California dreamin': CalCPA chair shares his vision for rebuilding the public's trust.

It is with great pleasure that I begin my term as CalCPA chair. It's an honor to represent such a wonderful organization and our 28,000 members. On behalf of our membership, 1 would like to thank 2002-03 CalCPA Chair Nancy Wheeler Chandler for her service and dedication to better our profession.

The unprecedented rapid-fire change our profession has experienced in the past two years has required us to face a challenging battery of criticism, reform and damage to ore" collective professional reputations. Let's take control and rebuild the public's trust by redoubling our efforts to remind the public that we are a group of hard working, dedicated professionals committed to doing the right thing.

SOUND FINANCIAL DECISION MAKING

According to a recent Bankrate survey that graded Americans' financial literacy on everyday money matters--such as reading bank account statements and paying bills on time--55 percent of Americans have financial practices that are worthy of only a "D" or "F." And in a test administered last year by the Jump$tart Coalition, two-thirds of high school seniors failed tests on credit. savings, investment and other basic money matters.

Providing financial guidance is our profession, so who better to help improve California's financial "know-how" than CPAs? We are in a unique position to work closely with our Personal Financial Planning Committee, the Jump$tart Coalition, high school educators and California legislators to:

* Educate Californians on sound tax and financial planning practices;

* Provide educators with comprehensive resources for teaching financial literacy concepts:

* Demonstrate that CPAs are competent professionals of the highest integrity who are dedicated to excellence and the best interests of the public; and

* Show that CPAs are active and contributing members of their communities.

This year we will launch a financial literacy program that incorporates elements of CalCPA's strategic plan to help rebuild the public trust and increase the financial savvy of our state.

ADVOCATING THOUGHTFUL CHANGE

As various accounting scandals have unfolded over the past two years, federal and state legislatures have made major changes to the way our profession is regulated. There are still many more changes coming and while some create important consumer protections, others show a lack of understanding of business and our profession.

Each of us must become involved in the political process--our future depends on it. Build relationships with your city, state and federal legislators and be available to discuss issues that affect the profession. You don't have to go it alone. Our government relations team can introduce you to your elected officials and provide you with summaries of various legislative and regulatory proposals to help make your discussions timely and informative.

We should all contribute to our CPA-PAC, www.calcpa.org/members/GR/CPA-PAC.html. to ensure that candidates who understand how to balance file needs of business and consumer protection receive our support. We can't sit idly by as our profession changes--we must be active participants.

A MIRROR OF CALIFORNIA

In 2000, CalCPA's Diversity Task Force investigated ways to increase the profession's diversity in terms of gender, national origin and ethnicity. Mark Dauberman, who chaired the task force, has agreed to chair the slate Membership Committee for the next two years and continue our diversity efforts by developing programs to:

* Increase the diversity of CalCPA's leadership so that it is more representative of the membership:

* Increase the diversity of CalCPA's membership to better reflect the makeup of the profession: and

* Increase the profession's diversity to better reflect the makeup of California's communities.

REDUCING COSTS AND IMPROVING MEMBER SERVICE

CalCPA and the Education Foundation, although separate entities, share many goals. A major objective for both organizations is to deliver services and products as efficiently and economically as possible. In the coming year, CalCPA and the Foundation will increase their collaboration and identify ways to reduce shared costs and improve member services.

A new service that is a direct result of this collaboration is that all CPE members earn through their chapters will now be entered into the Foundation's database. This will provide members with a complete CPE listing that they can turn in to the California Board of Accountancy when they renew their CPA licenses.

Also this year, CalCPA and the Foundation have joined forces to underwrite the costs of all CalCPA members' participation in the 2003 national MAP Survey. CalCPA is the only state society offering this valuable survey free to its members.

PLANS INTO ACTION

CalCPA's strategic plan will come into its own this year. Council, staff and members have developed tactics that will focus on:

* Strengthening our profession through representation, recruitment and public relations:

* Contributing to the success of our members through CPE, networking and recruiting; and

* Ensuring the success of CalCPA.

Ensuring CalCPA's success is essential to our members' success and to the continued efforts to strengthen our profession.

