Tuesday, March 25, 1997 | 11:59 a.m.
THROUGHOUT Southern Nevada, residents are scampering around like starving rodents in a desperate search for little white morsels.
But they're not looking for cheese or bread crumbs.
It's bank and cash register receipts they want.
The reason: a recent report that Las Vegas residents are audited more often than residents of any other city.
"Why is the IRS picking on us like that?" a middle-aged woman in an oversize, sequined T-shirt said to me as she crawled around the casino floor near the ATMs in search of withdrawal slips.
I was not paying much attention to her. I needed to make a $100 withdrawal in order to stage a monumental comeback in a lively poker game, during which I had been thrashed like a red-headed Raggedy Ann doll.
As soon as the ATM machine dispensed the C-note and the withdrawal slip, a dozen people crowded around me.
"Give me that slip," a man in a plaid jacket pleaded. "I need the deduction."
"I saw him first!" a man in dark glasses shouted.
The scene was so disconcerting I canceled my plan to recoup my losses at the tables -- much to the disappointment of the other players, who begged me to rejoin the game -- and left the casino.
But everywhere I went, the scenario was the same.
At the supermarket, several well-dressed middle-aged men were hanging around each cash register, all of them offering to bag and transport groceries to the parking lot in return for register receipts.
At the building-supply store, a well-manicured woman whom I recognized from the apartment complex down the street begged me for my receipt from the lawn-and-garden department.
"Excuse me," I protested, "but if I were an IRS agent, I might question why a woman who rents an apartment would purchase fence posts and fertilizer."
"I'm starting a cattle ranch," she snapped. "What the hell is it to you?"
I gave her the slip and suggested she tell the IRS auditors that she was starting a landscaping business.
"If I were you, I'd rough up those hands a bit before you called in for an audit," I said with a smile.
The next day, I called a childhood friend who happened to be an IRS field agent.
"Bob, I told you to never call me at work," my friend Van said. "Because of your columns, you're rated as Tax Collection Enemy No. 2 -- just behind Irwin Schiff."
"Nevermind that," I said. "How come Las Vegas residents are audited more than anyone else?"
"I don't know," Van replied. "Maybe it has something to do with the fact that you live in a town where people drink, gamble and party 24 hours a day, and then scam on anyone they can to make up for the losses."
I thanked Van for his time and told him I'd be seeing him.
"No, Bob, we'll be seeing you," Van said. "There's an item on your '95 return we want to go over -- something about a $2,000 expense for fertilizer to start a sheep ranch."
"Yeah, steer manure," I said.
"Exactly," Van replied.
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