The AARP Foundation Tax-Aide service in Whatcom County just completed another successful year of providing free tax preparation services to the citizens of Whatcom County. As can be seen in the attached summary we prepared over 1,100 tax returns and helped at least 242 others by answering tax questions. This is an increase of almost 4% compared to the previous year. Although these results are far below pre-COVID levels, the results are encouraging. In Washington, AARP Tax-Aide prepared over 390,000 returns and nationwide the number was over 1.1 million with close to $1.0 billion in refunds.
In Whatcom County we processed over $1million in refunds and estimate that we saved our clients approximately $240,000 in commercial tax preparation fees. We believe that for many of our clients, the fees they would have to pay to have their returns prepared would be a significant portion of their monthly budgets. Our 32 highly motivated volunteers worked diligently for ten weeks and logged 2,300 hours of support in addition to countless hours of training and preparation.
We could not provide these services without the ongoing support of the Whatcom community including our site hosts, First Congregational Church of Bellingham and the Bellingham Senior Activity Center who provide us with space to provide our services and welcome us with open arms.
Additionally, we would like to thank the following for helping us to get the word out about our services and sending clients our way.
The Bellingham Public Library
The Whatcom Asset Building Coalition
The Cascadia Daily News
The Lynden Tribune
Carlton J. Nathon. District Coordinator
AARP Foundation Tax-Aide, Whatcom County
