Public.Resource.org v. United States Internal Revenue Service

Filing 46

MOTION for Summary Judgment filed by United States Internal Revenue Service. Motion Hearing set for 1/7/2015 02:00 PM in Courtroom 2, 17th Floor, San Francisco before Hon. William H. Orrick. Responses due by 9/29/2014. Replies due by 10/29/2014. (Attachments: # 1 Proposed Order, # 2 Declaration of A. Leach, # 3 Declaration of D. Higley, # 4 Declaration of D. Ross, # 5 Declaration of J. Archibald, # 6 Declaration of L. Rosenmerkel, # 7 Declaration of M. Hooke, # 8 Declaration of U. Gillis, # 9 Exhibit 101, # 10 Exhibit 102, # 11 Exhibit 103, # 12 Exhibit 104, # 13 Exhibit 105, # 14 Exhibit 106, # 15 Exhibit 107)(Gelblum, Yonatan) (Filed on 8/13/2014)

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA

PUBLIC RESOURCE.ORG

)
)
)

Plaintiff
v.
INTERNAL REVENUE SERVICE,
Defendant.

)
)
)
)
)

Case No: 3: 13-cv-2789

)

DECLARATION OF MARIA D. HOOKE
I, Maria D. Hooke, pursuant to the provisions of 28 U.S.C. § 1746, declare as follows:
1. I am a Supervisory Program Analyst for the Business Systems Planning (BSP)
Organization in the Tax Exempt Government Entities Operating Division of the
Internal Revenue Service (Service or IRS).
2. My duties include overseeing the Submission Processing Programs (SPP) as
part of the BSP Organization. SPP Analysts author IRM 3.20.12, which provides
the instructions for Wage & Investment (W&I) employees to use when imaging
the Form 990 series returns in the Statistic of Income Exempt Organization
Image Net (SEIN). SPP also prepares and monitors the work plan assumption
figures for the imaging process. The assumption provides the hours and volumes
projected and used for this project. These figures were used to determine the
cost per document to image, redact and restrict. The costing information is
based on historical information considering the average time to complete a task
and a factor for the salary of the employees completing the task that is applied to

the estimated number of returns expected to be filed. The technique used in the
estimate is one that is routinely used at the IRS for program evaluation/planning
purposes.
3. "Image" means to scan the document as a TIF (tag image file) file in Adobe PDF
format. "Redact" means to mark and block out text in a TIF so once the
redaction is applied, the text is blacked out and illegible. "Restrict" means to
apply a computer code that indicates the TIF is not publicly available. When a
TIF is restricted, only IRS employees granted specific authority can access the
file.
4. I am aware that Public Resource filed a FOIA suit to obtain copies of Forms 990
(Return of Organization Exempt from Income Tax). I was contacted by Ms. A. M.
Gulas, Senior Counsel, Office of Associate Chief Counsel (Procedure and
Administration), and asked to describe and compile cost estimates for the current
process used to prepare Form 990 series returns for release to the public under
section 6104 of the Internal Revenue Code.
5. Exempt organizations are required by the Code to file returns with the IRS. Once
received, these returns are imaged into the SEIN system by W&l employees in
the IRS Ogden Service Center. The image is a TIF (tag image file) file in Adobe
PDF format. Forms 990 are available on COs or DVDs in Raw or Alchemy
format. The Raw format is just the TIF files (one file per page) plus an index file
showing which files belonged to which returns. The Raw format is best for users
who intend to process the image file through their own software. The Alchemy
-2-

format provides a search engine within the DVD allowing the subscriber the
capability of searching the index fields, i.e., EIN's, Tax Year, Taxpayer name,
State, ZIP, Return Type, Sub Code (the subsection of the Internal Revenue Code
under which the organization was granted exempt status), Total Assets and Sub
Date (means the date the organzation was granted tax exempt status). The
Alchemy format is best for users who wish to examine the returns visually.
6. Based on Form 990 receipts over the past years, when I prepared the budgeting
costs for the year, I estimated that 753,638 returns would need to be imaged in
2014. In 2013, the IRS received 376,588 Form 990 Series returns in paper
format and 318,910 electronically. The costing information for the W&l
employees is based on historical information considering the average time to
complete a task and a factor for the salary of the employees completing the task
that is applied to the estimated number of returns expected to be filed. The
estimated cost for W&l employees to image and restrict that number of Form 990
series returns is $447,596 (rounded up to the nearest dollar). This cost includes
the estimated labor cost of restricting the Schedule 8 to prevent its release. The
estimate I provided does not include the costs related to the SEIN system, which
is the system maintained and supported by the Office of Research, Analysis and
Statistics.
7. Once the Forms 990 are imaged, they are available for processing Form 4506-A

(Request for Public Inspection or Copy of Exempt Organization IRS Form)
requests from the public. Form 4506-A and media requests for public inspection

-3-

as processed by the EO RAIVS (Return and Income Verification Services
("RAIVS") unit, a group of W&l employees in the Ogden Service Center.
8. The EO RAIVS clerks follow procedures set out in IRM 3.20.13 (Exempt
Organization Photocopy Procedures) to redact confidential information that is not
available to the public under section 6104. One example is the Schedule B, list
of donors, which is a common document that would be included on all 990 Forms
except the 990-T, but Schedule B cannot be released to the public.
9. The budget figures I prepared for 2014 projected cost included $60,752 to restrict
the Schedule B from release. This figure is based on an average of 4 pages per
Schedule B, and 5 seconds to restrict each page, using a projected volume of
712,400 returns for calendar year 2014. The volume was adjusted to remove the
Form 990-T, which does not require a Schedule B.
10. Currently, the IRS does not have an electronic process to retrieve, redact and
restrict the electronically filed exempt organization returns and provide copies to
the public in a machine readable format. Based on a proposal that the Code be
amended to require that all Forms 990 be filed electronically, the IRS has
proposed development of a new system that would provide Form 990 series
returns in a machine readable format.
I
I
I

-4-

I declare under penalty of perjury that the foregoing is true and correct to the best of my
knowledge and belief.
Executed this

12>

day of August, 2014.

\..0)~~ ~
Maria D. Hooke
Supervisory Program Analyst
Headquarters Business Systems Planning
Tax Exempt & Government Entities
Internal Revenue Service
Charlotte, North Carolina

-5-