GASB 87: Single lease classification: What's changing and what you need to do

Read this if your organization operates under the Governmental Accounting Standards Board (GASB).

GASB Statement No. 97, Certain Component Unit Criteria, and Accounting and Financial Reporting for Internal Revenue Code Section 457 Deferred Compensation Plans (GASB 97) addresses specific practice issues that have arisen related to retirement plans. The standard can be roughly divided into two parts, each of which focus on a different aspect of governmental retirement plan accounting. 

Part 1: Component units

Over the years, GASB has wrestled with clarifying exactly what entities should be included in a set of stand-alone financial statements. In general, it defined a financial reporting entity as a stand-alone government and all entities for which it is financially accountable, known as component units. One of the many situations where the government is financially accountable for another entity is where the majority of the entity’s board is appointed by the government. 

GASB 97 clarifies that when the entity has no governing board and the government performs the functions that a board would normally perform, the consideration of consolidation should be the same as if the government appointed a voting majority of a hypothetical governing board. This portion of the standard is consistent with previously issued implementation guides. 

What is new is that GASB 97 creates an exception, allowing defined contribution pension plans, defined contribution OPEB plans, and certain Section 457 plans who do not have a board to be excluded from consideration as a component unit. While GASB believes that it would be appropriate to include them like other entities, they listened to stakeholders who voiced their concerns about the costs of presenting defined contribution plans as component units. Their research showed that most stakeholders do not use information related to defined contribution plans presented as component units of governments, although if the government controls the assets, such information is more valued. GASB decided to balance the costs of preparation with the usefulness of the information.  

Additionally, for the purposes of determining component units, the government is not considered to have a financial burden for defined contribution pension plans and defined contribution OPEB plans that are administered through trusts. 

What should you do? 

First, the intended impact is that there will be fewer defined benefit plans presented as component units. If you currently present a defined benefit plan as a component unit, you may be able to save money by excluding them from the government-wide financial statements. 

Second, if you currently report a defined contribution plan that is administered through a trust as a component unit, you should reassess whether that is still considered a component unit. Remember, even if it is not a component unit, GASB Statement No. 84 Fiduciary Activities may still require it to be included in the financials if the primary government controls the assets. 

When does this apply? 

These changes are effective immediately. 

Part 2: Section 457 plans

Back in 1997 when GASB Statement No. 32 was issued, GASB did not believe it likely that plans established under Internal Revenue Code (IRC) section 457 would be pension plans because at that time, most Section 457 plans did not have employer contributions. In the more than twenty years that have passed since then, the IRC and characteristics of some of these plans have changed, forcing GASB to reconsider their classification. With the issuance of GASB 97, the board stated that it believes Section 457 plans could indeed be pensions. Therefore, Section 457 plans which fit the definition of a pension trigger the same reporting requirements of any other pension plan. 

What should you do? 

If your governmental organization has an employee benefit plan under Section 457, you should take the following steps: 

First, determine whether the plan is a “pension plan” or not. Pension plans provide retirement income or other postemployment benefits such as death benefits, life insurance, and disability benefits. Pensions do not include postemployment healthcare benefits and termination benefits. 

Despite the common usage of “pension” to mean only defined benefit plans, the statement is clear that the term “pension plan” includes defined contribution plans as well.

If the plan fits this definition, proceed to the next step. If not, this statement does not impact you. 

Second, if your Section 457 plan meets the definition of a pension plan and either issues its own standalone financial statements or is included in the financial statements of another government, those financial statements should include all financial reporting requirements that are relevant to pension plans. 

Generally, this means that GASB Statement No. 68 Accounting and Financial Reporting for Pensions (GASB 68) and all its related disclosure requirements are applicable, although there are some plans that don’t fall within GASB 68’s scope where GASB Statement No. 73 Accounting and Financial Reporting for Pensions and Related Assets That Are Not within the Scope of GASB Statement 68, and Amendments to Certain Provisions of GASB Statements 67 and 68 applies instead. The additional requirements will not look the same for all entities; defined benefit and defined contribution plans have different reporting requirements and their footnote disclosures will differ. 

When does this apply? 

The requirements related to Section 457 plans apply to fiscal years beginning after June 15, 2021. Some stakeholders requested that GASB delay the adoption due to COVID-19, but the GASB believes that the adoption date they set provides sufficient time for adoption. 

What else do you need to know? 

