Sales Tax Slice: Memorial Day Weekend: Remembering Sacrifices and Pondering Tax Questions | Bloomberg Tax
Memorial Day, initially called “Decoration Day,” is almost here with what has become a tradition of barbecues, concerts, and three day weekends for many workers. Additionally, many people mark the holiday by laying wreaths or flags on the graves of veterans. So, are these commemorative items, memorial concerts, and barbecue offerings taxable? Countless people (or maybe just tax attorneys like me) will be wondering.
Some organizations, like the Boy Scouts or the military, observe Memorial Day by placing flags at the graves of veterans. However, in some states, like Texas, sales of flags of any kind are subject to sales and use tax. Luckily for them, other states, such as Pennsylvania and New York, exempt the sale of United States flags from sales and use tax. New York goes a step further and exempts the New York state flag along with military service flags, prisoner of war flags and blue star banners. California even has an exemption for flag lapel pins when sold by a nonprofit veterans’ organization. California also has an exemption for “buddy poppies” or similar, symbolic, temporary lapel pins sold by the Veterans of Foreign Wars when the pins memorialize U.S. military veterans killed in foreign wars.
As concerts are often held on Memorial Day weekend, the question arises as to whether admission to such events is taxable. In Alabama, unless a concert is conducted by the state or any instrumentality thereof, admission will be taxable. In Texas, as long as a concert is held by a tax exempt organization, admission to that concert is also tax exempt. Meanwhile, Illinois doesn’t impose tax on admission charges to concerts at all, as places of public entertainment are considered to be providing a nontaxable service.
What about barbecues? Will your grilling fare be subject to sales tax? Most states, like Maine and Arkansas, tax grocery items at a reduced rate or exempt it from sales and use taxes altogether. But, if you’re buying your ribs pre-cooked, the exemption may be lost as many states tax prepared foods. If you’re serving cold beer at your cook-out, be prepared to pay tax on it, as various states, like Arizona and Florida, do not consider alcoholic beverages to be food for human consumption and tax it accordingly.
One of the first to arrive at Scott was a C-9A with tail number 22586, according to Master Sgt. Gerald Sonnenberg, who retired from the Air Force just three weeks ago as the 932nd Airlift Wing historian. But ironically in 1971, that air ambulance would require ambulances of a different kind after it slammed into your family’s home and exploded.
It was during a routine training flight on Thursday, Sept. 16, 1971, that three Air Force pilots were practicing “touch-’n’-goes,” during which an aircraft briefly touches down as if to land but immediately takes off again. Capt. James L. Rhame Jr., of Hampton, Va., was in the pilot’s seat while Maj. Aubrey L. Akin, of Houston, sat in the co-pilot’s seat to evaluate Rhame and Lt. Col. Lloyd M. Clore in their bid to become aircraft commanders. Riding in the jump seat, Clore, an employee of Southwestern Bell in Fairview Heights, was a veteran of World War II and Korea and a long-time reservist.
According to Sonnenberg, at about 2:50 p.m. Rhame and Akin had dropped down for another touch-’n’-go when a fan blade in the plane’s No. 2 engine failed. Engine parts began falling off and littering the runway, but the plane still managed to climb to about 400 feet. Then, about a mile northwest of the base, the plane began a rapid descent to a point just east of what is now Illinois 158 and a quarter-mile north of Wherry Road.
As it came down, according to a News-Democrat article the next day, the aircraft cut a wide swath 1,000 feet long from the time it hit trees surrounding the house until it came to a stop in a clump of pines that bordered the farmyard.
“Bricks from the Klotz home were found several hundred feet away,” the article said. “Two new pairs of coveralls and two new workshirts, purchased recently by Klotz, were flung from a closet and landed in a tree. They were not damaged.”
Emergency teams rushed to the scene to find the severed tail section and a massive wall of flames where the house had stood, according to Sonnenberg. By the time the fire was extinguished, the front stoop and chimney were all that remained of the six-room brick house.
All three pilots died in the crash, but someone must have been looking out for your relatives. According to Sonnenberg, Bill and Luella were in Belleville attending the annual convention of the Illinois State Grange. They said they had planned to return home at 2:30 — about 25 minutes before the crash — until friends convinced them to stay for the evening session.
The crash was the first involving a C-9A, ending the plane’s initial four-year spotless record. It was also the first accident at Scott since 1966, when a C-119 Flying Boxcar crashed nearby with no injury. A week later, the 932nd’s chaplain, Capt. John Richter, published a tribute to the pilots in the Command Post, writing, “Their service to man and nation will remain an inspiration to us and challenge our best efforts as we press on.”
The C-9A flew its final mission in September 2005. I will send you the stories from Sonnenberg and the News-Democrat for your scrapbook.
On what day were Belleville residents finally able to make a long-distance phone call that did not have to be connected by a human operator?
