New Audit Committee Effectiveness Center promotes successful corporate governance.

Last month the AICPA launched the Audit Committee Effectiveness Center, whose primary mission is to improve audit committee performance to the benefit of an organization's many stakeholders. The array of current and future resources available through this online Center (www.aicpa.org/audcommctr) will support and promote effective audit committees and position the CPA, who has the competencies, ethics and expertise required of financial experts, as the ideal audit committee member.

The Center houses information concerning audit committees of all sizes and types of organizations--publicly held, private, not-for-profit or other public interest entities. With the goal of improving corporate governance, the Center will provide guidance to corporate management and boards of directors regarding best practices in appointing and managing the audit committee function. It also will offer competency self-evaluation and training recommendations for audit committees and information on effectively interacting with multiple stakeholders.

Two of the Center's major components are the Audit Committee Matching System, which began last spring (The CPA Letter, July/Aug. 2003), and the new Audit Committee Toolkit. The Audit Committee Matching System enables CPAs to find opportunities to provide their financial expertise and commitment to corporate governance as audit committee members, as well as helps companies and organizations searching for audit committee members to locate eligible CPAs. Gratis registration is provided to AICPA members, and the search process is being offered as a public service to organizations for the foreseeable future. The service can be access through http://acms.aicpa.org.

The Audit Committee Toolkit, which contains matrices, questionnaires, sample forms, checklists and other items, is designed to help audit committees uphold their fiduciary responsibilities. It is intended for all organizations.

The toolkit has been printed as a book and is being broadly distributed. It was provided at no charge to members who are senior executives and have financial reporting and/or internal audit and/or SEC Regulations responsibilities according to their member profiles (about 21,000 members nationwide). The AICPA also distributed the toolkit at the recent SEC Conference in Washington, D.C., and is working with the Michigan Association of CPAs for a special distribution in that state, among other things. Gratis distribution was made available through the support of CNA Insurance and the AICPA Foundation. For those who do not obtain the printed toolkit through one of the AICPA's distribution channels, it is available for purchase for a nominal $10 to cover costs (No. 991001CPA01; for order information, see page 7).

Members also may download the tools in PDF and Microsoft Word formats at no charge (the MS Word format allows you to customize the tools). Attribution to the AICPA is requested if you customize the materials.

What's more, you can sign up for E-Alerts (through the Center's home page). The E-Alerts will be sent whenever necessary to provide news relevant to audit committees, such as information emerging from the Financial Accounting Standards Board, the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board, news media and courts. New tools and updates of existing tools available through the Center will be communicated via the E-Alerts as well.