If your retirement plan falls within the scope of this pronouncement, you may have new costs to deal with, including potentially having to consult with an actuary to develop a model to prepare the new disclosures if you have a defined benefit pension. Fortunately, the GASB believes that most of the additional disclosures will relate to defined contribution pensions which have simpler note disclosures. 

If you would like more information or have questions about your specific situation, please contact Nathan Dunlap or Grant Ballantyne. We’re here to help.
 

Read this if your organization operates under the Governmental Accounting Standards Board (GASB).

GASB Statement No. 96 Subscription-Based Information Technology Agreements

Summary

GASB Statement No. 96 defines the term Subscription-Based Information Technology Agreements (SBITA) as “a contract that conveys control of the right to use another party’s (a SBITA vendor’s) information technology (IT) software, alone or in combination with tangible capital assets (the underlying IT assets), as specified in the contract for a period of time in an exchange or exchange-like transaction.”

GASB Statement No. 96 determines when a subscription should be recognized as a right-to-use subscription, and also determines the corresponding liability, capitalization criteria, and required disclosures. 

Why does this matter to your organization?

In 2018, Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) issued Accounting Standards Updated (ASU) 2018-15: Cloud Computing Arrangements for Service Contracts, and we knew it would only be a matter of time when a similar standard would be issued by the Governmental Accounting Standards Board (GASB). Today, more and more governmental entities are purchasing software in the cloud as opposed to a software that is housed locally on their machine or network. This creates the need for updated guidance in order to improve overall financial reporting, while maintaining consistency and comparability among governmental entities. 

What should you do?

We are going to walk through the steps to determine if a SBITA exists—from identification through how it may be recognized in your financial statements. You can use this step-by-step guide to review each individual subscription-based software to determine if Statement No. 96 applies.

Step 1: Identifying a SBITA

There is one important question to ask yourself when determining if a SBITA exists:

Will this software no longer work/will we no longer be able to log in once the contract term ends?

If your answer is “yes”, it is likely that a SBITA exists.  

Step 2: Determine whether a contract conveys control of the right to use underlying IT assets

According to Statement No. 96, the contract meets the right to use underlying IT assets by:

• The right to obtain the present service capacity from use of the underlying IT assets as specified in the contract
• The right to determine the nature and manner of use of the underlying IT assets as specified in the contact

Step 3: Determine the length of the subscription term

The subscription term starts when a governmental entity has a non-cancellable right to use the underlying IT assets. This is the period during which the SBITA vendor does not have the ability to cancel the contract, increase or decrease rates, or change the benefits/terms of the service. The contract language for this period can also include an option for the organization or the SBITA vendor to extend or terminate the contract, if it is reasonably certain that either of these options will be exercised.

Once a subscription term is set, your organization should revisit the term if one or more of the following occurs:

• The potential option (extend/terminate) is exercised by either the entity or the SBITA vendor 
• The potential option (extend/terminate) is not exercised by either the government or the SBITA vendor
• An extension or termination of the SBITA occurs 

If the maximum possible term under the SBITA contract is 12 months or less, including any options to extend, regardless of their possibility of being exercised, an exception for short-term SBITAs has been provided under the statement. Such contracts do not need to be recognized under the Statement and the subscription payments will be recognized as outflows of resources. 

Step 4: Measurement of subscription liability 

The subscription liability is measured at the present value of the subscription payments expected to be made during the previously determined subscription term. The SBITA contract will include specific measures that should be used in determining the liability that could include the following:

• Fixed payments
• Variable payments
• Payments for penalties for termination
• Contract incentives
• Any other payments to the SBITA which are included in the contract

The future payments are discounted using the interest rate that the SBITA charges to your organization. The interest rate may be implicit in the contract. If it is not readily determinable, the rate should be estimated using your organization’s incremental borrowing rate. 

Your organization will only need to re-measure the subscription liability is there is a change to the subscription term, change in the estimated amounts of payments, change in the interest rate the SBITA charges to your organization, or contingencies related to variable payments. A change in the discount rate alone would not require a re-measurement. 

Step 5: Measurement of subscription asset

The SBITA asset should be measured at the total of the following:

• The amount of the initial measurement of the subscription liability (noted in Step 4 above)
• If applicable, any payments made to the SBITA vendor at the beginning of the subscription term
• The capitalized initial implementation costs (noted in Step 6 below)

Any SBITA vendor incentives received should be subtracted from the total.

