, and that was actually a bit choir, said they thought that I should maybe at our select board meetings give a brief update of what the town highway crew is doing or what they're doing over the next two weeks or what they have been doing. And I thought that was a good idea. So I'm just going to briefly touch on that. And I'm going to let Paul respond to these other items. And that'll probably get a future date. So anyway, right now, the town crew is still working up at our pit. We've been doing some clearing, trying to get ready for somebody to come in there and screen sand. I met with Fred McCullough up there today. Peter was up there so that he could come in. And we talked about how we'd go about doing the stuff. So we're working in the pit up there still to try to get that ready for that screening process. And before we leave the pit, we had planned on doing that little parking area and then going up and doing the parking area for the state, expanding that one. So that's where we're going to be over the next week, roughly. We are going to be getting some chloride in. And we're going to be, that grader is going to have to go out there. But until we get our chloride in, we just can't grade the roads. They'd be just nothing but dust. But we do have a load of chloride coming in. And as soon as we get that in, we'll be grading roads and chloride. So, Steve, do we get reimbursed by the state for fixing up that wildlife area parking? No. We're just doing it because. Yes, because I don't, I mean, it's hard to tell who is using that parking area. But since we have our town forest up there, the use of that parking area has increased and increased and increased and people are walking up there. So it's probably more from our use than the wildlife management. And the other thing we use it for is it's our snowplow turnaround. Yes. So in the wintertime, if there are winter hikers up there and they're parking in there, it creates a problem because the truck can't turn around, essentially. May I ask a question? Sorry. Go ahead. Steve, when you say you're screening sand, I want to put in the minutes why you're screening sand. Because we use about 5,000 yards at a minimum of sand that we buy every year. OK. So we're getting this out of the pit rather than buying it. OK. For the roads in the winter? For the roads for the winter, yes. Where do you store it? We will store the sand over at our town garage, like normal. We may have a small stockpile left there at the pit also, but we plan on taking what we use normally over to the town garage. So instead of incurring the cost to, where did we get the sand last year, Steve? Barrens. Right. And how far is Barrens from our town garage? Oh, I'll do it in truck time, because that's what we pay for. It's about an hour and 15 to an hour, 20 minute roundtrip. So it's going to be what? 20 or 25 minutes, half an hour from our pit to the town garage? Roughly, yes. Half hour roundtrip. So that's a big savings. Plus, we won't be paying for the material. We have the material. We have the material. So we're going to get 1,000 yards from, you think, from the pit? Pardon? You'll get all of the 5,000 yards we need from the pit. Yes, that's our intention. And I think that's reasonable. I think we can get more than that. But that's what we need for one year's supply. Great. Thank you. I just didn't know what you were doing there. OK. So you were talking, Steve, about the June 6th meeting that you and Paul had with the public. Weren't you? Had I jumped ahead? What about it? Was there anything else you wanted to add about that? No, Paul had written up some stuff and some stuff that came out of the meeting. Like I said, overall it was a very positive meeting. It didn't go exactly as we had planned, but that doesn't matter. It still came out a very positive meeting. There was about 15 people there altogether, Count Paul and I. So it was a good meeting. And like I said, Paul had a few of the items that were there and he was going to address those. He's got his notes for that. So I'm not going to jump into that. I will just try to keep the sled board apprised of where we're headed and what we're doing. And I think that big suggestion was pretty good. So I'll try to do that. And if you have questions. Sarah, if you would make it our practice to make a regular agenda item, highway update or some such thing, that would be great. I think it's great. We'll just have Treasures Update. We'll have Highway Updates. Great idea. Yeah. Perfect. But Steve, what was Vic's idea that you said was a good idea? Well, we were talking about that. Well, we're just, what we're talking about. I guess that we have an update every week. Yes, exactly. As a regular part of our meeting. Yeah. All right.  Where is she? You better unmute yourself first. So we've got a small pile of stuff here. I'll start with the RB Technology Bill that I sent you guys today. Yep. Yeah. I'm not really comfortable signing off on this because I think there was several concerns in going through this. Sarah went through it and kind of made she was concerned about I made notes on a couple of things here that I just think that this is a lot of money for what was actually done and the time put into it. I mean, we're at $13,000 in our computer budget. And without actually breaking out the support services, I know just what we pay monthly is $700 a month for support services. And yet we turn around and get billed for quite a bit of stuff as well. So with your approval, it'll get paid. But I just think it's something you guys should be looking at and see what all the work was that was done. I will say the accounting computer is still not 100%. The printers didn't work when it was first installed. When we tried to install the printers, we couldn't get access to the server to install the printers. They should never have walked away from the office without knowing if the computers worked. So she sat there and didn't run check. Then when we finally got Holland to dial in on this, he couldn't even get access to the admin portion and had to reset all the passwords. And it's just a concern, I think. So, Phil, my understanding is that the bookkeeping computer is up and going now, correct? As far as I know, I don't know. He's still missing all of her. She can't have no Google Sheets or anything like that to do any of her spreadsheets. I think there was a part where there was no key to install that or something like that. And then she decided she was uncomfortable installing it. She's uncomfortable because of everything that happens that she doesn't want to be held responsible because there's been so many issues with the computer. I mean, every morning we were getting a backup issue. We finally got that resolved. But it never calls to get this all done. But did the backup issue have anything to do with the new computer installation? They said partially. Partially, OK. Then what were the other parts that were holding up the backup? I guess the other part of it had something to do with the computer system moving upstairs, which was something that we're being billed for through RV technology for their insight on how to do it. OK. I'll come down and install the key. I just heard from Amy today that she actually entered it and then took it out. So I don't know. But I'm perfectly comfortable setting it up. I was looking through this invoice, and I agree with you. There's some things that seem a little bit iffy, especially the stuff around moving upstairs. But the hang on, I'm trying to go through the invoice on my phone while I'm on this call. So the invoice actually netted out at $146. Right. But they used up all of the monthly services we've been accruing. So that means that now we have no bank of support services. But all I'm saying is that's the whole concept of this is when we have something big, we use it up, then we build it up again. I get that. But I think there's things like, I mean, there was an initial call about an inquiry about we had received something from our bank saying that if we had a certain kind of firewall or something like that, that we would not have access to the bank. I contacted them on it. They came back and said, oh, I think you'll be all right. But it was no security there. So I contacted Paul up still. He said that the new computer was going to be installed. Just me contacting Holland to ask him if that was true. When was this going to be installed? He then charged $32.50 just to answer me back to tell me when it was going to be installed. Those are the kind of bills that we should be incurring. I think Paul asked a question, $32.50? They did back out two and a half hours of time. So I'm wondering if that's what they went through and looked at stuff like that and why they backed out those two and a half hours and put them in as proud as Pro Bono. I guess what this brings up to me is if it's going to be, and I don't know what the right way to do this is, whether Phil should review these bills and then approve them for Derrinda to pay or whether we should have Derrinda wrangle with RB, it's a tough situation. But we need to have one point of contact. The I got into it with them a little when what we originally were scheduled, I think, for a Thursday to do that installation. And Holland actually called me and started going through the stuff and