Every spring I write an editorial announcing the lineup of our annual Compliance Week lineup. As you might imagine, last year’s conference, in the shadow of recession and financial crisis, had a touch of gallows humor to the whole affair.

I am happy, and more than a little surprised, to report that our 2010 conference will have a much more expansive and energetic tone. In fact, this may well be our best annual conference yet—and I was there in 2007, when the economy and corporate compliance budgets were roaring along like nobody’s business. Still, to my thinking, our 2010 conference has a better agenda, covering more issues, that’s drumming up more enthusiasm and response among the compliance community. This is going to be good, folks.

Let’s start with the basics about the conference itself. As usual, it will take place at the historic Mayflower Hotel in Washington, D.C. This year we have moved it a few weeks early, to May 24-26. We’ll have several hundred corporate financial, legal, risk, audit, and compliance officers gather to debate and discuss critical compliance and risk issues, from FCPA programs and internal controls to risk management and executive pay.

Two of our keynote speakers are among the most important regulators around right now: Luis Aguilar, an outspoken reformist commissioner on the Securities and Exchange Commission; and U.S. Rep. Barney Frank, chairman of the House Financial Services Committee. Yes, some critics disagree with how Frank, Aguilar, and others in Washington are handling the financial crisis—but that’s precisely why we are putting powerful voices like theirs in front of you. They are the ones creating the environment corporate compliance officers must live in, period. Do you want to hear their logic? Do you want to challenge their logic? Our annual conference is your opportunity to do that, and to stay aware of how compliance is changing.

We also have a full complement of speakers addressing the implementation and enforcement of all the rules Washington churns out: Gary Grindler, deputy attorney general and top overseer of corporate investigations at the Justice Department; Lanny Breuer and Denis McInerney, his two top lieutenants; Shelley Parratt, deputy director of the SEC’s Corporation Finance Division, and chief expert on all things disclosure (including the new disclosures about executive pay and climate change that your company is making for the first time this spring). JetBlue’s CEO, Dave Barger, will give a joint presentation with Joel Peterson, chair of JetBlue’s audit committee, about how the airline fosters an ethical culture in today’s world.

But those are the headline speakers. The guts of the conference, as always, will be chief compliance officers talking frankly about the challenges of their jobs. We have dozens of CCOs, risk officers, and internal auditors from the country’s most prominent public companies: Walmart, American Express, TimeWarner, U.S. Steel, Tyco, Johnson & Johnson, Visa, Home Depot, and many more. They will be offering thoughts and ideas about all manner of compliance challenges and will be looking for the same from attendees. This is a peer-to-peer event, where your opinion is as important as any other.

Forking over the cash to travel to Washington and attend the Compliance Week conference is not easy in a bad economy; we know this. Hence we are striving to make this event the most relevant, informative, useful gathering of compliance and corporate governance executives in 2010. We can always deliver news and information to help you do your job, but there is no substitute for the rich experience of meeting with, talking to, and learning from your colleagues—even in an economy like this one.

So if you’re free in the last week of May, please join us. Details, the agenda, speakers, and registration information can be found at http://conference.complianceweek.com.

Well, Compliance Week seems to have touched a nerve with news of the latest speaker for our annual conference this spring: Congressman Barney Frank.

As some of you might have seen already, earlier this week we sent out a mass email announcing that Frank, chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, will be the keynote speaker at our conference (May 24-26, in Washington, D.C.). We consider this good news. Corporate compliance officers, internal auditors, financial reporting executives and boards of directors are all awaiting a tectonic overhaul of corporate governance in this country. Since Frank is, you know, the person pushing the legislation through Congress, we decided it would be useful to give Compliance Week readers a chance to hear his thoughts on the matter and ask him a few questions.

Most of you seem to understand that logic. A vocal minority, however, opened the e-floodgates and fired off the usual denunciations of Frank as a liberal windbag. One bitter gem of an example:

Barney Frank is a despicable liar who puts self-interest before the country’s best interest. He will be tossed out on his ear in November, so I personally think he is a waste of your good money—and mine. I am disappointed with your choice of keynote speaker, and I will not be attending. I’ll also have to seriously weigh my subscription options next time it rolls around.

Yikes. First off, Frank is running against token Republican opposition this year and will be re-elected. Second, the Democrats will retain control of Congress this year and Frank will continue to be chairman of the Financial Services Committee. Third, this person (the corporate controller at a nationally known retailer) should consider a few anger-management classes. Or at least try yoga.

We received several dozen more responses like that, some of them equally vitriolic and ignorant, most of them assuming that if you don’t listen to what Frank has to say, somehow what he does won’t affect you. Others said someone should grill Frank on whether he helped drive the mortgage crisis by tinkering with the Community Reinvestment Act in the 1990s … and then promptly said they personally couldn’t be bothered to do the asking. I see.

I’ve had the experience of interviewing Barney Frank several times in my career, so let me confirm: Whether you agree with his politics or not, Frank is among the most intelligent, well-versed people in Washington. More to the point, he is also among the most powerful. He is a master of the legislative minutiae that ultimately end up being what really matters when it comes time to comply with the law. So if you want to know how the United States’ new corporate governance regime came to pass (we’ll have a new one by May, remember), or why some elements of reform became law while others died, or how Congress expects you to handle this new challenge, or if you simply want to uncork your frustrations to the elected official who oversees your line of work—Frank’s speech will be the opportunity to do any of that.

My only advice is that if you do want to ask the congressman a question, for your own sake, be prepared. Frank always is, and if you don’t know what you’re talking about (like my bitter commenter above), you won’t do yourself or other attendees any favors.

You can also see all our other speakers, an agenda, and extended early-bird pricing on our Compliance Week 2010 Conference webpage.

One bit of political flotsam flushed away in last night’s blue deluge: U.S. Rep. Tom Feeney of Florida. 

Feeney, a three-term Republican from central Florida, has been an outspoken critic of Sarbanes-Oxley and specifically of applying its notorious Section 404 provisions to small companies. Well, he lost last night. Democrat Suzanne Kosmas drubbed him out of town by a 57-41 margin. 

Feeney co-sponsored legislation in 2007 to delay Section 404 for non-accelerated filers until the end of 2008. That bill went nowhere, and ultimately the SEC decided to extend the deadline—for Section 404(b), the requirement for an auditor’s attestation on internal controls—until the end of 2009 anyway. But Feeney had been a reliable voice against Section 404 for six years. Notably, he also opposed the Wall Street bailout legislation. Anyway, he’s unemployed.

On the bright side for Section 404 opponents, Scott Garrett did hold onto his House seat in northern New Jersey. He was the other co-sponsor in that Section 404 legislation, and presumably will remain on the House Financial Services Committee, where he waged his anti-SOX battles. 

One last bit of political errata this morning: One of the many rumors around Washington and here in Boston is that Sen. John Kerry might take a position in Barack Obama’s cabinet, possibly as secretary of state. Kerry is chairman of the Senate Small Business Committee and a reliable opponent of extending Section 404 to small companies—so if he leaves the Senate, someone else will need to pick up that mantle. But there’s more: When it seemed that Kerry might win the White House in 2004, Massachusetts changed its law so that a vacant Senate seat is filled by a special election within 120 days. At the time, one rumored candidate for replacement was U.S. Rep. Barney Frank, now chairman of the House Financial Services Committee. 

I don’t believe Kerry will be offered a position in the Obama Administration. And if he does receive an offer, and he accepts, I don’t believe Frank will give up what is now one of the most important committee chairmanships in Washington. But stranger things have happened.