Yeshiva World News

The Internal Revenue Service detailed plans on Monday to weed out wealthy, international tax cheats with renewed urgency.

IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman said the agency recently formed the Global High Wealth Industry task force to target investors with assets “in the neighborhood of $30 million.”

Shulman, as he addressed members of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants in Washington, DC., said that a more “holistic” approach was necessary to find international tax cheats, given the growth in Americans investing overseas, and the broad and complicated nature of modern financing.

Shulman said the IRS has already hired flow-through specialists and international examiners. Over time, he plans to add additional tax agents with expertise on economic trends, valuation issues, and other areas.

As part of an earlier effort to bring U.S.-based international taxpayers into compliance, Shulman said that 7,500 investors recently participated in an offshore amnesty program.

The IRS has become more aggressive, but also more flexible, in tracking down international tax cheats. In August, the IRS struck a deal with the Swiss government, gaining access to thousands of UBS AG (UBS) accounts that Americans might have used to dodge tax payments.

(Source: CNN Money)

The NY Daily News reports: Capt. Kenneth Corey, commander of the 76th Precinct, covering Cobble Hill, Carroll Gardens and Red Hook, has taken his policing skills to the Internet, e-mailing crime updates and using the Web to dispel Internet rumors.

Corey’s posts, usually following the monthly Precinct Community Council meetings, sometimes take on a small town tone, but also remind residents of big city dangers.

When cops were on the hunt for a burglar, Corey told his readers police apprehended a Peeping Tom – or in police language, a man who “was surreptitiously photographing the occupant of the residence.”

Corey’s digital skills have attracted the notice of Police Department higherups, and other Brooklyn precinct commanders have asked him about creating their own online presence.

Some of the other borough precincts also are harnessing the power of the Internet. The 70th Precinct Community Council, covering Flatbush and Midwood, has a bare-bones blog that mainly serves as the council’s calendar.

In Canarsie’s 69th Precinct, officers send e-mails notifying residents of major crimes.

Corey’s e-mails go a step further – in addition to the crime posts, such as a string of burglaries in Cobble Hill that eventually led to an arrest – he notifies residents about other local issues, such as a warehouse collapse in August that damaged seven parked cars.

His list of recipients has reached about 100, but he noted, “Every time I send it out, I get another handful of people who want to be on it.”

The e-mails also contain monthly crime statistics and tips to avoid things like bicycle theft.

A Park Slope native and now a Staten Island resident, Corey, 41, took over the precinct in January and launched an electronic newsletter in June after making two observations about the district.

Corey sometimes corrects inaccuracies about crimes that he reads online. Last week, a blog reported that pedestrians were hit in a car accident on Columbia St. Corey e-mailed a note that only passengers were hurt.

(Source: NY Daily News)

[Rabbi Menachem Genack is the CEO of the Orthodox Union Kosher Division]

Dear Friends:

I write to share with you my strong conviction that Governor Corzine is good for the Orthodox Jews. Our community should support him because it has a substantial stake in his success. I touch here on just a few issues of major concern:
Education:

• Governor Corzine supports increased funding to our schools – under his administration there is some $94 million available in 2010 state funding to nonpublic schools for such things as remedial education, home instruction, remedial services for handicapped children in nonpublic schools, supplementary instruction, transportation and nursing services and textbooks.

• The Governor stated forthrightly to the Orthodox Union that while he does not support vouchers on constitutional, policy and financial grounds – and there is a divergence of opinion on the financial benefit of vouchers even within the Orthodox community – he fully appreciates the financial burden of parents opting to send their children to parochial schools and supports both charitable donation tax deductions and the establishment of a study commission chaired by Assemblyman Gary Schaer composed of members of the broad non-public school community to fully examine ways in which their educational mission could be supported by the state to the benefit of New Jersey children enrolled in these schools.

• With regard to technology grants to non-public schools – In his meeting with the Orthodox Union, Governor Corzine committed to work to restore some $7 million in non-public school technology grants in the upcoming “lame duck” session. In the meantime, public school districts applying for the $11.4 million available in New Jersey in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) funds must consult with nonpublic schools, which are eligible to participate if they meet the program criteria of having high concentrations of low-income students and demonstrated educational need.
Property Tax Burden.

