OAW, Over and Out

Today was the last day of OAW. We only had one meeting left and it was one of the very best. We went to Alexandria, to a sort of annex of the Pentagon, to the FVAP, the Federal Voting Assistance Program.
Remember a few things:

1. If you are an overseas voter, living overseas, use the procedures set up for overseas voters. That means do not phone your old board of elections and ask for a absentee ballot. There's the government site, FVAP, and there are private organizations, like OVF (Overseas Vote Foundation) that will help you vote as overseas voters. 
2. You have to send in your ballot/registration request EVERY year. The recommendation is to do it at the beginning of the year and get it out of the way and to do it even if there is no federal election scheduled. You never know when there might be a special election for an official who resigns or dies.
3. If you do not receive the ballot in time, use the Federal Absentee Write-in Ballot (FWAB) that you can find on the site. You must have registered before sending in the ballot. If you send in the ballot, thinking that it will serve as both registration and voting, it won't; it'll just be used as registration. And please, don't keep waiting for the official ballot until it's too late. If you have sent in the FWAB and your official ballot finally arrives, send that one in, too, and the board of elections has procedures to handle it.
4. If you've never voted, if you never lived in the US, they will guide you through the process of finding the right address to use, so don't use that as an excuse for not voting.
5. If your preferred party sets up an "overseas primary" election and you register for that, that is NOT a registration to vote in the election! 

You can set up alerts, so that you will be informed of upcoming deadlines for registration or voting in your state: http://www.fvap.gov/vao/alerts. First, you create your account with your email address and a password. Then, you set up your subscriptions. If you want to get the updates for your state, scroll down the list to "Absentee Voter Resources by State" and check off your state. Don't forget to click "Submit".
I'm not going to review yesterday's meetings, now. I'll leave that for another post. This is an election year, so it's important to have this one message only.

OAW - Day 2, Day 3, no time to write

There's the objective of keeping everyone posted on Overseas Americans Week. Then there's the reality of just not being able to sit down and write something. Forget about tweeting -- it's just not for me. Look at the logistics. If I leave the wifi on all the time on my phone, I'll wear down the battery. Plus, we don't always have decent wifi. I've got a pre-paid card (and in the US, that's not a really cheap option, just marginally less expensive than the 7-day plan I could have gotten on SFR with my French number) so I don't want to leave it on data mode, either. We don't have time to get out the computer all the time, either. I have managed to sit down, maybe once during the "work" day, each day, to connect myself, post a facebook update, or something.. But I also want to take the time to assemble my notes, so I can't spend all that time on internet.
I do want to thank the readers who have tweeted, referring their followers to my posts, and those who have shared on Facebook. My readership has spiked. My blog is not really intended for wide readership, but on these occasions, I do appreciate it.
Back to these last two days. Tuesday was a day full of meetings. We can't give the details of the talks. We have our position papers and this year we are talking a lot about banking discrimination both from the US side and the foreign side. I think we all know about the banking discrimination. I've talked about it enough; so has Victoria. And we'll continue to gripe. And when you talk about the discrimination on the part of foreign financial institutions, you talk about FATCA.
The Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation Business Traveler Card. (APEC card) is something new. The US is one of the 27 partners in APEC and the card is to allow business travelers from member economies to have streamlined immigration procedures when entering member territories. All the member economies have issued the cards except the US, which passed the law authorizing the cards in 2011. Homeland Security has not yet issued the cards, so we are asking legislators to put some pressure on. This has raised lots of eyebrows. It's something to aid commerce. US commerce.
The staff members we meet in legislators offices are very receptive to our positions. It's surprising how many of them have parents, siblings, friends living in foreign countries who have let them know already of our issues. They just didn't realize how widespread they were. Since I was privileged to have participated in this last year, it's also nice to go into some offices and see familiar faces -- we're bringing them up to date.
There are other meetings with administration representatives, like the one with Nina Olson on Monday and the one at the State Department this morning. I was at a meeting in Senator Toomey's office this morning, so I missed the State Department meeting, but I know it lasted a full hour longer than was scheduled, because I was saving seats for everyone for a long, long, long time at the Longworth cafeteria. That's always an important meeting where the citizenship questions are raised, and consular services....
I did mention spotty internet at the beginning. I interrupted this post for dinner and had no internet afterwards. So, Day 4 is dawning and I'm sending this off before we get cut off again.

We're in Washington -- AARO!

Victoria (follow her on the Franco-American Flophouse) and I are sharing a flat, obtained via airbnb, in the Adams Morgan section of DC, right near the zoo. We walked to, and later from, the metro station at Woodley Park -- a pleasant walk across Rock Creek on the Duke Ellington Bridge. It's a neighborhood, with people going about their business and as we were walking home yesterday evening, we thought how far we were from the hill.

So, let's go to the hill, which is why we are here in DC, anyway! It's Overseas Americans Week. This year, the delegation is made up of AARO (sorry, no link because it's still the old, outdated website and I won't put up a link until the new site is up) and FAWCO, the Federation of American Women's Clubs Overseas. Our partners at ACA now have a permanent presence in Washington. The AARO Facebook page will carry regular updates. We are united in our positions and efforts to bring about change in the laws, rules and regulations that have had unintended negative consequences on we who live abroad.
To start, breakfast at the Longworth Cafeteria. It was the first chance we had for all of us to get together. Tim's not in this picture, because he's the one who took it. We got down to business as soon as we cleared away the trays. Got out schedule sorted out: who would attend which meetings. Today, Tuesday, that's especially important as we've got several simultaneous appointments.

