Nice Things We Can and Can't Have

Happy Juneteenth.  I am mostly off for it, though I've gotten some calls and made a few others.  I also decided to put some thoughts down about this holiday in this month of observance. I will probably read it a week from Wednesday at the next open mic, but here goes:
 

( Marginal of Error )

So stay tuned for that. Then there's another angle on the current tensions between Big Uni and Smaller School which I briefly touched on the other day. In particular, a general trend and a specific fail we've come across.

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I am a graduate of two universities. Three, really, since the "U" in "UB" is also part of the bigger "U" that is the "State University of New York." Which is not to be confused with the "University of the State of New York," a much older and broader amalgamation of academia dating back far further than SUNY's founding in 1948. That older "University" is what the State Board of Regents runs, and it includes every school in the state from the simplest PlayDoh-generating public kindergarten to the highest PhD-generating graduate school. It also regulates every profession except mine. And if you weren't confused enough, New York University is neither, but a single private institution in lower Manhattan.

Until 1948, public colleges in New York State were a loosely defined mishmash of some teachers colleges (originally called "normal schools") such as Buffalo and Geneseo State; a handful of colleges of varying specialties and degree levels run under the auspices of otherwise private uni's at Cornell and Alfred.  Some counties and other entities also formed community colleges of their own. But in 1948, the weather all turned SUNY- with a hierarchy of centers, colleges, specialized programs at various levels and the community colleges all brought in. The formerly all-private University of Buffalo- along with its professional schools of law, medicine and dentistry- merged into the system in 1962; before that, Vestal's Harpur College, once part of Syracuse University, became the seed from which the full-U Binghamton Univerity center of SUNY grew. It did so just as UB went through numerous rebrandings emphasizing the SUNY, the NEW YORK and the BUFFALO at various times, but was always one of the four "university centers" with the fullest range of degree granting.

That began to change when the Regents, of that OTHER "University," changed the game.

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Until recently, only certain colleges could use the U-word in the name of their specific state-chartered higher education joint in New York. Previously, in order for you to be a U except as part of a bigger U,

University means a higher educational institution offering a range of registered undergraduate and graduate curricula in the liberal arts and sciences, degrees in two or more professional fields, and doctoral programs in at least three academic fields.

Ah, that pesky professional school rule. But as of January 2022?

University means a higher educational institution offering a range of registered undergraduate and graduate curricula in the liberal arts and sciences, including graduate programs registered in at least three of the following discipline areas: agriculture, biological sciences, business, education, engineering, fine arts, health professions, humanities, physical sciences and social sciences.

So, basically anything but basket weaving unless the basket's pretty darn fine.  Since then, around WNY, there's been an academic procession of colleges all lining up to Claim The Name.  In Rochester, the summer home of the Bills is now St. John Fisher University. The Kompeting Katholic school across East Avenue from them is now Nazareth U, though you may have to go to Bethlehem to register. Meanwhile, the signs are being changed as well right here in Buffalo. Starting with the older local member of SUNY on Elmwood Avenue that is oft mistaken for UB in mostly Amherst: Buffalo State College is now Buffalo State University, further confusing anyone who can't figure out which is which. Again, there's a similar crop of private sectarians doing the Vatican Rag of Renaming:  Canisius and Daemen U's on Main Street. D'Youville U on Porter Avenue. And, in the lovely area of Parkside, the first to make that official change,  Medaille U.

Or Not to U. There are many questions.

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I've never set a foot on Medaille grounds. Perhaps met one of its graduates. I do remember, while in law school, seeing them running local tv commercials with their then-priest of a college president, in clerical garb with an Irish brogue practically singing "Toora Loora Loora," pitching the school as providing traditional Catholic values without the nuns with rulers. 

Ah, but if you really want to sell the product,....

They added residential facilities, partnered with my own law school alma mater for a "3+3" program to get a J.D. in six years, and expanded to remote campuses in Amherst and Rochester. The biggest move, though, was sinking millions into a massive new athletic complex on the other side of the city for their rah-rah fighting sports teams....

The Mavericks.

