OAH in deficit 2nd year in a row
In my fourth report as treasurer, the news is once again mixed—we ended Fiscal Year 2006 (FY06) with an unanticipated deficit, but the finance committee and the board has worked with the executive director and staff to identify the sources of the problem and develop appropriate remedies....
The FY05 deficit of nearly $472,000 resulted primarily from unanticipated expenses involved in moving the annual meeting from San Francisco to San José, unanticipated office operations, and failure to realize projected revenues. The “surplus” of $205,310 noted above for FY06 includes more than that amount of temporary restricted revenues, i.e., funds not available for on-going operations. Thus, at the end of FY06, we faced an unanticipated debt of about $179,000 owed to IU, something not reflected in the accountants’ summary of revenue and expenses, but noted in the report itself. ...
Last year I suggested that there was reason for guarded optimism in FY06 because we had recently moved our investments to IU Foundation, advertising revenues are up, membership was up, development efforts enjoyed increasing contributions, and we anticipated no more unusual expenses like those in 2005. In retrospect, I was too optimistic. To be certain, our investments have done much better this past year and membership has continued to increase. Yet we ended FY06 with a debt of $179,259 owed to IU. The services provided by IU take place throughout our fiscal year, but OAH’s income is concentrated at certain times of the year. As a consequence, it has long been the practice to run a debt with IU that has usually been extinguished by the end of the fiscal year. In both FY05 and FY06, however, we ended the year with a debt. In FY05, the debt was paid by dipping into FY06 revenues. In FY06, the debt was too large to deal with in that way, but IU has been willing to carry us in the expectation that we shall balance our account during FY07....
Read entire article at OAH Treasurer Robert Cherny at the OAH website
The FY05 deficit of nearly $472,000 resulted primarily from unanticipated expenses involved in moving the annual meeting from San Francisco to San José, unanticipated office operations, and failure to realize projected revenues. The “surplus” of $205,310 noted above for FY06 includes more than that amount of temporary restricted revenues, i.e., funds not available for on-going operations. Thus, at the end of FY06, we faced an unanticipated debt of about $179,000 owed to IU, something not reflected in the accountants’ summary of revenue and expenses, but noted in the report itself. ...
Last year I suggested that there was reason for guarded optimism in FY06 because we had recently moved our investments to IU Foundation, advertising revenues are up, membership was up, development efforts enjoyed increasing contributions, and we anticipated no more unusual expenses like those in 2005. In retrospect, I was too optimistic. To be certain, our investments have done much better this past year and membership has continued to increase. Yet we ended FY06 with a debt of $179,259 owed to IU. The services provided by IU take place throughout our fiscal year, but OAH’s income is concentrated at certain times of the year. As a consequence, it has long been the practice to run a debt with IU that has usually been extinguished by the end of the fiscal year. In both FY05 and FY06, however, we ended the year with a debt. In FY05, the debt was paid by dipping into FY06 revenues. In FY06, the debt was too large to deal with in that way, but IU has been willing to carry us in the expectation that we shall balance our account during FY07....