ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, March 18, 1997 TAG: 9703180047
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A5 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: WASHINGTON
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
Leading Republicans said the proposals, while well intentioned, aren't new and don't go far enough.
The Clinton administration, seeking tighter control over the troubled IRS, unveiled a plan Monday to strengthen oversight and management of the tax collection agency.
The move comes as a congressional panel prepares its own recommendations to overhaul the Internal Revenue Service, which has come under unprecedented criticism for a botched computer upgrade and poor service.
``The IRS needs to be more responsive to taxpayers, to use technology more effectively and to be more efficient,'' Deputy Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers said in a speech to the Tax Executives Institute. Later, to reporters, Summers observed, ``Money has been wasted that should not have been wasted and customer service should have been better.''
Leading House Republicans said the proposals, while well intentioned, aren't new and don't go far enough.
``We have as an objective ending the Internal Revenue Service as we know it,'' House Speaker Newt Gingrich, R-Ga., said in a House floor speech outlining the GOP's upcoming plans in Congress.
Gingrich, citing the IRS' troubled $3.3 billion computer modernization program, said the Clinton administration should pursue major tax reform and shouldn't try to design a computer system to interpret an enormously complex and technical tax code.
The IRS is under fire after it admitted to essentially misusing or wasting $400 million out of $3.3 billion it spent on computer modernization since 1987, while failing to replace aging paper tax return processing or integrating nine databases used to research taxpayer complaints.
LENGTH: Short : 43 linesby CNB