Step 6: Capitalization of other outlays

In addition to the IT asset, Statement No. 96 provides for other outlays associated with the subscription to be capitalized as part of the total subscription asset. When implementing the IT asset, the activities can be divided into three stages: 

• Preliminary project stage: May include a needs assessment, selection, and planning activities and should be recorded as expenses.
• Initial implementation stage: May include testing, configuration, installation and other ancillary charges necessary to implemental the IT asset. These costs should be capitalized and included in the subscription asset.
• Operation and additional implementation stage: May include maintenance and troubleshooting and should be expensed.

Step 7: Amortization

The subscription asset are amortized over the shorter of the subscription terms or the useful life of the underlying IT assets. The amortization of the asset are reported as amortization expense or an outflow of resources. Amortization should commence at the beginning of the subscription term. 

When is this effective?

Statement No. 96 is effective for all fiscal years beginning after June 15, 2022, fiscal and calendar years 2023. Early adoption is allowed and encouraged.

Changes to adopt the pronouncement are applied retroactively by restating previously issued financial statements, if practical, for all fiscal years presented. If restatement is not practical, a cumulative effect of the change can be reported as a restatement to the beginning net position (or fund balance) for the earliest year restated. 

What should you do next? 

With any new GASB Standard comes challenges. We encourage governmental entities to re-review their vendor contracts for software-related items and work with their software vendors to identify any questions or potential issues. While the adoption is not required until fiscal years beginning after June 15, 2022, we recommend that your organization start tracking any new contracts as they are entered o starting now to determine if they meet the requirements of SBITA. We also recommend that your organization tracks all of the outlays associated with the software to determine which costs are associated with the initial implementation stage and can be capitalized. 

What are we seeing with early adoption?

Within the BerryDunn client base, we are aware of at least one governmental organization that will be early adopting. We understand that within component units of state governments, the individual component unit is required to adopt a new standard only when the state determines that they will adopt.

If you are entering into new software contracts that meet the SBITA requirements between now and the required effective date, we would recommend early adoption. If you are interested in early adoption of GASB Statement No. 96, or have any specific questions related to the implementation of the standard, please contact Katy Balukas or Grant Ballantyne. 

Read this if you are a CFO or controller.

The Governmental Accounting Standards Board (GASB) recently provided much needed guidance for governmental organizations struggling to account for relief provided in the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (CARES Act). In their Technical Bulletin No. 2020-1, Accounting and Financial Reporting Issues Related to the CARES Act and Coronavirus Diseases, GASB addressed a number of pressing recognition and presentation questions that you should be aware of when preparing financial statements. The following is a summary of the guidance:

• Resources received under the Coronavirus Relief Fund (CRF) subject to restrictions should be recognized as voluntary nonexchange transactions, subject to eligibility rather than purpose restrictions. As such, the entity should recognize resources received from the CRF as liabilities until the applicable eligibility requirements are met, including the incurrence of eligible expenditures. When the eligibility requirements have been met, revenue should be recognized for CRF resources received.
• Provisions of the CARES Act that address the entity’s loss of revenue should be considered an eligibility requirement for purposes of revenue recognition. 
• Any possible amendments to the CARES Act issued subsequent to the statement of net position date but before the issuance of financial statements, even when enacted with retroactive provisions, do not represent conditions that existed as of the period-end being reported and should only be reported as a nonrecognized subsequent event.
• With the exception of CARES Act funds provided through the Provider Relief Fund's Uninsured Program (operating revenues), funds received under the CARES Act are subsidies and should be reported as nonoperating revenues and presented as noncapital finance activities in the statement of cash flows.
• Outflows of resources incurred in response to the coronavirus disease due to actions taken to slow the spread of the virus or the implementation of "stay-at-home" orders should not be reported as extraordinary items or special items.
• In addition to the guidance provided with the Technical Bulletin, the GASB also provides a number of additional stakeholder resources that may be useful during this period on its website, including an Emergency Toolbox that provides guidance on donated assets, management’s discussion and analysis (MD&A), asset impairment, and many more. 

Please contact Robert Smalley if you have questions on the latest GASB updates.
 

Read this if your organization, business, or institution has leases and you’ve been eagerly awaiting and planning for the implementation of the new lease standards.

Ready? Set? Not yet. As we have prepared for and experienced delays related to Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) Accounting Standards Codification Topic 842, Leases, and Governmental Accounting Standards Board (GASB) Statement No. 87, Leases, we thought the time had finally come for implementation. With the challenges that COVID-19 has brought to everyone, the FASB and GASB recognize the significant impact COVID-19 has had on commercial businesses, state and local governments, and not-for-profits and both have proposed delays in effective dates for various accounting standards, including both lease standards.

