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Focus on Recruitment and Retention: NVFC Supports Increasing Tax Deductions for Volunteers Responding in Personal Vehicles
The National Volunteer Fire Council (NVFC) supports several pieces of legislation that would increase the income tax deduction that volunteers of all types can claim for miles driven in personal vehicles for charitable purposes. The deduction helps to reimburse drivers for the cost of purchasing fuel as well as wear and tear on their vehicles.
The current charitable deduction rate is 14 cents per mile, which was established in 1997 when the average price of gasoline fluctuated between $1.18 and $1.28 per gallon. On September 1, 2008, the average price of gasoline in the United States was $3.68 per gallon, approximately 300 percent higher than the price in 1997.
“Volunteer emergency personnel sacrifice their time, energy, and sometimes even their own financial resources to protect the communities that they live in,” said NVFC Chairman Philip C. Stittleburg. “As the price of gasoline rises, so should the reimbursement rate for volunteers, who have to pay the difference out of their own pockets.”
The NVFC has identified eight pieces of federal legislation (H.R. 2020, H.R. 6283, H.R. 6368, S. 1220, S. 3032, S. 3246, S. 3421, and S. 3429) that would increase the charitable deduction rate in various fashions. Additionally, many of the bills tie future increases in the charitable reimbursement rate to increases in the business mileage reimbursement rate, which was increased by the Internal Revenue Service from 50 cents per mile to 58.5 cents per mile in June. There is no mechanism in current law for increasing the charitable rate, which is why it has remained at 14 cents per mile for more than a decade.
Emergency response in rural areas, which are mainly served by volunteers, is extremely fuel-intensive in part because of the long distances that responders have to travel to reach incident sites. In July, the NVFC-supported Supporting America’s Volunteer Emergency Services (SAVES) Act (H.R. 6461, S. 3237) was introduced to help volunteer fire departments cope with the recent spike in gasoline and diesel fuel prices. The SAVES Act would subsidize fuel purchased for departmental vehicles but not for volunteers responding to emergencies in their personal vehicles, who qualify for the charitable deduction.
The NVFC has not endorsed any of the current proposals over the others, but believes that the charitable reimbursement rate should be increased at least to a level commensurate with the increase in gas prices, future increases in the charitable reimbursement rate should be tied to increases in the business rate, and that reimbursement should not be considered taxable income.
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Kimberly Ettinger
Director of Communications
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David Finger
Director of Government Relations
202-887-5700 ext. 12