2022 Tennessee Federal Tax Conference Bundle

Turney P. Berry concentrates his practice in the areas of estate planning, fiduciary matters, and charitable planning. Mr. Berry is Chair of Wyatt, Tarrant & Combs' Trusts, Estates & Personal Planning Service Team and a past member of the firm's Executive Committee.

Mr. Berry is active in the American College of Trust and Estate Counsel (ACTEC), and has served as President of the ACTEC Foundation, Regent of the College, State Chair for Kentucky, Chair of the Estate & Gift Committee, and Chair of the Charitable and Tax Exempt Committee. Currently he serves as Vice Chair of the State Laws Committee, and a member of the Long Range Planning Committee.

As a Uniform Law Commissioner, Mr. Berry currently serves as Co-Chair of the Drafting Committee on Economic Rights of Unmarried Cohabitants Act, Member of the Drafting Committee on Revised Disposition of Community Property Rights at Death Act, Vice-Chair of the Drafting Committee on Conflicts of Laws in Trusts and Estates, and Member of the Joint Editorial Board for Uniform Trust and Estate Acts. He has served as chair of the Uniform Fiduciary Income and Principal Act (UFIPA), chair of the Uniform Power of Appointment Act, Vice Chair of the Drafting Committee on Electronic Wills Act, and as a member of the drafting committees for the Directed Trust Act, the Revised Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act, the Trust Decanting Act, the Insurable Interests in Trusts Act, the Premarital and Marital Agreements Act, the Transfer on Death Deeds Act, and the Uniform Probate Code Artificial Reproductive Technology provisions, and an adjunct member of the Fundraising Through Public Appeals Act.

Mr. Berry is a Fellow of the American College of Tax Counsel, a member of the American Law Institute, a member of The International Academy of Estate and Trust Law, a member of the Advisory Council of the Heckerling Institute on Estate Planning, a Member of the Advisory Board of Trusts and Estates Monthly, and a member of the Bloomberg BNA Tax Advisory Board (Estates, Gifts, and Trusts). He serves as Adjunct Professor at the University of Miami Estate Planning LLM Program (teaching Business Succession Planning), and has served as Adjunct Professor at Vanderbilt University, the University of Missouri, and the University of Louisville, and regularly speaks at the nation's leading estate planning conferences. Since 1996, Mr. Berry has served as Co-Chair of the Midwest/Midsouth Estate Planning Institute at the University of Kentucky (the longest continuously run CLE event in Kentucky).

Mr. Berry has been certified as an Accredited Estate Planner® (AEP®) by the National Association of Estate Planners & Councils and is a member of its Estate Planning Hall of Fame [Kentucky does not recognize legal specialties]. He is listed in Woodward/White's The Best Lawyers in America® and in the Kentucky Super Lawyer Magazine in the area of Trusts and Estates.

Mr. Berry is the author or co-author of three Tax Management Portfolios: Estate Tax Deductions - Sections 2053 and 2054; Private Foundations - Self Dealing - Section 4941; and Taxable Expenditures - Section 4945. In addition he is co-author of Trust Law in Kentucky (in progress) and his frequent articles have appeared in numerous journals and magazines. Mr. Berry received the Texas Bar Foundation Outstanding Law Review Article award for an article he co-authored with Paul Lee titled "Retaining, Sustaining and Obtaining Basis" which was published by the Texas Tech Estate Planning and Community Property Law Journal in January 2015

Mr. Berry has been an Articles Editor of The Tax Lawyer and a past chair of the Louisville Bar Association Probate and Estate Planning Section (1989 Section of the Year). He is a member of the Louisville Estate Planning Council, Kentuckiana Planned Giving Council, and an adjunct member of the American Association of Life Underwriters.

Mr. Berry is a member of the Civilian Review and Accountability Board, Chair of the Center for Interfaith Relations, and Earth School/Carbon Nation. He is a member of Louisville Downtown Rotary, and a Member of the Honorable Order of Kentucky Colonels. He is a past member of the Board of Directors for the Muhammad Ali Center, Kentucky Opera, Actors Theatre, the Filson Historical Society, the Louisville Science Center, among others, as well as past President of the Daily Bread Sunday School Class at Christ Church United Methodist. Mr. Berry is the recipient of the National Philanthropy Day Baylor Landrum Award and has been recognized as a Distinguished Citizen of Louisville.

