Church Council

Meeting Minutes of September 16, 2010
Recorder: Carrie Skeffington

Present: Andy Ellis, Sally Hinckley, Nancy MacLean, Roger Addor, Bob Morse, Carrie Skeffington, Matt Early, Peggy Murray, Robin Reinhold, Carl Murphy, John McCall, Elsa Peters
Excused Absent: Phil Whitney, John Shoos

Nancy opened the meeting at 6:30 p.m. Carrie shared some reflections from Laura Ingalls Wilder.

The minutes from June’s meeting were accepted.

• There are contact sheets with the calendar of the year available for all members, along with copies of the bylaws and church budget.
• We introduced ourselves to each other and shared our occupations/skills.
• John spoke about our Safe Church Policy. Frank Knowles will make a presentation during Sunday’s worship service.
• There is feedback that members of the congregation don’t always read the on-line Beacon. Question for future discussion: How do we best communicate to our congregation?
• Gretchen Reynolds and Scott Berry, members of the board of the Discovery Center, joined us for a discussion of the budget situation of the Discovery Center. Currently there are three employees: director, teacher, and floater. Due to low enrollment, the schedule has been modified to a 3-day week. Director’s salaries will be reduced by 25% starting in January with an additional decrease for the school year of 2011. They are requesting a $5000 loan from the church, which would help them meet expenses for the current school year. We agreed to provide a $5000 loan from the unrestricted funds of the church, and requested that the Discovery Center Board provide quarterly updates and a year-end review in June.
• The church received a donation Of $1,000 from the Nancy Wynne Estate. We agreed toaccept the gift and the money will go into the undesignated invested funds.
• Homecoming Sunday is this Sunday, September 19th. Fellowship time is in Wright Pavilion.
• Our vision statement was sent to the teams and has been in the Beacon. There was a suggestion to make the vision statement the theme of a church service: FCCUCC – A Christian Family: Loving, Welcoming, Serving. We will put the vision statement in the bulletin and again in the Beacon.
• The new web page should be up and running the first of November.
• Team vacancies: SL & W: 1 vacancy; EF & G: 3 vacancies (there are 2 possible candidates.) Stewardship has gained new members since June.
• Nancy read a thank you note for the Pilgrim Lodge camperships given to one family.
• Nancy has agreed to continue as moderator and Matt will be vice moderator of the council.
• Topic for future discussion: volunteerism and the tasks assigned to each of the teams. Nancy will get copies of the document to us for a future meeting.

The meeting was adjourned at 8:26 p.m.

Next meeting: October 21, 2010
Recorder and Devotions: Peggy Murray