But wait, there’s more! In response to feedback FASB received during the comment period for the lease standard, the revenue recognition standard has also been extended. We didn’t see that coming, and expect that many organizations that didn’t opt for early adoption will breathe a collective sigh of relief.

FASB details and a deeper dive

On May 20, 2020, FASB voted to delay the effective date of the lease standard and the revenue recognition standard. A formal Accounting Standards Update (ASU) summarizing these changes will be released early June. Here’s what we know now:

• Revenue recognition―for entities that have not yet issued financial statements, the effective date of the application of FASB Accounting Standards Codification (ASC) Topic 606, Revenue Recognition, has been delayed by 12 months (effective for reporting periods beginning after December 15, 2019). This does not apply to public entities or nonpublic entities that are conduit debt obligors who previously adopted this guidance.
• Leases―for entities that have not yet adopted the guidance from ASC 842, Leases, the effective date has been extended by 12 months (effective for reporting periods beginning after December 15, 2021).
• Early adoption of either standard is still allowed.

FASB has also provided clarity on lease concessions that are highlighted in Topic 842. 

We recognize many lessors are making concessions due to the pandemic. Under current guidance in Topics 840 and 842, changes to lease contracts that were not included in the original lease are generally accounted for as lease modifications and, therefore, a separate contract. This would require remeasurement of the new lease contract and related right-of-use asset. 

FASB recognized this issue and has published a FASB Staff Questions and Answers (Q&A) Document, Topic 842 and Topic 840: Accounting for Lease Concessions Related to the Effects of the COVID-19 Pandemic. Under this new guidance, if lease concessions are made relating to COVID-19, entities do not need to analyze each contract to determine if a new contract has been entered into, and will have the option to apply, or not to apply, the lease modification provisions of Topics 840 and 842.

GASB details

On May 8, 2020, GASB issued Statement No. 95, Postponement of the Effective Dates of Certain Authoritative Guidance. GASB 95 extends the implementation dates of several pronouncements including:
•    Statement No. 84, Fiduciary Activities―extended by 12 months (effective for reporting periods beginning after December 15, 2019)
•    Statement No. 87, Leases―extended by 18 months (effective for reporting periods beginning after June 15, 2021)

More information

If you have questions, please contact a member of our financial statement audit team. For other COVID-19 related resources, please refer to BerryDunn’s COVID-19 Resources Page.
 

Read this if your organization, business, or institution has leases and you’ve been eagerly awaiting and planning for the implementation of the new lease standards.

Ready? Set? Not yet. As we have prepared for and experienced delays related to Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) Accounting Standards Codification Topic 842, Leases, we thought the time had finally come for implementation. With the challenges that COVID-19 has brought to everyone, the FASB recognizes the significant impact COVID-19 has brought to commercial businesses and not-for-profits and is proposing a one-year delay in implementation, as described in this article posted to the Journal of Accountancy: FASB effective date delay proposals to include private company lease accounting.

But what about lease concessions? We all recognize many lessors are making concessions due to the pandemic. Under current guidance in Topics 840 and 842, changes to lease contracts that were not included in the original lease are generally accounted for as lease modifications and, therefore, a separate contract. This would require remeasurement of the new lease contract and related right-of-use asset. FASB recognized this issue and has published a FASB Staff Questions and Answers (Q&A) Document,  Topic 842 and Topic 840: Accounting for Lease Concessions Related to the Effects of the COVID-19 Pandemic. Under this new guidance, if lease concessions are made relating to COVID-19, entities do not need to analyze each contract to determine if a new contract has been entered into, and will have the option to apply, or not to apply, the lease modification provisions of Topics 840 and 842.

Implementation of the lease accounting standard will most likely be delayed for Governmental Accounting Standards Board (GASB) entities as well. On April 15, 2020, the GASB issued an exposure draft that would delay most GASB statements and implementation guides due to be implemented for fiscal years 2019 and later. Most notably, this includes Statement 84, Fiduciary Activities, and Statement 87, Leases. Comments on the proposal will be accepted through April 30, and the board plans to consider a final statement for issuance on May 8. More information may be found in this article from the Journal of Accountancy: GASB proposes postponing effective dates due to pandemic.