A native of Tennessee, Mr. Berry received his B.A. and B.L.S. in 1983 from the University of Memphis and his J.D. in 1986 from Vanderbilt University.

Bruce McGovern is a tenured member of the faculty at South Texas College of Law Houston, where he also serves as Director of the school's Low Income Taxpayer Clinic. Previously, he served for many years as the school's Vice President and Associate Dean for Academic Administration. He received his undergraduate degree from Columbia University and his law degree from Fordham University School of Law. After law school, he served as a judicial clerk for Judge Thomas Meskill on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in New York. He then practiced law with the law firm of Covington & Burling in Washington, D.C. He subsequently earned an LL.M. in Taxation from the University of Florida Levin College of Law, where he taught as a visiting faculty member before joining the faculty at South Texas College of Law Houston.

Professor McGovern teaches and writes in the areas of business organizations and taxation. His courses include Federal Income Taxation, U.S. Taxation of International Transactions, Partnership and Subchapter S Taxation, and Federal Tax Procedure. He frequently speaks on recent developments in federal income taxation. Professor McGovern is a member of the Council of the State Bar of Texas Tax Section, a former Chair of the Houston Bar Association Section of Taxation, and a Fellow of the American College of Tax Counsel.

Nonprofit organizations and companies in a wide range of industries such as manufacturing, retail, cable television, real estate, professional services, waste management, and software, rely on Chris Wilson for assistance with a range of state tax planning and state tax litigation matters.

With litigation experience covering a broad range of trust, probate and estate administration matters as well as conservatorship proceedings, Chris has represented financial institutions, particularly their trust and wealth management officers, in matters involving allegations of breach of trust and breach of fiduciary duty. He has also represented trust and estate beneficiaries in matters involving will contests, breach claims, and other claims involving fraud and undue influence. Clients count on Chris to develop strategies to resolve disputes within the applicable terms of trust instruments or estate planning documents while also seeking to minimize the impact upon client and family relationships.

Additionally, Chris represents both petitioners and respondents in conservatorship actions, and understands the legal complexities, family dynamics, and individual desires for autonomy involved in conservatorship proceedings. Clients rely on him to navigate these complexities while also focusing on reasonable solutions to preserve individual autonomy, ensure the receipt of necessary care and management for disabled individuals, and to maintain family harmony.

Dr. Chris Kuehl is a Managing Director of Armada Corporate Intelligence. He provides forecasts and strategic guidance for a wide variety of corporate clients around the world. He is the chief economist for several national and international organizations – Fabricators and Manufacturers Association, National Association of Credit Management, Finance, Credit and International Business and the Business Information Industry Association. He is also the economic analyst for several state accounting societies – Missouri, Kentucky, Tennessee and Kansas.

Prior to starting Armada in 1999 he was a professor of economics and finance for 15 years – teaching in the US, Hungary, Russia, Estonia, Singapore and Taiwan. He holds advanced degrees in economics, Soviet studies and East Asian studies.

Chris is the author of Business Intelligence Briefs and Executive Intelligence Briefs - both publications from Armada. He is also responsible for the Credit Manager's Index from NACM and Fabrinomics from the FMA.

Steve Jasper is a member at Bass, Berry & Sims in its Nashville office. He advises clients in a wide range of tax disputes regarding Tennessee’s sales and use tax, franchise and excise taxes, business tax, and property taxes. Steve represents his clients in negotiations with taxing authorities and, as necessary, guides businesses through administrative proceedings or trials. As a reflection of his experience in state tax matters, on multiple occasions Steve has been selected by the Tennessee Department of Revenue to help draft major rewrites to significant portions of Tennessee’s tax statutes. Steve also assists expanding or relocating businesses in Tennessee achieve the maximum value they can through state tax incentives, payments-in-lieu-of-taxes (PILOT) agreements and state grant programs to help grow the state’s overall economic base.

