Still No News on SB 30 (StateTax Exemption for Forgiven Mortgage Debt)

As scheduled, the state legislature’s Appropriations Committee held a hearing earlier this month to determine the fate of Senate Bill 30.  As a reminder, this is the bill that, if passed, would restore the state tax exemption for the “shadow income” homeowners are imputed to have received if their home is foreclosed or sold in a short sale.  That exemption expired on December 31, 2012.

Unfortunately, the committee chose to “table” consideration of the bill to a later date.  Specifically, the bill was placed in the AC’s  “Suspense File”, to which the committee sends any bill with an annual cost of more than $150,000.  Suspense File bills are then considered at one hearing after the state budget has been prepared and the committee has a better sense of available revenue. No testimony is presented – either by the bill’s author or any witness – at the Suspense File hearing.

At present, we have no definitive date on which the Suspense Bill hearing will occur.  And the current high volume wrangling between the governor and the legislature over education funding makes it unlikely a final vote on SB 30 will occur pending resolution of these other political “hot potato” budget issues.  Stay tuned.