A different viewpoint on "the leaders' roundtable".

• Author: Fay, Robert F.
• Position: Letters - Letter to the Editor

Dear Editor:

I read with great interest the story titled "Roundtable Discussion" in the May/June issue of the Catalyst. Some of the comments printed in the article were disturbing to me and prompted this response.

In the portion of the story dealing with the question concerning peer review/quality review/discipline, Mr. Landes makes the remark, "There are just too many people out there yet who are too willing to do almost anything."

I find this comment offensive and opposite to the information The Ohio Society and AICPA leadership have talked about over the last two years after the Arthur Andersen collapse and demise. I hope many members are offended by his comment. The Society and the AICPA have stressed the thousands and thousands of audits that are being done without any problems and/or fraud, and without any negative effects upon our economic system. For Mr. Landes to make such a broad-based outlandish statement is disappointing for someone in his position to make.

In answering the same question, Mr. Shamis makes the remark, "But the quality of the work that we see coming up from smaller firms is really alarming." Also he goes on to say, "There's a lot of bad work out there."

I find these comments disappointing to read. Mr. Shamis should be aware that The Ohio Society has an ethics process in place that could have addressed these issues over his years in practice and helped the profession improve as a whole. All he would have to do is to make a copy of the financial statement that he feels is "alarming" and submit it to the Ethics Committee of The Ohio Society. This way, over the years, he could have been proactive in helping the profession in this area and helped some of the problems he feels he has seen over the years. But instead, I assume, he has not done this.

I am confident, based upon the hundreds of members that I know, that these concerns are not widespread and, in fact, the facts of financial statement failures we have witnessed prove this. In fact, as reported in the March/April 2004 issue of the Catalyst, "the majority of Ohio firms enrolled in the peer review process take the program seriously."

Mr. Landes also states "You wonder about the quality of the people doing peer review." This is disappointing to read. Mr. Landes is clearly in the position to be proactive and do something about this if this is a true statement. I do not perform peer review, but I know some members who do and they would probably be offended by his...