Sidney Kess, Esq., CPA, JD, LLM, has received the AICPA’s 2015 Personal Financial Planning Distinguished Service Award, which was announced today at the AICPA’s Advanced Financial Planning Conference in Las Vegas.  The award is granted annually to a member whose volunteer efforts have made significant contributions to the growth and advancement of the personal financial planning profession.

“Sid Kess has dedicated decades of service to the CPA profession, going above and beyond to raise the bar for CPAs who provide personal financial planning services,” said Susan Tillery, chair of AICPA’s Personal Financial Specialist (PFS) Credential Committee.  “His volunteer history for the AICPA began when he created the Tax Strategies for High Income Individuals Conference 30 years ago. In the last decade he has put a tremendous amount of effort into forwarding the CPA financial planning profession.  He uses every podium opportunity to highlight the value of financial planning, including the PFP section and the PFS credential.  Sid is a wonderful mentor and encourages all those he comes in contact with. He spends a great deal of time reaching out to young people and encouraging them in their CPA/PFS pursuits. He has made a difference in so many lives.”

Kess has authored and co-authored hundreds of publications, courses, videos, and practice aids on income tax and financial and estate planning for the AICPA, as well as CCH.  He is recipient of the AICPA’s Gold Medal Award, the highest award granted to a CPA by the AICPA, for his major contributions to the CPA profession, and the AICPA’s Special Recognition and Distinguished Lecturer Awards.  He was elected to the Estate Planning Hall of Fame by the National Association of Estate Planners & Councils and is the recipient of the New York State Society of CPAs’ Hall of Fame award.  He is Of counsel to Kostelanetz & Fink, LLP.

Kess is recognized as one of the nation’s best known continuing professional education lecturers.  He has lectured to more than one million practitioners on tax, financial, and estate planning.  In 2010, the AICPA established the Sidney Kess Award for Excellence in Continuing Education to recognize individual CPAs who have made significant and outstanding contributions in tax and financial planning and whose public service exemplifies the CPA profession’s finest values and ethics.  In an effort to tie university efforts to the profession, he has single-handedly created a personal financial planning conference with NYSSCPA and Baruch College.

“Sid is an incredible source of ideas and inspiration to the profession and his efforts have caused many tax-oriented CPAs to add personal financial planning to their services,” said Andrea Millar, CPA/PFS, associate director of the AICPA’s Personal Financial Planning Division. “He has worked tirelessly to promote personal financial planning in the media, including getting a regular PFP column added to many publications.”

About the AICPA’s PFP Division
The AICPA’s Personal Financial Planning (PFP) Section is the premier provider of information, tools, advocacy, and guidance for CPAs who specialize in providing estate, tax, retirement, risk management, and investment planning advice to individuals, families, and business owners. The primary objective of the PFP Section is to support its members by providing resources that enable them to perform valuable PFP services in the highest professional manner.

CPA financial planners are held to the highest standards and are uniquely able to integrate their extensive knowledge of tax and business planning with all areas of personal financial planning to provide objective and comprehensive guidance for their clients. The AICPA offers the Personal Financial Specialist (PFS) credential exclusively to CPAs who have demonstrated their expertise in personal financial planning through testing, experience, and learning.

About the AICPA
The American Institute of CPAs (AICPA) is the world’s largest member association representing the accounting profession, with more than 412,000 members in 144 countries, and a history of serving the public interest since 1887. AICPA members represent many areas of practice, including business and industry, public practice, government, education and consulting.  

The AICPA sets ethical standards for the profession and U.S. auditing standards for private companies, nonprofit organizations, federal, state and local governments. It develops and grades the Uniform CPA Examination, and offers specialty credentials for CPAs who concentrate on personal financial planning; forensic accounting; business valuation; and information management and technology assurance. Through a joint venture with the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA), it has established the Chartered Global Management Accountant (CGMA) designation which sets a new standard for global recognition of management accounting.

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