More information

Whether you are a FASB or GASB entity, you can expect a delay in the implementation of the lease standard. If you have questions, please contact a member of our financial statement audit team. For other COVID-19 related resources, please refer to BerryDunn’s COVID-19 Resources Page.

The recently released exposure draft of the Implementation Guide for Fiduciary Activities from the Governmental Accounting Standards Board begins to shed additional light on how governments should be implementing GASB 84 Fiduciary Activities. Organizations have been anxiously awaiting the proposed guide as the standard is effective for periods beginning after December 15, 2018.

The basic premise behind GASB 84 is to provide better financial reporting for organizations that have an inherent fiduciary responsibility for funds they hold, a concept that has not been historically required for some entities and inconsistently applied by others in the past.

The statement breaks down the four major categories of fiduciary funds that should be reported:

1. Pension (and other employee benefit) trust funds
2. Investment trust funds
3. Private-purpose trust funds
4. Custodial funds

As organizations have been preparing for implementation, questions continue to arise about which of their numerous activities really fall under the purview of GASB 84. The implementation guide takes a step to answer some of those questions.

The exposure draft answers some of the basic employee benefit plan questions that have been posed as a result of the standard (though largely through reference to criteria found in other GASB standards―like a “choose your own adventure” for accountants), but also delves into specifics around treatment of cemetery association funds, chess club fundraising and student activity fees.

The Exposure Draft is well worth the read at this early stage, especially as it digs into what constitutes “control” under GASB 84. Comments on the Exposure Draft are due by February 28, 2019.

While GASB has been talking about split-interest agreements for a long time (the proposal first released in June of 2015, with GASB Statement No. 81, Irrevocable Split-Interest Agreements released in March of 2016), time is quickly running out for a well-planned implementation. With the effective date looming on the horizon, (statement effective for periods beginning after December 15, 2016 unless early adopted), now is the time to start gathering needed information to record existing agreements under GASB 81.

We have learned from GASB’s not-for-profit FASB cousins that irrevocable agreements are rarely where they should be: in the hands of financial professionals. Compiling these agreements will require participation from many stakeholders. Your finance team will likely have to provide some education to avoid a great deal of confusion when asking the “do we have any irrevocable split-interest agreements?” question.

So, where do you start?

1. Have you been tracking this information right along, nicely documented in a folder by your desk? Great! Do a quick check of others in your organization to be sure your file is complete and skip steps 2-5.
    
2. Dig into your general ledger. Have you been receiving regular distributions from a trust? Some of these trust agreements pay out on a quarterly or annual basis and your accounting staff should be able to identify these payors. It may require a quick call to the administrator for the trust agreement to be sure the agreement qualifies under GASB 81.
    
3. Look to your fundraising professionals. Development departments like to keep track of all types of donations. It helps to quantify their good fundraising work. Be clear about what you need from them. Remember, irrevocable split-interest agreements, often trusts or other legally enforceable agreements, are agreements wherein a donor irrevocably transfers resources to a third party to hold for the benefit of the government and at least one other beneficiary —the “split” in “split-interest agreement”!
    
4. Keep talking to your fundraising professionals. Many of the split-interest agreements we find are very old, often created well before your current development software was put into place. Do you have old files that track this kind of information? It may require some digging in the paper files. Remember those?
    
5. All hands on deck. While the finance and fundraising teams are scouring their records, look to others in the organization that might have record of these types of agreements. You know who holds the keys to historical knowledge at your organization, so be sure to include them in your search.

Once the finance department has collected all of the agreements, take one more look to be sure they meet the requirements of GASB 81.“Are they really irrevocable? Or do we just hope they are?” Then you can get down to the business of accounting for them. If you have questions about the accounting for these agreements, please contact me. I would love to chat. And that is irrevocable.

Recently the Governmental Accounting Standards Board (GASB) finished its Governmental Accounting Research System (GARS), a full codification of governmental accounting standards. The completion of the project allows preparers easy access to accounting guidance from GASB. The overall project, starting from the codification of older pre-1989 Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) pronouncements in 2010, was focused on pulling together all authoritative guidance, similar to what FASB had done in 2009.

Here’s what we found interesting.

Poking around the GARS (Basic View is free) I was struck by a paragraph surrounded by a thick-lined box that read “The provisions of this Codification need not be applied to immaterial items.” If you have ever read a GASB or FASB pronouncement, you have seen a similar box. But probably, like me, you didn’t fully consider its potential benefits. Understanding this, GASB published an article on its website aimed at (in my opinion) prompting financial statement preparers to consider reducing disclosure for the many clearly insignificant items often included within governmental financial statements.

