Report Title:

Certified Public Accountant

Description:

Removes private or governmental accounting experience as meeting the required professional experience for a license in public accountancy.  Removes public accountant examination requirement that baccalaureate degree be in accounting.  (HB91 HD1)

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES	H.B. NO.	91
TWENTY-FOURTH LEGISLATURE, 2007		H.D. 1
STATE OF HAWAII

A BILL FOR AN ACT

RELATING TO PUBLIC ACCOUNTANCY.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF HAWAII:

     SECTION 1.  Section 466-5, Hawaii Revised Statutes, is amended as follows:

      1.  By amending subsection (d) to read:

     "(d)  Each applicant shall present satisfactory evidence in the form of a certified statement from present or former employer(s) that the applicant has met one of the following experience requirements for license:

     (1)  Completion of one thousand five hundred chargeable hours in the performance of audits involving the application of generally accepted accounting principles and auditing standards earned while in public accounting practice; or

     (2)  Completion of two years of professional experience in public accountancy practice as defined in section 466-3.  [Completion of experience in private or government accounting or auditing work, deemed by the board to be equivalent to professional experience in public accountancy practice as defined in section 466-3, may be substituted for all or part of the two years of professional experience in public accounting practice.  The nature, variety, and depth of acceptable private or government accounting or auditing experience shall be defined by the board in its rules.]"

     2.   By amending subsection (f) to read:

     "(f)  The board may allow an applicant to sit for the Uniform Certified Public Accountant Examination, if the applicant has met at least one of the following:

     (1)  Baccalaureate degree [in accounting] conferred by a college or university acceptable to the board; or

    [(2)  Baccalaureate degree with a major in a subject other than in accounting, plus eighteen semester hours of upper division or graduate level accounting or auditing subjects, conferred by a college or university acceptable to the board; or

(3)] (2)  Baccalaureate degree or its equivalent in accounting, conferred by a college or university outside of the United States, and submission of a letter of acceptance from an accredited United States college or university to its advanced degree program or an educational equivalency report prepared by an evaluator approved by the board."

     SECTION 2.  Statutory material to be repealed is bracketed and stricken.  New statutory material is underscored.

     SECTION 3.  This Act shall take effect on June 30, 2010.