By Janet Hartman, Budget and Finance Committee Chair

This is the time of year when we wrap up the chapter year with awards and elections and the annual meeting. But we also look forward to the next chapter year, and the chapter budget is essential to that process. We start in the spring and pass the budget by late summer, so that committees planning their activities for the year will have a framework to work within.

Last year, the budget committee doubled in size, with the addition of Maureen Malinowski. She’s learning the ropes of the budget process, and we work together with the Treasurer and the whole board.

The budget is just a plan, and you know what happens to plans! So each spring we begin by creating a comparison of the current year budget to what actually happened.

We start with the transaction report from the Treasurer and make some adjustments based on committee input. For example, we may have sold sponsorships or advertising during this chapter year, but not yet deposited the payment. This is the most time-consuming and tedious part of the process, but we want to really compare this year’s activities to this year’s budget with as few distortions as possible.

We provide this comparison to the Board, the outgoing committee chairs, and the incoming chairs. With only a little nagging, they respond with budget proposals for the following year. We integrate all the proposals into a draft budget for the board to review and discuss. Generally we are able to resolve any issues and pass the budget in August or September.

Our goal every year is for each major program (such as the dinner meetings, or a conference) to be self sufficient, roughly balancing income and expenses, and for the overall budget to balance as well. Activities that don’t involve income, from awards to student outreach, are balanced by the dues allotment from headquarters and general fundraising activities. Amazingly, although all the line items seldom work out as planned, the overall income and expenses generally net out close to even.

This year, we have an added wrinkle: our budget process involves the transition of the chapter year to match the calendar year (and the SLA year). So our budget planning is for 19 months, from June of 2006 through December of 2007.

Did you notice all the times I mentioned we use input from the committees? Those of you leading committees will be hearing from me and your board liaison, requesting updates on this year’s activities and a proposed budget for the coming transition year. We hope you can cooperate with us and we can get the budget passed on time again this year.