Board of Trustees Meeting: February 2007

Unitarian Church of Sharon
4 N. Main St.
Sharon, MA 02067

781-784-3652
E-mail UCS

Board of Trustees Meeting
February 1, 2007

Unitarian Church of Sharon

Board of Trustees Meeting: February 1, 2007

Submitted by: Jean Zaniewski

Attendees:

Susan Allison, Treasurer

Deb Cayer, Minister

Louise Marcoux, DRE

Rory MacGregor, Trustee

David Nelson, Trustee

Valerie White, President

Jean Zaniewski, Clerk

Valerie opened the meeting with chalice lighting and check-in.

A motion to approve the January minutes was made and approved unanimously.

Minister’s Report

Deb referred to her emailed report.
Administrative Needs: Recommendation that a small committee be formed to assess administrative needs, including an overview re policy and procedure. Janet is doing a wonderful job, but it’s clear that more hours are needed. Val will ask Bill Fox to lead this effort.

DRE’s Report

Refers to emailed report
Peace Wave Suitcase: A “suitcase” full of activities is circulating through the BCD religious educators will be here in the next couple of months.
Pysanky Room: will be on Saturday 2/17/07, adults are welcome. The session on the 4th is completely booked.
DRE registration: Nearly all the regularly attending children are registered.

Treasurer’s Report

Finance System Backed-up: Glen Rivard has assisted Susan in storing back up of computerized financial data onto a memory stick.
Password Protection: the finance section on church’s computer is now password protected.
Calendar Year Donation Summary Letters: About half these have gone out, Susan is working on getting the remaining thirty sent out.
Income/Expense: Susan distributes sheets, noting the BCD fundraising is included. Because the BCD UUA and Pledge figures were both booked in July, we appear to be ahead of budget. In actuality, we are tracking closely to what is expected. The pledge collection now stands at about 7/12 of the expected pledge total. We have 69 pledge units and pledges are coming in steadily.
Uncollected pledges from last year: there are some unfulfilled pledges from last year. Discussion - We are trying to balance the budget and bring our financial practice into uniformity. It’s possible some payments may not have been accounted for properly. Suggestion: a nicely worded letter should go out itemizing what the treasurer believes may be uncollected portions of pledges so that we can reach closure on this.

President’s Report

New Canvass Committee Member: Rebecca Kinraide, Don Brookfield’s granddaughter, has agreed to join the Canvass team. This year she will be the “shadow” member of the Canvass Team.
Release of architectural IP obtained: Joe Rando has worked with David Torrey and he has agreed to release his IP. We will be moving on to architect Lou Allevato for the remainder of the process.
Civil Engineer: John Glossa has recently taken sights and measurements of the church property. He will be producing a plot plan and a septic system design. He has requested water usage figures. Jean notes Susan researched water bills for the last three years. Dave volunteers to get records of the last ten years of water use from the town’s Water Department and get them to Jean.
Peace Process: Val and many others attended a recent peace vigil on a Rte. 95 highway overpass. Val has also been attending the town square Wednesday night vigils with the Quakers.
General Assembly: will be in Portland, Oregon this year. Val encourages anyone interested to speak with her.
New Member Intentions: We are anticipating several new members.
Music: is adjusting to the temporary loss of Jen Spencer due to her new baby boy. Val and Gary Webber will sing at the February 11 service, and Val will direct the choir the following Sunday.
Board of Health letter: We need to apply for a license to serve food. BOH recommends we update to a one year license rather than the one day special permit we had previously.
Bean Supper Survey: a survey of Bean Supper satisfaction/suggestion was made. The completed surveys are in the church office but haven‚t been assessed. Deb agrees to get this in motion.
Newsletter Advertising: Val has asked Bill Peyton to get a single page of advertising to Janet within the next two weeks.
Canvass: Canvass weekend is now scheduled for March 16/17/18th, with April Fools day to be the result presentation.
Fundraising Consultant for AME: visit scheduled for weekend of March 9, 10, 11th. Tentative plan is the fundraiser will come Friday evening around 5 pm. Committee members will greet her and familiarize her with church grounds. By 7 pm core members of committees and church leaders will assemble to have dinner with her. On Saturday morning, there will be a 9 am meeting of the BOT with the consultant. There will be a workshop 11 am to 2 pm which will include those with a high level of interest in the process. The consultant wants to get a feeling of our church, the “fabric” of our church. On Sunday the fundraiser will attend the church service and then conclude by about 1 pm.
Moose Hill Fundraising: Val reports that Moose Hill sanctuary will be embarking on a fundraising project to fund new bathrooms and classroom space. This may impact on our AME fundraising.
Sharon Cooperative Bank: Incident to its merger with Eastern Bank there will be about $500K available for community grants over the next three years. Some small fraction of this might be available for AME.
Long Range Planning: Val refers to Deb’s thoughtful email re long range planning. Val suggests sometime after April there be a retreat of board, committee chairs, and staff in order for all to think about a coordinated program. Next year’s calendar and available resources (people and financial) should be considered for all the various programs.