After issuing more than 80 pronouncements since its inception in 1984, including 19 in the last five years, GASB accounting requirements continue to grow. Many expect the pace to continue, with issues like leases accounting, potential revision of the financial reporting model, and comprehensive review of revenue and expense recognition accounting currently in process. With these additional accounting standards come more disclosure requirements.

With many still reeling from implementation of the disclosure heavy pension guidance, GASB is already under pressure from stakeholders with respect to information overload. Users of financial statements can be easily overwhelmed by the amount of detailed disclosure, often finding it difficult to identify and focus on the most significant issues for the entity. Balancing the perceived need to meet disclosure requirements with the need to highlight significant information can be a difficult task for preparers. Often preparers lean towards providing too much information in an effort to “make sure everything is in there that should be”. So, what can you do to ease the pain?

While the concept of materiality is not addressed specifically in the GASB standards, by working with your auditors there are a number of ways to reduce the overall length and complexity of the statements. We recommend reviewing your financial statements periodically with your auditor, focusing on the following types of questions:

• On the face of the financial statements, are we breaking out items that are clearly inconsequential in nature and the amount?
• Are there opportunities to combine items where appropriate?
• In the notes to the financial statements are we providing excessive details about insignificant items?
• Do we have an excess amount of historical disclosure from years past?
• In the management’s discussion & analysis, is the analysis completed to an appropriate level? Is there discussion on items that are insignificant?

The spirit behind the box is that GASB was specifically thinking about material amounts and disclosures. It was not their intention to clutter the financials with what their article referred to as “nickel and dime” items. With more disclosure requirements on the way, now might be the time to think INSIDE the box.  

For more guidance on this and other GASB information, please contact Rob Smalley.

With the implementation of GASB 72 now in full force, GASB organizations are hard at work drafting their new fair value disclosures. The addition of a fair value hierarchy table in the footnotes will add a bit more thickness to a likely already hefty financial package. With this added material comes valuable information for many financial statement users, including a much better explanation of the valuation approach of assets and liabilities reported at fair value.

Since GASB 72 (formally Fair Value Measurement and Application, effective for financial statement periods beginning after June 15, 2015) comes a few years after a similar FASB implementation, most investment professionals have dealt with the growing pains of the FASB implementation, and are well poised to provide the information necessary for the new fair value disclosures.

However, there are a few other things we have learned from the FASB implementation that can be shared with the GASB financial statement preparers:

• The unit of account is a big deal. While investments held by organizations may be specific stocks regularly traded on the open market (here’s a tip: these are level 1); there are other investment vehicles where an organization’s investment share represents a portion of a fund that holds all kinds of other investments (level 1? Maybe, maybe not – you will need to dig deeper). The good news is, with these kinds of investments, the organization is disclosing the level within the fair value hierarchy of their investment - the share of the fund. This is not the same as the level of the investments held within the fund. This is an important distinction and should result in much less time and effort in determining the appropriate level for an investment. GASB 72 uses the example of a mutual fund. An organization owns a share of the mutual fund, not the underlying investments, therefore the disclosure requirement is for the share of the mutual fund, not the underlying assets.
• GASB 72 requires investments measured at net asset value to be reconciling items to the fair value disclosure, but does not require these assets to be listed by level in the table (a recent change to the FASB). Further, a roll forward of level 3 items from year to year was also excluded.
   
• If you have heard of GASB 72, then likely you have heard of the three levels. The required disclosure includes three categories of valuation to be disclosed (aptly named level 1, level 2 and level 3). With each level, comes more involvement (or even, difficulty) in determining the fair value that is recorded. The new disclosure will make it clearer to the users of the financial statements how fair value is being measured.
   
• GASB 72 does provide some guidance in determining fair value through the use of one or more of the following valuation approaches: market approach, cost approach, or the income approach. GASB 72 discusses each of these separately, but remember there can be more than one approach, and not all items are measured equally.
• When you think about fair value, don’t focus solely on the investments, or even only on the assets. Liabilities are in there too! Think of measuring a warranty liability, for example.

We have the advantage of hindsight after the FASB implementation. I have great hope, that as with FASB, after the initial pain of the GASB 72 implementation, once our tables are setup, and a process is in place for identifying levels, our financial statements will be much more transparent, giving us all a clearer picture of the organization.

Please contact Emily Parker if you have questions on the latest GASB updates.