February 4, 2003

The Honorable Pamela F. Olson
Assistant Secretary (Tax Policy)
Department of the Treasury Room
3120 MT
1500 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W.
Washington, DC 20220

Robert E. Wenzel
Acting Commissioner
Internal Revenue Service
Room 3000 IR
1111 Constitution Avenue, N.W.
Washington, DC 20224

Note: The views expressed herein represent only those of the of the District of Columbia Bar Taxation Section and not those of the District of Columbia Bar or its Board of Governors. The Taxation Section is comprised of approximately 1,500 members. These materials were prepared by an ad hoc committee of the District of Columbia Bar Taxation Section. The members of the ad hoc committee are Andrea M. Whiteway (Chair), Rachel Cantor, Michael Cooper, Michael Desmond, Jeanne Falstrom, Bruce Larsen, Mark Liniado, Kelly Murray, Steven Rosenthal, Michael Rufkahr, and Charlie Temkin.

Re: Comments on New Tax Shelter List Maintenance Regulations

Ladies and Gentlemen:

Enclosed please find comments from the District of Columbia Bar Taxation Section on the Temporary and Proposed Regulations Regarding the Requirement to Maintain a List of Investors in Potentially Abusive Tax Shelters issued on October 22, 2002 (the "New Regulations"). The New Regulations substantially revise the rules obligating promoters to maintain lists with respect to potentially abusive tax shelter transactions. Although we support the New Regulations, our comments address three problems: the "after-the-fact" problem, the "retroactivity" problem and the "unlimited information gathering" problem. In our comments, we propose changes to the regulatory language to fix these problems and explain our reasoning.

We have limited our suggestions to these three problems because other commentators have provided useful suggestions for improving the New Regulations in other areas. Please feel free to contact the undersigned if you wish to discuss any of our suggestions or any other issues relating to the New Regulations.

The views expressed herein represent only those of the of the District of Columbia Bar Taxation Section and not those of the District of Columbia Bar or its Board of Governors. The Taxation Section is comprised of approximately 1,500 members. These materials were prepared by an ad hoc committee of the District of Columbia Bar Taxation Section. The members of the ad hoc committee are Andrea M. Whiteway (Chair), Rachel Cantor, Michael Cooper, Michael Desmond, Jeanne Falstrom, Bruce Larsen, Mark Liniado, Kelly Murray, Steven Rosenthal, Michael Rufkahr, and Charlie Temkin.

Respectfully submitted,
Miriam L. Fisher

cc:
Jeffrey H. Paravano
Eric Solomon
The Honorable B. John Williams, Jr.
Gary B. Wilcox
Nicholas J. DeNovio
Charlotte Chyr
Danielle M. Grimm
Tara P. Volungis
Matthew Stevens
Julian Kim