Regent to Speak to House Ways and Means Committee May 1

WACO, Texas - Randall H. Fields, chairman of the Baylor University Board of Regents, will speak before the U.S. House Ways and Means Committee Wednesday, May 1, about the impact of tax reform on charitable contributions to non-profit organizations.
Asked to speak by the Baptist Joint Committee, Fields plans to tell the committee that charitable giving needs to be enhanced rather than de-emphasized in whatever restructuring of the current income tax system comes out of Congress.
He will advise the committee, however, that any large, fundamental change in a tax restructuring will cause many ripples throughout the economy for a while.
"Any change in the current tax structure will have an immediate impact on non-profit organizations which rely on capital gifts," Fields said.
Fields describes capital gifts as very large gifts from individuals or businesses which donate to non-profit organizations as part of their tax or estate planning.
"Any change in the tax structure should include adequate safeguards to protect the charitable sectors, especially during this time when the government is trying to downsize and shift the load to the private sector," he said. "Those non-profit institutions with large endowments will be able to draw from those funds if charitable donations dry up, but those without significant endowments will have to scramble and may not survive."
Fields is chairman of the business and health care law section of the San Antonio law firm of Johnson, Curney & Fields, P.C. He earned his bachelor's and master's degrees in business administration from Baylor and a juris doctor degree cum laude from Baylor. He is a past chairman of the Deacon Council and Budget Committee at Trinity Baptist Church in San Antonio and currently serves the church as teacher of an adult Sunday School department.
For more information, contact Fields at (210) 377-1990.