After three years of effort, we finally were able to acquire another local practice.  A hopefully continuing friend of mine, Mari DeVries, has one of the most successful audit firms in Southern Arizona.  Her practice and ours were merged on May 1st and our offices will officially join at some point later this year. Mari will take over the audit lead and I will work on other development projects.  My most immediate goal, besides finishing a large backlog of work, is recruiting staff. We have six slots to fill and I have offers accepted for only three. I expect to close the next two shortly.  If I can locate one more tax staff, life will be good. In many ways, it already is.