C Street House No Longer Tax Exempt

[kpete]

Source: Talking Points Memo

C Street House No Longer Tax Exempt
Zachary Roth | November 17, 2009, 1:40PM


Residents of the C Street Christian fellowship house will no longer benefit from a loophole that had allowed the house's owners to avoid paying property taxes.

Previously, the house -- despite being home to numerous lawmakers -- had been tax exempt, because it was classified as a church. That arrangement had allowed the building's owner, the secretive international Christian organization The Family, to charge significantly below market rents to its residents. In recent year, Senators John Ensign (R-NV), Tom Coburn (R-OK), Sam Brownback (R-KS) and Jim DeMint (R-SC), and Reps. Zach Wamp (R-TN), Bart Stupak (D-MI) and Mike Doyle (D-PA) have all reportedly called C Street home.

Natalie Wilson, a spokeswoman for the Office of Tax and Revenue for Washington D.C., told TPMmuckraker that her office inspected the house this summer. "It was determined that portions of it were being rented out for private residential purposes," she said. As a result, the tax exempt status was partially revoked. Sixty-six percent of the value of the property is now subject to taxation.

According to online records, the total taxable assessment is $1,834,500. The building's owner last month paid taxes of $1714.70 on the property.

Read more: http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/11/c_street_house_no_longer_tax_exempt.php?ref=mp

[BumRushDaShow]

1. Oh my.

:popcorn:

[Mari333]

2. those f8ckers thought they could call themselves a church???

assholes didnt want to pay taxes?? oh the hypocrites!!!

[mascarax]

3. Why only 66%?

Or can we all declare certain rooms in our houses as a "church" and thus get tax exempt status too?!

[AlbertCat]

7. can we all declare certain rooms in our houses as a "church"

Only if your interior decorator is DIVINE!


Here's a foot note from the book I just finished. Richard Dawkins "The Greatest Show on Earth" (he's British, y'know....but this applies)


"Tax free status is easily obtained by almost any religious organization. Organizations that are not religious have to jump through hoops to demonstrate that they benefit humanity. I recently established a charitable foundation dedicated to promoting 'Reason and Science'. During the protracted, extremely expensive, and ultimately successful negotiations to obtain charitable status, I received a letter from the British Charity Commission dated 28 September 2006 which contained the following:'It is not clear how the advancement of science tends toward the mental and moral improvement of the public. Please provide us with evidence of this, or explain how it is linked to the advancement of humanism and rationalism.' Religious organizations, by contrast, are assumed to benefit humanity without any obligation to demonstrate it and even, apparently, if they are actively engaged in promoting scientific falsehood."

The "scientific falsehood" bit is in response to the fact (stated in the text above the foot note) that the Creation Museum in Ky is tax exempt (therefore we pay taxes to fund the spreading of this crap) and in England so do their citizens "pay" for the tax exempt Al-Nasr Trust...that distributes on campuses leaflets denying evolution. "Miseducation on a grand scale" as Dawkins rightly puts it.
You pay for it! You paid for C-House and you still pay for The Family.

[Politicalboi]

4. I hope they go back in years

And then file charges for lying on their taxes.

[tblue]

5. Ha. Ha. Ha. nt

[onehandle]

6. Chump change to these guys, but fair is fair. nt

[Historic NY]

8. A tax exempt flop house.. wow whats next the local whore house.

[aquart]

9. Ancient religions always contained a sexual component.

To keep the earth fertile with sympathetic magic.

It's only modern religion that worships getting pregnant without sex.

[Bette Noir]

10. Is anyone else annoyed that those Nazis not only call themselves "Christians,"

but they get the media to call them that, too?

I'd substitute "secretive authoritarian cult" for "secretive Christian organization" in the above story.

[Demeter]

11. Not Enough, But a Good Start

Hound these fascists to death.

[Vinca]

12. Hard to believe a boarding house for bullshit artists was exempt in the first place.