From Oklahoma to New York: Glenn McCoy’s Journey through SALT

Meredith: 00:00:35

Welcome to Saltovation.

The Saltovation show is a podcast series featuring the leading voices in SALT where we talk about the issues and strategies to help you make sense of state and local tax.

Meredith: 00:00:46

Welcome back to Saltovation. From Oklahoma to NYC, our latest guest, Glenn McCoy's journey through state and local tax spans.

Law school, government service, corporate leadership and consulting, marked by pivotal moments like the Oklahoma City bombing, 9, 11 and adapting to life in New York.

Meredith: 00:01:05

Hi, everyone. Welcome to the Saltovation Podcast. Today we are here with Glenn McCoy. Glenn, thank you so much for joining us today on the Saltovation podcast.

Glen: 00:01:14

Thank you. Thank you for having me.

Meredith: 00:01:17

And so can you share with us a little bit about your background and how you got into state and local tax?

Glen: 00:01:24

Oh, sure. How much time do you have?

Judy: 00:01:26

Right.

Meredith: 00:01:27

Whatever you can give us.

Glen: 00:01:30

Is an interesting story. I sort of fell into state and local tax, actually.

Judy: 00:01:34

Right. So common.

Glen: 00:01:36

Yeah, I went to, I'm originally from Oklahoma and I went to Oklahoma State University at undergrad and I majored in accounting simply because I knew I wanted to go to law school. And I thought if I don't get in law school, I've got to be able to get a job. And I know I can get a job in public accounting.

So I majored in accounting, had a great time at Oklahoma State, and then did get into law school and went to the University of Oklahoma and got my law degree. And while I was at the University of Oklahoma in the summer, the first semester, I was taking the Intro to Tax income Tax class.

And my professor was a fellow named Jeffrey Pinnell. And he came into class one day in the summer and he goes, listen, there's an opportunity at the Internal Revenue Service for a paralegal specialist.

You have to have a degree in accounting and you have to be enrolled in tax classes at the University of Oklahoma Law School. And so if anybody's interested, why don't you apply? And so I applied, as did a good friend of mine, Andy Hartman, who is still a good friend.

And we both were hired to work in the appeals office of the Oklahoma City District Office of the Integral Revenue Service. We were, you know, it was called a paralegal specialist. But what we did is we worked with all of the appeals officers.

So anything that was being appealed federally at the IRS level, we would write the protest, we would write the reply to the protest. So, like a protest to be filed. And the appeals officers, I was super impressed. They were, they were all CPAs, they were all lawyers.

A lot of them had LLMs.

You think about these people working in the Government, you think they're not qualified because these were brilliant people and they didn't work very hard. I mean, we went in at 8, we were finished at 4:30. And so after that I worked there for two.

My second and third year of law school, 20 hours a week during the school year and full time during the summer. And then when I got out having a degree in accounting, I was recruited by all the public accounting firms.

And so I went directly from OU Law School to Arthur Young. A little history lesson here. Back when there was a big eight. Know about that, Christine? When there was a big eight. But there were eight.

Judy: 00:03:56

I was big eight. Okay, I'm 30 years. So yes, big eight. I was like even thinking it might have been Big 12. Like I can't, you know.

Glen: 00:04:03

Yeah, Big 8. And so I went to Arthur Young and with an advanced degree, did pretty well, got promoted early. And then the oil bust came.

It was in the 80s and Arthur Young lost almost all of its clients, all of its oil and gas drilling funds, all this stuff. It was like desolate. And so I got laid off and as did a lot of other people who had advanced degrees.

They were all like, you know, you can get another job. You've got a law degree. Don't worry about it.

So I went to work for the Oklahoma Tax Commission and in the general counsel's office there in Oklahoma City. And there were statutorily, there's a general counsel and seven assistant general counsel.

So I was one of those seven and did litigation for the state and ran, represented the income tax division, sales and use tax division, and did all the hearings before the administrative law judges there. So that was the entrance into state and local that I just sort of fell into it and moved from there. There was an opportunity.

I'd gotten married, my wife wanted to move from Oklahoma City to Tulsa. I went into the tax commission to resign. I was going to get a job with a law firm in Tulsa.

And it just so happened that the fellow who's the administrator of the Oklahoma Tax Commission Mission in Tulsa was retiring.

And so because of my work in the general counsel's office, they came to me and they said, how would you like to be the administrator of the Tulsa District office for the Tax Commission? I'm like, great. I think I was 27. I had like 80 people reporting to me.

A lot of people that were there were not happy, you know, a lot of the old timers who really wanted that job. So I got a big dose of, you know, how to, how to be politically correct and how to give deference to people who had all the experience.

