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 Telecommuting from New Continued from page 11 York income
tax and with- holding requirements for a specified amount of time.
However, as of the time of this article, the New York Department of Revenue has remained silent on its position regarding these matters.
Connecticut: Connecticut is another state with
a ‘convenience of the employer rule.’ However, the state only applies this rule in determining Connecti- cut source income of residents of states that also apply the convenience rule. Otherwise, wages are sourced to Connecticut based on the portion of ser- vices performed within the state.
The Connecticut Department of Revenue has not issuedanyformofguidancetodate,butdidrespond to a state survey this past May regarding telecommut-
ing due to the COVID-19 crisis. The agency replied that it was working on guidance that would ensure ‘fair and equitable treatment’ to both its individual residents and Connecticut-based businesses.
Rhode Island: Rhode Island has issued formal guidance similar to that of Massachusetts, provid- ing that the presence of one or more remote workers in the state due to the COVID-19 pandemic will not automatically create an income tax-filing responsi- bility and sales and use tax-collection responsibility. Wages paid to a non-resident employee who is now telecommuting will continue to be treated as Rhode Island source income subject to income tax and withholding.
Businesses with telecommuting employees in otherstatesmustchecktoseeifthosestatesoffertax relief from withholding taxes, income-tax nexus, and
sales and use tax-filing obligations created by these remote workers during the COVID-19 health crisis. Unfortunately, there is no set time frame or require- ment that states issue such guidance.
Passage of the Remote and Mobile Worker Relief Act would help to remove some of the uncertainty surrounding the tax treatment of these workers. Employers in the meantime are left to monitor poten- tial changes to state tax laws where their remote workers are located during the COVID-19 pandemic to determine whether they have relief from tax filings in the telecommuting state. u
Carolyn Bourgoin, CPA is a senior manager, and Lisa White, CPA is a manager for the Holyoke-based accountingfirmMeyersBrothersKalicka,P.C.; [email protected]; [email protected]
  Springfield
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“And you can’t do the wall without the tub, so you have to wait, and this hap- pens all the time. If everything goes smoothly from here, it might be April when we reopen, or it could also be summer.”
By then, he thinks the world, and downtown Springfield, will look con- siderably different, and there will be a considerable amount of pent-up demand.
“Especially for the leisure travelers,” he said. “People are really itching to get out; they’re all waiting to go some- where, and also go to events, weddings, family reunions, and other celebra-
WNEU
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the 21st century, the new model, is all about giving students and graduates what I call the agile mindset, which
is knowledge and the power of learn- ing — giving students essential human skills that cannot be replicated by robots and gives them the mindset to continually add value throughout their professional careers.
“We’re educating people to get that first job, and to create every job after that,” he continued. “We’re making sure that every person who graduates from college is resilient and has social and emotional intelligence and has an entrepreneurial outlook, which is not about being an entrepreneur; it’s about
Schools
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and remotely at the same time.
“The rest of the staff spent the sum-
mer planning logistics around cam- pus,” he added. “It was so much work because we literally did everything we could think of.”
While enrollment projections dipped slightly early in the summer, Easler said it picked up again once word got out into the community of what WMA was doing to make the campus a safe environment. “Families want a little more predictability than
tions. I’m hopeful that we’ll be open- ing right when the pent-up demand is coming.”
As for the restaurant planned for the Court Square property, Picknelly and Yee project it will be open for busi- ness by the fall of 2022, and that, when it does debut, it will be an important addition to a downtown that may look somewhat different, but will likely still be a destination and a place people not only want to visit, but live in.
“Winn has done 100 renovation projects like this around the coun- try,” Picknelly said. “They are 100% convinced that this building will be fully occupied by the time we open —
value creation and having those essen- tial human skills. What that means, fundamentally, is that no algorithm will ever put them out of a job.”
To get his point across, he relayed
a conversation he had with some stu- dents enrolled in a nursing program. “They said, ‘this doesn’t apply to us,’ and I said, ‘yes, it does, because there are robots in Japan that are turning patients over in hospitals. So if you think technology does not impact what you do, you’re mistaken.’”
Summing it all up, he said that, moving forward, and more than ever before, a college education must make the student resilient, something he does not believe can be accomplished
they get out of the local public systems, which don’t have the kind of flexibility and resources we do.”
With such resources come a respon- sibility, Earls said, to understand what students are going through during this unprecedented year.
“I told the teachers, ‘always remem- ber that hundreds of kids will pass through here during the course of your career, but to John or Jameel or Suzy, you are their only second-grade teach- er, their only math teacher, their only Spanish teacher. You need to respect that.’ This year more than ever, we
there’s no doubt in their minds, based on the projections. I think that says a lot about people still wanting to live in urban areas, and I think it says a lot about Springfield and what people think of this city.”
Fighting Spirit
Returning to his analogy about shadow boxing, Sarno said COVID-19 has certainly proven to be a difficult sparring partner.
Unlike the tornado, which passed through quickly and left a trail of destruction to be cleaned up, COVID has already lingered far longer than
solely through online learning.
“How do I put the engineer and the
artist together, give them a real-world problem, and say, ‘have at it, go solve it?’” he asked. “They have to be face to face, hands-on. We can come up with alternate reality, virtual reality, and all the technology you want, but at some point, people have to sit down and look each other in the eye.”
Bottom Line
Returning to the subject of the pan- demic and the ongoing fall semester, Johnson reiterated his cautious opti- mism about getting to the finish line without any major incidents, and said simply, “get me to Thanksgiving with
“The rationale is, the only way to prevent widespread transmission on campus
is to know where the
virus is, especially with a population that’s often
most thought it would, and no one really knows for sure how much longer we’ll be living with it.
Meanwhile, as for the damage it
will cause, there is simply no way of knowing that, either, and the toll creeps higher with each passing week.
But, as the mayor noted, the city is already punching back, and it intends to keep on punching with the goal of regaining the momentum it has lost and turning back the clock — even if it’s only six or seven months. u
George O’Brien can be reached at [email protected]
everyone still on campus.” That’s when students will be heading for a lengthy break after a semester that started early (late August) and, to steal a line from Bill Belichick, featured no days off — classes were even in session on Labor Day.
But while he wants to get to Thanks- giving, Johnson is, of course, looking much further down the road, to the future of higher education, which is, in some important respects, already here.
He believes WNEU represents that future, and that’s why he “hung in there” during that search process. u
George O’Brien can be reached at [email protected]
need to pay attention to their anxiety levels, their social and emotional well- being. We’re going to make sure they feel safe and normalize the situation for them.”
That normalization, she believes, begins with in-person learning, and getting to that point took a lot of work. Now, she and other area heads of school can only hope it’s enough. u
Joseph Bednar can be reached at [email protected]
          asymptomatic.
”
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