expected me to go down to the town office and set up all the computer and install remote software so they could work remotely. And I had to admit, I got pretty angry about who was being tech support and who was getting paid for it. So I basically put a halt to everything for that day. Basically said, I'm not doing this. This is your job. I am not doing this. You guys need to make a decision. You make it right now as to whether or not you want to be tech support. Then Jared called me back and I was still pretty hot because it took them over an hour to decide whether or not they wanted to continue to do that, which kind of amazed me. They must have actually sat around and talked about it for a while. Jared called back. We had a good discussion. He did a lot of throwing himself under the bus. But also trying to make excuses about, well, we're not going on site. I said, well, I'm sorry. That's what you can do to actually call up a select board member and say, will you get down and set up this computer and install all this remote software so that I can charge you to set it up. It seemed kind of ludicrous to me. We finally did get to the point where he did show up on the front end and did the installation. But you're right, Jared, if there's stuff that's not right, that's a concern. So we do need to address that in some way, shape, or form. Peter and I've had ongoing discussions about this stuff from time to time. And I don't think either of us has a really good answer right now, but we're also in a, we're kind of squeezed a bit right now. Wilson, where's Angel? The Windows 8 stuff, I mean, right down to past due, essentially. We had a plan. COVID-19 happened. It messed us up. We've also had to spend a lot of money to dig ourselves out of that hole of having some very old operating systems that should have been replaced in the long run. And I don't know whether, you know, probably they should have been making recommendations about that stuff a while ago. I don't recall anything since I've been on the board, but probably along their somewhere, taking positions is you've got to upgrade these machines. So we're in that process now. Unfortunately, it's just not going very smoothly. The public computers here, Paul is going to come in Friday and he's going to set that up. That should be up and running. And I'll have to talk to him while he's there to make sure. And then if he's there, if you or Amy can give me a list of issues that remain on that treasurer's computer, I can make sure he addresses those while he's there. Well, I think both have been done now except for the fact of her not having access to these Google Sheets.  Right. See, that was, we shouldn't have had to call them back and sit there and wait for them to respond to our ticket. And, you know, she sat there and couldn't print it. Right. Right. I mean, I looked over Holland's notes and he, you know, he said that Amy said she would install the printers. Unfortunately, he accepted that as an answer. He shouldn't have. He should have said, no, sorry, I'm here. I'm installing the printers. That's my job. You know, I'm going to do it. But he went with, you know, what she was saying. How much just just backing up a little bit and, you know, hey, we all supported this. We all thought we were doing the right thing at the time. And Phil, I appreciate all very much all the time and energy you put into this. But, you know, I I unfortunately think that part of this problem is when we went out of the loop and purchased these computers on our own. And I know we saved some money doing that. But my experience all the years with computers is when you've got a support group working for you, you let them acquire the computers. They set them up, they install them, and they're 100 percent accountable for it. And if they screw it up, then you fire them. I don't know. I mean, if we're going to keep doing business with with R.B., we certainly have to have some kind of a come to Jesus meeting. But I think I think that balance.   But the fact is, I think our new financial arrangement is working. The fact that we were able to bank enough hours that it took care of all that. And yeah, we can we can argue about an hour here and an hour there. But I don't think that's a productive use of our time. Really, what we want to have is a reliable working up to date computer network. And we've I agree. We've we've suffered because we didn't we didn't update soon enough and fast enough. Mm hmm. Mm hmm. The. The Lister's computer, as far as I understand it, is set up and ready to go. But waiting for Amy to give us the go ahead, because she didn't want to do it until she watched the Grand List, I think was my understanding. Is that they were concerned that they didn't want to. It was such a timing. They didn't want to upset anything anywhere and lose any kind of data or not have access to the data. Yeah, that makes makes perfect sense when you've got some mission critical stuff. So that whenever she's ready to go, that should be able to be done. She also wanted us to hold off on the firewall update because they had sent a ticket on that. And so sure, we'll put that on hold till that I mean, there's some other stuff here. Just quickly. The. This is my train of thought. The wireless access point, they we got a message from Holland, I guess, saying that that is that end of life that needs to be replaced. I asked them for quote, they came in around 150. And then I asked them for what it was because I wanted to see the specs. And I think it's a ubiquity, which is a good, you know, commercial level. Access point. That's probably something we should go ahead and do. Is that for them to have access? As far as to have wireless access in the office, a wireless access. OK, OK, the Paul's computer is is another another situation. I mean, he's been a trooper moving over to the Chromebook and he's he's really starting to get the hang of it. In the midst of that, or kind of at the end of it, the computer just gave up the ghost and. It was funny because we had gone back and forth and asked me to go up and look at it as we don't in my mind. I'm driving up there to say, well, push the start button, you know. And no, no, it died. So I had got I got I think most of his. Now, off the old computer, I know I did not get his email archive files because they they're in a different place and they just didn't come over. So with with that, I think. We're going to need to pull the hard drive out of that old computer. Take it someplace like Staples, where they will just clone it and give us a copy on DVDs or something like that so that I can go through with Paul, we can make sure we've got all of his stuff because he does need some of that email archive. That's not that simple, is it? The printer he has is the old school type that has to be connected to the computer. He's now with the Chromebook needs something wireless. Printers are not terribly expensive. I think I can find something at Staples that'll give him what he needs. And we've chatted about that. So, you know, we've got a few other expenses there. And then I think once we get past that, Dorenda, we still have your laptop to set up. And I think you and Amy, we're going to share that. But we're not completely out of the woods yet. And you're right. I think Peter, you said, you know, come to Jesus moment. We probably need to have that. Liz, did you have a question for me? Well, not really a question. I just wanted to add that I did have a conversation with Ruben Bennett. And Bill, I'm sorry I never called you back. I got sidetracked with all this work stuff and I totally forgot.  Yeah. So anyway, Ruben is basically at our disposal. He'll come to a meeting if we want to put him on the agenda. Good. I think we should. Any other tech questions that I probably can't answer anyway, but. The email is coming, right? Yeah.  So what I and Phil, I really appreciate all the work you've done and the time you've spent. I can't even imagine, but we need to be paying these guys to do this. Yeah.  I hope we save some money. I think we're driving you crazy, which we don't mean to do. And I don't think it's fair for you to be in the middle of this. I think we we say to them, look, boys, you do it until you screw up and we expect you to give us good prices and good service and, you know, if you can do that, that's great. If you can't, then we need to find somebody else. Yeah. Yeah, but I but I think having us get and I mean, I've made this mistake in my in my past life, getting way too involved in these kind of things myself. And in the end, it's it's it's a problem. Yeah, definitely. So that's my that's my recommendation. I think the idea of having him come to a to a board meeting first. And yes, you know, maybe we need maybe we need a few more hours. I don't know. But the fact that we came out within one hundred and forty six dollars or whatever it is on this deal, I think is pretty good because it's a lot of stuff and we're not quite there yet. I know that. Right. Anything else, anybody? All right. That's permission to pay. OK. Yeah. Either is because it's not on the it's not on the order. Right. No, it's not on the order. Yeah, no, but I'll get it in there for the next. I'll get it in there for the next one. OK. OK. The next before we move on. Did you I forwarded you the invoice from Dell for the public computer? Yes, that is in the portables, I think, and I. Excellent.  