I mean, I really probably shouldn't have had that job, but I loved it. They came to love me. I think I stayed there for seven years and. And I was starting to get, you know, Harley Duncan.

I was involved with the Masada meeting at the Midwestern States association meeting, because it was Oklahoma. And so I met Harley Duncan.

I mean, started meeting all these people that ended up being sort of, you know, with me in my career for a long, long, long time. And so I thought, I don't want to be a career state employee. I want to get out of the state.

And so an opportunity came up for Carmagee Oil Company that was back in Oklahoma City, so moved from the Tax commission to Carmagee, and I became the director of State and local tax and in House Tax Council for them. And I remember vividly my first day at work there. You know, they were like, this position had been open for two years for their.

So they said, we have 173 open audits. And I was in charge of audits. And so I was like, oh, my God. You know, so I just sat down.

I remember the first week, I got mail from 13 different states. And within the first two weeks, I had a hearing, a unitary tax hearing in Idaho for Carmagee.

And I didn't really know much about how the company was organized, how it was set up, what parts were unitary, what parts weren't. What. You know, why we were being audited.

Meredith: 00:07:20

Right. What are you. What are you defending? And what. It's like, I haven't even seen the org chart yet. How am I supposed to make a unitary argument?

Glen: 00:07:28

Do I have settlement authority? I mean, what's our.

Meredith: 00:07:31

Can I take a look at the financials? What's our reserve for all of these? What's my materiality?

Glen: 00:07:36

I need to know. And I remember, like, somebody from the long term. It's like, don't worry about it. Go. You know, yes, you.

You know, just call us and, you know, get a number. And so that's kind of how it started. So I loved it. And I loved. I've got involved with the American Petroleum Institute.

I've always been one of those people who was like, the leader. I was president of my high school, you know, I did. I just always somehow. I don't know why. It's really usually thankless jobs.

But I got on the API Slift Committee, State and Local Income and Franchise Tax. And I met Marilyn Withecombe. She had just left Montgomery, Montgomery Ward. They're taken over by Mobile. And so she was suddenly in the.

In the oil and gas industry. And we went to our first API meeting the same time both of us were joining that group and met, you know, lots of people.

So I stayed in the oil industry, oil and gas industry for about seven years at Kermagee and just really loved it. But I got divorced, and I was wanting to leave Oklahoma, and I'd had a lot of hearings with. For Carmagee and New York State and New Jersey.

So I got to come up here to the Northeast frequently to handle those hearings. And I would, of course, try to arrange to have my hearing on Thursday so that Friday would be a travel day.

And I would instead stay in the city and then travel on Sunday. I could spend the weekend in the city and go to some shows or do, you know, see the sights and have some fun in the city.

And I fell in love with the city. So opportunity came knocking again, and I actually got a call for.

Headhunters were calling me, and I got a call to go to work for Disney in California to be their director of state, local tax. And everybody called all my buddies. They were like, oh, it's a sweatshop. You don't want to go there. It's horrible.

And I was like, okay, where do I want to go? And I was like, oh, I really want to live in New York. So I just told the recruiter, I want to move to New York City.

And I remember the recruiter saying, nobody wants to move to New York City. Why do you? I said, no, I really do. So I got. Had an interview with Bryce Waterhouse, and I moved to New York and went to work for pw.

And the rest I say, is history. I've been here for. Actually, it was 30 years, April 22nd. So when I left 30 years ago.

Judy: 00:09:59

New York was very different than it.

Glen: 00:10:00

Is, very different than it is now. And I also.

,: 1995

So I went out. The cfo, John Lenahan, he was the CFO at Carnegie at the time.

I remember him saying to me, my car was in the parking garage at Kermakee, and the blast had caused the garage to kind of tilt A little bit. And so they couldn't, the gates wouldn't open so nobody could get their car out. And I went to, I had to find somebody of authority.

So I found John and I was like, I have to take my car because I'm leaving, coming back, I'm giving my car to my brother. So I have to, I have to get it out. So he got, you know, people, security people and we got the car out and wow. That's how I left. Right.

So that's a thing. It was a thing. It was something you never forget.

And it was really also unusual for me because I didn't deal with the aftermath of that bombing because I left.

Judy: 00:11:31

Right. Because you weren't there.

Glen: 00:11:33

So I didn't know. Although I, you know, subsequently found out there were, you know, because daycare center was so close.

There were people, families at Carmagee that were affected, lots of people that I knew from tax commission that were affected, etc. And so I remember watching when they toured, when they felled the, the Murray Building.

