OUR VIEW: Are these appointees arbiters, or advocates? | Editorials | Idaho Statesman
Royce Chigbrow worked more than 40 years as a certified public accountant, a sound professional background for a State Tax Commission appointee.
Chigbrow’s political ties are also a matter of public record. He has served as campaign treasurer for Republican candidates, including Butch Otter. In 2006, Chigbrow ran for state controller, losing in the GOP primary. A year later, Otter appointed Chigbrow to a full-time job on the Tax Commission.
As one of the state’s four tax umpires, is Chigbrow rendering professional decisions, or decisions tainted by personal and political ties? The answer reflects not only on Chigbrow, but on an embattled commission.
According to an Associated Press story last week, Tax Commission employees say Chigbrow interceded on behalf of some of his son’s clients, over the objection of agency workers. His son, Cordell Chigbrow, has followed his father into the field of accounting and into the political arena; the younger Chigbrow has served as treasurer for Otter’s gubernatorial campaigns. In several instances, according to the AP, Cordell Chigbrow’s firm contacted Royce Chigbrow, seeking a reduction in payment plans or penalties. The reductions were approved.
Cordell Chigbrow denies seeking special favors, and Royce Chigbrow said he simply forwarded e-mails to staff without recommendation. “I have always recused myself from any business transactions that involve my former partner, my former accounting firm, or cases that involve my son’s representation of clients.”
But, as is so often the case, this situation creates problems of perception. That is especially true because, as chairman of the commission, Chigbrow was the public face of a body that publicly (and defensively) dismissed allegations leveled in 2008 by longtime commission employee Stan Howland. Since then, several more in-house whistleblowers have come forward to suggest that the commission has repeatedly written off tax debts by cutting special deals with politically connected taxpayers — an allegation that is starting to sound more and more familiar.
To an extent, the perception problems relate back to structure, and the inherently political nature of State Tax Commission appointments. By state law, no more than two of the four appointees can belong to one political party. That’s no safeguard against political overtones, but instead an acknowledgement that they exist.
Is there a better way to ensure that tax complaints are handled by arbiters, not advocates? Sixteen-year state Rep. Wendy Jaquet, D-Ketchum, is pushing to put a professional in charge of the commission. Newly minted Senate President Pro Tem Brent Hill, a Rexburg Republican and a CPA himself, also says the Legislature should look at some of kind of restructuring.
The time has come to put this job in the hands of tax pros who don’t have political ties. Collecting taxes and settling tax disputes should be as apolitical a task as anything that falls under state government’s bailiwick.
“Our View” is the editorial position of the Idaho Statesman. It is an unsigned opinion expressing the consensus of the Statesman’s editorial board. To comment on an editorial or suggest a topic, e-mail editorial@idahostatesman.com.
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