And we just got another one. So yeah, yeah, another little surprise. Um, so I don't know if I have to hash it out with you or not. But I was questioning why the town paid for the thermal imaging camera when we had been told in December that was something the department was going to pay for. So I reached out to March and asked if this was an oversight or something. And so that was the email I got back. Again, my question is two fold. It's technically the purchases of equipment is over budget. They sent up an invoice that they want paid in this current year for some breathing cylinder for the SCBA that is won't be here for 10 weeks. Um, but they want to pay for it out of the budget that's ending in two weeks. And then we got that new email tonight for an expected $4,000 bill. So before the before the $4,000 with the with the tanks and the contribution of the camera, overall, they would still be below their budget. They would be overspent on their equipment account, but they would be low their total projected budget, correct? Right. So in the financials that you've got tonight, it doesn't include these cylinders, which they did purchase two cylinders back in December and we paid for them in January. So they have already purchased two of them so far in this year. And now they're asking for these others to and then um, so that the second one, though, is not these last two are not in the financials. So they have seven thousand and some dollars left in their budget for the remainder of the year. But they've got a four thousand dollar engine repair coming and then this $1,500 for those cylinders, but they would still be below their total. I don't like that. Don't get me wrong. I don't like the idea of paying for something ten weeks in advance before we even get it just so they can use up the money in their budget. But I was not like what Dorenda said, this was not even like, this is their own petty cash checking account. So we'd not have access to that. Isn't that something different? We don't have access to their their accounts. And I thought that camera was coming from their own money, not from the not from their budget. Down payment and build us for the balance. I mean, the rentals bill, seven thousand dollar camera for one. We never agreed to it. We never just just to be clear, guys. And no, I think we are changing the changing the way we operate. But in the past, what I mean, Marge is correct. In the past, what we've told them is, you know, do the best job you can to estimate your expenses and then come out within your budget. But we don't care that much if you're over on one line item and under on the other line item. And that's that's her point of view. We don't want her to do that if we want to hold their feet to the fire and say, if you have three thousand dollars in your equipment budget, that's all you get. That's a different way of operating that we've been operating. So I, you know, the problem is it's just like the highway budget.  The equipment purchases for new equipment. Yes, they should be able to project that. But, you know, when the when the turbo charger goes on the on the fire truck, guess what? You got to replace it and you got to find the money somewhere. So I mean, this this to me all gets back to the whole issue of the fire department and how we operate with them and everything else. But I don't think this is the time to say no, we expect you to live within each individual line item. I think we say and we can decide whether we want to pay ten weeks ahead for those air cylinders. I don't like that very much. But the bottom line is, it looks to me like this is what I was looking at this afternoon that with that with that truck repair and with the camera purchase, they're still under their total budget. OK, but so I am, you know, I I'm sorry. I get so confused about fiscal years because I deal with two fiscal years. And ours is July one, right? This is for the next so they're spending. Yeah, OK, that makes sense. And this is not on typical of what they've done in the past. They hold on to their money and then in the quarter of the year they spend it. Yeah, that's fine. OK, I'm sorry. I got confused. Oh, that's OK. Is so they're I know the whole thing. A noise, Dorinda, and I don't and I don't blame her. But I think Marge is trying to be straight with us. And it's not an annoyance. It's just I don't feel my job as treasurer is to bring these things to your attention when they're over budget or not what we're expecting. And that's why I'm just asking you if it's OK to follow through it. I got my money. Well, and I will say that as someone who who trained with the fire department on that one day where I had to crawl in a smoke filled building, you can't see anything literally. And so these cameras are apparently supposed to help find people, right? Like find bodies. So I think that it's I'm glad we have one. I just want to go back to the air cylinders again. So they they're buying them and they're basically prepaying for them. They won't take delivery until in the next fiscal year. Right. They'll take them after they said that they're 10 weeks out or something like that. Are these the fancy air cylinders or are these to read to just fill up the regular those backpacks that they have now? Remember how they want to get those new ones that are super expensive? No, these are the. OK. For PSI air. OK, I thought we had told them they couldn't get the air. No, those are the fancy ones. Yeah, that was the turnout gear or something like that. But those are the stock packs or something like that that are really expensive. They're like 15 grand each or something like that. So and then we the camera thing, we're going to let the camera thing go, even though they said they pay for it themselves. Well, they are paying for some of it. Well, I thought they said they pay for the whole thing themselves. Maybe they spent the money on something else. Yeah, OK, so the. The problem is, Mary, they they manage their budget.  And if we want them to consult with us, we have to devise some kind of a system where they're going to report to us before they do this stuff. That's another subject. That's another. So that's a that's a long discussion that we keep coming back to. It's not like I want to be careful, I would say this. It's not like the money is being disappearing. It's not like they're spending it on, you know, training sessions in the South Seas. I don't doubt for a minute, this is stuff they need and they should have. Um, it's just, you know, it's our money and they spend it and I know that's annoying. Well, I think it comes down to, you know, what we've talked about before. It makes for a very difficult relationship when you have a crucial service in town being run by a nonprofit corporation. Right, right. Instead of the being governmental and they're not accountable to us. Right. Well, they're accountable, but only in the only in the big picture where we cut off their funding. Right. You know, and I saw those, all those stipends. I've never liked those stipends either. I don't get a stipend. I don't like the stipends either. Never did. Why don't I do something? Let's table this. Let's table this for tonight. I mean, I think we've got what we've got to render unless anybody disagrees and I appreciate you bringing to our attention. And the question the question I have is, so what do we have? What do we have left to pay between now and the end of the year? We have what? One more payroll. We have one more payroll. We probably will have power bills that will affect all of the part and telephone bills that will affect all of the part and any kind of fuel, anything like that. Anything that has a joint date on it will get approved back even if we need to fill out the July one. Well, we're going to be, we're going to be in the hall. It's a little hard to tell how much, but clearly we're going to be in the hall, but it's not going to be, not going to be horrible. I don't think, especially considering we had that $62,000 run-anticipated truck repair. So, you know, how did we do with tax payments? We did okay. There was, there was a big number left at the end. Let's see. Darinda, I can't hear you. Yeah, I'm looking at my paperwork. I don't have the number readily available, but it was a significant number. Some of it was just people oversight that it wasn't because they chose not to pay it. Some of it was, oops, I missed it. But we do have a significant number out there left to collect. But you still have to collect. Yeah.  Or, or did they just? I'm no longer the doing quintax collector. That's true. You're not about that. Well, what she says is that. I do talk with Dave Smith about it. And he did send out a letter along with the late notices. I don't think he's gotten a lot of feedback. I do know that some people called in and said, oops. Um, but I haven't gotten into the actual detail. Maybe Sarah knows more. We got a we got a whole bunch of I got a whole bunch of calls last week, followed by payments on Monday. We never get we never get any mail on Tuesday, but they were all people who they mean they had their pink slips in the letter.  