I watched it on television from New York, you know, and it was years before I really went back to see the memorial or anything like that. So quite a, quite an unusual movement from Oklahoma to New York City. And then I got here and it's fast, fast, fast and so many things going on.

But I was there, I loved it.

And I often said, you know, the difference was that you, you know, the clients at BDO were more middle market clients than Fortune 50 or Fortune 500 clients and they needed us.

They didn't have the in house expertise for state and local that a lot of the, you know, what I found in the big four was that you would oftentimes get projects from big, big companies after they'd already done everything in house they could to settle it and they couldn't do it.

Judy: 00:12:44

Yep.

Glen: 00:12:44

So they wanted management wanted somebody to point the finger at and say, well, firm did it or couldn't do it, you know, you would get it. So it would almost be a no win situation and be really hard to settle.

Whereas at bdo, they loved you, you helped them, them, they saw the value that you brought. And it was just a different sort of mindset, more, a little bit more collegial.

And I got some of my biggest clients there that stayed with me my, my entire career. You know, I was told long ago that, you know, clients have shelf life. And I, and I that's true.

You know, things happen, people within the company or firm will retire or get fired or just move and some or Somebody will come in over them and you know, stuff happens so that your relationship suddenly isn't the same. You may or may not get along with that new relationship and so you may, may lose them.

But I had one client in particular that was a pharmaceutical company. They did generic pharma rather than Brandon pharma, pharmaceuticals, and sort of had been family owned, about 3 billion in, you know, revenue.

So not small, but not huge. And I did everything for them. So that was really the main client I needed. I had audit defense projects in 10 or 12 states.

We did consulting projects, planning projects, restructuring projects, you know, everything, transfer pricing.

We pull in all types of different services for them and got, had a really great relationship and that, I'll just finish that thought that pharma was then acquired by a larger pharma that was then acquired by a larger pharma that was then acquired by a larger pharma. And when I went to kpmg, I brought in the small one and all these mergers happened while I was there.

So it was my client and it went from being a $3 billion client to being a $240 billion client. And I nearly lost control because everybody wanted it, you know, every partner. And I was not a partner there. I was a director.

When I went to kpmg, I was already of an age where I couldn't, if I'd gone in as a direct admit partner, I couldn't have invested in their plan before I would have to retire. So I just went in as a, as a director.

Judy: 00:15:17

But you're also, even though you were bid and qualified, you aren't a cpa, Right. Because you have an accounting undergrad. Did you get become a CPA or a lawyer?

Glen: 00:15:24

It's interesting. I could, I am a member of the, of the New York State Society.

Judy: 00:15:30

Okay.

Glen: 00:15:31

But I am not a cpa.

Judy: 00:15:33

Okay, that's interesting.

Glen: 00:15:35

How does that happen, you ask? I thought the same thing. Yeah.

I was also with a small public accounting firm after I, after I left Ryan, I kind of stopped midway after I got to New York.

But if you are a partner level person in a small regional public accounting firm, three partners in that firm can sponsor you and you can become an active member in the society.

Judy: 00:15:58

Oh, interesting. Okay.

Glen: 00:16:00

And so they really wanted me to do that. So yeah, I am, I am a member of the New York State Society, but I'm not a cpa.

Judy: 00:16:06

Well, so many things are changing in terms of that. But I was just thinking in terms of you being a partner. I am, but you know, I'm a Lawyer, too. But I was. I could be a cpa, but I wasn't.

But I went in public accounting. And then I'm like, okay, if I'm going to stay, I guess I better become a cpa.

So I kind of did it like you, but I got it because I'm like, to stay, to get the credibility I need, the certification, even though I kept my law license active. So I also thought I might step away and go to a law firm, but I just never did.

I've always preferred public accounting to a law firm from the ability to help more people across the nation than just beside us in one locality where I'm licensed. Right. Yeah, but then you were at PW. No. You were at BDO during 911 then.

Glen: 00:16:45

I was. Yes, I was at BDO during 9 11. And that was another thing. You know, all of my friends were like, okay, Glenn, where are you going next?

Because we're not going anywhere near you. You know, after Oklahoma City bombing, and I remember my mother telling me, you're not going to be safe in New York.

And I said, you know, the worst disaster in US history just happened across the street from me in Oklahoma City. I'm going to be fine in the city. And then 911 happens just a few years later.

Judy: 00:17:12

Were you close? Like, where's your building?

Glen: 00:17:14

In the financial district, Midtown and city. You know, the World Trade center was downtown, so miles, you know, nothing's that far in New York City, but it's. But it was pretty far. I remember.

