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NLC Registration
Brochure Now Available
The Registration Brochure for AGA’s 2007 NLC is now available
online. The brochure includes a list of the featured speakers,
education sessions and events. You can also get information about
registration, hotel accommodations, travel discounts and more.
Register online
View the brochure
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Get to Know Your AGA
Corporate Partner
Whatever your specific business needs, EAM, Inc. / Mosley
& Associates is ready to provide assistance to you.
Experts in consulting, project management, audit and advisory services,
we have decades of hands on experience in auditing and analyzing
domestic and international government operations in the specialized
areas of financial management, internal controls, information
technology, forensic auditing, monitoring of disaster relief programs,
and compliance with laws and regulations. We have specialized knowledge
and experience in the Federal Inspector General Community and the
GAO. We have unique experience in working directly with Supreme
Audit Institutions in foreign countries as well as CPA firms in foreign
arenas. We have specialized knowledge of how federal, state, and
local programs operate in the domestic environment and in foreign
countries as a result of having staff that have lived and worked
throughout the United States and in foreign countries. We offer
integrity and efficiency and have staff with Top Security
clearances.
Everett L. Mosley, Vice President
EAM, Inc. / Mosley & Associates
P.O. Box 506, Springfield, VA 22150
PH: 703.569.3176
TF: 866.770.1255
FX: 703.569.9666
E-mail: eaminc@cox.net
www.mosleyandassoc.com
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December 11, 2006 • News from the Profession
AGA Today is
Brought to You by AGA Corporate Partner Clifton Gunderson
 Clifton
Gunderson's DC office is looking for experienced professionals to join
our public sector practice. The ideal candidate will have 5+ yrs of
Public Accounting or equivalent audit experience along with your BA/BS
in Accounting and CPA or CGFM. Duties will include audits of Federal
entities, State & Local audits (GASB), A-133 audits, and compliance
auditing. To apply please e-mail Jennifer.Busse@cliftoncpa.com
Census Counts 100,000
Contractors in Iraq
There are about 100,000 government contractors operating in Iraq,
not counting subcontractors, a total that is approaching the size of
the U.S. military force there, according to the military's first census
of the growing population of civilians operating in the battlefield.
The survey finding, which includes
Americans, Iraqis and third-party nationals hired by companies
operating under U.S. government contracts, is significantly higher and
wider in scope than the Pentagon's only previous estimate, which said
there were 25,000 security contractors in the country. It is also 10
times the estimated number of contractors that deployed during the
Persian Gulf War in 1991, reflecting the Pentagon's growing post-Cold
War reliance on contractors for such jobs as providing security,
interrogating prisoners, cooking meals, fixing equipment and
constructing bases that were once reserved for soldiers. —Renae
Merle, The Washington Post. Read the entire article.
GSA Chief at Odds with
Agency Auditors
A move by the head of the General Services Administration to
slash a proposed budget increase for the agency's inspector general
office threatens to undermine the independence of the agency's
investigative arm, the IG's office and congressional sources charged. A
recommendation from GSA Administrator Lurita Doan that the agency's
inspector general perform only half of proposed fiscal 2007 audits is
"just an extraordinary effort to reduce serious scrutiny of the
agency," said Robert Samuels, a spokesman for the IG's office.
Critics also cited Doan's refusal to grant the IG office's full fiscal
2008 budget request. The GSA chief cut a request for a 30 percent
increase down to 7 percent. In a set of internal notes from the IG's
office obtained by Government Executive, officials say that
the office's fiscal 2008 budget request "has been revised by the
administrator for the first time in memory of agency officials, and the
revision to both language and dollar amounts are extensive." In a
speech Monday morning before an industry audience, Doan defended her
actions, saying some people at GSA "are wedded to old
inefficiencies [and] protecting turf, and [see] no need to cut costs,
much less [reduce] the yearly increases." Previous agency
administrators "were unwilling to apply common budget
discipline" to the IG's office, she added. — David Perera,
Government Executive. Read the entire article.
