You will be asked to prepare "executive summaries" of the information reported. An executive summary must be written concisely so that the…

Broward County

2013 Comprehensive Annual Financial Report (CAFR)

Assignment #1

General Instructions

For this assignment, you will be reading portions of the 2013 Comprehensive Annual Financial Report (CAFR) issued by Broward County, Florida. You will be asked to prepare “executive summaries” of the information reported. An executive summary must be written concisely so that the executive does not have to read a long document. However, the summary still must include all of the major information reported in that section of the CAFR. Your job is to make it possible for the executive to read a few paragraphs rather than multiple pages of the CAFR and yet comprehend all of the key points and critical information. This is tough to do! Think carefully before you write your summaries. Determine what information is essential for the executive to know, and then write a clear and concise summary. EACH summary must be no more than 2 single-spaced pages. Your summaries must be IN YOUR OWN WORDS. DO NOT QUOTE (CUT AND PASTE) FROM THE REPORT.

You may assume that the executive is knowledgeable about accounting and is very familiar with the financial statements, notes, and MD&A prepared by public corporations. However, the executive is not at all familiar with the reporting practices of governmental units and has never seen a CAFR issued by a local government.

Please submit ONE WORD document containing a “signed copy” of the Huizenga School cover page and your responses to the specific requirements listed below. Please note: I print the submissions to a printer used by several people; consequently, if you submit more than one file, your submissions may get separated during printing and you may not get credit for all your work.

This is an individual assignment. Do not collaborate with anyone else as you work on this assignment.

Specific Requirements

1. Read the Letter of Transmittal (pages i – iv), and prepare an executive summary of the information in the letter. (20 points)
2. In the Notes to the Financial Statements, find NOTE 1-Summary of Significant Accounting Policies. Read and summarize ONLY the section titled A. Reporting Entity. Do not summarize any other portion of NOTE 1 or any other note included in the Notes to the Financial Statements. (15 points)
3. Find the Management’s Discussion and Analysis (MD&A) section of the CAFR and read the section titled Overview of the Financial Statements. Also, go back to NOTE 1, and read the sections titled B. Basis of Presentation, Government-wide and Fund Financial Statements and C. Measurement Focus and Basis of Accounting. Prepare ONE executive summary of all this information. (30 points)
4. Go back to the Management’s Discussion and Analysis (MD&A) section of the CAFR, and prepare an executive summary of the section titled Government-wide Financial Analysis. Note: this section includes several pages of analysis. Make sure you summarize all of the key points in this analysis. (20 points)
5. Go back to the Management’s Discussion and Analysis (MD&A) section of the CAFR, and prepare an executive summary of the section titled Financial Analysis of the Government’s Funds.  Note: this section discusses governmental funds and proprietary funds. Make sure you summarize all of the key points in this analysis. (15 points)

Note

Your submission will contain 5 executive summaries. Each summary may be no more than 2 single-spaced pages with a maximum of 10 single-spaced pages for the entire submission. Use your judgment to determine the appropriate length for each summary, and use the point values to gauge the relative lengths of the summaries. For example, the longest summary is likely to be Requirement 3, which has the highest point value and will likely require 2 full pages to adequately cover the information. Requirements 2 and 5 have the smallest point values and likely will require only 1 page to adequately summarize the information.