CalCPA staff and leadership are dedicated to finding new ways to improve delivery of member services through the use of technology. CalCPA's website will be redesigned during the next year to make it even more member friendly. Our electronic newsletter, BUZZ is now complemented in alternating weeks by the addition of CalCPA Industry BUZZ for our industry members. A new Accounting Educators' BUZZ directed to our members in education will launch this summer.

We are committed to protecting and improving CalCPA's financial health. During the upcoming year, efforts to increase membership will be embedded throughout the organization as we develop new ways to demonstrate to nonmember CPAs that their success, and the profession's success, is closely linked to their participation in CalCPA.

Underlying all our efforts is CalCPA's commitment to rebuilding trust in the profession. Listen for statewide radio ads that reinforce the value and depth of CPA services. Additionally, we will work with you to increase the profession's visibility through media opportunities and appearances at community events, schools and business organizations.

In closing, thank you again for placing your trust in me to represent our profession. Please fuel free to contact me at [e-mail] with your concerns or comments.

I look forward to working with you as we restore the trust in our profession that we have worked so hard to build over that past century. We owe it to ourselves--and future generations--to strengthen our core values of integrity, competence, independence and objectivity.

STEVE WIMMERS: AN ACTIVIST FOR HIS COMMUNITY AND PROFESSION

BY JANE GIRARD

Steve Wimmers has a lot of small-town pride, quite an accomplishment for someone who lives in a city of 1 million. But, stroll through Wimmers' San Diego neighborhood, where he keeps his office and you'll see. He knows everyone.

"Ocean Beach is really a small town," Wimmers says. "People here know one another and care about the community."

Wimmers' Career has evolved, in part, from his community activism, which also inspires his professional activities.

Diving Right In

A yearning to swim helped to steer Wimmers toward a CPA career, "My dad bought a summer family pass to the public swimming pool in our neighborhood," he recalls. "I wanted to make sure we used that pass so we would get it again the following summer."

The 10-year-old Wimmers tracked each family member's visits to the pool and calculated the cost per visit at the end of the summer. "I can assure you that, with eight kids in the hot Ohio summer, we got our money's worth, chuckles Wimmers as he reflects on his first foray into cost accounting and quantity discounts.

Several summers of swimming later, Wipers added a little theory, to his practical knowledge of accounting when he attended Ohio State University as part of an honors accounting program.

"Many of the classes were huge, sometimes with several hundred people in them" he recalls. "We had 19 people in the honors accounting classes."

Between the small class sizes and the stewardship of a strict, but inspiring, accounting professor, Wimmers realized his passion for accounting and began thinking about where he wanted his career to take him.

It wasn't Ohio.

"I remember walking to my 8 a.m. psychology, class my freshman year during a severe cold spell," says Wimmers. "I passed ha, a bird frozen in its tracks and, for the first time in my life, it dawned on me that there must be a better place to live."

So, Wimmers spent spring break of his senior year traveling across the country, and interviewing at various CPA firms as he went. The trip ended in San Diego, where he was offered positions at two CPA firms.

"I fell in love with the beach in San Diego," he recalls.

After graduation and a summer traveling the country without the benefit of a car, Wideners started at Touche Ross.

Scandal Creates Fortuitous Career Turn

At Touche ROSS, then part of the Big Eight, Wimmers quickly learned what happens when a CPA firm does the wrong thing.

"A mini scandal ended my career there, he recalls, though not because of any problems with his work. The firm had issued a clean audit opinion on a client that soon went bankrupt, and as a result, the SEC prohibited the firm's San Diego office from taking on any new publicly traded clients--all prior to Wimmers' employment. But, hall of the San Diego auditing stall, including Wimmers, was laid off.

"I used my severance package to buy my first stereo system," he remembers. "And for the next two months, I studied for the CPA Exam."

His layoff was fortuitous though. Rather than continuing on the Big Eight track, Wimmers worked several different jobs and eventually decided to start his own business.

"When my son, Eric, was two, I had an opportunity to stay at home with him and I took it," Wimmers recalls.

