Main Menu

Georgia Wing Banking

Started by ADCAPer, November 27, 2006, 05:18:19 PM

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

RiverAux

Whenever I bother to check that section of the website there is almost always a draft version of some regulation there for review.  The Comm reg was there recently. 


DNall

#21
Quote from: Eclipse on November 27, 2006, 09:04:14 PM
OK - I guess we'll extend this here.

Have your members order their own insignia.

Many wings till have Wing charge in their airplanes, established accounts, or just don't do business with particular FBOs.

Get a real charge card or don't assume the responsibility.

The bank plan specifically indicates that SOP in many cases will be for the member / commander, etc., to assume the cost and request reimbursiment.
If you can't afford it, don't do it, someone else will, or the item / event will simply not happen.

Some of us have legit issues with power and light bills, or encampments that incur 10's of thousands of dollars in expenses, while others seem to think that this plan will live or die because of unit insignia stores.
I don't want to discount what you're saying, but don't think the silly little unit supply box is unimportant because ita value is under a hundred bucks. When a kid works real hard to earn a stripe & ribbon & you don't have it to give, that breaks hearts & destroys retention. maybe you can get by with it here & there, but try not having one lazy kid at Amn & one motivated kid at SrA but they're both still wearing one stripe, just wait & see how long that motivation stays intact & don't hold your beath waiting for the lazy kid to wake up & get moving. It may be a low dollar thing, but it matters more than the number of zeros at the end.

Quote from: ELThunter on November 27, 2006, 08:59:30 PM
Quote from: arajca on November 27, 2006, 08:13:56 PM
Colorado has implemented it already. So far, it seems to be working well. The wing administrator writes the checks and the authorized signers come in twice a week to sign. The average turn around is about a week, including mailing time. The wing administrator is not one of the signers.

So do the squadron signers remain the same, or is that delegated to the Wing?  How would it work for squardon's that are not located near a Wing HQ?
I'd ask that question also. I assume you mean a couple Wg Sr Staff officers have to sign to reimburse me with my own money, after a sufficient delay of course. A couple times a week sounds fine, but are they going to keep that up? It's going to get pretty full time, especially in a large wing lke mine. I'm hearing that & thinking abou tmy Wg's AEO that sends off Yeagers to NHQ twice a year when he feels like it. Then I'm thinking about how I'm going to pay for local activities, much less do anything on the fly. I'm also thinking about how everything we do seems to price more & more people out of participating. We were exempted from ADA but decided we'd voluntarily comply anyway (why I don't know), but we don't care in the slightest about less that rich people; that's freakin genius right there.

I understand & agree with the motivation behind doing this, but I'll say again, they are going about it all wrong. They should look to other de-centralized non-profits for an example. In a fraternity for instance, very large sums are processed locally & an annual financial report does go up each year in the annual report, but local money is NEVER considered property of the national corporation. If it were, a law suit over an incedent in one place could take local dues away from good people in another place. Yet, they still attain a certified audit (unqualified - unconditional) & pull more grants than CAP will ever see. Incedently why is CAP trying to attain outside grants & such. If they need money for something, that should be requested in the AF budget, if they say no then it just shouldn't happen. I don't like us beholden to anyone else.

BlackKnight

Quote from: RiverAux on November 28, 2006, 01:16:11 AM
Whenever I bother to check that section of the website there is almost always a draft version of some regulation there for review.  The Comm reg was there recently. 

Precisely my point. To our knowledge the revisions to the financial regs were never posted for comment.  Since we're in the middle of all this I doubt we would have missed it.  We've been checking for the drafts of the new regs almost daily over the past couple of months.
Phil Boylan, Maj, CAP
DCS, Rome Composite Sqdn - GA043
http://www.romecap.org/

RiverAux

I wonder....if the National Commander issues an Emergency Change I think it automatically accepted unless rejected by the NB or one of those groups.  Would an emergency change have to go through the review process?  I have no clue if that happened here but thought it might be a possibility. 

ELTHunter

Quote from: DNall on November 28, 2006, 01:23:29 AM
Incidentally why is CAP trying to attain outside grants & such. If they need money for something, that should be requested in the AF budget, if they say no then it just shouldn't happen. I don't like us beholden to anyone else.