We have not received any calls from people saying I can't pay my taxes. It's a hardship because what I would suggest to if someone does call, you know, we still have, you know, I want to it's not a lot of money, but it's like 4,000 or 5,000 left in our middle sex fund that we're giving out $200 grants to people.  So you're talking about capstone or you're talking about town money? No, I'm talking about the town, the middle sex, that little pot of money that we have. We've given out grants to folks. It's not a lot, $200, but you know, it could be that that's going to help them pay for groceries so they can pay for taxes. So if someone does call to say, I'm having trouble paying my taxes, you should you should let them know about the this the it's really the food shelf money that we have. That was my concern. My grant was whether or not you were talking about actually town funds. No, no, no, just as the middle sex food shelf money. That we're granting out donations. That's from private donations. Yeah, yeah. And we're just giving out, you know, checks, no questions asked for people that need it. So, you know, some people have been, most people have heard about it on front porch form or have been referred to it. But some people might not know that it exists and it may be very useful to them. You did there wasn't an announcement about a month ago, wasn't there? A couple of announcements on front porch form. Yes, Dave Karki, who's managing the the grant distribution. Anything else, Brenda? Oh, I think that took care of my file. Thank you very much. So we have. Just taking it in order here, approval of the May 19 minutes. Either my kids are back and I don't need you don't need my vote on any of these things. So I think I'm going to get off. And my computer is only down to nine percent anyway. OK, Mary, thank you. Bye, Mary.  Thank you. Motion on the minutes. Yeah, I'll make a move. I'll second Steve's motion. All in favor of the motion. Please say aye. Aye. OK, we've approved the minutes. Wait, there are two sex, two sets of the minutes, my May 19th and May 21st. Oh, I'm sorry. Do you want to just everybody was there for both? Do you just want to say we approve both of them? Yeah. Thank you. And everybody's favorite subject, the Washington County Sheriff's Contract for the upcoming year. Yeah, I feel like this is Groundhog Day. Everybody see that movie? Yeah. Here we are again. We haven't gone anywhere. Nothing's changed. They don't give up their money and we're right back at it again. And we have no price. And guess what? The Sheriff's Department is more behind and has more work and more stuff to do, and it's only going to be worse. So I saw them during covid like outside Romney. I'm like, nobody's driving. What what are you doing? It, you know, it is what it is, guys. I don't know. I mean, we hear from people that they want speed enforcement. We try and hold their feet to the fire. But they can only do what they can do. And we're not the top priority, needless to say. So it's fine. I proved it. Yeah. Well, wait a minute. You're going to motion. OK, I move that we approve the the Sheriff's plan for next year. Contract, contract, contract. I'm just going to throw in the seventy five hundred dollars and do the math. OK. Yep. OK. Is there a second? Second. OK, all in favor? Aye. Aye. OK. Steve, did you second that? I did. Don't hold it. Do I have your permission to sign on the board's behalf? I will get this docusign thing undone. But yes, OK. Yeah. Yeah, that's a pretty cool little program. Yeah, I just don't know how to take things like that and put it into, you know, how to transfer paper, but I'll figure it out. Hey, I've been signing so much stuff. God only knows what I've done. I probably bought a few missiles and maybe a nuclear power plant or two. I don't know. Probably. Who knows? So what do we think? What do we think? What do we think about starting real meetings again a little soon, a little early? Governor hasn't looked at that restriction. I don't think that's wise idea. No other town is doing that. I am not comfortable. I am a type A blood and I'm at risk of dying. Me too. Thank you. OK. OK. Zoom around where it is then. I agree. I want to be safe. I mean, we could have, we could plan to have a meeting outside, I suppose, but that sounds a little crazy. This actually does work. Yep. Could I say something? As a citizen, it's really easy to participate in meetings when they're on Zoom. Yeah. I agree. We have so many more people coming to our meetings than ever. It's fantastic. It's really good. No, I know. That's definitely been the highlight of this. And I mean, it must be we're unfriendly when people come down to the town hall. I don't know. They don't seem to come. They like to Zoom with us. No, you guys are always friendly.   So we're very appreciative. Good. Oh, I appreciate that. I really do. And we like, we like having people here. So. Well, and even if we do move to, you know, going back to meetings, we can always have it still be Zoom. Like you can have a computer and people could Zoom in if they want to. Exactly. That's a really good point. Yeah. I mean, that's what I was going to suggest that we make this a practice. And then, and then guess what? If a board member's out of town, like I've been known to do sometimes they can Zoom in too. So. And right. Yeah. No, I think I think it's all good. I think it's all good. Well, I'm off. I'm off to my my cocktails with the motorcycle boys. Important, important business. So I am ready to including, including, we were going to invite Sarah to our motorcycle meeting, but we decided we wanted her to get a little more practice on her scooter first. Did you get your pink helmet? All I could get was a black helmet with pink pink waves on it. Is it just a metal blue helmet? Is it a moped, Sarah? Or what is it? It's 49.7 cc. So it's I don't need a license. I'm just a hazard. OK. I'm just a hazard. Is it fine? It's a little, Molly Supel is a little scary, but what's really going to be scary is when they grade the roads. That's going to be totally fine. You're going to go really slowly. That's for a few days when they grade the roads. You look like you are having a good time anyway, Sarah. It's my big trip to your house, Steve. Thank you very much. Sarah's day out. OK, guys, I'm going to adjourn the meeting. Thank you. Bye, everybody. Thank you, guests. OK. Bye. Bye, everybody. Bye-bye. Yeah. Bye. Bye.


Who says you can't make dessert on a smoker? This smoked blueberry crumble is one of my favorite recipes to make with fresh summer produce. I'll show you how to make it. To make the blueberry filling, mix together 36 ounces of fresh blueberries, two tablespoons of lemon juice, and a teaspoon of vanilla extract. Just toss the blueberries until they're evenly coated. Before you add a mixture of half cup granulated sugar, three tablespoons cornstarch, half teaspoon kosher salt, and a fourth teaspoon of ground cinnamon. Fold everything together until the dry ingredients are no longer visible and then just set this blueberry mixture aside. For the graham cracker topping, you'll need two packages or 18 sheets or 278 grams of cinnamon graham crackers crushed up. I just crushed these in the bag and add them in. You kind of want some fine bits and some chunkier pieces. If you don't have cinnamon graham crackers, just use regular and add a pinch or two of ground cinnamon. You'll mix that with a half cup of dark brown sugar, a teaspoon kosher salt, and then you'll add in two sticks of melted, unsalted butter, and another teaspoon of vanilla extract. The blueberries will go into a smoker safe dish and then you just add the topping on top. This will go on to the smoker at 350 for 45 to 55 minutes. You want that blueberry filling to be nice and bubbly and your topping to be golden brown and crispy. You can also bake this in an oven if you don't have a traeger or smoker. I would go with a similar time and temperature recommendation. While it's going to be very tempting to dig right into this, let it rest for 30 to 60 minutes before serving. That filling will really thicken up and be a lot more pleasant to eat. I do like adding a bit of fresh lemon zest on top while it's warm. Those oils from the lemon zest will come out while it rest. And that will give you the perfect opportunity to make this lemon whipped cream. I'm sure you could serve this blueberry crumble with ice cream or just a ready-made whipped cream. A homemade whipped cream is really great and it's super easy to make this lemon spin. I had a pint of heavy cream, some fresh lemon zest, about a fourth cup of powdered sugar, and a pinch of salt to a stand mixer. You could also use a hand mixer and just whip this until it's nice and thick. Just like whipped cream. It shouldn't take more than a couple minutes and you're ready to go as soon as your crumble has cooled. Throw some of this on there and go to town. So to prove my point, and definitely not because I just wanted to dig in after only 15 minutes of cooling, you'll see why you want to let this cool a bit more. It's still a little bit runnier than I would like, but once you throw some cream on here, I promise you you're not getting any complaints. So that's it for this recipe. Hope you enjoy. If you want more ideas for things to make on The Smoker and Smoker Desserts, check out some of our other videos and some recipes on WithTheWinterf.com. We'll see you next time.


