It appears the Charitable Giving Act (H.R. 7), a House bill providing incentives to increase charitable giving, may begin to move. A tentative mark-up of the bill is scheduled for September 4 in the Ways and Means Committee. Introduced in the House on May 8th by Rep. Roy Blunt (R-MO) and Rep. Harold Ford, Jr. (D-TN), the bill has garnered national attention, particularly in philanthropic circles, for a small provision that would have the effect of increasing foundation payouts from 5 percent to roughly 5.4 percent. For example, today’s Diane Rehm show on National Public Radio features a debate between Rick Cohen, Executive Director of the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy, who supports the provision, and Dot Riding, President of the Council on Foundations, who opposes the provision. Currently, foundations can count administrative costs in meeting a requirement that mandates spending a rolling average of at least 5 percent of assets per year. The provisions would no longer allow foundations to count administrative costs in the payout calculation, thereby having the effect of increasing the payout rate from 5 percent. While this payout provision has drawn most of the attention, the bill has other features that drew support from some charities. For example, taxpayers who do not itemize would be allowed to deduct charitable contribution in excess of $250 ($500 couple), but not more than $500 ($1000 couple). This nonitemizer deduction would be in place for 2004 and 2005 only. The bill would also allow people age 70½ and over to rollover distributions from Individual Retirement Accounts directly to an exempt organization staring in 2004. There are other provisions to encourage charitable contributions in the bill. The comparable bill in the Senate, the Charity Aid Recovery and Empowerment Act (CARE Act), passed last April.