NYSSCPA Distinguished Service Award
This award salutes CPA members who have distinguished themselves as Society leaders through model service within the NYSSCPA and the profession. The award celebrates those who have demonstrated outstanding dedication to and have made a remarkable impact upon the Society and the profession through endeavors such as inspirational service in leadership positions in the NYSSCPA, the development of future leaders of the Society and the profession, educational or publication efforts, public service and other activities.
Allen L. Fetterman lectures extensively throughout the country about not-for-profit accounting and auditing, federal single audits, tax compliance and governance. He conducts seminars and webcasts, and speaks at conferences for the AICPA, the NYSSCPA, CPA firms, associations and societies. When the Foundation for Accounting Education (FAE) inaugurated its Nonprofit Conference in 1979, Fetterman was an obvious choice to be a speaker. He has spoken at almost every one since, and intends to speak at the 50th conference in 2028, when he will be 80. For his many years of lecturing at FAE events about nonprofits, he is one of the honorees for the 2024 Distinguished Service Award.
“It’s not just that he has spoken at [almost all] of the not-for-profit conferences that ever took place,” said Derek A. Flanagan, who was hired by Fetterman, worked with him for 10 years, and nominated him for the award. “He is one of the reasons that people go to the conference. He’s one of the featured speakers, always has been, and that’s a big part of the reason why the conference has been so successful over the years.”
Fetterman can thank his mother for setting him on a long and rewarding career in accounting, one that has earned him success and accolades. A Bronx native and Bronx High School of Science graduate, he “was always good with numbers and what we used to call arithmetic and then, later on, mathematics,” he said. “I aced every math Regents [examination] in high school, so I decided I’ll go to City College and be a math major.”
Then came first-year calculus. “I had no idea what it was all about,” he said. “So, I took an aptitude test at City College after my freshman year. It basically said that my first choice should be business, and that shocked me. I had no idea that I had an affinity for business, but my second score on this test was law. So, I said, ‘OK, I’ll major in political science in my sophomore year. I took poli sci and found it boring.’”
That’s when his mother stepped in. A garment center bookkeeper, she suggested that he take accounting. His response: “What’s accounting?”
But he followed the motherly advice and, to his delight, found his calling. “I said, ‘OK, I’ll try it in my fourth semester.’ I took Accounting 101 and loved it. Got an A. And that was the end of my career search. I switched.”
“Accounting is the use of numbers and the theory behind it,” he explained. “Accounting is an art, not a science. It uses mathematics, but it’s highly theoretical. I just liked the order of things.”
Graduating in 1968, he won the award for the top accounting student but took a career detour, teaching at an elementary school in the Bronx for three years while working toward his MBA at Baruch College. There, he studied under Abraham J. Briloff, known as “the conscience of the accounting profession.” Briloff was a disciple of Emanuel Saxe, who served as dean of Baruch from 1956 to 1968, and after whom the NYSSCPA named its education award.
“It was the 14-week course of [Briloff] lecturing about current accounting theory [that] taught me how to think,” said Fetterman.
After graduating in 1972, he made the crucial decision not to join a Big Eight firm, ignoring the advice of his professors. Instead, he opted to join Loeb & Troper LLP, whose clients were exclusively nonprofit entities.
“I like that type of clientele because they were in business not to make money, but to provide service to society, to people in need, to patients, to students, to people who needed social service,” he said. There was a pragmatic element to that decision, as well: “I wanted to go with a midsize accounting firm so that, when I became a partner, I actually felt that I was an owner, not a well-paid employee.”
It turned out well for everyone. Fetterman spent 36 years there, serving not-for-profit organizations as an auditor and consultant, and becoming a partner after 11 years. In addition to his client responsibilities, he was the partner in charge of the firm’s quality controls and technical resources—essentially, the auditor who “audited” the firm’s work products before they went to the client. He also created the firm’s continuing professional education program and taught in-house seminars. In addition, Fetterman was an assistant professor of accounting at a local college and a guest lecturer at Yale University and New York University.
“Allen hired me right out of college and was my mentor in public accounting for over 17 years,” said Allan M. Blum, a former chair of the Society’s Not-for-Profit Organizations Committee, and now a health care partner at FORVIS. “He was and is a great role model, and extremely knowledgeable about the not-for-profit sector, and taught me a tremendous amount, and has been a sounding board for accounting issues to this day.”
David M. Rottkamp, another former chair of the Not-for-Profit Organizations Committee, also attested to Fetterman’s interest in nurturing talent. “I grew up under the mentorship of Allen Fetterman,” said Rottkamp, now a partner and the nonprofit practice leader at Grassi, whom Fetterman hired out of Pace University in 1987. “I have had amazing success in my career because of what he instilled in me.”
“He was someone who challenged you at every step of the way,” added Rottkamp. “He made you do your work before you came to him. He expected you to have answers. He is an educator and a teacher who challenged you to be better, and he made you want to grow professionally.”
In 2003, Fetterman retired from the firm, with Rottkamp volunteering to help carry his mentor’s boxes out to his car on his last day. But don’t use the R-word to describe the following two decades.
“I’m not retired from the profession,” said Fetterman. “I’m retired from the practice of being a public accountant.” But he also insists that he is not working: “It’s a hobby for which I get paid.”
“I love it. I enjoy it. I really enjoy speaking, meeting with people around the country,” Fetterman said. “I think it’s good for my health. And I have to stay calm because if I’m going to lecture, I have to read. I have to stay up to date in the nonprofit world, accounting and auditing and tax. It’s good to stay current, but it also keeps me and my brain active, which I think is healthy.”
That enthusiasm and desire to give back to the profession extends to his committee service.
He served the AICPA and NYSSCPA in a number of capacities, including the AICPA’s Not-for-Profit Organizations Committee, Not-for-Profit Audit & Accounting Guide Task Force and Joint Trial Board. He chaired the NYSSCPA Not-for-Profit Organizations, Professional Ethics, Audit, and Quality Control Practice Assistance
committees. He also served as a vice president of the NYSSCPA and as a trustee of the Foundation for Accounting Education (FAE). In addition, he is a past recipient of Outstanding Discussion Leader Awards from both the AICPA and FAE. He has also written articles published in national accounting periodicals in the United States and Israel on accounting and taxes for not-for-profit entities.
Fetterman cited his service as chair of the AICPA’s Joint Trial Board as one of the highlights of his career. Comprising 35 CPAs, the board conducts trials of CPAs accused of severe or significant violations of professional ethics. He served on the Joint Trial Board for six years and was elected as chair by the other 34 judges.
As an active Society member—“even more so since he retired,” said Flanagan—Fetterman encourages CPAs to get involved in the Society.
“You learn a lot by meeting people in New York from around the state, from the AICPA, from around the country, [and] you get different perspectives,” Fetterman said. “I think it’s important that every CPA somehow gives back to the profession.”
ssteinhardt@nysscpa.org