Hello and welcome to this session. This is Professor Farhad. In this session, we would look at controlled foreign corporation and the subpart F income. This topic is covered in international accounting as well as international taxation. If you have not connected with me only then please do so. YouTube is where you would need to subscribe. I have 1500 plus accounting, auditing, finance and tax lectures. If you like my lectures, please like them, share them, put them in playlists, let the world know about them. If you're benefiting from my lectures, it means other people might benefit as well. So please share the wealth on my website. In addition to my lectures, I do have additional resources such as the PowerPoint slides, notes, multiple choice through false additional exercises, 2000 plus CPA questions. Please check out my website. Studypal.co is an artificial intelligence study by the platform that match you with someone who's studying for the CPA or CFA. If you're interested, please check them out. They're in 85 countries in 2800 city. Let's talk about controlled foreign corporation or CFC. What is the big idea behind this controlled foreign corporation? Well, it's a foreign. It's located outside the U.S. It's a corporation and somehow someone controls it. So what's the big idea? The big idea is before 1962 U.S. companies would set up a subsidiary in a tax haven country like the Cayman Island and the Cayman Island will record the sales to non-U.S. customers. The money comes into the Cayman Island and it's tax haven, it's tax at a low rate. Then the subsidiary would lend money to the parent company in the U.S. The money will transfer to the U.S., but it will be in form of loans rather than dividend. So simply put, the money will sit in the Cayman Island tax deferred. That's the idea. So Congress obviously figured this out in 1962. They decided to have what's called a new tax classification for corporations, which is controlled foreign corporation, CFC. The purpose was again, obviously to crack down on the use of tax haven by U.S. companies so you can avoid paying U.S. taxes. Now bear in mind, you cannot avoid paying taxes forever if you bring the money into the U.S. via dividend. Then you have to pay taxes, but also the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act changed that as well and just giving you a historical overview. So U.S. Congress created this controlled foreign corporation rules in 1962. So what is a controlled foreign corporation? Is any corporation in which U.S. shareholders hold more than 50% of the voting power or the fair market value of the stocks? Simply put, if they control the company more than 50%, then this is a foreign corporation, a CFC. A foreign controlled corporation. Now we have to understand how do we account for that 50%? So who is counted in the 50%? Are all shareholders counted in the 50%? Well, only those shareholders, it could be a corporation, individual, tax resident, they either directly or indirectly own 10% or more. So when we're counting, so if this individual owns 6%, this individual owns 12%, this individual owns 15%. Well, guess what? The six individual is not counted. This individual is counted 12%. This individual is counted 15%. So when we're counting toward the 50%, only the individuals or the entities, again, it doesn't have to be individuals. It could be a corporation. It could be a partnership. It could be a trust. But the point is, as the stockholders, they have to own more than 10% to be accounted in the aggregate up to 50%. So simply put, if you have a corporation that owns entirely by one shareholder and it's structured overseas, that's clearly a CFC. Why? Because it's one shareholder and one shareholder owns how many of the shares? Who 100%? That's more than 50%. So this rule is starting corporation owned by one or few US individuals. So you have maybe three people or four people. Each one owns 25%. For example, if we have a corporation with 100 individuals and each own 4%, then that's not a CPC. That's not a controlled foreign, not CPC controlled foreign corporation. That's not a controlled foreign corporation. So what if it's not a controlled foreign corporation? It means, if it is, if it's not, then it's good. If it's not, we don't have to worry about anything. But if it is, means you are a shareholder with 10% or more, this individual here in yellow and this individual in green, or more than taxed on certain income, whether they receive the cash or not. Then under those circumstances, those individuals that own more than 10%, if it's a controlled foreign corporation, whether certain income is taxed or not, whether they receive the money or not, it's taxed to them. It's basically like a tax, tax through entities like a partnership or an S corporation. Simply put, you cannot shelter that money because you are part of this controlled foreign company corporation and you own more than 50% as part of the, more than 10% as part of the 50% ownership. More about controlled foreign corporation. All majority foreign subsidiaries are controlled foreign corporations. Simply put, if a company outside the US, if it's, if the subsidiary of the US, it is a controlled foreign corporation. It's simply put, it's the majority of the owners will be, sometimes it's the parent company is the owner of that subsidiary and the parent company is a US citizen. Therefore, it's controlled foreign corporation. Okay. So generally speaking, the United States exempt from US taxation income, income earn, remember the subsidiaries. So if you, if you're operating as a subsidiary, remember what we talked about subsidiary? Well, as long as you don't bring the money to the US, you don't have to be taxed. Remember, if you are operating as a branch, then that's different. Remember, we talked about the branch versus the subsidiary.  If you're a subsidiary, that's not a big deal. Okay. However, you don't have an exemption for the so-called subpart F income earned by this corporation. Now we need to talk about this subpart F income. So basically, if you are a subsidiary, you don't have to worry about anything unless you have this type of income. Now, what is this type of income? That's the question. Well, look at it this way. Subpart F income is taxed currently similar to foreign branch. What is foreign branch? Simply, if you have a foreign branch, it means you are, it's as, it's as if you are operating in the US. In subpart F income, it's as if you are operating in the US. Okay. So what is subpart F income? This is what we need to talk about next. So simply put, we're going to talk a little bit more about it. There's no easy, you know, one answer for it. It can be characterized as income with little or no economic connection with the F, with the foreign controlled country. So simply put, it's an income that can be easily shift, easily movable. It has no economic connection to that country. It can be moved to another country if need be. So you're moving it to a low tax jurisdiction just for the purpose of gaining a tax advantage. Not because there's economic benefit. There's not no economic sense. It just for tax purposes. So what are those typical type? Typically, what does those income include? It includes income derived from insurance of US risk like insurance income because you could move insurance income anywhere you want to. Income from countries engage in international boycott, certain illegal certain illegal payments. But the fourth category is what we're going to be focusing on because this is the most common. It's when you have income, foreign based company income. Okay. That's the most important category of support F income and includes the following. So we're going to focus on this. We don't really don't care about the other three, but the other three are if you saw them in a multiple choice questions, they are considered support F income. So if you have insurance income, that's a part income. If you if you're getting income from a country where it's being where we're boycotting that support income. If you receive a legal payment that support income, but we don't worry about this. So we need to worry about those FBC FBC income. What those FBC income have three types passive income FBC, which is kind of the foreign personal holding company like personal holding company in the US sales income. Or we call it FBC sales income or service income, which we call it FBC service income. Those are the three that we're going to be focusing on starting with the first one passive income. Well, hopefully, you know what passive income is passive income is when you're earning the money without doing anything. For example, if you have stocks, bonds, if you are have rental property. So this include interest. If you receive interest dividend, royalties rent, okay, capital gains from sales of assets, access of foreign gains over foreign currency losses other than the one that has to do with your business. Okay. So all of those are passive income and because they are passive income. They are under foreign based company income. That's part of subpart F. So if you receive any of those, then guess what? You cannot shelter that income. That's the point. Another type of income that you cannot shelter is foreign based company sales income. So what is that? Well, it's when the controlled foreign corporation or the control controlled foreign company makes sales outside its country of incorporation. Well, let's let's kind of look at an example. We have the USA here. USA and we have Ireland. Okay. So the US company created a subsidiary in Ireland, sub in Ireland. And guess what? This Irish company, all what they do is they sell to Germany. That's all. That's all what they do. So they sell to Germany. That's their income. So simply put, they make sales outside its country of incorporation. Well, if that's the case, then that's considered subpart F income. Simply put, it means it has to be taxed. Now it's not considered sales from a subsidiary. Okay. Now you might be asking, hold on a second. Why doesn't Apple then pay taxes in the US on that sales? Here's the thing