The Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) program will host a kickoff event on Monday, February 4, at Claude Black Community Center to start the 2019 tax season, which runs through April 15. VITA offers free tax preparation for Bexar County individuals and families who earned up to $55,000 last year.
During the regular 2018 VITA season, 19 sites prepared 30,140 returns resulting in $10.6 million savings in tax preparation fees. There were over 300 trained and IRS-certified volunteers (contributing over 18,500 volunteer hours). $53.9 million was refunded to local filers and $21.2 million in Earned Income Tax Credits (EITC) went back to 11,600 taxpayers.
VITA is an incredibly valuable service to the community, focusing on helping working families file their taxes and claim the important credits for which they qualify. In particular, VITA emphasizes the Earned Income Tax Credit, which is one of the single strongest anti-poverty tools as it works toward pulling a family out of poverty simply by claiming the credit.
The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) created the Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) program more than 40 years ago with local communities to provide free tax return preparation to low-income taxpayers, using IRS-trained community volunteers.
For more information on VITA locations and services, visit www.vitasa.org, call (210) 222-2975 or dial 2-1-1.
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