Highlights
AGA Advertising Opportunities!
Advertise in
AGA's electronic newsletters—TOPICS and AGA
Today! Get maximum exposure and build your brand.
Click here for all the
information you need to run your ad! Or you can contact
AGA's Director of Communications,
Marie
Force
PARs Due
Dec. 15 for CEAR Program Review
AGA’s CEAR Program helps raise the quality and usefulness of
federal agency performance information through promulgation of
guidelines, training workshops for Performance and Accountability
Report (PAR) preparers and program reviewers, an in-depth peer review
of each PAR, opportunities to serve as reviewers, and an annual
comprehensive compilation of commendable practices, examples of
creativity and practices in need of improvement. Interested in
participating? Click
here to learn more or contact Craig Galloway to reserve a
spot for your agency's PAR.
Computer-Based Auditing Tools & Techniques—A
Special Supplement to the Summer 2005
Journal
Auditors everywhere rely on a
variety of computer-based tools and techniques to get their jobs done.
The supplement will be bagged and mailed along with the Summer 2005
Annual Technology issue of the Journal of Government Financial
Management.
Click here for more information.
CGFM Exam 3 Study Guide
Now Available!
Be sure
to order the new Study Guide for CGFM Exam 3: Governmental
Financial Management and Control to help in your preparation for
the examination. Click here to learn
more.
 ORDER NOW!
A Primer on Internal Controls and Auditing: Crucial to Government and
the Economy
By: Wanda A. Wallace, Ph.D., CPA, CMA,
CIA
Internal control has never been optional, and now an easy-to-read
resource directed to a wide audience is available to understand both
what is meant by "internal control" and how an
“audit” is conducted. Click
here to order your copy.
|
November 29, 2004
• News from the Profession
Nearly All Federal
Agencies File Financials on Time
All but two major agencies submitted financial statements by Nov.
15, just 45 days after the close of the fiscal year, meeting a deadline
that is nearly three months earlier than last year's, the U.S. Office
of Management and Budget (OMB) announced. "We are pleased that
federal agencies are now able to issue financial and performance
information in a time frame that is comparable to the private
sector," said OMB Controller Linda Springer in a statement. The
Homeland Security and Health and Human Services departments were the
only agencies that didn't make the deadline, but both agencies planned
to hand in the statements just a few days late, according to OMB. The
other 22 agencies' meeting of the accelerated deadline marks a
"major step forward" in financial and program management,
said Jonathan Breul, a senior fellow at the IBM Center for the Business
of Government. The faster financial reporting is impressive enough, but
agencies also needed to prepare performance information in time for the
earlier deadline—a task that's even more challenging, he said.
"Particularly in the case of performance information, it took some
heroic efforts" to get the Performance and Accountability reports
in on time, Breul said. —Amelia Gruber, Government
Executive. Click here to
read more.
Critics Say Credit
Rating System Open to Manipulation
Without their credit ratings, schools can't get built, highways
can't be paved, factories can't expand. Critics say the big
three—Moody's, Standard & Poor's and Fitch—have become
some of the most important gatekeepers in capitalism without the
commensurate oversight or accountability. With the stroke of a pen they
can effectively add or subtract millions from a company's bottom line,
rattle a city budget, shock the stock and bond markets and reroute
international investment. Yet there is no formal structure for
overseeing the credit raters, no one designated to take complaints
about them and no regulations about employee qualifications. When a
company, town or entire nation wants to borrow money by selling bonds,
the market almost always requires that the rating companies get
involved. Bonds they deem safe get a good rating. The higher the
rating, the lower the interest rate the borrower must pay. But at the
heart of the increasingly profitable business is a conflict: The rating
companies get the bulk of their revenue from the fees they charge to
the very entities they are rating. —Alec Klein, The
Washington Post.
Click here to read more.
DoD Urged to Hire New
Chief to Fix Financial Systems
David Walker, head of the U.S. Government Accountability
Office, said the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) should create a new
top management position with responsibility for overhauling the
agency's financial management systems. At a hearing Nov. 18, the Senate
Armed Services Committee questioned comptrollers from the armed
services on why they continue to be plagued by financial management
problems, and looked to Walker for guidance. The comptrollers assured
the committee that they expected visible improvements over the next
several years, but Walker said he believes that DoD’s goal for a
clean audit by 2007 is unrealistic. Walker said that though he believed
agency leaders were committed to cleaning up financial systems, he
recommended creating a new position of chief operating officer or chief
management official. That individual would be charged with
straightening out the agency's financial management systems. Walker
noted the challenges of having so many distinct organizations within
Defense, saying: "There are too many layers, too many players, and
too many systems." —Kimberly Palmer, Government
Executive. Click here to
read more.