with Apple. Yes. The Apple Inc. in the US, we have Apple Inc. in the US owns Apple subsidiary in Ireland. They own Apple subsidiaries in Ireland. So what's the problem? And most of the sales of the Irish sub is around for in other countries around the world. So why does the Irish sub, the Irish Apple sub does not pay taxes in the US? Here's why. Because the Irish sub, what happens is they own the intellectual property, the intellectual property of Apple. They own at least half of it. I don't know the amount that they own the intellectual property. Simply put, the Irish Apple subsidiary is getting their merchandise from China, getting their merchandise from China. Therefore, this relationship is basically broken because they're getting the merchandise from China because they own the intellectual property. Then they're selling it to Germany. So the sales income, the foreign-based company income, it's when the US company sells it to Ireland and Ireland sells it to Germany. So it's just like a conduit. That's not the case in Apple. And this is why, in case you're wondering why, how does Apple doesn't pay taxes on that foreign income? And it's not only Apple. Remember, I told you about Skype owned by Microsoft. They operate in Luxembourg as well as Google and all the other big companies. That's what they do. So simply put, it's income derived by the foreign corporation where the controlled foreign corporation has little connection with the process that generate the income and the related party is involved.  And there is a related party involved. What does mean a red party? It means the parent company is selling them the assets. If the controlled foreign corporation earns income from the sale of property to customers outside of their country of incorporation. Again, think about the US and Ireland that don't think about Apple. And either the supplier or the customer is a related party. So let's assume now the US is a related party that subsidiary. This constitute foreign-based company sales. And foreign-based company sales usually involve three countries. The parent company in the main country selling the product to the subsidiary then the subsidiary selling the product to a third country. Simply put, a US parent manufactures a product that it sells it to its controlled foreign corporation in Hong Kong. In which it turns itself into a customer in Japan. So you have USA, we have Hong Kong and we have Japan. First we sell it to Hong Kong. Then Hong Kong sells the product to Japan. So the Hong Kong is not really selling it within Hong Kong. So Hong Kong is just a conduit. It's on the route. Therefore the sales made here, it can no longer be considered a sales by a subsidiary that's considered sub part of income. And it has to be taxed in the US now. Tax in the US now. Another example would be Ulysses Limited is a controlled foreign corporation organized in the UK and owned 100% by Joyce, a US company. So Joyce owned this company. Ulysses purchases finished inventory from Joyce and sell the inventory to a customer in Hong Kong. Simply put, we go a company in England that's owned by a US company. They buy the stuff from the US company and they sell it to Hong Kong. Well, guess what? This is a foreign-based company sales income. What does that mean? This is sub part F income. It means it's taxed now. It's taxed. The profit is taxed now. You cannot defer it. This is what we mean by that. There are some exceptions to the sub chapter or sub part, sub chapter F income. An exception applies to the property that is manufactured, produced or grown, or if it's extracted in the country in which the controlled foreign corporation was organized or created and to property sold for use, consumption, or disposition within that country. So if you're manufacturing the country, if you're manufacturing the product there, or if you're extracting the product there and it's being consumed there or being sold within that country, then that's an exception. Then it's no longer foreign-based company sales. In both of these situations, fewer than three countries are involved and the controlled foreign corporation has participated in the economic process. So the point is that that subsidiary is not only a conduit. It's actually doing something. It's producing the product, manufacturing the product, growing the product, producing the product. The resources are being extracted in that country. They're being consumed there. If that's the case, then it's no longer sub chapter.  For example, in the previous example of that UK subsidiary purchase raw material from Joyce and prefer substantial manufacturing activity in the UK before selling the inventory to customers in Hong Kong, then the income is not FBC income. So as long as they do some transformation in the UK, then they will no longer be considered under sub chapter F income. Even without the manufacturing activity, sales to customer within the UK would also be precluded. They will be because it's not, would not produce FBC sales income because there's no third country involved. If they buy the stuff from the US and they sell it in the UK subsidiary, sell the product within the UK, then guess what? It's no longer subject to sub chapter F income. Service income is another category. Foreign-based service income is income derived from the performance of services for or on behalf of a related person and perform outside the country in which the controlled foreign corporation was created or organized. Basically the same concept except here, rather than selling goods, you are providing services, but it's exact same concept, exact same concept. Income from services performed in connection with the sale of property by a controlled foreign corporation that has manufactured, produced, grown or extracted. Such property is not. Of course, if that's the case, if it's manufactured, produced or grown within that territory, then it's not. Now you have to remember that a large amount of offshore profit is active trade or business income not involving related person. So most of the subsidiaries outside the US, US subsidiaries that are outside the US, they don't participate in that sub chapter F income. The escape, the definition, what does that mean? If they escape the definition, their income is the third until we bring it back to the US. They're not subject to immediate taxation. And remember, the rules were changed. The rules were changed recently where you can bring it back and you have a dividend received deduction. So the determination of the amount of controlled foreign corporation income currently taxable, how do we determine how much of it is currently taxable? If the sub part F income is less than 5% of the controlled foreign corporation. So simply put, if you make that much money and that much is considered sub part F income, then you don't have to worry about this part. So if it's a small amount of your income is sub part F income, which is less than 5%. If the sub part F income is between 5% and 70% of the foreign controlled corporation. So if it's that much, well, guess what? If it's between 50 and 70, if it's 30% is then 30% of it is taxable now. If the sub part sub chapter F income or sub part F income is greater than 70%. So if you have, if it's greater than 70%, then all of your income is taxed now because the majority of your income is sub chapter F income. Therefore, even if it's only 80 or 72 or 75, more than 70, then it's 100% taxable. Now there is a safe harbor rule. What is the safe harbor rule? And hopefully if you understand the safe harbor rule, you say, okay, this makes sense now. Simply put, if the foreign tax rate is greater than 90% of the US corporate income tax rate, then none of the controlled foreign company or corporation income is considered to be sub part F income. What does that mean? In the US right now, the tax rate is 21%. So as long if we multiply this by 90%, it's approximately 19%, give or take like 18.9 to be more specific. So as long as the tax rate in that country in which you are operating is 18.9 or greater, which is 90% of the US tax rate, then you don't have to worry about this sub part or sub chapter sub chapter F income. With the current tax rate of 21%, US multinational corporation need not to be concerned with this rule as in countries where the rate, where the effective rate is 18.9% or higher. Because guess what, if you're operating in a place where the tax rate is higher than the US, then you're not really trying to avoid paying taxes because you are paying more than 90% of US taxes. So these countries are not considered tax haven as far as sub part F purposes are concerned. So the country effective rate, the way we compute the county effective rate is a combination of the corporate income tax and the withholding tax rate applicable to dividend. This is how you determine whether the effective rate is 90% or more of US tax rate, which happens to be 21%. Now, if you have any additional questions about this topic, please email me. If you want additional resources about this topic, visit my website. If you want to access the PowerPoints as well as other features. In the next session, we would look at foreign tax credit. Again, if you visit my website, please consider subscribing. It's a lot of resources and it's an investment in your career. Good luck and study hard.


This is why I have such frustration say with people like Sam Harris the sort of radical atheists because they seem to think that once human beings abandon their grounding in the transcendent that the plausible way forward is with a kind of purist rationality that automatically attributes to other people equivalent value. It's like I just don't understand that. They believe that that's the rational pathway.  In market says that no one is good but God and it's only through God that we can understand what is right and wrong because morality is based on God's character. We all fall short of God's standard of goodness but Jesus offers us forgiveness today through his sacrifice on the cross. Follow for more Christ centered content and help support my ministry on Patreon.


