The certified letter from the state demanded that Deena Mount pay a 6-year-old debt. Amount owed: five bucks. Cost for the certified postage: $6.51. And if she doesn't pay up, her former employer, the California Emergency Management Agency, is prepared to deploy the dreaded "Franchise Tax Board offset process." That's bureaucratese for, "Pay up or we'll yank the cash out of your next state tax refund." Mount is bewildered. "It's not like I was trying to be deceitful," she said this week during an interview near the Department of Alcohol and Drug Programs offices where she now works. "All they had to do is call me."