• Governor Corzine has been working on our property tax burden since the first day he went to Trenton. While there is more work to be done, the long-term reforms that Governor Corzine put in place have started to work – last year, the increase in property taxes across the State was the lowest in 10 years. Through increased funding for education ($1.8 billion) and more shared services and consolidations, property taxes are finally beginning to stabilize.

• In four years, Governor Corzine has delivered nearly $7 billion in property tax relief to New Jersey families. And, this year, even while he cut the budget, he preserved rebates for seniors and those who need it most – families with incomes $75,000 and below. The Governor has committed to restoring the rebates to all eligible families when our economy recovers.

• The Governor also expanded “Senior Freeze” property tax rebates and 70,000 more seniors and disabled residents are now eligible. He also extended the filing deadline so that everyone eligible had a chance to get a rebate. And, he also eliminated the 3 year residency requirement for seniors seeking eligibility for the rebate.

Charitable Tax Deduction

• The Governor went on record with the Orthodox Union in support of a state charitable tax deduction on donations made to an array of non-profit entities including religious institutions.

Religious Accommodation

• Governor Corzine demonstrated his leadership in this area by signing legislation proposed by Assemblyman Gary Schaer that puts in place key religious accommodation laws protecting the religiously observant of all faiths in the workplace, on college campuses and in hospitals and nursing homes.

• It was Governor Corzine who ensured that observant Jewish inmates in the state’s prisons have kosher (and kosher for Passover) food.

Security Issues

• This is an issue of grave concern to our Orthodox community, and to other religious communities – most recently underscored by events in Middlesex County. It is of equally grave concern to Governor Corzine, who has instructed the Attorney General to vigorously address the commission of bias crimes throughout the State.

• Further, Governor Corzine expanded the State’s Bias and Intimidation Statute – New Jersey’s hate crimes law – to add protections and strengthened the State’s bullying laws.

On a host of other issues, from energy efficiency, to demonstrated support for Israel through a revitalized and permanent NJ-Israel Commission, to divesting funds from Iran, to selecting Senator Loretta Weinberg, an experienced Jewish legislator, as his running-mate, Governor Corzine has a proven record of leadership on issues we care about as Orthodox Jews, as residents of New Jersey, and as Americans. He deserves re-election.

Sincerely,
Rabbi Menachem Genack

(YWN World Headquarters – NYC)

CNN has hit a new low. Its prime-time shows have finished dead last among the cable news networks, The New York Times reports.

When the October cable news ratings were finalized Monday afternoon, CNN finished fourth and last place for the first time. The network that pioneered the 24-hour news format has trailed the Fox News Channel and MSNBC before, but is now also being beaten by its sister network, CNN Headline News.

The Times explains: “The results demonstrate once more the apparent preference of viewers for opinion-oriented shows from the news networks in prime time.”

For the first time, MSNBC’s “Countdown with Keith Olbermann” beat CNN’s prime-time highlight, “Anderson Cooper 360,” and Sean Hannity’s and Rachel Maddow’s programs both finished solidly ahead of “Larry King Live” in the prime-time hours.

CNN said that it still attracts the most viewers when all hours of the day are considered, and that it is no surprise that viewers turn to more partisan programming during prime-time. “CNN’s ratings are always going to be more dependent on the news environment, much more so that opinion-based programming especially in prime time,” the network said in a statement.

CNN’s prime-time programs don’t lack opinions, said Don Surber in the Charleston, W.V., Daily Mail. It’s the “sneaky” way the network uses to express them — “Anderson Cooper’s sneering contempt for conservative protesters,” for example — that turned people off, and pulled CNN’s prime-time ratings down 68 percent in the last year. “Cooper and company try to be stealth but they come of as snide and fake, as if they are trying to hide who they really are.”