Steve is a graduate of the University of Missouri where he received a law degree and bachelor’s degree. Prior to joining Bass, Berry & Sims, Steve produced the evening newscast for local ABC affiliate in Columbia, Missouri, KMIZ-ABC 17.

Steve retired as a principal with Ernst & Young, LLP in July 2020 and served as a client serving contractor to EY until June 30, 2022.

He served as the State and Local Tax Leader for EY's Americas Tax Policy in Washington, DC. He previously worked in the EY Los Angeles and New York offices, was a state and local tax attorney for an international insurance company and an associate attorney with a major regional law firm. He previously worked in state government in New Jersey, including for the governor of the state.

Steve is currently a columnist for Tax Analysts, writing a periodic column on state tax matters. He has written extensively on the state and local tax treatment of pass-through entities (e.g., partnerships, limited liability companies and S corporations). He recently published a series of comprehensive articles summarizing the enactment by the states of entity-level "pass-through entity" taxes in response to the federal state and local tax deduction limitation imposed by the federal Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017.

He focused his practice on the state and local tax aspects of mergers and acquisitions and was involved in over 900 transactions affected by the tax laws in all 50 states.

A frequent speaker and writer on state and local tax developments, Bruce Ely of the multistate law firm of Bradley Arant Boult Cummings LLP and Steve received the Bloomberg Tax & Accounting State Tax Co-Authors of the Year award in December 2017 for their work on Bloomberg Tax's Pass-through Entity Navigator (PTEN). EY also awarded Steve its first ever lifetime achievement award as tax educator of the year in 2017 and lifetime achievement award from its Indirect (State and Local) Tax practice.

He also is a guest lecturer on state and local tax matters for the LL.M. in taxation program at the Georgetown University School of Law.

Steve holds degrees from Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service, Seton Hall University School of Law and a master's degree in tax law from New York University School of Law. He is a member of the New York and District of Columbia Bar Associations and is admitted to practice in New Jersey as well.

Seth is a senior manager in KPMG’s M&A Tax practice in Memphis. Seth joined the M&A Tax practice in 2012. His responsibilities include performing tax due diligence and tax structuring services in connection with corporate acquisitions. Seth also regularly provides tax advice in connection with internal corporate restructuring transactions.

John Bunge is a Partner in the Tax Group of Waller Lansden Dortch & Davis, LLP. He helps clients navigate the confluence of tax planning, business succession planning, and estate planning, and seeks to find the most elegant solutions possible to reach their goals.

John's wealth preservation experience includes gift, estate, and generation-skipping transfer tax minimization, through the use of irrevocable trusts, sales and gifts to trusts, charitable-interest trusts, and grantor-retained annuity trusts, among other sophisticated wealth planning strategies. John also advises families on the formation of investment entities, such as family limited partnerships and family LLCs.

John helps clients reach their charitable goals, using charitable giving techniques to minimize income, estate, and gift taxes, and advising clients on the formation and operation of tax-exempt organizations, including private foundations.

John also counsels families regarding the formation, structuring, and operation of family offices and private trust companies.

Additionally, John helps clients minimize income taxes through individual, partnership, and corporate tax planning. John also has experience assisting taxpayers through IRS audits, appeals, and Tax Court litigation.

John has a B.S., summa cum laude, from the University of Kentucky, a J.D., magna cum laude, from the University of Alabama, and an LL.M. in Taxation from the University of Florida, where he received the Richard B. Stephens Award for outstanding student.

Experienced in trust and estate planning matters, Jill advises high net worth individuals, owners of closely-held companies, executives and other clients in complex trust and estate planning matters. Jill is well-versed in planning for retirement benefits, as well as the intricacies of conservatorships and probate. In addition, she assists clients with family offices and the formation and operation of private family trust companies under Tennessee law. Prior to Waller, Jill gained valuable trusts and estates experience with two Tennessee law firms.

