Historical Context: Alabama Department of Finance

~ fortherecordadah

The Historical Context for the Alabama Department of Finance has been posted from the Records Disposition Authority (RDA) approved by the State Records Commission on October 18, 2023. The RDA establishes disposition requirements by designating records as either temporary records which may be destroyed after a specified retention period, or permanent records, which must be preserved in perpetuity. The complete RDAs for close to 175 agencies can be found on the Alabama Department of Archives and History website.

During Alabama’s first 120 years of statehood, no state agency centrally administered its finances. Instead, state agencies, boards, commissions, and authorities administered their budgets independently. Agencies could choose how and when they reported on their financial management and were required to account fully for expenditures only if an oversight body deemed it necessary. This decentralized approach led the state government to experience continuous financial shortfalls. The state did not have sufficient cash to pay its year-end obligations for a stretch of twenty years between 1910 and 1930, despite the Legislature’s efforts to boost state revenue by raising taxes and issuing bonds. Altogether, the State of Alabama incurred more than $13 million of debt by the onset of the Great Depression.[1]

In 1931, the dire financial situation led Governor Benjamin M. Miller to commission the Brookings Institution to undertake a comprehensive study of Alabama government and, using the results, to offer fiscal and administrative recommendations.[2] Concluding that the state’s financial management was “gravely defective,” the Brookings Institution recommended that Alabama establish a Service of General Administration, including divisions responsible for budgeting, centralized accounting, reporting, and purchasing.[3] The report suggested that the state employ a comptroller, a “chief financial officer of the administrative branch of the government” appointed by and serving at the pleasure of the Governor, to control the deposit of funds into the State Treasury, to issue money, to keep the state’s central accounts, and to create annual and other periodic financial reports.[4]

Throughout the 1930s, the Legislature gradually implemented portions of the Brookings Institution’s recommendations, starting small and moving toward sweeping reforms by the decade’s end. In 1932, the Budget and Financial Control Act established and attached directly to the Governor’s Office an Office of State Comptroller that inherited duties formerly belonging to several other state agencies. In this process, the Legislature abolished some agencies, such as the Budget Commission, while others, such as the Office of State Auditor, continued to operate with reduced responsibilities.[5]

As Frank Dixon based his successful 1938 gubernatorial campaign on promises to restore public confidence by wholly reorganizing state government, the previously established organizational structure would be short-lived.[6] Agreeing with Governor Dixon’s priorities, the Legislature enacted Act 1939-112, abolishing the independent Office of State Comptroller, transferring its former responsibilities to the newly created Department of Finance, and empowering the Department of Finance to manage and control all matters pertaining to fiscal affairs, except those duties assigned to other agencies.[7]

With this new structure, the Department of Finance operated with a Director of Finance to serve as the “chief financial officer of the state and the advisor of the Governor and of the Legislature in financial matters.”[8] Much like the Brookings Institution report had suggested, the Department of Finance originally included five divisions: the Division of the Budget, the Division of Control and Accounts, the Division of Local Finance, the Division of Purchases and Stores, and the Division of Service.[9]

As the state’s financial needs evolve and with approval of the Governor, the Director of Finance may establish new divisions and sections.[10] As of 2023, the Department of Finance includes Real Property Management, which encompasses the Division of Construction Management, Division of Facilities Management, and Division of Leasing Management; the Division of Procurement; the Division of Risk Management; the Division of Control and Accounts; the Division of the Budget; the Legal Division; the Office of Indigent Defense Services; the State Business Systems Division; the Office of Personnel; the Division of Accounting and Administration; and the Division of Debt Management and Capital Planning. A brief history of each division’s origin, scope of responsibilities, and restructuring is provided below.

