Partner
James O’Brien has over 31 years of tax experience, including ten years in a Big Eight public accounting firm, four years in a large law firm, and seventeen years of large public company in-house experience at senior leadership levels. He has dealt with a broad array of federal, state, local, and foreign local country tax issues and related tax audits. He has strong mid-career experience handling a wide range of state & local tax matters. With his extensive tax experience in a variety of professional settings, Mr. O’Brien has advised and assisted with tax planning and tax risk minimization and related financial reporting issues, tax due diligence, and tax dispute resolution, including tax audits and appeals, as well as tax operational issues.
Specifically, Mr. O’Brien has worked closely with internal corporate executives and cash management personnel to develop and support positions for deferring U.S. tax expense for earnings deemed permanently reinvested offshore consistent with company business objectives. He has also worked closely with the management and finance personnel of a company with extensive land holdings to maximize the potential tax deferral benefits from like-kind exchanges of real estate. Mr. O’Brien has substantial experience with apportionment and with business vs. non-business income reporting positions for state income tax purposes. As an example, he has negotiated a state corporate income tax refund of over $50 million from one state based on a non-business income reporting position. When practicing law, he was part of a team of lawyers who litigated the constitutionality of the 1991 Pennsylvania corporate net income tax law changes suspending the tax net operating loss carryforward provisions.
Mr. O’Brien has spoken extensively on federal tax, state and local tax, and corporate tax operational issues to the Tax Executives Institute, the Council on State Taxation (COST), the Pennsylvania & New Jersey Institutes of Certified Public Accountants, the Manufacturers Alliance for Productivity and Innovation (MAPI) Tax Councils, the Birmingham Tax Forum, and other professional associations.
Mr. O’Brien has a JD degree from the Villanova University School of Law, and a BS in Accounting from Penn State University. He is a member of the Pennsylvania Bar. He is based primarily in the Birmingham Alabama area.
James W. O’Brien
Barnwell Consulting, LLC
675 Seminole Avenue, Suite T04
Atlanta, Georgia 30307
Office: (770) 988-9364
Fax: (404) 941-3020
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