On January 27, 2004, the Treasury Department and IRS published Treasury Decision 9112, 2004-1 C.B. 523, in the Federal Register (69 FR 3826), which removed impediments to the electronic filing of Form 8609, “Low-Income Housing Credit Allocation and Certification,” by revising former §1.42-1T(e)(1) and (h)(2) and adding §1.42-1(h). Former §1.42-1T(e)(1) and (h)(2) required an owner to include a third-party signature from an authorized State or local housing credit agency (Agency) official when filing the form with the owner’s Federal income tax return for each year of the 15-year compliance period. Section 1.42-1(h) contains the filing requirement for Form 8609 and no longer requires the third-party signature when filing the form with the owner’s Federal income tax return.

Section 42 provides for a low-income housing credit that may be claimed as part of the general business credit under section 38. In general, the credit is allowable only if the owner of a qualified low-income building receives a housing credit allocation from an Agency of the jurisdiction where the building is located.

Section 1.42-1(h) provides that a completed Form 8586, “Low-Income Housing Credit,” must be filed with the owner’s Federal income tax return for each taxable year the owner of a qualified low-income building is claiming the low-income housing credit under section 42(a). A completed Form 8609 must be filed with the owner’s Federal income tax return for each of the 15 taxable years of the compliance period. Failure to comply with the requirement of the preceding sentence for any taxable year after the first taxable year in the credit period will be treated as a mathematical or clerical error for purposes of section 6213(b)(1) and (g)(2).

The IRS plans to reduce taxpayer burden by allowing taxpayers to file Form 8609 one time, instead of filing the form with the same information for 15 consecutive years. Taxpayers currently file the form as part of their return with the Internal Revenue Service center that processes their return. Planned revisions to the form should improve administration of the low-income housing credit program by requiring taxpayers to send completed forms to the Philadelphia service center, where each Agency currently sends Part I of the form. The requirements for completing and filing Form 8609 will be addressed in the instructions to the form.

It has been determined that this Treasury decision is not a significant regulatory action as defined in Executive Order 12866. Therefore, a regulatory assessment is not required. It also has been determined that section 553(b) and (d) of the Administrative Procedure Act (5 U.S.C. chapter 5) does not apply to these regulations. Because no notice of proposed rulemaking is required, the Regulatory Flexibility Act ( 5 U.S.C. chapter 6) does not apply. Pursuant to section 7805(f) of the Internal Revenue Code, these regulations were submitted to the Chief Counsel for Advocacy of the Small Business Administration for comment on their impact on small business.

Paragraph 1. The authority citation for part 1 continues to read, in part, as follows:

Authority: 26 U.S.C. 7805 * * *

Par. 2. Section 1.42-1 is amended by revising paragraphs (h) and (j) to read as follows: