Non-Profit Fraud and Abuse Expert Zerbe Joins Malin Bergquist’s National Accounting Joint Venture

ERIE AND PITTSBURGH, PA, June 1, 2010 – Malin Bergquist, the regional accounting firm serving more than 150 not-for-profit and tax-exempt clients, has added industry specialist Dean Zerbe to the board of advisors of its national joint venture, the FD Alliance, comprised of Malin Bergquist and other top CPA firms in Atlanta, Chicago and Phoenix. 

Zerbe and Malin Bergquist’s Vincent Halupczynski will advise non-profit clients on how to avoid the risk of financial fraud at a time when loose internal control and governance processes have had devastating impact across the nation.

Zerbe currently serves as National Managing Director for alliantgroup. For more than a quarter of a century, he was active in congressional investigations of government waste, fraud and abuse, including serving as Senior Counsel and Tax Counsel on the Senate Finance Committee for Senator Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa). His initial focus will be on religious organizations and national non-profit organizations, with a special concentration on "stress tests" that can validate the strength of an organization’s internal control methods.

About the FD Alliance: In what Inside Public Accounting calls “a unique arrangement,” Malin Bergquist and the Alliance bring together experienced CPAs who know one another and already work together, and can tap into strong networks of connections in their regions, collaborating in the same way as practice groups of national firms. Malin Bergquist now deploys more highly sophisticated expertise in the fields of international financial reporting standards (IFRS), public company/SEC, manufacturing and distribution, health care, construction and transaction support. The other firms in the Alliance are Frazier & Deeter (Atlanta), Mueller & Co. (Chicago) and Wallace, Plese + Dreher (Phoenix/Tempe).

About Zerbe: Widely recognized by the press as a leader in tax and oversight matters, Zerbe has appeared on CBS Evening News and been quoted in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, The Financial Times and USA Today; as well as specialty publications such as Tax Notes and The Practical Accountant. In addition, he is a columnist for Forbes Magazine online (Forbes.com) and the Chronicle of Philanthropy.