Familiar Faces, Places in Enron Hearings This Week

February 25, 2002 (PLANSPONSOR.com) - As February draws to a close, a number of Enron-related hearings are scheduled on the Hill - with a combination of new participants and a few familiar faces.

Things will begin tomorrow morning at 9:30 a.m. when Enron Vice President Sherron Watkins will appear before the Senate Commerce Committee , chaired by Senator Ernest Hollings (D-South Carolina).  Enron President and Chief Operating Officer Jeffrey McMahon and former Enron President and Chief Executive Officer Jeffrey Skilling are also scheduled to appear.

Just a half hour later the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee , chaired by Senator Paul Sarbanes (D-Maryland), will continue its focus on accounting and investor protection issues.  Scheduled to testify are three former SEC chief accountants and former Financial Accounting Standards Board Chairman Dennis Beresford.  Previously the committee has heard from five former Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) chairmen.

Wednesday

On Wednesday, the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee , chaired by Joseph Lieberman (D-Connecticut), will convene, focusing on Wall Street analysts’ recommendations on Enron.  Last Friday, Lieberman and Ranking Member Fred Thompson (R-Tennessee) sent letters to the Department of Labor, the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to determine what the agencies knew about how Enron was run and whether they could have done anything to avert the company’s collapse. 

Last week, Congressman Henry Waxman (D-California) outlined the contents of an Enron employee meeting videotape in a letter to Senator Lieberman.  That tape reportedly showed Enron executives in 1999 supporting a hefty investment of 401(k) balances in company stock. 

Thursday

The month will wrap up on Thursday with a hearing scheduled for the Senate Finance Committee , chaired by Senator Max Baucus (D-Montana). Witnesses scheduled to testify ( http://finance.senate.gov/press/pr022202.pdf ) include:

  • GAO Comptroller General David Walker 
  • US Treasury Benefits Tax Counsel William Sweetnam 
  • Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. (PBGC) Executive Director Steven Kandarian 
  • Jack VanDerhei, Research Director, Employee Benefit Research Institute

Also beginning Thursday in Washington is the 2002 National Summit on Retirement Savings.

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