Real Property Management

The Division of Construction Management’s history predates the establishment of the combined Department of Finance.[11] In 1903, the Legislature established “a building commission” to “contract for the extension, enlargement, or improvement of the present State Capitol building.” The Legislature also authorized the commission to acquire additional grounds and construct additional buildings necessary for the operation of state government.[12] Alabama Act 1911-369 modified the composition of the commission’s members, replacing the State Treasurer with an Alabama Supreme Court justice.[13]

In 1927, via a joint resolution, the Legislature specifically requested that the commission install an elevator within the State Capitol building.[14] To more broadly address structural needs and after the Department of Finance completed a Survey of [Alabama’s] Capital Improvement Program in 1945, the Legislature created a Building Commission Fund and empowered the Building Commission to determine how the fund should be allocated, giving priority to projects classified as “urgent” in the Department of Finance’s report.[15] The Legislature characterized the Building Commission as having “full power and authority… to plan and provide for the improvement of all property now owned or hereafter acquired by the state.”[16]

Also in 1945, the Legislature directed the Building Commission to promulgate and enforce a “code of minimum building standards” for state government buildings, public and private schoolhouses, hotels, and movie theaters. Beginning in January 1946, no state government buildings or schoolhouses could be constructed or acquired that did not conform with the parameters of the state building code.[17]

The Building Commission continued administering the state building code for several decades until Act 2015-435 created the structure that exists as of this writing. Determined to “establish centralized management of real property through leasing administration, facilities maintenance and management, and construction management… within the Department of Finance,” the Act abolished the Building Commission and transferred its former responsibilities to the newly created Division of Construction Management.

While the Department of Finance had performed facilities and leasing management functions in the past, Act 2015-435 also established two additional divisions, the Divisions of Facilities Management and Leasing Management, to absorb these responsibilities.[18] The Department of Finance organizes the Divisions of Construction Management, Facilities Management, and Leasing Management within an overarching Real Property Management grouping.

Altogether, the Legislature empowered the Department of Finance to “establish comprehensive real property asset management practices,” “to incorporate energy efficient practices and behaviors into daily and long-term operations of state government,” and to enforce the state building code.[19]

Division of Procurement

Competitive bidding has been a commonly accepted practice in American government since the nation’s earliest years.[20] However, the decentralized nature of Alabama government meant no state agency was solely responsible for competitive bidding and purchasing until the early twentieth century.

In 1919, the Legislature established a State Board of Control and Economy to oversee state expenditures. Among other responsibilities, the Legislature empowered the State Board of Control and Economy to “purchase all supplies for all departments and activities of the state” through a formalized bidding process. The Board advertised solicitations for proposals in major newspapers, evaluated the proposals, and awarded state contracts to the “lowest responsible bidder.”[21] These duties transferred to the State Board of Administration in 1923, and eventually to the Department of Finance in 1939, where they fell under the purview of the Division of Purchases and Stores.[22]

Act 1939-112 granted broad authority to the Division of Purchases and Stores to administer the competitive bidding process. With the Competitive Bid Law, the Legislature enshrined the state purchasing process in statute, specifying that most public contracts should be awarded “by free and open competitive bidding, on sealed bids, to the lowest responsible bidder.”[23] Although technological advances have altered many aspects of the process, these competitive bidding practices continue to be utilized in Alabama.

One of the Department of Finance’s five original divisions, the Division of Purchases and Stores not only performed the Department’s duties “with respect to purchases and contracts and leases” but also “distribute[d] all [supplies,] materials, equipment and other personal property purchased” for state agencies.[24] The latter function would be transferred to the Division of Service in the late 1980s, after which the Division of Purchases and Stores became known as the Division of Purchasing via Act 1989-947.

More recently, Act 2021-296 created the position of Chief Procurement Officer, who oversees what is known, in 2023, as the Department of Finance’s Division of Procurement.[25] Also in 2021, the State of Alabama launched Alabama Buys, an “open and transparent e-procurement system” encompassing all stages of the purchasing process.[26]

Division of Risk Management

In October 1923, the Alabama Legislature established a State Insurance Fund to insure state government buildings against “loss by fire or tornado.”[27] Legislators may have acted in response to the loss of the Tuscaloosa State Capitol Building, which burned to the ground in August 1923. The building, leased from the state to the Baptist Convention of Alabama for use as a women’s college, had been completely uninsured.[28]

Alabama Act 1923-593 initially empowered the State Board of Administration to administer the Fund.[29] That responsibility transferred to the Department of Finance with its creation in 1939.[30] The State Insurance Fund’s scope also changed during the mid-twentieth century, with Alabama Act 1949-675 expanding insurance coverage to include “loss by fire, lightning, windstorm, and hail.”

