Bridgeport resident David Walker, the nation’s former chief accountant who warned of the national meltdown before there was a national meltdown, is making the Park City home base for his Comeback America Initiative, an effort to bring sanity back into the budget-making process in Washington. Headquarters for CAI is Downtown on State Street. Part of his spending reform effort will include highlighting financial challenges in Bridgeport. Check out details of CAI in the latest info alert from Walker:
I’m sending this notice about the new Comeback America Initiative (CAI) on February 2, 2011, which is Groundhog Day. In my view, Washington politicians have been hiding too long from the structural deficits that threaten our nation’s and families’ futures. It’s time for them to come out of their holes and take action to avoid a debt crisis in the United States. Such a debt crisis would have severe adverse consequences in the U.S. and around the world. We can and must take steps to avoid it in order to keep America great and the American Dream alive for future generations of Americans.
CAI is a small organization that will have a big impact on promoting fiscal responsibility and sustainability. To do so, we have put together an outstanding Board and Advisory Council to help achieve our mission. CAI will conduct a range of activities on its own and in cooperation with others.
The following is summary information about CAI. Additional information can be found on CAI’s web site at www.tcaii.org. Please check it out, sign up and encourage others to do so.
You can reach me at CAI’s new address which is 211 State Street, Suite 401, Bridgeport, CT 06604. Our main phone number is (203) 382-1000, email is Info@tcaii.org. Please update your address book with this information.
We will formally launch CAI on February 14, 2011. That is Valentine’s Day, and also the day that President Obama is scheduled to submit his Fiscal 2012 Budget to the Congress. If he’s serious about addressing our escalating deficits and debt burdens, this budget will have more thorns than roses.
CAI MISSION AND VISION:
CAI’s mission is to promote fiscal responsibility and sustainability by engaging the public and assisting key policymakers on a non-partisan basis in order to achieve solutions to America’s fiscal imbalances. Its vision is to keep America great and the American Dream alive for future generations.
CAI’s ACTIVITIES:
CAI will foster a national discussion around the themes, issues and possible solutions in the book “Comeback America,” with an emphasis on various specific policy, operational and political reforms needed to put government on a more prudent, sustainable and accountable fiscal path. The organization’s primary focus will be federal fiscal issues; however, it will also highlight the larger national fiscal challenge (federal, state and local) and will engage in selected state and local reform initiatives (e.g., pensions, retiree health care, tax systems) and in certain state and local jurisdictions (e.g., Connecticut and Bridgeport, CT).
CAI will engage in various online, on-air, publication and other communication activities, participate in various town hall forums and other public events regarding fiscal matters, and assist key policymakers in their efforts to examine and build support for specific policy reforms to help ensure greater fiscal sustainability.
All activities will be non-partisan in nature and will be designed to make government more future focused, results oriented, successful, efficient, equitable and sustainable. This includes steps designed to transform government to increase transparency and accountability in connection with key areas of ineffectiveness, inequity and fiscal irresponsibility.
CAI’s BOARD OF DIRECTORS:
J. Michael Cook (Chair)- Independent Director, former Managing Partner and CEO of Deloitte Worldwide, and former Chairman of the AICPA
Ernest A. Almonte – Partner, Disanto Priest & Co, former Chairman of the AICPA, and Former Auditor General of Rhode Island
Norman R. Augustine – Independent Director, and former Chairman and CEO of Lockheed Martin Corporation
Michael J. Critelli – Independent Director, and former Chairman and CEO of Pitney Bowes
Harold E. Ford, Jr. – Executive Vice Chairman of Bank of America/Merrill Lynch, and Former Congressman (D/TN)
Melquiades R. Martinez – Executive Vice President of JP MorganChase and former U.S. Senator (R/FL) and Secretary of Housing and Urban Development
William D. Novelli – Distinguished Professor in Practice at Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business, Former CEO of AARP, and Co-Founder and Former President of Porter Novelli
Andrew L. Stern – Senior Research Fellow at Georgetown University’s Public Policy Institute, and Former President of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU)
Paula Van Ness – Independent Consultant, and Former CEO of the Starlight Children’s Foundation and the Make-A-Wish Foundations
David M. Walker – Founder and CEO of the Comeback America Initiative (CAI), and Former U.S. Comptroller General and CEO of the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO)
Joshua S. Weston – Independent Director, and Former CEO of Automatic Data Processing (ADP)
Rev. Jim Wallis – CEO and Editor-in-Chief of the Sojourners
CAI’s ADVISORY COUNCIL:
Emeritus Members:
Hon. Alan Greenspan, Former Chairman of the Federal Reserve
Hon. Paul A. Volcker, Former Chairman of the Federal Reserve
Hon. Alice M. Rivlin, Former Vice Chair of the Federal Reserve and head of OMB and CBO
Hon. Roger W. Ferguson, Jr., Former Vice Chair of the Federal Reserve
Other Distinguished Members:
Dr. Barry Anderson – Independent Consultant
Robert L. Bixby – The Concord Coalition
Dr. Stuart M. Butler – The Heritage Foundation
Dr. Fred V. Carstensen – Connecticut Center For Economic Analysis
Jon Cowan – Third Way
Manny Espinoza, Association of Latino Professionals in Finance and Accounting
Dr. Robert Greenstein – Center for Budget and Policy Priorities
Dr. Douglas J. Holtz-Eakin – American Action Forum
Dr. Carolyn Lukensmeyer – America Speaks
Maya MacGuineas – Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget
Dr. Donald B. Marron, Jr. – Tax Policy Center
William Marshall – Progressive Policy Institute
Dr. Joseph J. Minarik – Committee For Economic Development
Alan A. Nadel – Strategic Apex Group
Dr. William A. Niskanen – CATO Institute
Dr. Paul L. Posner – George Mason University
Dr. Robert D. Reischauer – Urban Institute
Dr. Isabel V. Sawhill – Brookings Institution
Dr. C. Eugene Steuerle – Urban Institute
Lisa S. Weatherby – Wachovia Securities
SELECTED PLANNED ACTIVITIES FOR THE SPRING OF 2011:
· While CAI will engage in numerous ongoing activities, the following as several examples of major activities in the near future:
· Fiscal Solutions Tour and Related. Citizen Education and Engagement Efforts Ongoing)
· CAI Fiscal Solutions Summaries and Slide Packet (March 2011)
· Publication of a Fiscal Responsibility Index Report for the United States and Other Major Industrialized Nations (April 2011)
· CAI Plan A and Plan B for Addressing Federal Structural Deficits (May-June 2011)
Thank you Mr. Walker for bringing your fiscally fit organization to Bridgeport. Hopefully it will serve as a formula to put Bridgeport in the black.
*** A step in the right direction, maybe? Bpt has had their fair share of so-called heavy hitters before with plenty to say, however talk is cheap, no? *** Time will tell. ***