He took on a Jew small clients to fill the time while his son was napping. "If I needed to deliver paperwork or make copies, I'd put Eric on the back of my bike and we'd go together."

Once Eric started school, Wimmers realized that he liked working for himself. Within a couple years, he outgrew his home office and moved his business, Steven H. Wimmers, CPA, to a nearby office building, where he's been ever since, working mostly on tax and auditing.

Having an Impact

Wimmers takes his community involvement seriously. He has lived in Ocean Beach for almost 30 years and has a long history of working to make his community better, whether it's through the YMCA, the Ocean Beach Community Development Corp.--which he helped found--or the local merchants association.

"He gives his time to organizations he believes in," says attorney Bill Reedhead, a client, fflend and fellow local activist. "If he doesn't believe he can make a positive impact in a leadership position, he won't take it."

Wimmers' activism has forced him to focus on a work-life balance. "I stick to a rigid schedule so I can have time with my family," he says. That daily time with sons Brett, 17, and Kurt, 15, plus his wife, Elizabeth, makes it all worthwhile. His former "assistant" Eric, now 28, is attending medical school at Howard University.

Reaching the Pinnacle 

Wimmers' community involvement eventually led to increased CalCPA participation. He joined in 1983 "to take advantage of the health benefits and continuing education programs," he says, but didn't get involved until the 1990s, when he joined the San Diego Chapter's Management of an Accounting Practice Committee.

It was here that he realized the value of his professional organization. "It was such a great group," Wimmers recalls. "I really appreciated how all these small practitioners were there to help each other. There was no competition."

That experience inspired him to get more involved with CalCPA, and he soon became the MAP Committee chair and San Diego Chapter president.

Wimmers' CalCPA involvement increased when his chapter nominated him to CalCPA Council, which eventually led to a role as the chair of the Bylaws Implementation Task Force.

"Any time the words 'bylaw revisions' were mentioned in any other organization I've been involved in, I either fell asleep or ran in the other direction," he quips. But CalCPA's revisions were important to Wipers and he took his role in the sometimes contentious task force seriously.

"I felt the Council was too big and ineffective," he recalls. "We tackled some difficult and politically charged issues, but we got through it and developed a more streamlined, effective leadership," he says.

This successful role An CalCPA Council prompted fellow members to encourage Wimmers to run for vice chair and eventually leading him to his current position as CalCPA chair.

"I can't tell you how honored and excited I am to become chair of CalCPA," he says. "It's the pinnacle of my professional career.

Serious Work Remains

But Wimmers doesn't plan to rest on his laurels. He recognizes a number of professional concerns that will be the locus of the coming jean.

"The biggest issues we face involve who is setting the standards of our profession," he says. "Nationally and statewide, we're facing rules potentially set by non-CPAs. While it's important to develop trust with the public, we also need to be sure that CPAs can work with the new rules."

Colleagues say Wimmers' style builds results-and trust.

"He's a quiet, jet assertive leader," says Larry Perle, CPA, a former employee and now a partner at Lamb, Morton, Perle & Gautschi. "He really listens to people and has a warm and friendly approach with everyone he meets. When you talk to him, you feel like you've known him all your file."

Perhaps that's because Wimmers makes an attempt to get to know everyone he meets. "Every one of our 28,000 members is an individual with his or her own story to tell," he says. It's something he keeps in mind as he's dealing with fellow members on a daily basis.

"We members have a lot in common in terms of what we want for the profession, and it's important that we remember that when we occasionally disagree on the smaller issues," he says.

And Wimmers likes to use these people skills to benefit the profession. "I really enjoy working with the folks in Sacramento," he says, referring both to the CalCPA's government relations team and the legislative and regulatory decision makers.

"CPAs need to be represented now more than ever. I hope to be able to help explain our case to legislators," he says.

With Wimmers as chain, CalCPA has a true activist on its side. "He's a dependable and thoughtful leader," says Nancy Wheeler-Chandler, outgoing CalCPA chair. "He takes his role in leadership very seriously and I think we have a good jean ahead of us."

Jane Girard is CalCPA's online manager, You can reach her at [e-mail].