In 1990, the Legislature created a Division of Risk Management within the Department of Finance to administer the State Insurance Fund and other similar funds and to “provide programs [and] guidelines leading to premium and financial risk reductions” for the State of Alabama.[31] These increased responsibilities reflected the development of risk management as a discipline throughout the twentieth century.[32]

As of 2023, the Division of Risk Management administers a range of insurance programs in state government including, but not limited to, the State Insurance Fund, the General Liability Trust Fund, the Educators Liability Trust Fund, the State Employee Injury Compensation Trust Fund, the State Employee Assistance Program, and the Equipment Maintenance Program. The Division also performs other risk management activities, such as assisting with implementing the State Employee Assistance Program (EAP), which provides short-term counseling services to participating state employees.[33]

Division of Control and Accounts (State Comptroller’s Office)

The Brookings Institution’s 1931 report recommended that the State of Alabama employ a comptroller to oversee government financial operations. With the passage of Act 1932-37 the following year, the Legislature established and attached directly to the Governor’s Office an Office of State Comptroller.

Seven years later, legislators abolished the independent Office of State Comptroller, transferring its former responsibilities to the newly created Department of Finance. From the Department’s inception, the State Comptroller has overseen the Division of Control and Accounts, often called the State Comptroller’s Office. Among other duties, the Legislature empowered the State Comptroller “to keep all books, records and accounts relating to the finances of the state government,” and “to control and make records of all payments into and out of the State Treasury and each special fund and account therein.”[34]

While its core mandate has remained unchanged, the State Comptroller’s Office undertakes additional responsibilities as provided by statute or as instructed by the Finance Director. For instance, in 2009, Governor Bob Riley’s Executive Order 46 directed the State Comptroller’s Office “to establish a database of state expenditures, including contracts and grants, that are easily accessed by the public[.]” The Legislature subsequently enacted Act 2009-750, which details the information to be contained within the database and specifies that, among other requirements, the database must include “the amount, date, payor, and payee of [state expenditures],” including expenditures via contracts and grants.[35]

On October 1, 2010, the Comptroller’s Office launched the state expenditure tracking portal “Open Alabama” (www.open.alabama.gov), which provides detailed information on state expenditures as of this writing. Similarly, Alabama Act 2012-407 required the Office “to post and maintain a statewide database on the State’s website of each request for a proposal for a public contract” by state agencies.[36] The State Comptroller’s Office continues to serve as a hub of statewide financial operations by processing and approving payments into and out of the Treasury in accordance with its original mandate.

Division of the Budget (Executive Budget Office)

The Budget and Financial Control Act of 1932 laid the foundations for the work now performed by the Department of Finance’s Division of the Budget. The Act formalized procedures for transmitting the annual budget to the Legislature, dictated the budget’s required format, and established procedures for making appropriations and allotments to state agencies. From 1932 until the Department of Finance’s creation in 1939, the Budget and Financial Control Act entrusted these responsibilities to the Office of State Comptroller attached to the Governor’s Office.[37]

The Division of the Budget has existed within the Department of Finance since its formation. Among other responsibilities, the Legislature requires the Division to prepare detailed tentative budgets for every “department, board, bureau, commission, agency, office and institution of the state,” to make budget allotments, and to furnish all information for and assist in preparation of each year’s budgeting legislation.[38] The State Budget Officer, a public official appointed by and serving at the pleasure of the Director of Finance, oversees the operations of the Division.[39]

The scope of the Division’s budget authority and financial management responsibilities greatly expanded with the Budget Management Act of 1976.[40] Among other provisions, it requires the Department of Finance to assist the Governor and state agencies in financial planning, to develop budget submission packages, to review operations plans, and to report quarterly to the governor and the legislature on the state’s fiscal operations.

The Department of Finance and the Governor’s Office have piloted various methods to comply with the Budget Management Act of 1976 requirements while maximizing governmental efficiency, with the most far-reaching of these initiatives being the statewide strategic planning and budgeting system known as SMART Governing.[41] Jim Main, Director of Finance, collaborated with Governor Bob Riley and an executive committee of state agency heads to develop and enact the SMART Governing Program. An Executive Planning Office, separate from the Executive Budget Office, administered the SMART Governing Program between its rollout in 2006 and its deactivation in 2011 by Governor Robert Bentley. Although the Executive Planning Office ceased operations, state agencies continue to budget using the goal-setting principles established by the SMART Governing Program.[42] As of 2023, the Executive Budget Office retains primary responsibility for performing budgetary functions in state government.

Legal Division

The Legal Division Chief advises the Finance Director and the department at large on legal matters and represents the department in any legal proceedings.[43]

The 11th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, ratified in 1795, confers sovereign immunity to the states, and Alabama’s 1901 Constitution reiterates the state’s sovereign immunity, saying that “the State of Alabama shall never be made a defendant in any court of law” in its Declaration of Rights.[44]

**Explanatory Note: Sovereign immunity is a legal doctrine specifying that federal and state governments may not be sued without government consent. The doctrine originated in British common law and applies to federal, state, and tribal governments in the United States.[45]

Sovereign immunity shields Alabama state government from legal action and prevents citizens from seeking financial compensation from the state for legitimate grievances. To address this impasse, the Legislature established a State Board of Adjustment via Act 1935-546. The Board provides a method for Alabama to render payment for injuries, property damage, or death in those cases where the State has a legal or moral obligation to pay, but litigation is impossible due to the government’s sovereign immunity.[46]

With an increase in workload, the Board required ongoing administrative support. To that end, in 1953, the Legislature established the Department of Finance Legal Division. Since its inception, the Legal Division has provided administrative support to the Board of Adjustment, along with its other responsibilities to advise and represent the Department of Finance.

Office of Indigent Defense Services

In 1963, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Gideon v. Wainwright that state governments must provide attorneys to indigent criminal defendants.[47] Later that year, the Alabama Legislature passed Act 1963-526, which, among other provisions, directed trial courts to forward indigent defendants’ legal bills to the State Comptroller’s Office for payment. The State Comptroller’s Office continued coordinating the provision of and payment for indigent defense services for the next several decades.

In 2011 with the passage of Act 2011-678, the Legislature established a separate Office of Indigent Defense Services within the Department of Finance to carry out administrative duties for Alabama’s public defender program, such as maintaining lists of eligible payees and approving payments for services rendered. The State Comptroller’s Office remains responsible for processing payments for these services.[48]

State Business Systems Division

Responding to advancements in computer technology over the last fifty years, the Department of Finance has established various technologically oriented divisions and sections. The earliest example may be the Data Systems Management Division, which the Legislature created via Act 1973-1299 “to plan, control, and coordinate State data processing activities… [and] to provide systems design and programming services to all state agencies.”[49]

Throughout the 1980s, the Data Systems Management Division incorporated innovative technology into the State of Alabama’s financial processes. Specifically, in 1982, the State of Alabama purchased the computerized Financial Resource Management System (FRMS). The overarching FRMS program contained various subprograms intended to centralize accounting processes within state government. Several state agencies worked together throughout the 1980s to bring the subprograms online. For example, the State Comptroller’s Office collaborated with the Executive Budget Office and the Office of State Treasurer to adopt the Central Accounting System (CAS) subprogram for statewide financial management, and the State Comptroller’s Office worked with the State Personnel Department to implement the Government Human Resources System (GHRS) subprogram for state payroll and personnel management. These software subprograms automatically communicated within FRMS to ensure that the state accurately recorded its finances. Around the same time, the Legislature granted the State Comptroller’s Office permission to carry out electronic fund transfers.[50]

The State of Alabama continued to use the FRMS program until 2015, when the government adopted the State of Alabama Accounting and Resource System (STAARS). Like FRMS, STAARS includes various subprograms, including STAARS Financial, for centralized financial management.

