USFA Financials

[keith]

"The culture of the USFA?" This sounds like a comparison with NASA, post-Columbia.

Perhaps all candidates for USFA office should have their O-rings checked?

[TBean]

How can the weapon programs (which presumably are aware of their budget) have just kept on sending in invoices?

You are assuming that it was the job of the weapon's program to track thier expenses against thier budget. Are those paid positions? If not, you are asking a lot of a vounteer or several volunteers to not only provide a service, but also track a budget.

It seems, that the responsibility was with the staff to keep track of that and report back to the programs and/or the Board. Clearly, this needs to be done in a timely manner to avoid budget overruns and the person previously in the position was not up to the task. The entire ability to recognize or react to the potential issue is dependent upon a person doing thier job adequately - without the information going into the system you cannot do anything.

The Board of Directors has identified the points of failure and is attempting to fix the situation with proper controls.

[keith]

You are assuming that it was the job of the weapon's program to track thier expenses against thier budget. Are those paid positions? If not, you are asking a lot of a vounteer or several volunteers to not only provide a service, but also track a budget.

No I was assuming that there should be some awareness that there was in fact a budget and how much it was. If people didn't know (or didn't care) then that is a problem - and an ongoing one.

It seems, that the responsibility was with the staff to keep track of that and report back to the programs and/or the Board. Clearly, this needs to be done in a timely manner to avoid budget overruns and the person previously in the position was not up to the task. The entire ability to recognize or react to the potential issue is dependent upon a person doing their job adequately - without the information going into the system you cannot do anything.

They seem to have fixed a problem. However, just handling all invoices within 60 days does not prevent over spend.

The Board of Directors has identified the points of failure and is attempting to fix the situation with proper controls.

Well reading the attached document a cynic might observe that they have merely fixed the data entry problem.

[Philistine]

You are assuming that it was the job of the weapon's program to track thier expenses against thier budget. Are those paid positions? If not, you are asking a lot of a vounteer or several volunteers to not only provide a service, but also track a budget. {snip}

I don't know--my inclination is to be a bit suspicious.

But that's based on several assumptions that are not necessarily true:

1. The budets were given to the teams.
2. The team(s) exceeded the budgets by a significant amount (if not then why was this an example in the letter).
3a. The team had a single person submitting receipts and/or
3b. Members of the team received significantly more reimbursements than they had prior years (assuming they were members in prior years).
4. They weren't told to keep submitting invoices after expressing concern.

Now some or all of those might change my inclination--but in general it seems that beyond the single person who was overwhelmed at the USFA, and the lack of oversight, there was a marked lack of thought as to the consequences of going over budget by those being paid.

Hopefully, both the new oversight, and the shock of the past year's financials will change this way of interacting with the USFA.

--Philistine

[Mr Epee]

They're available. I've got copies going back several years. And I'm not on the BOD or an officer.

Then what was all the business about big G D-worth making multiple requests for information? And if this information has been readily available, then why do we need additional oversight committees?

The simple answer is that there are numbers and then there are numbers.

Can you share the documents that you have?

[arc]

1. The budets were given to the teams.
2. The team(s) exceeded the budgets by a significant amount (if not then why was this an example in the letter).
3a. The team had a single person submitting receipts and/or
3b. Members of the team received significantly more reimbursements than they had prior years (assuming they were members in prior years).
4. They weren't told to keep submitting invoices after expressing concern.

Not being involved in the "high performance" arena (or whatever they're calling it this year), I think that some of these assumptions are incorrect, in particular 3a. I think that the various members of the team, the captains, coaches (where applicable), the referees accompanying teams, etc., etc. all submit their receipts for travel, hotel, and whatnot independently, and that it was the responsibility of the staff member in question to be the central person keeping track of the budgets. Of course, those are my own assumptions and inferences, which may or may not be accurate ...

[Redblade]

I find it very encouraging that we see such quick action by the Budget and Finance committees.

I find it very encouraging to see such quick action by you in responding to the committees' quick action.

[jjefferies]

Now some or all of those might change my inclination--but in general it seems that beyond the single person who was overwhelmed at the USFA, and the lack of oversight, there was a marked lack of thought as to the consequences of going over budget by those being paid.

Hopefully, both the new oversight, and the shock of the past year's financials will change this way of interacting with the USFA.
--Philistine

Well I definitely approve of oversight and scrutiny. Suspicions aside this whole thing will probably benefit the organization as a whole. And while it did cost it didn't destroy the organization - the old "what doesn't kill you makes you stronger" say.

But I don't see transparency here. I do see quick response and some long overdue accountability to the membership. Which leads me to my question of, who besides Michael Massik is leaving or has left the organization? One of the areas of lack of clarity to me is how the organization actually runs. And I'm not referring to the usual quips about "haltingly" or "not at all". But I really don't see Massik as personally handling tracking of accounts, receipts, payables etc. So it must have been a lower level person who Massik was responsible for and Massik now falls on his sword, in the non-fencing figurative manner, and takes responsibility and leaves us. Is that how this plays out?? While Massik may have ruffled my fur once or twice by not providing adequate or timely response on what to him must have been minor matters, I found him to be a pleasant and decent enough fellow. I certainly wish him the best and no ill will.

But how does the organization move forward? Are the oversight committees adequate fixes? When does a new Executive Director get picked and who picks them? Will this fall to the new executive board? And then back to this entire issue with the upcoming elections. I surely do wish I had more faith in the nominating committee's selection process. This is a time when the USFA could do with some strong leadership.

Bottom line is that this looks like interesting times at the Old USFA.

[Capt. Slo-mo]

You are assuming that it was the job of the weapon's program to track thier expenses against thier budget. Are those paid positions? If not, you are asking a lot of a vounteer or several volunteers to not only provide a service, but also track a budget.

The National Coaches are paid positions, as I understand it. Some of the weapon squads also have managers. There were budgets set at the beginning of the fiscal year (August 1, if I recall). I would think it would be in each squad's interest to be keeping track of its expenditures against the budget, so they don't run the risk of suddenly running out of money, and failing to get re-imbursed for cabs in Catalonia or flights to Foggia.

Now, with the re-imbursements running so far behind, that makes their life tough. And not getting regular, timely feedback on what was approved (and what might not have been approved) makes an accurate running balance even tougher. Still, each of the National Coaches should have been able to roughly track their own expenditures against the budget they were given.

However; is this the primary source of the USFA's shortfall? One would suspect the Weapon Squads are only a minor part of the problem, but without any numbers it's hard to say. I've been told the "death of a thousand cuts" analogy is pretty accurate. No one area of the USFA caused all the shortfall. If every Squad bleeds a little, and nearly every World Cup trip loses a little money because of late travel arrangements or exchange rates, it adds up over time, even before you start looking at NACs.

Having more oversight in place than an overwhelmed staffer or an ED who tried to keep all the financial balls up in the air--but mainly through his hands--has got to be an improvement.

[dcmdale]

I think you're putting a bit of spin on that tidbit that may not be there. I take the language regarding the now-departed member of the staff as an attempt, without naming names, to provide additional assurance to the membership that the conditions which produced this past year's surprises no longer exist ...

I agree with you. This report is obviously intended for consumption by the general membership and does not mean that more pointed information didn't come out of this meeting. In general, I wouldn't think that the committee would want to go into detail about personnel matters in an open letter.

I also wouldn't expect that this is the end of the matter. Both the committee and the membership needed to know immediately that the USFA was still a viable organization and that there wasn't anyone who needed to be quickly apprehended before they could get to Uruguay. I think that this was that meeting. I would expect that the two committees have considerably more work to do before they are comfortable.