Lynn A. Gandhi is a partner with Honigman Miller Schwartz and Cohn LLP where she advises clients nationwide on multistate tax strategies, resolving tax disputes and litigating state tax cases. Specializations include income and net worth taxes, including SBT, sales and use tax, insurance company and retaliatory tax, investment incentives and tax savings, corporate income and franchise taxes, net worth taxes, and gross receipts taxes. Ms Gandhi possesses extensive experience practicing law in a corporate setting and engages in counseling efforts regarding tax legislation and other technical corrections.
Ms. Gandhi focuses on managing businesses overall state tax burden and effective rate for multinational business enterprises and has extensive experience in implementing planning techniques within a corporate tax environment. She has also designed and implemented SOX controls for state tax functions and led a global investment incentive process for a Fortune 100 multinational manufacturing company.
Ms. Gandhi publishes and speaks frequently on pertinent state and local tax issues, including the new Michigan Business Tax, gross receipts taxes, state tax planning, transactional tax opportunities and issues, renegotiating incentives, Sarbanes Oxley processes and controls, sales and use tax topics, multistate apportionment and corporate tax best practices.
Prior to joining Honigman as a partner in February 2008, Ms. Gandhi spent over 20 years in industry and received early training at a Big Four accounting firm. She graduated from Kalamazoo College, received a J.D. from Wayne State University Law School and an LL.M. in Taxation from the New York University School of Law.
Janet Spies has been a policy analyst in the Franchise Tax section of the Tax Policy Division since February 1995. Her activities include maintaining an expertise in and knowledge of all franchise tax laws and rules, responding to telephone and written requests for tax policy information, developing and instructing training classes on franchise tax, making recommendations on proposed or pending franchise tax legislation, drafting franchise tax rules, assisting Legal Services on an as-needed basis in the review or preparation of position letters or other information for hearings and assisting, on an as-needed basis, Assistant Attorney General’s with franchise tax cases, and develop and present franchise tax seminars and speeches to the general public as requested.
She began her career with the Comptroller’s office in September 1982 as an auditor in Houston. After transferring to Austin in April 1986, she has worked as a staff development specialist; Manager of a project in Audit Headquarters; and Business Analyst in the Integrated Tax System Division.
In May 1981, Janet received a Bachelor of Business Administration degree with a concentration in accounting from Southwest Texas State University in San Marcos. Janet was also a member of the 2001 class of Leadership Texas.
Janet is actively involved with the Society of Government Meeting Professionals (SGMP), the Executive Women in Texas Government (EWTG), and the Leadership Texas Alumni Association (LTAA). She is a founding member of the Austin 5 Foundation which serves as a fundraising vehicle for several worthwhile organizations including the Capital Area Food Bank. She served as the 65th President of the Austin Junior Chamber of Commerce (Jaycees) and was an active member for over 13 years. Currently, Janet serves as the Ride Coordinator for the Wurst Ride in Texas – www.wurstride.com - which benefits the Capital Area Food Bank.
Glenn R. White is the administrator of the Tax Policy Division in the Bureau of Tax Policy at the Michigan Department of Treasury. The Tax Policy Division employs the skills of administrative law specialists and analysts who provide policy recommendations to the bureau’s director, the executive office, various divisions within the department, and the general public. Guidance from the division is issued as administrative rules, revenue administrative bulletins, letter rulings, technical advice letters, and internal policy directives.
Prior to being named administrator of the division in 2005, Mr. White was employed by the Michigan Department of Attorney General as an assistant attorney general in the Revenue and Collections Division, where he represented the Department of Treasury in tax litigation. In addition to his law degree from Thomas M. Cooley Law School, he also holds a Master of Laws in Taxation from New York University.
Thomas M. Zaino is Chair of the Multistate Tax Practice Group and Member in Charge of the Columbus, Ohio office of McDonald Hopkins, LLC. McDonald Hopkins is a full-service business law firm with over 130 attorneys located in Chicago, Cleveland, Columbus, Detroit and West Palm Beach. Mr. Zaino represents clients on business and tax legal matters. He was Peer Review Rated AV® for ethical standards and legal ability by Martindale–Hubbell. Recently, Mr. Zaino served on current Governor Ted Strickland’s Transition Team and was reappointed by Governor Strickland to the State Racing Commission. He is a frequent author and national speaker on state and local tax developments.
Previously, Mr. Zaino served as Ohio’s Tax Commissioner under Governor Bob Taft from 1999 to 2003. As Tax Commissioner, he led the Ohio Department of Taxation, which is responsible for administering most state-collected taxes, several locally collected taxes, and for supervising the real property tax. Mr. Zaino’s role included guiding the development of Ohio’s tax policy through state and federal legislative efforts and serving as chair of the bipartisan Committee to Study State and Local Taxes. He was active nationally, serving on the Board of Trustees of the Federation of Tax Administrators and as Chair of Ohio’s delegation to the Implementing States Committee of the Streamlined Sales Tax Project.
Prior to joining the Taft Administration, Mr. Zaino was a tax consulting partner at PricewaterhouseCoopers, LLP. At PwC, he represented clients in a wide variety of federal and multistate tax matters, such as tax audits and tax incentive negotiations. Mr. Zaino was also a founding member of the firm’s National VISION Team, a special project management service provided to large businesses to assist in the implementation of significant business process and legal entity changes.
Mr. Zaino is also a founding member of the Independent SALT Alliance (ISA), a multistate network of state and local tax professionals. These professionals come together from backgrounds that include practice leadership from the world’s largest accounting and law firms, corporate management from “Fortune 500” companies, and executive positions with various state taxing agencies. ISA provides a network that enables its members to stay informed of state and local tax issues across geographic, industry and tax specialty lines. Further, the firms and individuals that make up ISA are able to draw on the expertise, relationships and skill sets of their fellow ISA members when presented with the opportunity to introduce services or address issues and opportunities outside of the member’s own practice portfolio.
Mr. Zaino currently serves on the Board of Directors as Treasurer of Prevent Blindness Ohio, a not-for-profit organization that works to prevent blindness and preserve the sight of all Ohioans through public information, research and early detection.
Mr. Zaino graduated from the University of Cincinnati in 1986 with a B.B.A. in accounting and from The Ohio State University in 1989 with a law degree.
