Government Finance Review articles from August 2003

Government Finance Review archives from August 2003

Keeping pace with information technology.(from the editors)
August 1, 2003... For the past several years, Government Finance Review has sought to dedicate at least one issue each year to the diffusion of advanced information technologies in state, provincial, and local governments. While we were planning this issue,...

Back in the Big Apple: 2003 Annual Conference recap.(News & Numbers)(Government Finance Officers Association)
August 1, 2003... GFOA members gathered in New York City May 18-21 for the association's 97th Annual Conference--the first time since 1971 that the conference has been held in the center of the financial world. Convened at the Hilton New York in the heart of...

Meet your new president-elect and Executive Board members.(News & Numbers)(Government Finance Officers Association)
August 1, 2003... GFOA is governed by the 18-member Executive Board, which consists of 15 members-at-large serving staggered three-year terms, the current president, the previous year's president, and the president-elect. At the association's annual business...

Paying GASB?(Governmental Accounting Standards Board )
August 1, 2003... By now, some of you have received your "fair share assessment" from the Governmental Accounting Standards Board. It seems that the GASB is experiencing some financial difficulties and that the solution to its woes is to solicit "assessments"...

More good news for D.C.(News & Numbers)(District of Columbia bond ratings up)(Brief Article)
August 1, 2003... Mayor Anthony Williams and Chief Financial Officer Natwar Gandhi announced in June that Fitch Ratings and Standard and Poor's had upgraded their ratings of the District of Columbia's general obligation bonds to A- from BBB+. "This is a...

Committee recommends merging City of Omaha, Douglas County.
August 1, 2003... After more than a year of interviewing government officials and employees, consulting with national experts, and reviewing the literature, a citizen's committee recommended in June the full merger of the City of Omaha and Douglas County. ...

Brookings: impact fees good for economic development.(News & Numbers)(Paying for Prosperity: Impact frees and Job Growth)
August 1, 2003... Impact fees are a more efficient way to pay for infrastructure than general taxes, increase the supply of buildable land, have complex effects on housing prices, and do not slow job growth. These are the major findings of a new Brookings...

New releases.(Balancing the Federal Budget)(Book Review)
August 1, 2003... In this timely new book, Irene Rubin focuses her attention on how government tried and eventually succeeded in balancing the U.S. federal budget in 1998. With characteristic insight and a lively narrative, Rubin describes the successive efforts...

Poison pills and white knights: doing business with an ERP industry in transition.(enterprise resource planning)
August 1, 2003... Industry turmoil resulting from the burst of the tech bubble and the recent merger mania facing some of the largest software firms has left governments anxious about the products they own or were considering purchasing. This period of...

Bringing ERP to California's trial courts.(Order in the Courts!)(enterprise resource planning supports Court Accounting and Reporting System)
August 1, 2003... Until recently, the State of California's trial courts were the responsibility of county governments throughout the state. Most of California's 58 counties were providing day-to-day administrative services and financial systems for the trial...

It's about time(keeping)! The ins and outs of time and attendance software.
August 1, 2003... Given the large sum of operating dollars that goes toward personnel costs, in any governmental entity, the old saying. "Time is Money" is very appropriate. The ability to manage employee time accurately and efficiently is a worthwhile and...

Planning for CRM success.(customer relationship management)(related article: New York City's 311 Project)(related article: Philadelphia's Inside-Out Approach to CRM)
August 1, 2003... Customer (constituent) relationship management, or CRM, is an enterprise software system designed to automate customer-facing processes. Examples of applications commonly associated with CRM include call centers and citizen Web portals. CRM is...

Managing your virtual world: internal controls for enterprise technology.
August 1, 2003... Am I able to truly automate and integrate governmental operational processes while preventing the software from becoming just another legacy budgetary control system? Are my people ready, willing, and able to use the new software? Will the...

Making the grade? ERP and public school districts.(enterprise resource planning)
August 1, 2003... Over the last several years, government organizations across the country have enhanced their efficiency and effectiveness by procuring and implementing ERP and financial systems. In some cases, vendors have taken products initially created for...

Audit committees that work: a properly constituted audit committee is an important tool for ensuring the independence of the external auditor and thus the reliability of the financial statement audit.(Best Practices)
August 1, 2003... The corporate accounting meltdown of 2002 raised public awareness of the importance of a properly constituted audit committee. Long before audit committees made headlines, however, GFOA offered practical guidance on audit management in the form...

Career paths of local government finance professionals: a recent survey of GFOA members shed light on a relatively unexplored topic--the career development and job satisfaction of local government finance officers.(Management & Careers)
August 1, 2003... As faculty training pre-service, in-service, and executive students for opportunities in public service, we are often asked for career advice. We suspect this is a common occurrence for faculty members, as well as for many senior managers who...

Portal Technology for the public sector: lessons from Lawson software's user conference.(Solutions)
August 1, 2003... Although portal technology offers a number of important benefits to the public sector, it is still unclear whether these benefits are enough to justify such an investment in the face of declining revenues and shifting priorities. GFOA has...

Washington, states ignoring needs of local governments: while local governments have borne much of the burden for stepped-up homeland security since 9/11, the federal and state governments have been reluctant to provide financial assistance.(Federal Focus)
August 1, 2003... The fiscal plight of local governments across the United States is a tough sell in Washington these days. In the face of shrinking revenues, rising homeland security costs, and increasing demand for public assistance, one would think the case...

GASB mandates immediate expanded disclosure for derivatives: the GASB's new guidance on derivatives disclosure is designed to increase the public's understanding of the significance of derivatives to a government's financial position.(The Accounting Angle)(Governmental Accounting Standards Board)(Technical Bulletin 2003-1)
August 1, 2003... The Governmental Accounting Standards Board in June issued Technical Bulletin 2003-1, Disclosure Requirements for Derivatives Not Reported at Fair Value on the Statement of Net Assets. The new guidance on derivatives disclosure was first...

Value-based health care procurement.(The Bookshelf)(Health Care Purchasing: A Value-Based Model)(Book Review)
August 1, 2003... Reading Health Care Purchasing is like going to an unfamiliar supermarket for a staple like milk: an inordinate amount of time is spent simply trying to find the desired item, with a number of distractions along the way. In this case, the core...

GFOA events.(Government Finance Officers Association)(Calendar)
August 1, 2003... August Portland, OR 11 Evaluating Internal Controls 11-12 Costing and Outsourcing Government Services 12 GASB Pronouncements: A Comprehensive Survey 13-14 Financial Planning and Multi-Year Budgeting 13-15 Advanced...

State and provincial association events.(Calendar)
August 1, 2003... Ohio GFOA Annual Conference September 15-18 Cincinnati, Ohio www.ohgfoa.com Minnesota GFOA Annual Conference September 16-19 Alexandria, Minnesota www.mngfoa.org Municipal Finance Officers Association of Ontario...

25 years later: cities still battle the fallout of prop 13.(Commentary)(Proposition 13 and property tax caps)
August 1, 2003... June marked the 25th anniversary of the passage of Proposition 13 in California, a landmark initiative that changed the landscape of local government in America. For California, Proposition 13 capped local property tax rates, transferred...