On January 10, 2024, the Commonwealth Court held in NHL Players Ass’n v. City of Pittsburgh, (No. 1150 C.D. 2022) that the City of Pittsburgh’s Facility Tax — a unique tax on nonresidents who use a sports stadium or arena (“Facility”) to engage in an athletic event or other performance — violated the Pennsylvania
Uncategorized
Update on Tower Health’s Chester and Montgomery County Real Estate Tax Exemption Appeals
On October 16, 2023, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court granted Tower Health’s Petition for Allowance of Appeal related to the Montgomery County hospital property. The Supreme Court is going to address the following two issues on appeal:
- Whether the Commonwealth Court erred by holding that Pottstown Hospital, LLC, offered substantial executive compensation based upon the financial
UPCOMING PENNSYLVANIA ANNUAL ASSESSMENT APPEAL DEADLINES POST AUGUST 1
Now that the 2024 tax year August 1 annual assessment appeal filing deadline has passed for 26 counties in Pennsylvania, the appeal deadlines for the remaining 41 counties are as follows:
August 15
Berks
August 31
Wyoming
September 1
ARMSTRONG, BEDFORD, BRADFORD, CAMERON, CARBON, CENTRE, CLEARFIELD, CLINTON, COLUMBIA, CUMBERLAND, ELK, FOREST, FULTON, GREENE, HUNTINGDON, JEFFERSON…
PA Commonwealth Court Flatlines Nonprofit Hospitals Exempt Status for Real Property Taxes
On February 10, 2023, in a much-anticipated group of Opinions, the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court (“Court”) held that four separate Tower Health hospitals (one in Montgomery County and three in Chester County) did not qualify as institutions of purely public charity and thus, the hospitals were not entitled to real property tax exemptions for the 2018…
Allegheny County – Bonus – Real Estate Tax Assessment Appeal Deadline – March 31, 2023
The deadline for filing a real estate tax assessment appeal for the 2023 tax year is fast approaching in Allegheny County. The deadline is March 31, 2023. Normally, you would only be able to appeal the assessment for the 2023 tax year, however, because of the shenanigans with Allegheny County manipulating the Common Level Ratio…
New Year, New Useful Guidance: Clarification on Inflation Reduction Act’s New Excise Tax for Share Redemptions
This past summer under the Inflation Reduction Act, Congress enacted new Internal Revenue Code (“Code”) Section 4501, which imposes an excise tax on certain corporate redemptions or repurchases by a corporation of its own stock. Essentially, Section 4501 only applies to “Covered Corporations”, which more or less translates to corporations whose stock is publicly traded.
Circle of Seasons: A Refresher on the Importance of Administrative Formalities
In Circle of Seasons Charter School v. Northwestern Lehigh School District, 273 A.3d 23 (Pa. Cmwlth. 2022), the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court reversed the trial court decision, and the matter was remanded to the common pleas court to transfer the matter to the County of Lehigh Board of Assessment Appeals via a nunc pro tunc…
Philadelphia Publishes FAQs Addressing Expiration of Its Temporary Nexus Waiver
In February, the City of Philadelphia published FAQs regarding expiration of the temporary nexus waiver that had been in place during the COVID-19 pandemic. During the pandemic, the City had temporarily waived its legal nexus threshold that considers the presence of employees working temporarily from home within the City as sufficient to establish nexus for…
PA Supreme Court Says Whistleblower Payments are Taxable Compensation
Recently, in O’Donnell v. Allegheny County North Tax Collection Committee, et al., No. 8 WAP 2021 (Dec. 27, 2021), the Pennsylvania Supreme Court held that whistleblower payments constituted compensation subject to local earned income taxes.
In 2014, the taxpayer had filed an action alleging that his employer violated the federal False Claims Act (“FCA”). …
PA Commonwealth Court affirms that Bankruptcy and Trust Fund Taxes Don’t Play Well Together
On March 3, 2021, the Commonwealth Court in Mandler and Nuclear Imaging Systems, Inc. v. Commw., No. 483 F.R. 2014, overruled taxpayers’ exceptions to the Court’s decision affirming the denial of the taxpayers’ petition for refund of employer withholding taxes paid to the Pennsylvania Department of Revenue (the “Department”) in satisfaction of $180,000 in…