SEC's PCAOB Won't Have A Chairman Just Yet

by Glen Shapiro, LawAndTax-News.com, New York

17 March 2003

Expectations that US Public Company Accounting Oversight Board's new Chairman would soon be announced were dashed when Securities Exchange Commissioner Cynthia Glassman told reporters that the PCAOB wouldn't have a new chairman for at least "four to six weeks." The SEC was still accepting nominations for the position last Friday.

The PCAOB was mandated by the Sarbanes-Oxley Act and has until April 26 to be fully operational.

Glassman said the SEC has already received about 30 names, which will be added to the 450 others who applied prior to the resignation of William Webster.
The SEC elected former CIA director Webster to chair the board in a contentious 3-2 vote, but Webster stepped down shortly afterwards when it was learned that he chaired the audit committee of a public company being investigated for accounting irregularities. SEC Chairman Harvey Pitt also resigned, as did SEC Chief Accountant Robert Herdman.

Glassman said a simple vetting process will eliminate most of the applicants and then the five-member SEC Commission will either vote among themselves or in an open meeting to elect a new chairperson.

In other PCAOB news, the board announced Wednesday that it will hold a special public meeting on Thursday to discuss rules relating to public company funding of the Board's operations.

As mandated by the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, the PCAOB's annual budget (minus registration and annual fees paid by public accounting firms) will be collected from public companies, including US and foreign private issuers, as well as investment companies, creating what many businesses see as simply one more tax.

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