Fund Raising Seminar

Susan, Rory, and Philip Conover recently attended a fund raising seminar led by Jerry King. Among useful suggestions were to enliven financial sheets with graphs, color etc. Also, to provide each pledging unit three addressed envelopes at the end of the FY to encourage summer pledge fulfillment. Other notable points were:
Stewardship: seminar leader Jerry King felt strongly that pledging, canvassing etc all be considered and termed “stewardship.” Stewardship is a total vision of which fundraising is part.
Planning cycle begins with initial stress on vision; thinking about programs; then to budget building process; then to fundraising. It is a cyclical process with long term goal process. He suggested a Stewardship Committee.
Stewardship Committee - would encompass the Canvass Committee.
Monitoring: Someone should be responsible for contacting persons who haven‚t regularly pledged.
Regular Bills: Jerry King suggested mailing “bills” or otherwise encouraging people to pay pledges regularly on a weekly or monthly basis.
“One More Day” Pledging - Jerry King suggested asking people to pay for “one more day” of the church’s operation. In our case this would be about $350.
Connect Children with Giving: Jerry King suggested things such as kids making and selling cookies, converting proceeds to pennies, and having children dump pennies into metal bowl at the next church service.
Three Major Ways to Canvass: are potlucks, commitment services, and face-to-face. Jerry King says do each one for three years, and expect results to fade. Be prepared to change to one of the other models to increase effectiveness. Our canvass process now is closest to the potluck model.
Budget Process: Currently we start by thinking about fixed costs, and thinking about what we can possibly fund other things at. Comment made that at one time “Budget Hearings” were held in Sanctuary. Susan says she can provide history of fixed costs: insurance, utilities etc. Rory volunteers to serve on a team regarding compensation for staff, Val will ask others to serve on this with him. Suggestion made Brenda Wilbur and Tom Yeransian would be very helpful on this.

Other Business

Julie Armstrong has offered to tender resignation as VP and Board Member: She has been traveling a great deal and has many other commitments. The by laws provide for the BOT to fill unexpired positions. Consensus - we would love to have her stay in any capacity she can. However, we would understand and continue to value her contributions in another way. Discussion: is there anyone on the BOT who could sub in for the VP position? Possibilities would be David Nelson, Bill Fox, or Rory. Or, someone serving on a committee already, such as Wilbur Edwards could be brought in. Duties include holding a meeting of the committee chairs in the fall. VP should be a “connector” Prior VPs have not become Presidents. Also, who could be brought in to fill the BOT position?
Buildings & Grounds: B&G has made emergency pew repairs by affixing brackets. There is a longer term plan to separate the pews. Re the furnace, the pipes were cleaned out as a core of sludge had filled them. In the future they will be flushed every five years.

Barriers to Growth:

Passed as Julie and Bill are absent. A discussion re planning is proposed

Motion to Adjourn

Carries with one opposed.

Next meeting date is first Thursday in March.

Suggestion: Barriers to Growth discussion to be held first next month.

The meeting was adjourned at 9:05 pm.

Process observation: The Board was generally on task though sometimes a little rangy. There was energy and focus and we were thoughtful about how we used time. Reports had been read in advance. There was space for all points of view; things were generally timely and purposeful. Valerie kept us on track.

Top

About UCS | Worship | Religious Education
Fellowship | Social Justice | Home