Lipton Tee and Lipton Soup presents Inner Sanctum Mystery. Dear friends, this is your horror host at the squeaking door of the Inner Sanctum. Come in, come in. Hang your hats on the torture rack over there and get cozy. Tonight we've got cadenzas and cadavers. Murders and melodies. That's all I can tell you now. No sense putting the cart before the herd is rare. From the way you're talking, I guess we're going to have music on the program tonight. I think that's real nice. So do I, Mary. I've always loved music.  Now please, I'm being serious. You know, I once won a prize for playing the piano. Yes, they gave me a love... Wait, wait. Don't, don't tell me. Let me guess. They gave you a lovely sterling silver medallion. Didn't they, Mary? No, they didn't. You know very well that the only way you can get that sterling silver medallion is from the Lipton Tee people. And ladies, it's solid sterling silver and it's just the right size, about an inch in diameter. It's the kind of jewelry you find at those smart shops on Fifth Avenue in New York. The medallion is decorated with a Chinese inscription and it's hung on a narrow black rayon satin ribbon.  And here's how you get this handsome medallion. Just send 25 cents and the box top from a package of Lipton's, the tea with the brisk flavor, to Lipton Tee Box 92. That's Box 92, New York City. Send for yours tonight. Give me a pen, Mary. I'll send them a check immediately. And what's more, I'll write it in blood. There'll be plenty spilled here tonight. The title of our story is Musical Score. It's an original radio play by Christopher Mayle and our star is Barry Kroger, who plays the role of Grasso. It's the story of a simple melody of a killer who, as our story opens, is fighting desperately and alone against a raging storm off the coast of Maine. The lifeboat he's in is half found and the man's wild rowing does little good. I'm a murderer! A murderer!  And I am free! Did I do it all for nothing? Peter told his wife and they were the first to go, almost in the same spot. Oh, Wolfim's composing. Oh, and that tune of his. He had all three of us on the life raft, crazy with it. That maddening tune. But I still hear him humming. I still hear it. But the sea was calm that day. Dead calm. Fifteen days of calm.  And that son... Carl!  Marsha seems to like it. Part of the symphony I'm working on. It does get on our nerves, Tom. How is your wife? I don't know, Grasso. Poor Marsha. Yes, yes I know. I'm hungry. Smile, how about some ration? Ah, that fat belly of yours.  We've got rations for one person for two days. The woman eats, we don't. Now forget it. Well, we ought to be practical. Smile. What made the Santa Margarita go down so quickly? I told you. Nothing but a stray mind. It was Argentine registered coffee, both a neutral. It's all it could have been. I'll cut it out when you're tall. Or change the tune at least. I can't stand it. Sorry. You may be a famous playwright, Grasso, but you don't know the sea. We're near the main fishing banks. We've got a chance of meeting a fisher we can hold out. Tall! Tall, will you stop that blaster, too? Yes, I haven't said tall, quit it! What a trio. A perfume manufacturer, a playwright, and a sailor. We all wanted food. We all wanted water. Sweet things. An end of tolls humming. Well, I wanted all that more than the others did. Without Marsha Tall, I could eat a little. Without Peter Tall's song, I could rest. The 17th night it was. The moon painted us all in silver and black. The other slept. Tall had his wife's head cradled in his lap. I crawled over to Tall. How is she, Tall? You know, I think she's getting better. She smiled at me a minute ago. My singing helps.  Hum your song. For the last time. I cut off his infernal song, cut it off with my fingers, digging into the yielding flesh of his throat. He slumped over his wife's body. I closed my ears to her moans, and I pushed them both. What? A murderer. So Tall's gone, so's his wife. But they didn't fall off. One of the three of us murdered them, and it wasn't me. I don't think you did, Smiles. I know I didn't. You're voting two to one and electing me the murderer, huh? Not necessarily, Grasso. It just looks a little like it. How are you going to prove it? Who's going to believe you any more than they'd believe me? Even I was ready to murder for a crust of bread.  So we hang together or we hang separately, then? Let's be practical about this, Smiles. None of us can afford to be mixed up in even the implication of murder. Suppose we have an agreement, just in case we are picked up. What kind of an agreement, Grasso? Suppose we agree now and for all time that Tall and his wife simply died at sea and were buried at sea. On the 21st day, the rations were gone and the song, we could all hear Tall humming it from the bottom of the sea. We watched each other like animals.  I lived to fear and to kill again. Fear began with a little scene in the Portsmouth Hospital where we were being treated.  Yes, yes. No more hunger-painting, Smiles. How about you, Grasso? Pretty normal now, I guess. Oh, by the way, a friend of mine, second-made on another ship, was in the sea me yesterday. Yes? They picked up a couple of survivors from the Santa Margarita before we were rescued. Not interested, eh? They were a man and his wife.  No, no, no, not poor Marsha and Peter Tall, but the friends of theirs, the Abraham Davises. You know them? Davises? The symphony conductor? Yeah, that's him. Wouldn't he like to know about the Talles, huh? You've got a flair for the dramatic, Smiles. Sometimes it's dangerous to be so talented. They began to worry if both of them weren't ganging upon me. But days, weeks past, nothing happened. Only the Talles melody was always with me, day and night. It kept ringing in my head, dawn and on and on. At least I hadn't heard from the other two until one morning a letter came from Abraham Davises, the symphony conductor and dear friend of the Peter Talles. Yes, sir. It has taken me this time to locate you three who were with my lamented friends, Peter and Marsha Tall, when they died at sea from the score of Peter Tall's last symphony, his performance, and thought you might like to hear it. Hear it? I didn't need a reading to hear it. But I'd have to be there. They would be. Maybe plotting to tell lies about me to Davises. Right then, I decided to kill them both. That way only. They freed them from anxiety. Murder would free me. Ivanov would be first. Yes, fat, beady-eyed, Ivanov. I studied their movements. Ivanov worked late at his office every Tuesday night and on the second Tuesday of each month, the Halifax-bound cargo steamer, Sam Lewis, left her New York dock. My plan was simple. It involved my waiting for Ivanov in his apartment house on the night of Tuesday, May 8. My weapon would be simple, too. A common bread knife. Simple and so satisfying. Good day, Mr. Ivanov. Thanks for the bottle of perfume. My girl's crazy about it. When you get married, I'll give you a quarter of it. Thanks! I slid the knife from my sleeve and gripped the handle. Ivanov reached his door. His broad back was a leap away. I knew where to strike. You learn those tricks in my trade. An upward thrust just below the right shoulder blade.  Feeling no remorse, no pity, just relief that I had nothing more to fear from even of at least one more to kill, to be free one more. I turned my back on the cooling mat at my feet and reached the street. I walked fast. I had only a little while to reach the docks and make my boat. Tolls and melody kept beating its tireless notes against my veins. Dear me and gory bee, that's my idea of a real fun plug-er. Oh, speaking of music and murder, did you ever hear of the fiddler in temper? He murdered his wife because she was always harping at him. Oh yes, and because she had a cellist disposition too.  