Metropolitan Community Churches

Board of Administration

 

 

Conference Call

Friday 11 February 2005

 

Present

 

Judy Dale (Chair)

Marsha Warren (Treasurer)

Stephen Harte (Secretary)

Rev Jeff Miner

John Vespa

 

In Attendance

 

Rev Dr Cindi Love (Executive Director)

Margaret Mahlman (Chief Financial Officer)

 

1.1        Prayers

 

Stephen Harte opened in prayer.

 

1.2        Approval of Minutes

 

The Board approved the minutes of the Conference Call of 14 January 2005 and instructed that they be posted on the MCC intranet.

 

1.3        Condolences

 

The Chair, on behalf of the whole Board, expressed her condolences to the Chief Financial Officer and her partner Donna on their recent bereavements and affirmed MCC’s commitment to sensible self care strategies for each employee.

 

2          Action Items

 

2.1        Executive Director Report

 

The Executive Director reported on her activities since she first arrived in the office on 18 January.  In that time she has been in contact with around 600 Pastors and other key stakeholders to solicit their perspectives on the needs and challenges facing us.  She has attended meetings of

 

      • the Leadership Team (made up of the Executive Director, the Moderator, the Vice Moderator, the Moderator-Candidate and the Chair of the Board of Administration);

 

      • The Church Planting Team;

 

      • The Women’s Conference;

 

      • The Board of Elders;

 

      • Large Church Pastors Meeting;

 

      • SGI Team;

 

      • Web Team.

 

She felt encouraged and inspired after a successful Board of Elders meeting in Florida.  She felt their work on a strategic planning document (with the input from stakeholders across the denomination) has been particularly impressive. 

 

The Board of Elders has also approved an evaluation and development strategy for themselves to enhance accountability and promote excellence.  This involves a 360° evaluation process for each Elder (which actively solicits comments from other stakeholders at all levels) as part of ongoing Elder development.  Additionally, performance would be evaluated by way of an assessment involving others – some selected by the Elder and some by the Moderator and the Executive Director.  She felt that the adoption of this process was a key element of our future strategy.  Additionally, the Elders had expressed their willingness to allow the Executive Director to offer guidance to them in their financial and work planning.  The Executive Director will copy to the Board of Administration details of the evaluation strategy.

 

The Elders had welcomed the constructive input from the outgoing Interim executive Director in her departure memo and were taking steps to reassign some countries to new Elders as part of a more efficient deployment of resources.

 

The Staff Team continued to be working hard in the midst of all the transition issues facing the organisation.  The Executive Director will propose to the Board of Administration in due course (hopefully by the next Conference Call, other tasks permitting) policies of remote working, PTO and severance and will frame these in the context of a wider HR strategy.

 

The Board congratulated the Executive Director on a successful first month in office and thanked her for her hard work, especially given the challenges of her work and family life now being split between two locations.

 

2.2        Cash Flow

 

The Treasurer reported that November financials had been issued and it was hoped that December financials would be ready shortly, these having been delayed due to staff bereavements and the extra workload involved in readjusting our reporting to facilitate the forthcoming audit.

 

We are not using our line of credit and hope not to until the summer.  We should start receiving tithes at 14% in February.

 

2.3        2005 Audit

 

The Board reaffirmed its commitment to instructing the denomination’s first external audit during 2005.  It was still hoped that this would be ready to be presented at General Conference in July but the Board gave the Executive Director authority to adjust the timing of the audit in according with staffing priorities.

 

2.4        Moderator Retirement

 

The Treasurer reported that she had been in communication with the denomination’s lawyers regarding the paperwork surrounding the Moderator’s Retirement package.  She expected this to be ready within the next two weeks.

 

2.5        Future Meetings

 

Our future meetings will be as follows:

 

April 2005 – Los Angeles

 

Saturday 2 April – travel day

Sunday 3 April – team meetings in the afternoon

Monday 4 April - Board of Administration

Tuesday 5 April - Board of Administration

Wednesday 6 April – joint Board of Administration / Board of Elders

Thursday 7 April - joint Board of Administration / Board of Elders

 

As this was longer than originally planned it was noted that some may now have to investigate changing tickets and adjusting schedules in their secular jobs.  The Chair reported that family commitments meant that she now could not attend the April meeting and it was agreed by the Board that Rev Jeff Miner would chair these meetings in her place.

 

July 2005 - General Conference – Calgary

 

Wednesday 20 July        dinner for BOA/BOE/Staff

Thursday 21 July            BOA development day (unstaffed due to other staff commitments)

 

The Board was reminded that participation in the Banff trip would be entirely at Board members own expense, the Board of Elders having been told the same.

 

October – Washington DC

 

Wednesday 26 October – travel day

Thursday 27 October – Board of Administration

Friday 28 October - Board of Administration

Saturday 29 October – MCC Human Rights event

Sunday 30 October – installation of new Moderator

Monday 31 October – travel day

 

2.6               Church Planting Letter

 

The Board would be issuing a Church Planting Letter in the next week sharing the experiences of the successful Church Plant in Birmingham, England which made good use of money from the 0.5% tithe challenge.  It is hoped that sharing this example will encourage participation in this year’s 1% tithe challenge – all the proceeds of which will be used to further the Church Plating strategy.

 

2.7               Stakeholder Input and ED/Staff evaluation

 

The Board noted the importance of valuing and encouraging feedback from our stakeholders throughout the denomination on service levels and service quality from the denomination.  The Executive Director will bring proposals in due course for adopting a sustainable strategy.  Additionally, and separately, the Executive Director will bring proposals for the evaluation of her role and those of other members of the staff team.

 

2.8        Bylaws

 

The Executive Director reported that the Bard of Elders had gratefully received our requests to amend the Bylaws but had been unable to give the matter due attention at their recent meeting due to severe time pressures.  It has now been agreed that it would be preferable for the two Boards will cooperatively review these at our joint meeting in April and any resulting proposals will still be in good time for consideration by the Calgary General Conference.

 

3          Action Items

 

3.1        Recast 2005 Budget

 

After some discussion, it was proposed by Mr John Vespa, seconded by Mr Stephen Harte that the recast 2005 budget presented by the Executive Director be adopted.

 

In favour:           Judy Dale

                        Marsha Warren

                        Stephen Harte

                        John Vespa

 

Against             Rev Jeff Miner

 

The Budget was accordingly adopted and the Executive Director would inform all budget holders of this, emphasising the financial controls which she will put in place to ensure that the denomination can quickly adjust expenditure should income fall short of budgeted projections.

 

3.2        Executive Director Contract

 

This will be held over until our next call.

 

4          Closing Prayers

 

Marsha Warren closed in prayer.