Committee asks LSO to redraft exemption-reporting bill, seeks data on tax foregone

The committee turned to tax-exemption reporting after the Department of Revenue explained the state lacks comprehensive, reliable surveys of exemptions since a reporting requirement was removed in earlier sessions. Brett Fanning described how past surveys were time-consuming, incomplete and why other states (Virginia was cited) use memoranda of understanding or MOUs to require reporting as a condition of receiving an exemption. He told the committee the core data stakeholders want are "the amount of tax that you've collected; the amount of tax that you've paid; the amount of sales and use tax that has been foregone due to the exemption; the amount of property tax that you've paid; and total number of full- and part-time Wyoming employees, along with average wage and benefit information."