Tax-Delinquent Nickolas

The saga of Mark Nickolas – or The Foundation for Kentucky’s Future, Inc., Mark Nickolas, Chairman – is interesting not just because of Nickolas’s dereliction in paying state income taxes until caught, but in the amounts as well as the Nickolas identity. Are Nickolas and the organization he chairs the same, or are they different and does he take a salary? Since the delinquent check for 2003 exhibited payment by the organization, did Ben Chandler and Jody Richards employ Nickolas as campaign manager that year or did they employ his organization?

If Nickolas worked for both Chandler and Richards in their losing campaigns in 2003 and paid only $1,048 (presumably including interest and late-filing penalties) in state taxes, was he working for peanuts or did he simply have an exorbitant amount of itemized deductions? After all, he paid $5,309 (about five times as much) in delinquent taxes for the next year, 2004, when apparently he was not working for Chandler and Richards in campaigns. His income – or that of the organization – was in such lowered conditions in 2005, apparently, that he paid no taxes, so what happened? Is Nickolas destitute?

There’s nothing wrong with being destitute, especially in a failed operation, but Nickolas manages to keep his blog “BluegrassReport.org” in operation, openly soliciting contributions, of course (52 as of Jan. 14, with a goal of 200). While the FKF is a non-profit endeavor, does it need a fulltime employee to keep it up to speed? Is Nickolas working at something else, and was he doing that in 2005, for which year he paid no taxes? What are the purposes and/or the services of The Foundation for Kentucky’s Future, Inc.? Is Nickolas a paid lobbyist or political consultant and, if so, how would that affect his tax status? If the FKF accepts donations, is it a federal 501-C(3) tax-exempt organization, or does it fit another category, perhaps because of its obvious political activity?

Undoubtedly, there are other questions about Nickolas and the FKF. Perhaps the Lexington Herald-Leader would find it interesting to take a look at both, notwithstanding their sharing of Nickolas’s opposition against Governor Fletcher and the administration in Frankfort.

And so it goes.

Jim Clark