Margaret is an "almost native" of Tennessee having moved to Nashville in 1974 when her father (Dr. John S. Johnson) came to take over her grandfather's private practice (Dr. Hollis E. Johnson) and practice medicine alongside his identical twin brother (Dr. Robert M. Johnson). Margaret obtained her undergraduate degree from Southern Methodist University (1984) and a graduate degree from Vanderbilt University (1989). Her love of medicine from growing up a doctor's daughter coupled with the task of creating an insurance program for older adults at St Thomas Hospital led to the creation of her health care benefits management and consulting company, Medical Accounts Management, in 1990.

The genesis of her business was helping individual clients navigate the confusing territory of health insurance benefits, health insurance carriers, healthcare providers, and Medicare. With the enactment of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) in 1996, Margaret saw an opportunity to assist employers in the management of their healthcare benefits and expanded her business model to include employer contracts. Some of her employer clients include LBMC, Athens Distributing, Health Services Management, and CoreCivic. Margaret is married to Doug Smith, CEO of Hutson-Wood, and has three grown children, two daughters-in-law, three grand dogs, one amazing grandson and another grandchild on the way.

RJ is a managing director in KPMG’s Mergers & Acquisitions Tax practice in Knoxville. RJ originally joined KPMG as part of its International Tax practice in 2011 and joined the Mergers and Acquisition Tax practice in 2014. RJ regularly advises clients regarding the tax aspects of business acquisitions, combinations, divestitures, and restructurings, including complex cross-border transactions.

In his more than 35 years of practicing tax and business law, Leigh Griffith has helped clients grow their businesses from the start-up stage to billion-dollar corporations. Transaction-oriented businesses, healthcare companies, private equity firms, Limited Liability Companies (LLCs), and partnerships rely on Leigh's experience and counsel to structure their tax matters, which can range from a few million dollars to over $1 billion.

Colleagues and clients regularly turn to him for his deep knowledge of tax at the state, national and global levels as well as the intersection of non-profit tax law, for-profit tax law and healthcare regulatory law.

Leigh's background as a certified public accountant has contributed to groundbreaking legal work, including: creation of the first LLC in Tennessee; development of the Double Holdco LLC structure for the home healthcare industry; being named principal draftsman of the Tennessee LLC Act; participating in the first life insurance/annuity combination securitization, recognized by the rating agencies as a new security and a new asset class; American Bar Association Tax Section Advisor to National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws - Series of Unincorporated Business Entities Drafting Committee. One of approximately 650 Fellows of the American College of Tax Counsel, Leigh is also a sought-after seminar leader for continuing professional education programs. Leigh contributes a bimonthly column, "The Pass Through Partner," in Taxes Magazine, published by CCH Tax and Accounting.

Leigh has been recognized for his vast tax law experience in The Best Lawyers in America since 1995. A partner in the Nashville office of Waller Lansden Dortch & Davis, LLP, Leigh earned his J.D. from Vanderbilt University Law School. He holds an LL.M. in Taxation from New York University and earned his B.A., magna cum laude, from the University of Virginia.

Anne Waters is an attorney and a CPA. She joined Blankenship in September 1998. She graduated from Vanderbilt Law School in 1994. She worked with several large law firms in Nashville prior to joining the firm. For her undergraduate work, she attended the University of Notre Dame and graduated with a Bachelor of Science, majoring in Accounting. Her primary focus area is estate planning, including estate and gift tax, wills and trusts, and trust and estate income tax work.

Bryan Howard is a founding member of Howard Mobley Hayes & Gontarek, PLLC. He assists high net worth families with wealth transfer planning, tax reduction planning, charitable giving and asset protection planning. He also advises the owners of closely-held businesses with respect to tax and business succession issues and represents fiduciaries and beneficiaries with regard to trust and estate administration and litigation issues. Bryan is an ACTEC Fellow, a certified Estate Planning Specialist in Tennessee and is listed in Best Lawyers in America.

Brian is a member of Butler Snow's Business Services Group where he concentrates his practice on tax planning and tax controversies, mergers and acquisitions, and joint ventures. In addition, Brian has recently focused a significant amount of his practice on advising clients with respect to establishing Opportunity Zone Funds and Qualified Opportunity Zone Businesses.