Then, we all went off to the IRS to the Taxpayer Advocate Service, headed by Nina Olson, who has extensive knowledge of our particular issues and has worked very hard to bring about change. In fact, AARO presented her with an award for her dedication. Her key staff were also present and we all recognize that their contribution is immeasurable. We can't say too much, yet, about the content of the meeting. But our key issues are very high on their list of priorities.
Back to the hill, first to bring Carolyn Maloney's office up to date. She is the co-chair of the Americans Abroad Caucus. And on to other representatives. No need to go into details. I think that our new issue on APEC cards (Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation, and the card is the ABTC, Asia business travel card) is getting a lot of attention. This is a card that allows streamlined processing for business travelers belonging to the APEC economies. The US is one, so it honors the cards of business travelers from member economies, and passed a law in 2011 to establish the card for US business travelers. Homeland Security has still not issued those cards.
Must go, now. Today is a busy, busy day.

Making appointments for March

First of all, here's a picture of one of the Magnolia trees on our street, taken about 10 days ago, still at the beginning of the month! And in the States, it's still freezing! Unfortunately, that blue sky has disappeared in a haze of yellow smog. The sun comes through, but the sky is ugly. Details at any distance are blurry. The other day, from the library, just a block over from the Eiffel Tower, the tower was not clear.

High school mate, C, was in town last week and after work, she went off to tango. I accompanied her one evening, even though I don't dance; I watched the feet go by and was entranced. Another evening, she invited my friend R and me to come to the studio to observe the dubbing work. (I love that -- never get bored!) Then she and R went off to tango and I came home. They had a fair dance lesson, not great, but really hit it off and didn't end their evening of gabfest until almost midnight. 

AARO has the first of its two tax seminars during the week. I didn't need to go to 101, but because I am one of the event organizers, I did go. I always learn something, anyway. It motivated me to finish up my FBAR form, which I did just before opening the blog post. This year the FBAR must be done on the pdf form one downloads from the site. You can then fill it out on your computer, without being on line. I got out last year's FBAR so that I had all the bank info ready and I had already gotten the highest balance during the year figure onto my spreadsheet and converted into USD, so I was ready to fill it out. It still took almost an hour. Once it's filled out properly, you click on the "Home" tab of the file and it connects to the website for e-filing. You get a confirmation notice, which I printed up, as I also printed out my file. I don't know why I actually printed them -- old habits die hard -- I have the file and the confirmation saved on my hard drive. So, that's done. Next step is to try to get an estimate on my taxes, because I will owe more for 2013. I get an automatic extension for filing but still have to pay (overpay) by April 15, so I don't get stuck with a penalty.

During the week, I had to tackle the appointments for Overseas Americans Week. I was asked to hold off to start with, so I feel I got a late start. I wasn't as free as I had been earlier. I'm frustrated, because next week, it should be done -- then we go!

I'm getting excited about the trip. I won't see T&B immediately, during OAW, but will get a chance on the return leg. I'm staying an extra week in order to go up to Pittsburgh, family visit there, and then back to DC. J tells me we may get to go to the Pirates' season opening home game. I hope we can get tickets. And they've got tickets for the opera the next evening! Sounds great. 

Spring seems to be here already!

We had our trees pruned last fall, so we don't see much of anything on the branches in our yard, but across the street, the fruit trees are in bloom. Our yard has turned to moss; I'd guess it's 80% moss, now, and I don't see the primeveres (primula), but I do spot them in the neighborhood. Forsythia is in bloom and the magnolia trees are budding. The roses have sprouted new leaves and I guess the buds will be coming, soon. My parsley didn't die this winter, and we've had fresh parsley a lot. I'm thinking I should do some preparation work on the vegetable garden boxes, but I can't help but think that a freeze could come.
Here, we had a wonderful visit by Claire, Aurelia, and Constance from England and Emma from the Tarn-et-Garonne. It was a short week, but the aunts, uncle, and cousin had a chance to meet Constance. Of course it rained a lot, so it was not great for going outside and doing things. I did take Aurelia to the library with Sacha. Aurelia got to use the umbrella and Sacha didn't complain when I put the plastic bubble on the stroller. We went to pick him up and took the long bus ride to the library, singing "The Wheels of the Bus..." and "I had a tiny turtle..." all the way, to the delight of Sacha. Then, we sang again on the ride back after the "lap-sit". The whole family gathered for a pizza party at Louis and Gwen's.
Other than that, it was a wet and windy month of very mild temperatures and not much activity.
I wanted to get rid of my US tax declaration, but many French institutions and administrations don't post their year-end statements until March or April, or even May. Some have come dribbling in, but I'm still waiting for others, so it's not worth opening the software to do only partial work. I think I can finish the FBAR, though. Get that out of the way, at least. I'll have to do it before April 15th, just to have an idea of what I may owe, so I can send in a check. I'll have to take the automatic extension (allowed to those who live abroad) to figure out the final figure, though.
AARO is having two tax seminars, again, this year. March 13, for those who are new to filing their US taxes (newcomers overseas, new to filing, or thinking of doing it yourself for the first time...) and March 17 for more experienced filers, who need to learn what's new this year or who have complicated returns. We hope a lot of new, young people will come. They are often unaware of their filing obligations because they owe no tax. If you know any Americans in or near Paris, let them know of these events.