Good budget news for ANA board

American Numismatic Association Excutive Director Larry Shepherd is getting good at wrestling budgetary alligators if advance word about what he was to report to the ANA board of governors in Portland, Ore., is any indication.

The can-do Davy Crockett spirit has turned an ongoing deficit situtation into a positive number excluding legal expenses that he can do nothing to control.

During the first nine months of the fiscal year (which ends March 31), the ANA had revenue of $3,847,296.20 and expenses of $3,620,028.94, leaving a surplus of $227,267.26.

“In October we took aggressive action in response to the collapse of the financial markets ... we tore up the remainder of the fiscal 2009 budget and implemented a lockdown on discretionary expenditures,” Shepherd said.

The result was a cut to expenditures of $796,000, a savings of 18 percent compared to the budget projection.

Taking the big cuts were salaries and benefits, $226,000; general and administrative expenses $226,000; printing and publication, $175,000; advertising and promotion, $131,000; mail costs, $95,000 and travel, $37,000.

Compared to this point in last year’s budget, Shepherd notes that it is an improvement of almost $1 million.

Unfortunately, the legal expenses he cannot control were $546,000, chewing up much of the other savings that he had achieved.

In Portland, the ANA board will adopt a budget for the next fiscal year, which begins April 1.