You know, everybody remembers where they were and what they were doing on that morning. And I do remember it was a very clear, crisp, beautiful day in New York City. Clear skies, Sunny, you know, September 11th.

And I live right around the corner from the Plaza Hotel. And so. And I walked to work. So I walked down 5th Avenue and. And our offices were at 43rd and Madison. So from 58th and 5th to 43rd Madison.

So I stepped out on the corner of 58th and 5th, and I saw the smoke plume that you all saw on the news from one of the towers. Because I remember leaving the apartment and I'd heard, oh, the World Trade Center's been hit by plane.

I thought, oh, it's probably a helicopter or one of those small. Something little, I thought. And then when I saw the smoke, I thought, no, that was not a small plane. So I went on to work.

I got to the office and I just did everything normally. I stopped and got my coffee at my little coffee shop, you know, before I went in. By the time I got in the office.

The second plane had hit hour, and all the staff, everybody was. That was in the office were. It was just pandemonium. And I was a partner and just made partner at bdo.

And all of the other partners at BDO were on airplanes going to Chicago for a board meeting. The leaders of the firm, and so they couldn't be reached. And there were like two other partners that.

We were junior partners that were only ones in the office. And everyone was turning to us about what to do, you know, and I, I just immediately said, just evacuate. Just go home. Go somewhere safe.

Because the location of the BDO office was. We were just a couple of blocks away from Grand Central, just a couple of blocks away from the Chrysler Building.

There were other landmarks that were very close proximity to the office, and nobody knew whether there was going to be something else, you know, and after they started circulating, all the news was, oh, there's one, that's Pennsylvania. You know, they started talking about the other planes.

And so, you know, I just remember saying, just, you know, I mean, after having experienced Oklahoma City bombing, you know, I was like, we're out. I said, I'm. I'm out. I'm leaving. And yeah, I'm your leader, but I'm banning ship and you need to just leave.

So I had inherited a case from one of my partners at BDO that was a New York State audit. And I had continued it because I'd just gotten it and I wasn't ready. And so I filed for a continuance and they continued it.

It was going to be held on 911 at 9:30 in the morning in Tower 2. The State Department had an office on the 86th floor of Tower 2. And I would have, if I had not continued the case, been, I would.

Wouldn't be talking to you today. And it was so eerie. I didn't realize that until I pulled out the case file again, you know, to start working on the case. And then I was.

I should have kept that page, but I couldn't. It was just. It was just really.

Judy: 00:20:51

But the people that you were having the hearing with are probably no longer with us.

Glen: 00:20:54

They're no longer with us.

Judy: 00:20:55

So did you win the case? Because just by default.

Glen: 00:20:58

You know what's interesting is that all those audit papers were lost, right, for all those audits. And so, yeah, they kind of went away because they couldn't really reconstruct them. The people who had worked on them were gone.

Horrible time in New York and just living here and in my building, a lot of people were from Cantor Fitzgerald that lived in my building or their parents did. And, you know, there were. Every day there was a funeral and there were. If it was a police reform.

And they had him at St. Patrick's Cathedral, which is also a walk right down 5th Avenue from my apartment. So you could tell, you could be in an okay mood.

And you're walking to work and you're around the corner and you start to see the street blocked and hear the bagpipes playing.

And then you see the fire trucks down in front of St. Patrick's and so I always walked right down there and stood and watched them before I went onto the office. But it was every day for weeks and weeks. And then they had all the Kendra Fitzgerald funerals in the Central Park.

It was a very trying time, but I think it changed the city. I think it changed the people in the city. I think that people are.

I don't know what your experiences have been, either one of you, but people were friendlier after that.

Judy: 00:22:16

I feel it's been great. No, really welcoming. Yes.

Glen: 00:22:20

On the street, they would help tourists. They would, you know, it was a more collegial. Not such a rat race. People actually slowed down. I think it's gone right back up.

But yeah, there was a long period of time where it was, it was different. And I think it. Yeah, forever.

Judy: 00:22:37

Yeah.

Glen: 00:22:37

As a result of that. But yeah. So Pricewaterhouse bdo. I left video, went to Ryan.

Judy: 00:22:43

Okay.

Glen: 00:22:44

Ryan was really very young firm then. I was third partner and Brent hired.

Yeah, Brent hired me to develop an income franchise tax group within Ryan because they were really, you know, built on the strength of sales and use tax reverse reviews. And so I'd been, I'd been the partner, national partner, charge assault for BDO before I left. And I.

So I went to Ryan to develop the income tax practice and I loved it. It was challenging. It was a unique environment. It's still a unique environment. It's a different firm today than it was then.

ned a four year contract from: 2006

I mean, Ryan had every client in the world for sales tax, but they had not done income tax for them.

