While I appreciate the need to increase the licensing fees and the application fees, the proposal calls for a 133% increase to be effective this year. As a public entity, our FY budget for 2019 - 2020 will end 06/30/2020 and the FY budget for 2020 - 2021 is well on its way to being completed. The impact on my office will be an additional $4,500 for the licensing renewals alone. We have managed to struggle with our limited training budgets by finding creative and budget conscious options secondary to the cost of attending conferences to ensure that our licensees are able to comply with the continuing education requirements. Some counties don't even have training funds available. Coming up with the proposed increase will present a burden for the counties that we will need to bare for the future, but coming up with the proposed increase with this short notice in the current fiscal budget is a burden that the counties will need to struggle with immediately.
Thank you for your consideration.

Peter Q. Santini, Pima County Public Fiduciary License #20199

I agree and understand that fees associated with initial licensure and renewals may need to be increased. However, an effective date further in the future is necessary to allow public offices, such as mine, to work it into a future budget. I believe the proposed increase is unreasonably large. I am worried it may affect the ability of our office to retain the number of licensed individuals we currently have or adversely affect other vital parts of our budget, such as training.
I will have expectations of AOC staff as these increases become effective. I would expect the exam, which is grossly outdated to be updated and the processing time of initial licensure and renewals to be expedited.
Thank you for your time.

Crystal K. Rose Cillitto
Pima County Public Fiduciary Supervisor
License #20793

The biggest issue this proposed change presents is the combination of the amount the fees are being raised and the immediate application of the proposed rules. Long term most larger entities will be able to recover but smaller business and public fiduciaries will immediately struggle adjusting to this so that they can maintain a licensed staff appropriate for their case load. Ultimately theses changes will discourage new licensed fiduciaries and new fiduciary businesses from becoming established at least in immediate terms.

-Pablo Valencia, License #20858

The issue here is most public fiduciary offices work on a strict budget and the budget is needed to pay for license renewals as well as other expenditures. In my office, we have more than 18 licensed fiduciaries. This increase does not allow all of us to attend AFA and NGA conferences so we can obtain our CEUs. This increase is going to happen regardless of input but I hope the funds collected goes to updating the overly outdated Fiduciary Exam.
- Darren Joe, Lic. No. 20792