Cheltenham Township and the tax collector are fighting over taxpayer data privacy
As Cheltenham pushes to bring businesses to town, the township and tax collector disagree over who should run business license registrations. A switch would require changing a town ordinance.
Cheltenham Township plans to take over part of the independently run tax office amid a dispute with its finance officer over business data.
The disagreement over data privacy began shortly after Melvin Pitts took office in January, according to Pitts and emails obtained by The Inquirer. Cheltenham plans to amend the township code and reassign one of Pitts’ duties to help resolve the impasse.
Dispute over business licenses
Cheltenham’s tax office is independent from the township and collects county, school district, and municipal taxes for a flat fee from each entity. The tax collector, under the township code, also doubles as Cheltenham’s finance officer and issues the town’s annual $15 business licenses.
Shortly after Pitts and the township commissioner board’s new president, Matthew Areman, began their terms this year, Areman asked Pitts for a list of licensed businesses. Then in August, Pitts was asked for similar data to fulfill a Right-to-Know request.
Pitts refused both requests because, he said, he sees the information as confidential taxpayer information. Tax professionals who violate confidentiality rules can face jail time under state law.
“It’s very sensitive data,” Pitts said in an interview.
But the township argues that a list of licensed businesses does not qualify as tax information and should be public.
“I agree with you that information related to tax … is not subject to public access,” township solicitor Ed Diasio wrote to Pitts in February, “but there is no provision … that a list of businesses that the township has licensed in the township is not subject to public access.”
Two lawyers specializing in public records told The Inquirer that although the tax office is exempt from Right-to-Know requests, there are exceptions. The tax collector may provide certain data, such as high-level reports, as an officer of the township.
Cheltenham has no list of businesses
Without the business license data, Cheltenham has little way to confirm which businesses are operating in the township, spokesperson Lauren Walter said — especially more discreet enterprises like rental properties, which the township has to inspect every three years.
“Township Administration does not currently have a defined list of businesses within the Township, making communication with our business community a challenge,” Walter wrote in a statement. When the township began regulating plastic bags, for example, the environmental committee went door to door to help inform proprietors of the changes.
Cheltenham officials are also keen to build the township’s business tax base as part of its most recent comprehensive plan.
Rental inspector confronted tax collector
The conflict between the tax office and the code enforcement department came to a head in August, after Pitts learned that the township’s rental inspector, Michael Goldstein, had access to the tax office’s data portal. In August, after Pitts moved to cut off Goldstein’s access, Goldstein confronted Pitts.
Pitts recalls Goldstein telling him: If you take away my portal access, “I’ll crush you.”
Goldstein wrote an apology to Pitts after the incident that does not specify what he said. “I did not realize in that moment that my tone sounded aggressive or threatening,” Goldstein wrote in part. “While I was previously approved to have access, [I] honestly did not know that you did not want me to have access to that information.”
Walter, the township spokesperson, said that she conferred with Goldstein and that he had access in the system only to business contact information, not to financial data.
Township to do business licensing in-house
Now, the township is planning to transfer business licensing applications to someone who will handle accounts receivable, a now-vacant role. Information on newly licensed businesses would then be shared with Pitts’ office for tax collection purposes.
Moving the licensing process from the tax collector’s office to the township would require Cheltenham to amend the town code, which currently specifies that the collector handles it.
Cheltenham plans to post the accounts receivable position within weeks, new township manager Jonathan Altshul said, and would not move to amend the ordinance until sometime after tax day 2027.
Pitts would have to remove business licensing from a new system his office is rolling out to allow online tax payments, he said, and he worries that the licenses will become delayed by code enforcement.
That is what had led to a $30,000 backlog in licenses that Pitts inherited, he said, and has since cleared.
“We’ve been getting stuff done so quickly,” Pitts said. “I just want to do my job, and do it under the law.”
Areman, the commissioner board president, said Cheltenham “looks forward to working closely with the tax office throughout the transition” to ensure it is “seamless for the business community.”
Inquirer Greater Abington
This suburban content is produced with support from the Leslie Miller and Richard Worley Foundation and The Lenfest Institute for Journalism. Editorial content is created independently of the project donors. Gifts to support The Inquirer’s high-impact journalism can be made at inquirer.com/donate. A list of Lenfest Institute donors can be found at lenfestinstitute.org/supporters.