Judy: 00:23:46

Sure.

Glen: 00:23:46

So that was my challenge, was to get in with those partners who knew a contact of a big, big firm that we did fantastic sales tax work for and get them to hire us to do income tax work. And so did that. Loved it. And then I had some personal reasons for leaving and I left and I went to a small.

That's when I went to this small middle market firm, Holtz, Rubenstein and Reminick.

Judy: 00:24:16

Oh, okay.

Glen: 00:24:17

One of my good girlfriends and partners who's still a good friend was at BDO with me. And she had gone there their estate and gift practice. And so she contacted me and next thing I knew, I was there as the.

In charge of their state and lobby group. But there was no state and local group. So I was to develop that. And it was.

It was a challenge because I was having to use all the federal or international tax people to do the salt work.

Judy: 00:24:49

Yep.

Glen: 00:24:50

You know, you find it, kill it, do it, and build a pipeline. And so it was just really, it was just a little overwhelming. And then it. They. It came to light. They were going to be acquired by Baker Tilly.

Judy: 00:25:04

Oh, interesting.

Glen: 00:25:06

Okay. I thought, you know, maybe it's time for me to go back to big four.

So as that merger was happening, I went to KPMG and was there, you know, good buddies with Nikki Crichton and a few other people that I knew really well there and had it. Had a good time for a long time. But then, you know, it's sort of like Covid hit. You're working from home.

I'm not a partner, but I'm highly paid and I'm. There were just a lot of, you know, writing on the wall. I thought, well, they offered a package. So I took the package.

And I was gonna retire, I thought, sort of, kind of. But I'd been on. I didn't know what I really wanted to do.

And it was the middle of COVID And so I fortunately had saved enough of my rubles that I could afford to sit for a little while and think about it. And I was on the board of governors for IPT at that time. And one of.

One of the other partners from Brian, Trisha, Fortune, was also on the board meeting. And I said, hey, I'm. I'm not working. I've just left kpmg. And Trisha was like, why don't you come back? And I was like, I don't know.

Yeah, that's what happened.

Judy: 00:26:27

So you're a boomerang.

Glen: 00:26:28

Yeah, so I'm. I am a boomerang. And I gotta tell you, I love it. It's just, it's. I've had completely different roles here.

Judy: 00:26:35

Yep.

Glen: 00:26:36

Since then. I came in and. And I connected directly with Brent. And Brent is, you know, just a brilliant guy.

And he was like, you could Do I could have done a lot of things because you could go into our law. Brian Law, you could go to our advocacy practice, you could go into our income tax practice.

But you know, he just hired a fellow who'd been the head of income, the overall head of tax for Deloitte. Greg. Rob. Do you know Greg?

Judy: 00:27:02

Oh, I do, yeah.

Glen: 00:27:03

Ryan.

Judy: 00:27:05

Well, he retired and he. From Deloitte and then that was his pet segue. Right. To Ryan. I kind of just talked to him recently.

Glen: 00:27:11

Yeah, yeah.

Judy: 00:27:12

Okay.

Glen: 00:27:13

He's at Ryan and so he has the role that I had before. Okay. And, and so I thought I don't really want to do that. So Brent was like, why don't you come in and do.

You're really good at selling business development. He goes, I put together a team of just 12 partners who all have industry experience and specialty experience.

And we're practice leaders like of credits and incentives or property or income tax or sales tax, you know, so all these people, great depth of knowledge in a specific area. Because I've put together a group, they're reporting to me and we're going to hit all of our client base and we're going to cross sell.

nd so I came in to do that in: 2021

And I always kind of wanted to be in national tax because I have always done public speaking since I started and I've always authored articles and written, you know, thought leadership articles. And so I thought, you know, I really would rather do that. But Ryan really didn't have a. We had a national tax group, but it was really small.

It wasn't. It just wasn't going to be a right fit at that time.

Judy: 00:28:39

Okay.

Glen: 00:28:40

So segue. Three years, three and a half years later, I got appointed to the advisory board for Tax Note State and started publishing articles there.

So I've published about six or seven in two years. There's their quarterly. Yep. And. And then I just got on the Bloomberg State Tax Advisory Board.

Judy: 00:29:01

Yeah, they're. They're really picking up with a lot of stuff. I've been noticing lately they're trying to come in over CCH and some of the historically.

So it's been really interesting to see like who's giving different kinds of information that's relevant. Yeah, like they were a resource I used when I started this podcast is.

Meredith: 00:29:19

For educational purposes only. And is not intended, nor should it be relied upon as legal, tax, accounting or investment advice.

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