Related to telecommunications, the Legislature determined in 1990 that Alabama state government should facilitate “the creation and maintenance of an efficient, modern, economically feasible, telecommunications system.” [51] Alabama Act 1990-553 established a Telecommunications Division with the Department of Finance to work towards creating such a system. The Division became responsible for telephones and cable wiring but also exercised broad authority over “switches, networks, branch exchanges, software, and other devices used… for the purpose of communicating voice signals or digital data.”[52]

In 1997, G. Sage Lyons, Director of Finance, consolidated the Data Systems Management and Telecommunications Divisions into a single Information Systems Division (ISD). ISD eventually operated alongside another technologically oriented division, the SMART Business Systems Division, which Jim Main, Director of Finance, established in 2008.[53] The Department of Finance renamed the SMART Business Systems Division in 2010 to the State Business Systems Division (SBS).

A shift occurred during Governor Robert Bentley’s administration when Alabama Act 2013-68 established an Office of Information Technology (OIT) outside the Department of Finance, headed by a Secretary of Information Technology, a member of the Governor’s cabinet.[54] In November 2016, the Department of Finance and OIT signed a memorandum of understanding clarifying the relationships between OIT, ISD, and SBS.[55] Alabama Act 2017-282 transferred ISD’s staff and resources to OIT, leaving SBS as the sole technologically oriented division within the Department of Finance. OIT and the Department of Finance continue collaborating closely on communications, cybersecurity, data processing, and information technology governance within state government.

Office of Personnel

Filed in September 1982, the Alabama Administrative Code Chapter 355-1-1-0.1 established an Office of Personnel within the Department of Finance. The Office of Personnel coordinates human resources activities with the Department, including employee selection and orientation, compensation administration, training, and disciplinary matters.

Division of Accounting and Administration

In April 1997, with the approval of Governor Fob James, Finance Director G. Sage Lyons established the Division of Accounting and Administration. The Division provides internal accounting support services to the Department of Finance. They reconcile all funds in the State of Alabama Accounting and Resource System (STAARS), pay bills, manage fixed asset inventories, and process cash transfers on behalf of all Department of Finance divisions. The Division of Accounting and Administration also assist other divisions in preparing their annual budget requests and operations plans before submitting the entire department’s budget to the Executive Budget Office.

Division of Debt Management and Capital Planning

Alabama’s 1901 Constitution, Section 213, stated that “[a]fter the ratification of this Constitution, no new debt shall be created against, or incurred by this state.” Constitutional delegates intended this “debt prohibition” to be absolute, though exceptions would be identified in subsequent years. [56] For instance, the Supreme Court of Alabama held that the Constitution’s debt prohibition does not apply to obligations incurred for the current fiscal year’s operating expenses or debts incurred by separate public corporations functioning as state instrumentalities.[57] Amendment 26 to the Alabama Constitution permitted the state to establish a sinking fund to pay its floating debt.[58]

**Explanatory Note: Floating debt is a type of short-term debt that is continuously refinanced. Governments maintain floating debt through a constant process of obtaining new loans. The new loans are used to pay off old loans and sustain operations.[59] Sinking funds contain money gradually set aside to repay debts (including floating debt) or other obligations, thereby softening the hardship of a repayment deadline.[60]

Since its inception, the Department of Finance has assisted the Governor, Legislature, and other state agencies with financial planning, ensuring that government operations can be funded within the constitutionally mandated parameters outlined above. Determining that the proper management of the state’s public debt necessitated centralization in a specialized division, in September 2000, with the approval of Governor Don Siegelman, Director of Finance Henry C. Mabry, III created the Division of Debt Management and Capital Planning to analyze, coordinate, and manage Alabama’s public debt.[61]

[1] Judith A. Kamnikar, “Alabama Department of Finance,” Encyclopedia of Alabama, February 11, 2013, https://encyclopediaofalabama.org/article/alabama-department-of-finance/.

[2] The Brookings Institution is a nonprofit, nonpartisan public policy organization headquartered in Washington, D.C. The Institution conducted similar studies for several other state governments during the Great Depression including, but not limited to, Mississippi, New Hampshire, and North Carolina.

[3] The report also proposed that the Service of General Administration should be responsible for the state’s personnel management. Ultimately, the Legislature would create an independent State Personnel Department with the passage of Alabama Act 1939-58.

