FASB in Transition

The Financial Accounting Standards Board is already preparing for the post-Herz era and considering some new members to round out the soon-to-be seven-member board.

One of the leading candidates for one of the three vacancies on the board is FASB technical director Russell Golden, according to The Wall Street Journal. Golden, a former Deloitte & Touche partner, has been a FASB staff member since 2004 and has become one of the more knowledgeable experts advising the board on the standards it has been developing.

Meanwhile, questions are swirling about whether the board will be able to meet its deadlines for its various convergence projects with former chairman Robert Herz due to leave by the end of the month. Herz unexpectedly announced his retirement last month, about two years before his term was supposed to end (see FASB Chairman Herz to Retire Next Month). The board is also slated to expand in size from five members to seven.

Filling in for Herz will be acting chairman Leslie Seidman, who was supposed to start her job on Oct. 1 (see FASB Retools Pension Plan Standards). But Seidman was the board member quoted when FASB recently announced its proposed standards for pension accounting, leaving the impression that she has already effectively stepped into her new role.