CAFR Audit – Don’t Forget to Add Three Zeros

CAFR1.com | In 2003, the Washington State Government just on the state level had at least $20.28 billion in surpluses of the Taxpayers money it was not using. The following is “a” CAFR potential audit surplus for the State Government, Inc. of Washington from 2003.

This is just “State Government Inc.”, just think of what the totals would be if an audit was done of the 2000 or so “other” local government CAFRs or AFRs “in” the state of Washington which are independent of the state’s accounting. The totals from all local governments in the state of Washington would dwarf the state totals in comparison.

The same applies to all other states, CA, NJ, FL, NY, AZ, MI, MA, IL, most cities, counties, and the rest. Pay attention!

To download the Washington State 2000 through 2008 CAFR go here:http://www.ofm.wa.gov/cafr/default.asp

• -Buildings, roads, bridges, land (not for sale), and equipment.

• -Deferred compensation plans for employees. These are plans in which the employee contributes to his/her retirement over and above the normal employee retirement contribution.

• -Any fund that is 100% supported by donations, bequests, gifts, endowments, etc. These are not taxpayers money.

• -For Colleges and Universities. All endowment and similar-type funds should not be included as surpluses. Sometimes these funds are combined with other college/university funds. We are interested in surpluses, so in these cases the total amount should not be included.

• -Funds in which the revenues/contributions are 100% held for other individuals, organizations or another government.

• -Funds that are required by law in which a bank, financial institution, insurance companies, etc. are required to deposit with the government a certain amount for insurance against the entity going bankrupt. These are not taxpayers’ money.

• -Retirement/Pension Funds – only included are 1/2 of the actuarially determined excesses, the taxpayers portion. The other 1/2 is the government employees portion.

The figures are in thousands so add three zeros.

Review of The State of Washington CAFR- FY 2003

Find your states CAFR breakdown here.

This snip copied below is from one of the articles Catherine Austin Fitts wrote in November of 2001 of which is linked here – http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0208/S00055.htm

“That was one of the reasons I turned down the opportunity to serve at the Federal Reserve and instead started Hamilton upon leaving the Bush Administration. It was the reason why we at Hamilton built Community Wizard. The Community Wizard made it possible for anyone to put together a sources and uses statement for government activities (taxes, time use, spending, credit, regulation, operations, and more) in their community. An easy step was just linking to the Coomprehensive Annual Financial Reports (CAFRs). The shock of finding so much in the way of hidden assets and where the money was really going was always a pleasure to watch. Why should the finance committee chairmen of the political campaigns be the only ones to see the information on how the money works by place?

Luis Mendez, one of my partners at Dillon Read, visited me in Washington in 1996. He said that Wizard was a stupid idea that would not work. Things were hopeless, he said. I showed Luis a printout of the CAFR for his community of Bronxville, New York. When he saw the figures, he exploded in rage. The first item was $4 million of flood insurance. This was the worst form of corruption, Luis said. Apparently, Bronxville was on a hill. The next day Luis spent two hours on the phone with the Deputy Mayor of Bronxville going through each item and informing him this was all going to stop. Apparently, things were far from hopeless, once one had the information. It just took one good map to see how to fix thousands of little things, one at a time.”