States Participate in Regional Calls

State Board Report

March 2016

Over the last few weeks, many NASBA Regions held conference calls led by their Regional Directors. The calls included a summary of matters discussed at the January Board of Directors meeting as well as updates on legislative issues and trends as summarized by NASBA Vice President – State Board Relations Dan Dustin and Director of Legislative and Governmental Affairs John Johnson. The Boards’ representatives, both Board chairs and executive directors, exchanged information on matters that are currently facing them. Among the topics mentioned were:

• Alaska – Drop in oil revenues has had a major impact on the state’s budget, leading the Governor to ban the Board’s travel.
• Arizona – House bill seeks to consolidate licensing boards.
• Arkansas – Asking NASBA to assist with developing social media strategy.
• California – Moving to new office location this spring.
• Hawaii – Implementing mandatory peer review in 2017.
• Louisiana – Comparing CPE tracking systems to find one that is intuitive.
• Maryland – Soliciting new additional members for their Peer Review Oversight Committee through the Maryland CPA Society.
• Minnesota – Returning to requiring renewals on an annual basis.
• New Hampshire – Determining how to handle firms that have clients involved with the medical marijuana industry.
• New York – Receiving direct referrals from Department of Labor which are being handled by office of discipline.
• North Dakota – Looking at "nano learning" for continuing professional education credit.
• Pennsylvania – Several members of the Board are not being appointed or renewed resulting in no possibility of a quorum to conduct business.
• Virginia – Interested in gathering information on what other states are doing to promote secession planning.
• Washington – Studying the impact of SSARS 21 on peer review.

Common topics of discussion during the Regional conference calls were: dealing with budget cuts, potential consolidation of licensing boards, rules covering practice in states allowing recreational marijuana, the impact on the CPA pipeline of the CGMA and other credentials, encouraging secession planning, retirements of Board staff and members, tools available from the NASBA Communications team and attendance at upcoming NASBA meetings.

John Dailey (NJ), chairman of the Committee on Relations with Member Boards, has recommended that all Regional Directors schedule at least two Regional conference calls during the year, to strengthen communication among the neighboring Boards and NASBA.