Accounting Grads Face
Best Job Prospects in Years
College graduates with accounting degrees are entering the working
world at a good time—recruiters are eager, jobs are plentiful and
offers are attractive. Demand for accounting services is way up because
of new regulations spawned by corporate scandals such as Enron and
WorldCom. Recruiters from PricewaterhouseCoopers plan to hire about
3,100 people off U.S. college campuses this year, up almost 19 percent
from last year. Ernst & Young plans to hire 4,000 new graduates,
increasing hiring about 30 percent this year. Jim Case, director of the
career center at Cal State-Fullerton, says regional and local
accounting firms are hiring, too. —AccountingWEB.
Cli
ck here to read more.
Study: Private-Sector
Pay Model Worth the Pain
Shifting federal agencies to pay-for-performance systems
"will better serve the needs of the federal government," but
it could be several years before the work force accepts the idea,
according to a new report sponsored by IBM's Center for The Business of
Government. The transition to pay-for-performance systems will have
"a much higher prospect for success if managers and employees are
involved in the planning," the report says. According to "Pay
for Performance: A Guide for Federal Managers,” written by
compensation expert Howard Risher, abandoning the 15-grade General
Schedule—the white-collar pay system for about 1.6 million
employees—will not be easy. Risher believes, however, that most
federal employees won't lose economically under systems that base at
least part of their annual raises on job performance. "Very few
employees are performing so poorly that they will be denied
increases," Risher writes. "For the high performers—and
every agency will define that differently—their salary will go up
more rapidly than under the GS system.” —Stephen Barr,
The Washington Post.
Click here to read more.
Audit Finds LA Utility
Overbilled by $4.2 Million
Public relations firm Fleishman-Hillard overcharged the Los Angeles
Department of Water and Power by $4.2 million through
"unsubstantiated, unsupported and questionable" billings, the
city controller said in an audit released earlier this month.
Controller Laura Chick said she turned her findings over to federal and
local prosecutors investigating the contract, and to the city attorney,
who has sued the firm seeking reimbursement. "What my audit found
are millions of dollars in bills that boggle the mind and defy common
sense," Chick said at a Nov. 16 news conference.
"Fleishman-Hillard treated the ratepayers of Los Angeles like a
cash cow, milking them for millions." Richard Kline, regional
president of Fleishman-Hillard, has acknowledged that some of the
firm's bills were not supported by documentation, but he said they
amount to no more than $652,457 over five years. Seven former employees
of the firm had told the Los Angeles Times in July that they
were encouraged or directed to inflate bills to the municipal utility
in some cases by $30,000 per month. — Patrick McGreevy, Los
Angeles Times.
Click here to
read more.
Website Urges Exchange
of Purchasing 'Best Practices'
A new website will serve as a clearinghouse for suggestions on
improving federal agencies' purchasing practices. The site collects
critical procurement information in one spot and stands to benefit
contractors as well the federal acquisition work force, said Robert
Burton, associate administrator of OMB’s Office of Federal
Procurement Policy. OMB developed the site over the past 18 months in
collaboration with other agencies and private sector groups. The site,
called the online
Acquisition Center of Excellence for
Services, also contains links to federal procurement laws, policies
and regulations, and a section on training opportunities. —Amelia
Gruber, Government Executive. Click here to read
more.
Companies Say SOX Costs
to Jump to $5.8 Billion
Companies will spend $5.8 billion on meeting Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX)
requirements in 2005, even though executives initially believed the
costs would be a one-time expenditure. According to a study by AMR
Research, 36 percent of companies plan to increase spending, 52 percent
will maintain current levels and 12 percent will decrease SOX spending.
AMR Research surveyed more than 200 business and IT leaders on their
Sarbanes-Oxley and broad compliance spending priorities. John Hagerty,
vice president of research, said the "one-time" project is
turning out to be an ongoing issue. Over the next year, AMR Research
estimates expenditures will occur in these key areas: 42 percent on
internal labor/headcount, 29 percent on outsourced services and 28
percent on technology. —SmartPros. Click here to read
more.
|