Huh.  Must not have read up on the legacy of THAT brand:P

Also, not just "other side of the city," but:

Medaille trustees had approved a lease agreement for the Elk Street land running through 2036 “with payments increasing over time” and a location next to a chemical plant “that has continued to emit airborne toxins” resulting in “health issues for those exposed while on the premises.”

THAT assessment is part of a post-mortem in today's online Buffalo News (right-click that link and select "open in private/incognito mode" to get past the paywall) about why Medaille has just become Unseen University. After a failed attempt at merging with yet another local Catholic institution, Trocaire Not Yet A University, the school announced that it is closing its lecture hall doors forever after graduating its final class last month.  The reasons are many and varied, the possibly toxic dirt all dished in that article, but the biggest bit of interest to me in it was the primary stated reason for Trocaire following in good Catholic contraceptive fashion and pulling out at the last minute:

When Trocaire College pulled out of a deal to buy Medaille University last month, it cited concerns that Medaille had filed for pandemic-related federal tax credits it may not be legally entitled to claim.

 

Trocaire’s purchase agreement with Medaille gave Trocaire the option to terminate the deal if it wasn’t satisfied that Medaille was eligible for the credits, called Employee Retention Credits, according to a letter Trocaire President Bassam Deeb sent to Medaille Interim President Lori Quigley on May 9.

Which gets us to the other nice thing we apparently can't have anymore.

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Beginning with its own name. the COVID pandemic of 2020 onward was an alphabet soup of acronymia. Medically, we learned of N95s and PPE and lots of others from the CDC. Meanwhile, the government gave us the CARES Act, the HEROES Act, the PPP program, and, pertinent to the demise of Medaille, the ERC.

I didn't learn of the "Employee Retention Credit" program  myself until things had settled somewhat back into normalcy in 2021. I'd filed a bankruptcy for a restaurant that shut down toward the end of 2020 after trying to make a go of it during the first year of the shutdown.  It leased its location and equipment, its inventory was negligible and perishable, and nobody owed it any money. A small insurance refund and a couple hundred bucks in the bank were all it had. "No asset case," the trustee said. Then he got a call from a local accountant specializing in tax matters.

Did my client have employees during 2020? Yes.
Did it withhold and pay over their taxes as required? Also yes. (These follow you personally and I always tell people to make sure these get paid.)

Based on those answers and, with a little work from me, he got approved on a contingent fee basis to apply for a credit back to the restaurant's trustee of all the withholdings he turned over in those quarters. Early on, the IRS sent in over ten grand, with more expected.  This was a way of encouraging people to keep their businesses going as much and as long as possible. Even I benefited; no credit against my own self-employment taxes, but I did get to defer over $3,400 of them from 2020 into the following two years with no interest or penalty.

Beginning sometime last year, though, ERC had become the target of scammers and other smooth operators. I began hearing ads on radio shows, sometimes many every hour, Even if you got PPP money, even if you made a profit, even if you're a non-profit! No fee unless we get you the money! 

That's the problem with programs like this, is they attract attention like this. Much like the older, off by one letter tax acronym EIC for Earned Income Credit, likewise a well-intentioned means of helping hard-working low-income taxpayers in the US that's been abused by tax preparers and family members, to the point where a paid preparer can't even file a return asking for it without attaching a Spanish Inquisition of a form certifying entitlement to the money.

That's just side one- it's longer than the current Form 1040 itself!  So with these sharp operators clogging the IRS with these applications, at a minimum it's slowing down approval of legitimate requests for the credit (my client's from 2021 is still awaiting one 2020 calendar quarter getting final approval), while at worst it's letting taxpayer money out the door to people, and possibly universities, who aren't entitled to it.  It's been suggested to me that the tap may now be turned off on account of the Republican hostage-taking over the debt limit this month, which was "paid for" in part by throwing unspent COVID-related "surpluses" back into the treasury pot.  Which may help my client's creditors, but won't help the underclassmen of Medaille who now have no place to go or their faculty or staff members who were summarily cut off from their paychecks as soon as the deal fell through.

But at least they got Juneteenth off, so they've got that going for them, which is nice:P