THE CHESTER COUNTY COMMUNITY FOUNDATION
“I call Eric my Superman…”

Karen A. Simmons
President & CEO

Established in 1994, the nonprofit Chester County Community Foundation today administers some 300 charitable funds that last year awarded $2.7 million to the community through 419 grants and 106 scholarships – with a staff that includes only two full-time employees. Developing an accounting system to process thousands of individual and corporate contributions, grants, endowment and non-endowed investments, non-cash gifts, fundraising events, planned giving assets, and administrative expenses is a formidable challenge.

Several years ago, the foundation had to restructure its entire business affairs office quickly, but President & CEO Karen A. Simmons needed to make sure she had a solution in place first. “I called Your Part-Time Controller and asked Eric if he could do a ‘Superman’ job,” she recalls. Eric and a YPTC team were on site in a matter of days conducting forensics tests of the computer system, and learning the organization’s accounting packages. They determined what functions had to be done on weekly and monthly bases to meet accounting standards, and established protocols and policies. They helped the foundation identify which controls and personnel it could sustain internally and which ones were best outsourced. Then they helped CCCF transition to the new system.

Even though YPTC was unfamiliar with the intricacies of community foundation accounting practices, the restructuring was quickly successful. “Even though they had never used our software before, they were tenacious in learning it. Today we’re utilizing even more of the software’s capabilities, and more effectively,” she observes.

The YPTC solution involved a combination of strategies. Associate Mary Jane (“Mare”) Emery has a work station in the foundation’s offices where she provides controller functions two days a week – and is considered such a member of the CCCF family that she’s listed in their annual report and website as staff. Regular bookkeeping and accounting functions are handled by student interns from nearby West Chester University who, at $10 an hour and under strict internal controls and YPTC oversight, are learning the business of nonprofit accounting.

For the Foundation and for Simmons, it’s the best of all accounting worlds. “We have a highly qualified controller here consistently and more affordably. We get to keep costs reasonable, we get the expertise of YPTC, and we get to train energetic, computer-literate young people to become the nonprofit accountants of the future,” she says.

“For us, hiring a local accountant didn’t give us the nonprofit accounting expertise, depth, quality control, or fallback we needed. The fallback is important: if something happens, Your Part-Time Controller has a cadre of people who can step in. As our needs have changed, this has happened a couple of times over the past several years, and each YPTC accountant has been exemplary.”

Since YPTC came on board, the Chester County Community Foundation has gone through five audits seamlessly and with high marks. “I like YPTC’s quality and depth. Because of YPTC’s solid track record and performance, I can sleep at night. YPTC provides clear, concise accounting with dispassionate neutrality and no political agenda. Eric Fraint flew in and saved us when we had to restructure quickly – I call him my Superman.”