Could this be one of the drivers behind this change?  Is national trying to find alternative methods of financing that makes them less reliant on the AF, and this makes the "Corporation" stronger and enabling them to move farther away from USAF control?
Maj. Tim Waddell, CAP
SER-TN-170
Deputy Commander of Cadets
Emergency Services Officer

BlackKnight

Quote from: RiverAux on November 28, 2006, 04:06:23 AM
I wonder....if the National Commander issues an Emergency Change I think it automatically accepted unless rejected by the NB or one of those groups.  Would an emergency change have to go through the review process?  I have no clue if that happened here but thought it might be a possibility. 

Good point. That's certainly a possibility, but it would be the biggest "end run" since OJ played in the Rose Bowl.   ;D
Here's the applicable paragraph from CAPR 5-1:

4. Emergency Regulations.
a. General. Emergency regulations are regulations issued by the National Commander pursuant to Article XX paragraph 3 of the Constitution for which the National Commander declares the regulation to relate to a situation requiring immediate action due to a state of emergency or an unforeseen circumstance involving the preservation of life or property.


I just don't see how revisions to the financial regs could possibly be considered a state of emergency. And one would think that in the revision description/purpose of the regulation it would define the revision as an emergency revision. These don't.  Nor are there any accompanying paperwork or letters declaring such.

Phil Boylan, Maj, CAP
DCS, Rome Composite Sqdn - GA043
http://www.romecap.org/

Eclipse

Quote from: ELThunter on November 28, 2006, 04:08:09 AM
Quote from: DNall on November 28, 2006, 01:23:29 AM
Incidentally why is CAP trying to attain outside grants & such. If they need money for something, that should be requested in the AF budget, if they say no then it just shouldn't happen. I don't like us beholden to anyone else.

Could this be one of the drivers behind this change?  Is national trying to find alternative methods of financing that makes them less reliant on the AF, and this makes the "Corporation" stronger and enabling them to move farther away from USAF control?

No, yes, kind of, I guess.  Hm....

The reasons given were to allow us to obtain an "unqualified" audit, which supposedly opens doors to lines of credit and donation not open today.

But it needs to be said that we don't get dollar 1 from the USAF.  All of our funding is via a Congressional appropriation which appears as a line item of the USAF budget, but does not come "from" them.

"That Others May Zoom"

RiverAux

The wing banker program was being tried as an experiment in some wings and I imagine that was being done through approved Wing supplements, which wouldn't go through the national review process.  But, as to how it got national, I don't know.  If someone cares to go throug NB/BOG/NEC minutes they could probably find out more about the details of how it happened. 

DNall

Quote from: Eclipse on November 28, 2006, 05:06:01 AM
Quote from: ELThunter on November 28, 2006, 04:08:09 AM
Quote from: DNall on November 28, 2006, 01:23:29 AM
Incidentally why is CAP trying to attain outside grants & such. If they need money for something, that should be requested in the AF budget, if they say no then it just shouldn't happen. I don't like us beholden to anyone else.

Could this be one of the drivers behind this change?  Is national trying to find alternative methods of financing that makes them less reliant on the AF, and this makes the "Corporation" stronger and enabling them to move farther away from USAF control?

No, yes, kind of, I guess.  Hm....

The reasons given were to allow us to obtain an "unqualified" audit, which supposedly opens doors to lines of credit and donation not open today.

But it needs to be said that we don't get dollar 1 from the USAF.  All of our funding is via a Congressional appropriation which appears as a line item of the USAF budget, but does not come "from" them.
Which originates as a request reviewed by AF and made by them to Congress, CAP does not directly request anything from congress at any time, though admittedly there is a lot of back channel to it. Operations are also paid out of thier O&M budget, as well as some other stuff. The fact is if the AF ever decides it doesn't need CAP, congress won't give us a dime & probably will pay rougher then that (I've heard the plan), and there will be no CAP 30 days later.

There are orgs out there that would be willing to give us money to help support our programs, but it makes us beholden to them & compliant with their standards. Ultimately it is he with the gold makes the rules, and I like that staying the AF, or at least the AF coordinating requests for support from other govt agencies. I do NOT like being supported by non-govt orgs.