(Source: Politics Daily)

Erie County, NY – A leading Jewish group rejected an up-state Republican’s apology for comparing Assembly Speaker Shelly Silver, the Orthodox Jewish speaker of the state Assembly, to Adolf Hitler and calling him an anti-Christ.

The Simon Wiesenthal Center issued a statement saying the mea culpa by Erie County Executive Chris Collins, who is eying a run for governor, “is small solace.”

“This was not an off the-cuff remark made in the heat of political debate or battle, but during remarks made and prepared for a public audience at a fund-raising event,” said Rabbi Marvin Hier, founder and dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center.

Collins tried to call Silver yesterday, but did not get through and did not receive a return call.

As was reported yesterday that during a GOP dinner in Buffalo, Collins compared Silver to Adolf Hitler and called him an anti-Christ.

Collins through a spokesman said he made a “poor joke” and extended his “sincerest apologies” to Silver.

A Silver spokesman declined to comment for a second straight day.

(Source: NY Daily News)

New Yorkers are fleeing the state and city in alarming numbers — and costing a fortune in lost tax dollars, a new study shows.

More than 1.5 million state residents left for other parts of the United States from 2000 to 2008, according to the report from the Empire Center for New York State Policy. It was the biggest out-of-state migration in the country.

The vast majority of the migrants, 1.1 million, were former residents of New York City — meaning one out of seven city taxpayers moved out.

“The Empire State is being drained of an invaluable resource — people,” the report said.

It all adds up to staggering loss in taxable income. During 2006-2007, the “migration flow” out of New York to other states amounted to a loss of $4.3 billion.

The center, part of the Manhattan Institute, blames the state’s high cost of living and high taxes.

(Source: NY Post)

London – The case of a Jewish school accused of breaching race relations laws could have ramifications for other faith schools, the government says.

The Supreme Court case centres on the refusal of London school JFS to admit a boy whose mother converted to Judaism in a way that it does not accept.

Appeal Court judges held that as Jews are an ethnic group, denying places on these grounds is racial discrimination.

A government submission said the result may affect all Jewish and Sikh schools.

This is because in nearly every case members of the Jewish and Sikh religion are also members of a particular ethnic group related to their faith.

The boy in question, known as M, has a father who is Jewish by birth and a mother who is Jewish by conversion.

But the ceremony was conducted by a Progressive rather than an Orthodox synagogue which is not recognised by the Office of the Chief Rabbi (OCR).

The OCR only recognises children born of Jewish mothers as truly Jewish and this is the test the school uses in its admissions rules.

The Court of Appeal held in July that because Jews are also defined as an ethnic group under the Race Relations Act, denying a child admission solely on the basis that their mother is not Jewish would count as unlawful racial discrimination.

But the JFS argued in court that its admissions policy of giving preference to Jewish children when the school is oversubscribed is based on religious rather than racial grounds.

However, in a submission to the court, the Department for Children, Schools and Families said there could be ramifications for some faith schools where the faith is linked to race.

The school, a successful and oversubscribed secondary in the London Borough of Brent, claims on its website that it reflects “the very wide range of the religious spectrum of British Jewry”.

It says: “Many come from families who are totally committed to Judaism and Israel; others are unaware of Jewish belief and practice.

“We welcome this diversity and embrace the opportunity to have such a broad range of young people developing Jewish values together,” it says.

(Source: BBC)

The search is resuming Tuesday morning for a small plane that may have gone down in the woods over Rockland County.

The Federal Aviation Administration Command Control Center on Long Island reported a small plane disappearing from its scope – or it flew below 700 feet – at approximately 6:09 p.m. on Monday evening in the area near Harriman.

Police and fire crews are heading back out to Harriman State Park in Haverstraw, looking for any signs of the wreckage. State and county helicopters are concentrating on a six square mile area in Haverstraw.

The choppers, equipped with infrared and night vision, searched rugged terrain around Horse Chock Mountain near Harriman State Park until about 1:30 a.m. Rescue crews used ATVs to search nearby terrain.

Late Monday evening, several witnesses reported seeing a plume of smoke descending down in the sky behind the mountain.