[4] The report notes, “In Alabama, and the same is true in most of the states, great confusion has resulted through failure to distinguish clearly between the functions of a comptroller and an auditor.” Indeed, the State Auditor was called the Comptroller of Public Accounts before 1868. As the report explains, auditors and comptrollers perform different administrative duties, with auditors responsible for “reviewing all financial transactions… [to ensure] that all requirements by the legislature in respect to the collection, custody, and disbursement of public funds have been duly complied with.” The Brookings Institution Institute for Government Research, Report on a Survey of the Organization and Administration of the State and County Governments of Alabama (Montgomery, AL: The Wilson Printing Company, 1932), 25-26.

[5] Alabama Act 1932-37, also called the “Fletcher Budget Act,” after its sponsor, Senator Shelby S. Fletcher from Huntsville, Madison County, AL.

[6] Judith A. Kamnikar, “Alabama Department of Finance,” Encyclopedia of Alabama, February 11, 2013, https://encyclopediaofalabama.org/article/alabama-department-of-finance/.

[7] Alabama Act 1939-112.

[8] Code of Alabama 1975 § 41-4-30.

[9] The Legislature abolished one of the five original divisions, the Division of Local Finance, with the passage of Act 1951-194. It is unclear why the Legislature abolished the Division of Local Finance without reassigning its duties elsewhere. In 1945, Governor Chauncey Sparks called for the Division of Local Finance to “be strengthened… that it may be more helpful to [county and municipal governments],” implying that the division may not have been operating as beneficially as intended.

[10] Code of Alabama 1975 § 41-4-37.

[11] Real Property Management encompasses the Divisions of Construction Management, Facilities Management, and Leasing Management.

[12] Alabama Act 1903-42.

[13] Alabama Act 1911-369.

[14] Alabama Act 1927-451.

[15] Projects which the Department of Finance classified as “urgent” included a $900,000 renovation of Bryce Hospital (Tuscaloosa, AL) and a $675,000 engineering laboratory at Alabama Polytechnic Institute (now Auburn University in Auburn, AL).

[16] Alabama Act 1945-128.

[17] Alabama Act 1945-290.

[18] The Division of Service, which operated a central mail room and provided facilities management services to state agencies located in Montgomery, was one of the five original Department of Finance divisions created in 1939. Another predecessor was the Office of Space Management, which the Legislature created with the passage of Alabama Act 1973-1294.

[19] Alabama Act 2015-435.

[20] An early reference to competitive bidding is found in the Journals of the Continental Congress when, in November 1775, the Congress established a committee to advertise and evaluate proposals for supplying rations to two new Revolutionary War battalions. Patricia H. Wittie, “Origins and History of Competition Requirements in Federal Government Contracts: There’s Nothing New Under the Sun!” Reed Smith LLP, February 2003, https://www.reedsmith.com/-/media/files/perspectives/2003/02/origins-and-history-of-competition-requirements-in/files/origins-and-history-of-competition-requirements-in/fileattachment/wittiepaper.pdf.

[21] Alabama Act 1919-47.

[22] Between February and September 1923, the State Board of Control and Economy was known as the State Board of Convict Supervisors. On September 28, the Legislature renamed the State Board of Convict Supervisors to the State Board of Administration. Alabama Acts 1923-85, 1923-475, and 1939-112.

[23] Alabama Act 1957-343.

[24] Alabama Act 1939-112.

[25] Alabama Act 2021-296.

[26] Department of Finance, Division of Procurement, “Welcome to Alabama Buys,” November 2021, https://www. alabamabuys.gov/page.aspx/en/usr/login?ReturnUrl=%2fpage.aspx%2fen%2fbuy%2fhomepage.

[27] Alabama Act 1923-593.

[28] “Third Capitol of State is Burned,” The Birmingham News, August 23, 1923.

[29] In fact, Act 1923-593 grants responsibility for the Fund to “the State Board of Convict Supervisors, or its successors.” However, Act 1923-87 had renamed the State Board of Convict Supervisors to the State Board of Administration.

[30] Alabama Act 1939-112.

[31] Alabama Act 1990-672.

