Roby Sawyers, CPA, Ph.D., received the 2020 Arthur J. Dixon Memorial Award, the highest honor bestowed by the accounting profession in the area of taxation. The award, given by the AICPA Tax Division, was presented Nov. 18 at the AICPA Tax Division fall online gathering by Chris Hesse, CPA, chair of the AICPA Tax Executive Committee and principal, CliftonLarsonAllen LLP.
Sawyers is professor of accounting and director of undergraduate programs at N.C. State University's Poole College of Management. His areas of expertise include federal estate tax issues, North Carolina's tax structure, behavioral aspects of income tax decision-making, tax patents, and state and local tax. For more than two decades he has participated as a chair or member on numerous AICPA task forces, committees, and Technical Resource Panels (TRPs). Recently, he chaired the Tax Legislation Task Force from 2012 to 2014 and since 2018 has been a member of the Tax Practice Responsibilities Committee.
The annual award honors the memory of Arthur J. Dixon, a CPA who had an outstanding record of service to the tax profession and to the AICPA Tax Division. The award was established after his death in 1981 to honor outstanding CPAs in the area of taxes.
At the same AICPA Tax Division gathering, Grant Thornton's Jamie C. Yesnowitz, J.D., LL.M., and Jeff Martin, CPA, received the Jonathan Horn Distinguished Service Award. The Distinguished Service Award's name was recently changed to posthumously recognize and thank Jonathan Horn, CPA, a former TRP volunteer, AICPA staff member, and past recipient of the award.
