“Payroll Record Requests” - Most all Townships in North Dakota have received a request for payroll information.  This request is from Open the Books which is a "cost of government" website.  While nobody needs the extra work of digging up and producing this information, this is a legitimate request and it cannot be ignored by any Township.  The request asks that any fees be waived but you do not have to do this without charge!  The template link below shows that you can charge $25 an hour after the first hour spent gathering the information. The template kind of gives you a check sheet to help you get through complying with this information request.  For one thing, you can fill in the time it will take to find all the information and compute the cost that will be involved. The request says they have to approve any cost in writing before any cost is incurred. So fill out the template with the cost and send that to the email address provided. They will have to pay for the search before you have to do it. If it will take 5 hours to dig it up because your township doesn’t have computerized records you can charge for 4 hours at $25, they may not want to pay $100 to find out what you pay your officers.  Be careful that no personal data such as Social Security Numbers are released.  Here are a couple of items from the Attorney General to help you comply with the law.  Attorney General's page on Open Meetings and Records:  https://attorneygeneral.nd.gov/open-records-meetings/manuals-and-guides
Template to Use When Responding to an Open Records Request:
https://attorneygeneral.nd.gov/sites/ag/files/documents/Open-Records-Template-For-Response-to-Request.pdf
The Open Meetings and Record laws are in NDCC 44-04 and are found on pages 108 to 118 of the 2018 edition of the NDTOA Township Officers Handbook.  When you have put all this information together, keep a copy, this may not be the only request for this information we will see.

NDTOA Bakken Oil Tour - Because of unexpected delays for the printed Grassroots Report, the Bakken Tour notice did not get out in time for the sign up deadline so this tour has been canceled. We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused. NDTOA and the ND Petroleum Council are working to set up a tour for a future date.

All Annual Township Meetings - March 20, 2018

January 5, 2018 - Township Officer compensation is a W2 item. 1099 is not the correct form and the W2 must be filed for any amount, even if the compensation is less than $600. There is a $530 dollar fine for each W2 you fail to file. The deadline for giving W-2 to employees and filing the IRS 941 or 944 is January 31. Jan 31 is also the deadline for filing 1099 MISC to unincorporated entities/individuals that the township paid $600 or more for services during a calendar year.