Answer to Friday’s trivia: People apparently took little note when “Green Grow the Lilacs” opened on Broadway on Jan. 26, 1931. Named for the popular folk song with the same title, Lynn Riggs’ musical that featured a young Tex Ritter lasted just 64 performances, closing on March 21. But it was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize and started popping up in regional productions around the country. That’s probably why the legendary team of Rodgers and Hammerstein took a second look at it. Writing all new music, they kept the same plot and turned it into one of Broadway’s most enduring musicals — “Oklahoma!,” which opened in 1943 and at that time ran for an unprecedented 2,212 performances. The Tony Awards did not start until 1947, but Rodgers and Hammerstein earned a special Pulitzer in 1943 and the show was awarded a special Tony on its 50th anniversary in 1993.
For many years, the garden at the farm has been the pride and joy of the chief farmer, my father-in-law. He planted and harvested many bushels of produce of all kinds. Even dog-tired from working all day, he would till his garden to perfection before going to bed.
We know he doesn’t care about much now, because he never says anything about the big patch of weeds out back where we try to make a garden each year. It always starts with promise and good intentions, but when we can’t be there to attend to it all the time, it becomes a jungle.
We salvaged some cabbages and a few onions, I think, before everything disappeared under the dense foliage. What is hidden in there does seem to be a big attraction for some bluebirds so we haven’t just mowed it off. I’m pretty sure there are some potatoes out there but a recent expedition failed to uncover where they might have been.
Meanwhile the cattle adventures continue. When a momma cow died giving birth, my son couldn’t find the baby at first. He finally tracked it down with the rest of the herd, trying to steal some milk from the other mommas. It was weak but had followed the other cows clear to the other end of the place, almost a mile away.
So it became a bottle baby, bedding down with some chickens in a pen and drinking milk starter twice a day. It is one of my mother-in-law’s pure joys to be able to baby a little one like that. This one didn’t survive, but there have been others, and some of them are still producing new babies each year.
I think the trick is to enjoy the days of rewards, not matter how slight, more than the days of disappointment. It’s not an easy job but it is just another farm chore.
▪ In the second, center fielder Will Greenwald had just been burned by a run-scoring triple off the bat of Nazareth Academy’s Matt Flach. The next batter, Carson Bartels roped a sinking liner into right-center field which would have driven home Flach. But Greenwald saved it with a diving back-handed catch.
“We’ve been solid defensively this whole post season,” Bentlage said. “Everybody just runs around and has fun.”
“It’s game of inches,” he said. “They made some great plays where, if the ball goes through on just a couple, we end up with four of rive more runs.”
The Emeritus position at BNL was established to recognize retired scientists who have made particularly noteworthy contributions to the Laboratory's reputation as a world-class scientific institution.
Carol Creutz has received the title of Senior Scientist Emeritus for her distinguished contributions in mechanistic chemistry, photochemistry, and catalysis. Creutz was named Chair of the Chemistry Department in 1995, the year this photo was taken.
Emeritus status was granted to Carol Creutz, effective at the time of her retirement as a senior chemist on September 30, 2012, for her long and distinguished career at the Laboratory. She joined BNL on November 1, 1972, after earning her Ph.D. at Stanford University in 1971.
In a congratulatory letter to Creutz from then-Lab Director Sam Aronson, he cited many of her accomplishments and contributions:
"As part of DOE's Solar Photochemistry program at the Laboratory, you have made distinguished contributions in mechanistic chemistry, photochemistry, and catalysis. You have advanced understanding of oxidation-reduction reactions and shown how such reactions can be effectively applied in proposed solar-to-fuels conversion. Your research advances in the spectroscopy of mixed-valence transition metal complexes and in mechanistic studies of reactions important to conversion of solar energy to fuels have had wide scientific impact.
"You have been a valuable member of the Chemistry Department since 1972, and you have been a key contributor in the strong worldwide reputation of the BNL Solar Photochemistry program. Your service as Chair of the Chemistry Department from 1995 to 2000 helped guide the Department through the difficult times following the shutdown of the BNL research reactors and the associated program impacts. You have contributed to the growth in importance of basic energy science, and the initiation of new programs in nanoscience that are playing an increasingly important role in the Chemistry Department's research.
"Your continued engagement and reputation as a creative research scientist and work in mechanistic chemistry and solar photochemistry are extremely valuable to the Laboratory."
Said Creutz, "I am very moved by and grateful for Dr. Aronson's letter. I am also very grateful for the opportunity to continue in my studies of chemical mechanisms for reactions to be used in converting and storing the energy from sunlight into electricity and fuels. This vast and important field offers many demanding unsolved problems and solving these contributes to a broader understanding of the world at large."
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We are excited to offer this 2019 Nissan Armada. This SUV gives you versatility, style and comfort all in one vehicle. You appreciate the finer things in life, the vehicle you drive should not be the exception. Style, performance, sophistication is in a class of its own with this stunning Nissan Armada. This is the one. Just what you've been looking for. This is about the time when you're saying it is too good to be true, and let us be the one's to tell you, it is absolutely true. We look forward to seeing you soon! Please call us for more information.