Al Sayre

The whole wing banker thing comes from the fact that as a non-profit, CAP is subject to audit, but we can't get an Unqualified (read clean) Audit because no-one knows how much money is floating around in the 4000 squadron accounts that National doesn't know about.  The estimate is around $3-4 million.  This hurts us when trying to play with the big charities for funding.  With the Wing Banker, the 52 Wings can be audited and CAP can get the Unqualified Audit it needs.
Lt Col Al Sayre
MS Wing Staff Dude
Admiral, Great Navy of the State of Nebraska
GRW #2787

TankerT

Quote from: BlackKnight on November 27, 2006, 11:00:27 PM
I think it's pretty clear that existing CAP funds cannot and should not be intentionally diverted to avoid the wing bank.  However, I do not see how CAP can possibly have any control over how other non-profit agencies or trusts manage their funds.  I would be interested to see a direct reference to that Omnipotent regulation!  ;)

Well.  They cannot.  However, one item of interest is that it needs to be very clear that when these other non-profits are set up to have money on the side, that when they are raising funds, members cannot indicate that the money is for Civil Air Patrol.  (I.E. they can't raise money in the name of CAP, or in uniform... etc...)  If they do, the members involved can have their membership terminated, and their non-profit corporation can be sued.  (And, depending on how everything is done... I think that laws involving fraud could come into play...)

/Insert Snappy Comment Here

TankerT

Quote from: RiverAux on November 28, 2006, 05:15:15 AM
The wing banker program was being tried as an experiment in some wings and I imagine that was being done through approved Wing supplements, which wouldn't go through the national review process.  But, as to how it got national, I don't know.  If someone cares to go throug NB/BOG/NEC minutes they could probably find out more about the details of how it happened. 

Actually, this was not originally done as a Wing project, but as a National project.  It was originally done under corporate mandate from NHQ with Virginia wing being the "guinea pig."

/Insert Snappy Comment Here

Eclipse

#32
Quote from: TankerT on November 28, 2006, 04:36:41 PMActually, this was not originally done as a Wing project, but as a National project.  It was originally done under corporate mandate from NHQ with Virginia wing being the "guinea pig."

Actually, my sources say you have that backwards. 

Virginia Wing did this on their own and thought it was "so awesome" they brought it up through their Region, etc.  We can thank them for this mess.

It should be noted that those same sources tell me that Virginia, much like most Region Commands, has a very low per-day transaction count, so unlike a state like ILWG, which is buried, implementing this for them was not as big a deal.

"That Others May Zoom"

TankerT

Quote from: Eclipse on November 28, 2006, 05:09:39 PM

Actually, my sources say you have that backwards. 

Virginia Wing did this on their own and though it was "so awesome" they brought it up through their Region, etc.  We can thank them for this mess.

It should be noted that those same sources tell me that Virginia, much like most Region Commands, has a very low per-day transaction count, so unlike a state like ILWG, which is buried, implementing this for them was not as big a deal.

Well.  Could be.  (Sorry... but that comment also made me think we need a custom CAP Magic 8-Ball... "My sources say...")  (I won't name my source, but he/she is normally pretty reliable... but it's not worth an argument... and that's not to say that the information wasn't garbled in transmission...)

However, I will say, our wing has this implemented and it is running successfully.  I wouldn't call it a mess at all.  (And, we have a pretty decent sized volume.)

I was pretty much against this program when it was announced (and was fairly vocal about it)... but... it's working pretty well.  Plus, it cuts down on a lot of the duties at the local unit.  Having experienced it... I think this is actually a good idea and a step in the right direction.

Mind you, it's working well as our Wing FO and Wing OM did a super duper job coming up with our policies and procedures documents... (which if your Wing King calls my Wing King about and asks nicely... I'm sure he'd make available...) 

On another note... this whole unit credit card thing... boy... if that doesn't scream FWA opportunity... That program... I'm not sold on... although... I can understand some of the probable reasoning behind it... not that I agree completely...


/Insert Snappy Comment Here

Eclipse

Quote from: TankerT on November 28, 2006, 05:38:55 PM...it cuts down on a lot of the duties at the local unit.  Having experienced it... I think this is actually a good idea and a step in the right direction.

What has it reduced locally?