[32] Georges Dionne, “Risk Management: History, Definition, and Critique,” Interuniversity Research Centre on Enterprise Networks, Logistics and Transportation, September 2013, https://www.cirrelt.ca/documentstravail/ cirrelt-2013-56.pdf.

[33] Governor Guy Hunt ordered the Department of Finance to develop, maintain, and carry out an Employee Assistance Program (EAP) for all state employees with his Executive Order 48 in 1992.

[34] Code of Alabama 1975 § 41-4-50.

[35] Code of Alabama 1975 § 41-4-65.

[36] Code of Alabama 1975 § 41-4-66.

[37] Alabama Act 1932-37.

[38] Code of Alabama 1975 § 41-4-80.

[39] The title of the Division’s leader results in the Division of the Budget often being called the Executive Budget Office.

[40] Code of Alabama 1975 § 41-19-1 to § 41-19-12.

[41] SMART Governing operated according to the principles of performance budgeting, in which budgetary allocations are based upon specific, measurable objectives set by state agencies in consultation with the Department of Finance, the Governor’s Office, and the Legislature. The SMART acronym stands for “Specific,” “Measurable,” “Accountable,” “Responsive,” and “Transparent” governance.

[42] The Associated Press, “Governor Bentley Drops Riley’s Budgeting Process,” Tuscaloosa News, November 4, 2012, https://www.tuscaloosanews.com/story/news/2012/11/04/ governor-bentley-drops-rileys-budget-process/29899196007/.

[43] The Board of Adjustment’s records are governed by a separate Records Disposition Authority (RDA). The Alabama Department of Finance follows all retention requirements in the Board of Adjustment RDA to manage the Board’s records; Alabama Act 1953-448.

[44] Alabama Constitution of 1901, Article I § 14.

[45] National Conference of State Legislatures, “State Sovereign Immunity and Tort Liability,” NCSL, September 8, 2010. https://www.ncsl.org/research/transportation/state-sovereign-immunity-and-tort-liability.aspx.

[46] Alabama Act 1935-546.

[47] Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U.S. 335 (1963).

[48] Code of Alabama 1975 § 41-4-322.

[49] Alabama Act 1973-1299. Interestingly, the Legislature also enacted Act 1973-1286 on the same day, which established a Division of Printing and Publications within the Department of Finance to coordinate state government printing activities. The Department abolished the Division of Printing and Publications in the early 2000s as advances in desktop computing eliminated the resource burden once posed by printing.

[50] Alabama Act 1984-789.

[51] Alabama Act 1990-553.

[52] Code of Alabama 1975 § 41-4-283.

[53] The SMART Business Systems Division collaborated with other Department of Finance divisions to implement SMART Governing, the strategic planning and budgeting system developed by Main, Governor Bob Riley, and an executive committee of state agencies.

[54] Alabama Act 2013-68.

[55] Alabama Department of Finance and Alabama Office of Information Technology, “Memorandum of Understanding,” Montgomery, AL, 2016, http://oit.alabama.gov/wp-content/uploads/sites/14/2017/09/Department-of-Finance-Transfers-Operational-Leadership-of-ISD-and-SBS-to-the-Office-of-Information-Technology.pdf.

[56] Alabama State Bridge Corp. v. Smith, 217 Ala. 311, 116 So. 695 (1928).

[57] Ibid. Examples of public corporations acting as instrumentalities of the state include, but are not limited to, the Alabama Highway Finance Corporation and the Public School and College Authority. Department of Finance Executive Budget Office, State of Alabama Executive Budget: Fiscal Year 2022, March 2021, https://budget.alabama.gov/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/FINAL-State-of-Alabama-Budget-Document-FY22.pdf.

[58] Amendment 26, which was ratified in 1933, is often called the “Constitutional Budget Amendment.”

[59] Farlex Financial Dictionary, “Floating Debt,” Farlex, Inc., December 9, 2021, https://financial-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/floating+debt.

[60] Chris B. Murphy, “Sinking Fund,” Investopedia, December 9, 2021, https://www.investopedia.com/terms/s/ sinkingfund.asp.

[61] Henry C. Mabry, III, to Don Siegelman, July 31, 2000.

Sources of Information

Leave a comment