Good heavens, what have you got there? It looks like a Chinese gong. It is, Mary. I got it from an auctioneer. You know, those fellows always say, going, going gong. Well, what are you going to do with it? Oh, I've always wanted to kick the gong around. Besides, if you're going to tell that Chinese story about the medallion, I ought to accompany you on the Chinese gong. Well, I'm not going to tell it in Chinese, so suppose you put that thing away. But, ladies, there is a story behind that sterling silver medallion that the Lipton Tea people want to send you, and what's more, it's a true story. It seems that the original of this handsome medallion was given to an American flyer who was rescued by Chinese guerrillas after he bailed out over enemy territory. The flyer was told that the Chinese letters on the medallion would identify him and bring him safely through the lines. Well, he did get through, and only then did he learn that the inscription said, good luck in Chinese. Now, there's a story to tell your friends when they're admiring your medallion on its smart black ray on satin ribbon. And to get this good luck charm, just like the one the flyer carried, all you have to do is send 25 cents and the box top from a package of Lipton's, the tea with the brisk flavor, to Lipton Tea box 92, New York City. How about hitting that gong now so they'll remember? Yes, that's box 92 in New York City. All right, now let's go back to our murderer who's being haunted by a song. Remember what happened? A composer named Tell and his wife, Marsha, were thrown off a life raft and drowned by one of three other men on the raft. The killer has been telling us his story as he fights the sea in a lifeboat. You remember that he just murdered even half and is now heading for a Halifax-bound cargo ship. This is your flight room, Mr. Grosser. Anything I can do for you? No thanks, not just now. I'm going back to bed. When do we reach Halifax? Here in the morning, sir. Good night. Thank you. Oh, wait, wait. I'm afraid I'm rather a nervous traveler. Just between us, Ed. Do we have competent officers aboard? They're best, sir. Captain James is tops. There's nobody cheaper out anywhere than Mr. Smipes, sir. So he was there. I'd gone to a lot of trouble to get aboard that ship and he was there. I kept out of his way entirely until last night. We were off the main shore. It was raining slightly. I slid the long, well-pointed bread knife into my sleeve and made my way toward the afterdeck. It lacked three minutes of eight bells. There for a smoke. There he was. Just where he had been every night. Smoky. Leaning against the rail near the small light boat. I could barely see him. He was so dark. But I stole toward him a foot at a time. Now I held my breath. I was so close. Slowly I brought my arms straight to my side. Plexed my muscles. Tensed with a thrust. I calculated the lunge. The cigarette told me where his mouth was. Then he turned his head a little.  I thought you'd looked me up if I came to the same spot each night. You're turning out to be quite a killer, aren't you? How did you... Yes, we... Still he'll be smiling. Now nobody knows what happened on the life raft. Nobody. I'm free. You'll never be free. The song... The song will... I dumped Smythe into one of the small boats and climbed in myself. I pushed out on the davits and lowered the boat to within a couple of feet of the water. And then climbed down the supporting ropes to it. I'd cut the ropes in the flat hull of the ship, flid path. We were alone. Just Smythe and me. And Smythe was dead. So I threw him overboard and I was alone. And free. And tonight, I'm alone and free.  Hear me, Tom! Hear me! I'm going crazy. There can't be a light. Not a light. But what must there be there? A light of land. Rocks ahead of me. And the surf's breaking against me. I'm close. I think I'm too close. I'm going to crash into them. The surf's picking up the boat and throwing me down the rock. I'll be killed! Wait, darling. I think I hear something outside. What? Stop a minute. I think I hear something. You don't have to shout. What is it there? Listen. Isn't that our door? Is that your pounding? How could it be? This is a lighthouse. New would come out to an island in this stone. Just the same. I'm going to see. All right. I'll go with you. What is he? No. No. Not you! Stay away, Tom! He's made it, Marshal. Here. Give me a hand. Put him in the living room, bunk. Peter. Yes? How did he know our name? By what he said? He's changed a lot. Since we saw him last. Since I saw him last. He was on the life raft with us. The Santa Margherita? Yes. I'd know him better than you would. You were ill. His name's Grasso. His was the last voice I heard before we... all overboard. Well, Mr. Grasso, you look a lot better this morning. How was your hand? Throbs. I can't move. What happened? You were washed up against the rocks in a lifeboat.  Obviously. You didn't choke me thoroughly enough, Grasso. The water revived me. And I was clutching in Marshal's dress. Yes, but how did you... Get here? Yes. Fishing boat. It was almost dawn when you tried to kill us. I managed to hold Marshal up for a little while. We were lucky. What are you... Here.  I'll take you to the tower. Where's your wife? Marshal's gone to the mainland to get the doctor. We're alone. Yes. We're alone. Relax. No. Let me go, Tal. I... I didn't mean to do it. I was crazy with hunger. And that tune of yours... They're all crazy, Tal. I... I'll pay you. No, I'll pay you. It's too late, Grasso. Anything. Don't. Don't. You could start a... hemorrhage that way. What are you going to do to me? I'm nothing, of course. I... Here we are. You're not bringing me up here for the sun and the air, Tal. Why? You'll be very comfortable in this bed. Marshal liked it here. Wonderful view in every direction. These windows here pull to one side. What? Like this, eh? Now, I'll leave you direct... No, it's out. Don't walk, Grasso. What? I... I don't know. I... But you're up to something. Don't be silly. I'm just going to work on my music for a while. I'm having trouble with one part in it. It goes... Huh? Remember, Grasso? Well, that's it. I see it now. Why, you... You'll be safe here. I have this barred metal door here to keep saboteurs out. If you want anything, just talk. Acoustics are wonderful down these stairs. You can hear everything. Talk? No. My head... I'll do anything. Anything. Everything. Grasso. I heard about... Even I've smurred around the radio the other day. All right, all right! I get it.  I killed even my wife. I killed Slives.  Ha, ha, ha, ha. And the top drawer of the table next to the bed is a loaded revolver. Ha, ha, ha, ha. Stop, talk! The revolver... God, yeah. It'll stop it. Now, I'll never hear that song again. Never. Play it! Play your melody, talk! And the blaze is with you! Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha.  The gun is loaded with blanks. Ha, ha, ha, ha. It's still a way out. It's still a way out. All right. Talk. Marsha, darling. No. Everything is fine now. Yes. Yes, there is something you can do for me. Send Davis a wire, will you? Just say... Plan fall production of Symphony. Have just finished final score. Hey, how would some boogie-woogie sound to you right now? I'd settle for a nice cozy fife and drum corps. Now, stop that funny kind of talk, because I've got something important to say. Folks, tonight the Lipton Tea people have asked me to remind you that the goal of this Seventh War loan drive is $14 billion.  But every one of those dollars has a purpose behind it. And that purpose is to end the war in the Pacific as quickly as possible. Yes, that $14 billion is needed to move our soldiers halfway around the globe to build new ships and faster planes. We've promised our fighting men the very best weapons that can be made. That's the least we can do. And we're helping to fulfill that promise when we buy war bonds, when we support the Seventh War loan drive with every penny we can spare. So folks, please buy all that you can when the Victory Volunteer comes to your house. Oh, we got a moral for tonight's story. If you're thinking of marrying a musician, insist on a big house, don't go in for this lighthouse-keeping stuff. Oh, by the way, this month's dinner sanctum mystery novel is The Right Red Hand by Joel Rogers. And listen to this. Our star next week will be the famous traumatic actor of stage and screen Raymond Massey. He will appear in a story about a man who plays chess. Nice quiet little sport. Except that our friend uses human beings for his chess pieces.  Now it's time to close the squeaking door until next Tuesday. When Lipton Tea and Lipton Soup bring you Raymond Massey and another inner sanctum mystery story directed by Hyman Brown. So, until then, good night. Pleasant dream. There's a modern food with an old-fashioned homemade flavor. It's Lipton's noodle soup. Yes, Lipton's does taste homemade. It's got that same chickeny taste as the chicken noodle soup you make right in your own kitchen. Lipton's has got the same good herbs in the flavoring, the same tender golden egg noodles. But listen, Lipton's noodle soup mix comes in an envelope and it only takes a few minutes to prepare. Of course, sometimes it's hard to get in some stores these days, but there's lots of good things scarce in wartime. So remember to always ask for Lipton's noodle soup. And remember to tune in next Tuesday night for another inner sanctum mystery. This is CBS, the Columbia Broadcasting System.