I know that it's possible to configure the section in a parent POM and have it apply to the sub-modules in a multi-module project. However, I'd like to have a separate POM to reference as a dependency so I can have a reporting configuration I can "mix in" to various projects without having to replicate my reporting configuration across multiple projects. (See "dependency POMs" here: http://sonatype.com/books/maven-book/reference/pom-relationships-sect-pom-best-practice.html)
For example, for my Widget project, I have a parent POM (widget-parent) with two sub-modules, widget-core and widget-web. I'd like to have a separate POM, static-analysis, that widget-parent depends on. static-analysis would have a block that would define Checkstyle and FindBugs reporting. When I build Widget, I would expect Checkstyle and FindBugs to be run on widget-core and widget-web.
If your solution only works in a particular version of Maven, let me know. We haven't upgraded to 3.x yet.