AGA Today is Brought to You by the
University of Alabama in Huntsville
 Cost Accounting
Standards and Financial Management of Government Contracts course
begins Jan 10.
Understand how "cash flow" affects contract profitability.
Learn about
incentive and option structures, invoicing processes, improving
cash flow
and cost reporting as well as CAS and non-CAS accounting
standards, proposal
preparation and evaluation techniques. Distance Learning from
the
University of Alabama in Huntsville Continuing Education.
Visit
www.e-trainingsolutions.net
or email ann@e-trainingsolutions.net
Defying Calif.
Legislators, Officials Revive Tax Return Program
California tax authorities have defied lawmakers by reviving
ReadyReturn, a program that allows some taxpayers to have the state do
their returns for them, and expanding it from a tiny pilot project to a
service for 1 million residents. The move was engineered by outgoing
Controller Steve Westly and his successor, John Chiang, both champions
of the program. Intuit, the Silicon Valley manufacturer of TurboTax,
spent $1 million trying to defeat Chiang on Nov. 7 and stop the
program. ReadyReturn is designed to ease the burden of filers with the
simplest returns: single taxpayers with one employer and no complicated
deductions. Despite rave reviews by most of the 11,000 taxpayers who
used it last year, the Legislature over the summer yielded to an
intense lobbying campaign by Intuit and let the program die. But Chiang, Westly and Department of Finance Director
Mike Genest, who make up the state's Franchise Tax Board, made the move
after receiving legal opinions from legislative and tax board staff
suggesting that they have the authority to implement the program on
their own. Officials at Intuit denounced the Franchise Tax
Board's move, calling it an attempt to circumvent the law. —Evan
Halper, Los Angeles Times. Read the entire article.
Young People
Interested in Federal Work, but Rate Jobs Low
Americans think government jobs offer good benefits and security
and that's about it, according to survey results released Tuesday. The
public rates federal jobs far below those in the private sector in
terms of salary (not including benefits), opportunities for promotion,
impact on important causes, competitive environment, chances for
innovation, work environment and the quality of co-workers, the Gallup
Organization found in its first poll on attitudes toward government
work. But the good news for agencies that have to hire enough new
workers to replace the nearly 50 percent of employees ready to retire
over the next decade is that 34 percent of 18- to 29-year-olds still
indicated that they were interested in federal work. Linda Springer,
who leads the government's recruiting efforts as director of the Office
of Personnel Management, said the high rate of interest in government
jobs among young people is heartening. —Karen Rutzick,
Government Executive. Read the entire article.
Need CPE Hours?
AGA's partnership with MicroMash offers you high-quality courses in
auditing, accounting and more. See the full
listing.
Police Pension Fund out
$38 Million
The Detroit Police and Fire Retirement System is out
$38 million in loans to a company whose toxic waste operations were
shut down by the state because of a leak. Pension board members agree
they made a bad investment in Environmental Disposal Systems (EDS), the
Birmingham firm that defaulted on loans from the board, angered
neighbors of the operation and attracted several lawsuits. Now, instead
of eating the loss, the pension board is assuming ownership of wells
that drill hazardous waste 4,500 feet into the ground below Romulus.
The operation that opened this year after 17 years of controversy
remains closed and faces fines of $25,000 a day. —Christine
Ferretti and David Josar, The Detroit News. Read the entire article.
GASB Issues Statement 49 on
Pollution Remediation
The GASB has issued Statement No. 49,
Accounting and Financial Reporting for Pollution Remediation
Obligations. The Statement seeks to establish clear and consistent
guidance regarding when and how the costs and liabilities related to a
government’s responsibility to clean up pollution should be
determined and reported. Statement 49 identifies five events or
circumstances that would prompt a government to estimate expected
outlays for pollution remediation and requires the use of a
probability-weighted estimation method, the expected cash flows
measurement technique. Statement 49 will be effective for financial
statements for periods beginning after December 15, 2007, but
liabilities should be measured at the beginning of that period so that
beginning net assets can be restated.
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