Hawaii Administrative Rules
Title 18 - DEPARTMENT OF TAXATION
Chapter 231 - ADMINISTRATION OF TAXES
Section 18-231-19.5-07 - Written opinions; petition for further segregation
Current through February, 2024
(a) A person to whom a written opinion pertains may petition the department for further segregation of some or all of the information in the written opinion that the department proposes to disclose. The petition shall be submitted in writing to the department's technical review office within thirty days after the notice of intention to disclose is mailed.
(b) The petition shall contain:
(c) No special form shall be required for the petition. A letter addressed to the technical review office, department of taxation, shall be a sufficient petition under this section if the letter complies with subsections (a) and (b).
(d) The thirty-day period in subsection (a) may be extended by the department for good cause shown. The department may refuse to extend the thirty-day period if the extension would leave the department an unreasonably short time to consider the petition before the written opinion must be disclosed under section 18-231-19.5-06(b) (one-hundred-eighty days from the date the notice of intention to disclose was mailed).
(e) Within thirty days after receiving the petition, but not more than one-hundred-eighty days from the date the notice of intention to disclose was mailed, the department shall mail its final determination to the petitioner.
(f) A petition for further segregation shall be denied, in whole or in part, if the department determines that the petitioner does not have a material interest in maintaining the confidentiality of the disputed information.
Example: Taxpayer Kimo Arnold is a shareholder of Rosie's Inc., a corporation. Rosie's Inc. has two other shareholders, Rose Machado and Louis Michel. Mr. Arnold requests, on his own behalf and not on behalf of either Rosie's Inc. or any other shareholder, a written opinion from the department regarding a partial redemption of his stock in Rosie's Inc. The written opinion, as the department proposes to disclose it, begins, "Corporation C has one class of stock which is owned as follows: T, with 100 shares; U, with 400 shares; and V, with 150 shares." The part of the written opinion that the department proposes to segregate identifies Mr. Arnold as T, Ms. Machado as U, Mr. Michel as V, and Rosie's Inc. as C. Mr. Arnold petitions for further segregation of the numbers "400" and "150" in the sentence quoted above, only on the ground that those numbers are personal privacy information as defined in section 18-231-19.5-04(d). Because the numbers "400" and "150" represent the holdings of people other than Mr. Arnold, the department may determine that Mr. Arnold would not be specially, personally, and adversely affected by the disclosure of the numbers "400" and "150" in the written opinion, and thus may deny his petition because he does not have a material interest in maintaining the confidentiality of that portion of the opinion sought to be segregated.
(g) If the determination of the department under this section is partly or wholly adverse to the petitioner, the department shall notify the petitioner of the appeal rights under section 231-19.5(f), HRS, at the same time it notifies the petitioner of its determination on the petition.