"That Others May Zoom"

carnold1836

Quote from: Al Sayre on November 28, 2006, 12:39:07 PM
The whole wing banker thing comes from the fact that as a non-profit, CAP is subject to audit, but we can't get an Unqualified (read clean) Audit because no-one knows how much money is floating around in the 4000 squadron accounts that National doesn't know about.  The estimate is around $3-4 million.  This hurts us when trying to play with the big charities for funding.  With the Wing Banker, the 52 Wings can be audited and CAP can get the Unqualified Audit it needs.

How does this hurt CAP when trying to play with the the big charities for funding. The Boy Scouts of America, a non-profit organization much larger than CAP, has well over 4000 units spread across the US and each of these troops, packs, crews, ships, etc. have there own accounts as do the councils in each city/state region. As a former employee of one of those councils and troop leader at the local level they never report financials to National Scout Headquarters in Dallas. I would say that they are a very large benefactor of some very large charitable contributions.
Chris Arnold, 1st Lt, CAP
Pegasus Composite Squadron

TankerT

Quote from: Eclipse on November 28, 2006, 06:49:18 PM
What has it reduced locally?

For starters... no more checks and statements to deal with.  Wing handles it all.  This is especially nice with monthly bills.  In fact, you can pretty much not worry about Paragraph 5 of CAPR 173-1, and all its sub-items.  (That's all the banking procedures.)

No more CAPF 173-2.

No more maintaining Financial Records per paragraph 13.  Your financial review (per paragraph 14) will practically be done for you.  Same with paragraph 15 (with some items exempted as well).

Basically, most of the busywork you had before is cut out.  You lose some conveniece of having a checkbook.  But, if your wing is on the ball, you can get a check the next day.

So, for the most part, the things you have to worry about are Finance Commitee type things, like their approvals, minutes and whatnot.  (Which, you already do anyway...)

/Insert Snappy Comment Here

TankerT

Quote from: carnold1836 on November 28, 2006, 07:37:58 PM
How does this hurt CAP when trying to play with the the big charities for funding. The Boy Scouts of America, a non-profit organization much larger than CAP, has well over 4000 units spread across the US and each of these troops, packs, crews, ships, etc. have there own accounts as do the councils in each city/state region. As a former employee of one of those councils and troop leader at the local level they never report financials to National Scout Headquarters in Dallas. I would say that they are a very large benefactor of some very large charitable contributions.

Well.  The Boy Scouts get some of their money because they are the Boy Scouts.  (Face it, name recognition helps them a lot.  It also helps them with fundraising too.)

For big money grants, apparently an unqualified audit helps you a lot.  (I didn't know this... but apparently a lot of agencies have an unqualified audit as a requirement to apply for their money.)

Basically, from what some accounting/finance folks have told me... the difference in audit types will allow us to apply for some big money that would otherwise be unavailable.  Plus, it also allows us to better monitor for FWA.  (You may be offended about this... but believe me... we do need it.  Lots of units are on suspension... to include some wings... for FWA items...  It's always the 1 out of the 100 that ruins it for the rest of us...)

/Insert Snappy Comment Here

ADCAPer

Quote from: Eclipse on November 28, 2006, 05:09:39 PM
Mind you, it's working well as our Wing FO and Wing OM did a super duper job coming up with our policies and procedures documents... (which if your Wing King calls my Wing King about and asks nicely... I'm sure he'd make available...) 

You've started to get towards my area of concern. To begin with, despite what people keep telling me, CAPR 173-1 does not require anyone to participate in Wing Banking. In fact, if anyone has any type of document from National which indicates that this program is mandatory then I would like to see it. National obviously doesn't know where it's located or it would be posted it on the national web site so everyone could see and know that this program is truly legitimate.

Unfortunately just to further compound the problem, it appears that CAP is obviously going to allow each wing to develop their own guide on how to run the program.

It seems to me that a better plan would be National to lay down the ground rules in CAPR 173-1 than to have every state decide how to manage their program through a "guide" book which can then be rewritten any time the wing doesn't like the way things are going.

Al Sayre

I'm not an accountant, but what TankerT says pretty much echos the way it was explained by our Wing CV.
Lt Col Al Sayre
MS Wing Staff Dude
Admiral, Great Navy of the State of Nebraska
GRW #2787