“It may have cleared the mountain. We don’t know,” said Hillcrest Fire Chief Kim Weppler. “The specifics right now are vague whether the plane actually did make impact. All we have now is a plane that looked like he was coming down or spiraling down or coming down into the mountain range and leaving a trail of smoke.”

Time and darkness were both factors in the search on Monday night. Because of the location six separate agencies were coordinating on the ground, all feeding information to the eyes in the sky.

Compounding the mystery, neither the FAA or local airports have had any reports of a missing plane.

(Source: CBS2 HD / Eli Rowe / YWN-32)

The pilots of the commercial jetliner that last week overshot its destination by about 150 miles have said they were using their laptops and lost track of time and location, federal safety officials said Monday.

The Airbus A320 was flying at 37,000 feet over the Denver, Colorado, area at 5:56 p.m. Wednesday when it last made radio contact, the safety board said.

Northwest Flight 188 had departed San Diego en route to Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport carrying 144 passengers, two pilots and three flight attendants. Northwest recently merged with Delta Air Lines.

“Using laptops or engaging in activity unrelated to the pilots’ command of the aircraft during flight is strictly against the airline’s flight deck policies and violations of that policy will result in termination,” Delta said Monday in a statement.

Pilot Timothy B. Cheney, 53, was hired in 1985 and has more than 20,000 hours flight time; First Officer Richard I. Cole, 54, was hired in 1997 and has about 11,000 hours of flight time, the report said.

Neither pilot reported having had an accident, incident or violation, neither had any ongoing medical conditions and neither said he was tired, it said.

They each had a 19-hour layover in San Diego; neither said he had slept or argued during the flight, but both said “there was a distraction” in the cockpit, according to the report.

The pilots said there was “a concentrated period of discussion where they did not monitor the airplane or calls” from air traffic control, though both said they heard conversation on the radio, the report said.

Neither pilot said he noticed messages sent by company dispatchers, it added. It said the men were talking about the new monthly crew flight scheduling system put into place in the wake of Northwest’s merger with Delta Air Lines.

“Each pilot accessed and used his personal laptop computer while they discussed the airline crew flight scheduling procedure,” the report said.

“The first officer, who was more familiar with the procedure, was providing instruction to the captain.”Neither pilot said he was aware of where the plane was until a flight attendant called the cockpit about five minutes before the plane was to have landed and asked their estimated time of arrival, the report said.

“The captain said, at that point, he looked at his primary flight display for an ETA and realized that they had passed” the airport, it added. After 78 minutes of radio silence, the pilots re-established radio contact with air traffic controllers, it said.

After landing at Minneapolis-St. Paul, both voluntarily underwent alcohol breath tests, which proved negative, the report said.

The safety board said its investigators interviewed the pilots separately Sunday in Minnesota for more than five hours combined. The investigation will include scrutiny of the flight and voice data recorders, it said.

An airline spokesman said Monday the company has sent the passengers on the plane $500 travel vouchers to compensate them for their inconvenience, and that the pilots have been suspended until the conclusion of the investigations.

The NTSB on Monday interviewed the three flight attendants who were on the plane, a spokesman for the Association of Flight Attendants said.

The lead flight attendant told officers she was unaware there had been an incident aboard, according to the report.

The NTSB is hoping the plane’s cockpit voice recorder either will confirm the pilot’s account or provide evidence of another possible explanation, including whether the captain and first officer fell asleep.

(Source: CNN / Eli Rowe – YWN)

It was a blast felt for blocks. A gas explosion blew apart a Queens home on Monday night, injuring several people.

The force of the explosion blew out the back of the building and bowed the front of it — all after an early evening blast heard from blocks away.

The explosion sent two occupants away in ambulances — a man found in the back with burns on his body and a woman buried by rubble and rescued by firefighters.

As for the cause, FDNY Chief Edward Kilduff said one of the victims was emptying his propane tank.

“We’re not sure why but he was in the backdoor. The wind must have shifted and it actually blew the propane into the house, so now we have the propane in the house. When it hit an ignition point, it blew up,” Kilduff said.

(Source: WCBSTV)