wfn.org | Council Leaders Propose "New Covenant" To Solve Budget Woes

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4-October-1996 
 
 
96376        Council Leaders Propose "New Covenant"  
                       To Solve Budget Woes 
 
                          by Alexa Smith 
 
ST. LOUIS, Mo.--Hints of  a "new covenant" between the wider church and its 
mission arm in Louisville emerged here Sept. 13 as the General Assembly 
Council (GAC)'s Executive Committee held preliminary talks  about how to 
either shed $2.4 million in costs or raise that much in revenue  to meet a 
projected shortfall in the just approved 1998 General Assembly mission 
budget. 
 
     Executive Committee chair Youngil Cho of Raleigh, N.C., said that 
continuing to frantically make adjustments year after year in light of 
continually sinking unrestricted giving is the wrong strategy. 
 
     "We're caught in a systematic cycle," he said.  "We try to address 
these problems by cutting things -- we can no longer do that." 
 
     To curtail what some fear could be frantic cutting, Cho proposed 
rethinking how the PC(USA) has built its budgets for decades.  Instead of 
just allocating what comes in, he suggested, the GAC should begin setting 
more focused priorities and then be more proactive in securing funding for 
them. 
 
     Specifically, Cho proposed 
 
          establishing 70 percent of existing programs as  top priorities, 
based on a supply/demand 
          model that gives congregations what they demand and are willing 
to pay for 
          retraining staff to be generalists whose responsibilities shift 
to meet changing priorities 
          identifying new sources of income, such as increasing the sale of 
denominational 
          resources and approaching donors of restricted funds to change 
their giving to meet 
          changing needs 
          tightening up existing travel and administrative budgets 
          developing a mentality that asks the wider church for prayer and 
financial support as the 
          General Assembly Council forms a new vision for mission. 
 
     "This is the nature of a covenant," said the Rev. Blair Monie of the 
Presbyterian Church of Toms River in Dallas, chair of the Council's 
Congregational Ministries Division (CMD) Committee -- a program area that 
is also proposing reducing staff and program and increasing fees for 
services to clients as ways to meet the projected deficit.  "We cannot do 
everything [the denomination is currently doing] unless, across the church, 
there is a new covenant." 
 
     Monie bemoaned what has become acquiescence to a predictable pattern 
of declining giving followed by budget cuts.  Inevitably, he insisted, 
"Every time we publish a budget like this ... it becomes self-fulfilling 
prophecy.  We're following instead of leading. 
 
     "The question," Monie said, "becomes, How can we prepare for the 
worst-case scenario and still lead the denomination?" 
 
     This worst-case scenario varies from division to division, with some 
-- such as the National Ministries Division (NMD) -- relying more heavily 
on unified (undesignated) dollars than others.  In 1996, for example, NMD 
relied on unified dollars for 41 percent of its $31.3 million budget.  In 
1997, 37 percent of the Worldwide Ministries Division (WMD) budget and 24 
percent of CMD's budget will come from undesignated giving. 
      
     The Staff Leadership Team told the Executive Committee it believes 
that 40 percent of the projected $2.4 million shortfall in 1998 might be 
recouped by increasing revenue and by administrative savings, such as 
greater use of national conference centers for meetings, using mission 
personnel to raise funds and increasing the charging of fees for services. 
 
     The Staff Leadership Team includes the Rev. Frank Diaz, interim 
executive director of the GAC, the three division directors and Corporate & 
Administrative Services director G.A. "Pat" Goff. 
 
     "We need to do some radical rethinking.  We need to reinvent our 
philosophy ... and also identify meaningful things congregations want to do 
and will say Amen to," said Diaz.  He believes that part of the problem is 
simply getting out the mission story to congregations that are willing to 
give but are too often unaware of what projects are under way and what 
ministries are unfolding.  "If there's a disaster in this country, it's no 
problem for Presbyterians to give $10 million," Diaz said. 
 
     "If the church had confidence in what we do at this level ... they'd 
respond in some way," he said. 
 
     Council member the Rev. Hugh Burroughs of Santa Monica, Calif., agreed 
that interpreting mission better to congregations is what needs to happen. 
"We've asked staff persons to reduce their budgets by 5 percent, 8 percent, 
10 percent yearly. ... I believe the system is gridlocked. 
 
     "But I believe revenues can increase if we interpret to the church. 
We can go out and increase revenue." 
 
     But it is the other elusive 60 percent of the shortfall that escalates 
stress and increases worry that programs will be cut and jobs will be lost 
-- causing an impact not only on the denomination's staff of approximately 
700, but also on a wider church that has become accustomed to particular 
services. 
 
     "Yeah, people at the Center in general fear what the implications of 
[further budget cuts]  are. It's no secret that morale at the Center has 
been affected by the uncertainty of the budget for the last three years," 
National Ministries Division director the Rev. Curtis Kearns told the 
Presbyterian News Service.  Kearns acknowledged that strict prioritizing is 
not without its problems and jobs may be lost in 1998.  "But the long-range 
plan may present things staff folks can have confidence in. ... 
 
     "It may not be in '98," said Kearns, adding that the impact of this 
new vision may not  be felt for several years.  "But by 2001 we may feel we 
can increase the budget by $1 million, and by 2005 we may feel we can 
increase the budget by $2 million.  The issue is not continual downsizing. 
 ... 
 
     "But at what point do we see the situation turning around?" 
 
     Worldwide Ministries Division interim director Gwen Crawley is 
grappling with how reduced funding is impacting the mission program right 
now.  She admits that it is "hard to tell" how mission will be shaped in 
the future, since it is getting harder and harder to pay for programs that 
past General Assemblies have already mandated. 
 
     "The General Assembly has told us [WMD] to increase the number of 
missionaries overseas. We've done that.  But the fact of the matter is we 
can't pay for it anymore.  We can certainly try to manage them in a 
different way ... but we need some guidance," Crawley told the Executive 
Committee. She stressed that volunteer assignments are one way to keep 
expanding mission work at a time when WMD has little flexibility, with 
approximately two-thirds of its budget funded by restricted endowments. 
 
     Crawley said WMD has funds dating from the 1800s to pay for mission in 
China, India, Iran, Egypt, Pakistan and Korea, but almost no endowments to 
pay for ministries in Africa, eastern Europe and Latin America. 
 
     "We're not going to raise $2.4 million by restricting travel and 
making administrative changes. We're going to have to do that by increasing 
revenue, changing the pattern of how we do things," Crawley told the 
Presbyterian News Service.  "We're going to have to work real hard across 
divisional lines to do this. ... 
 
     "And we're probably going to have to let go of some things, some 
sacred cows." 
 
      Kearns and Crawley both said they want to avoid pitting mission 
programs against each other to raise money. 
 
     Diaz told the Presbyterian News Service that he thinks this problem is 
surmountable.  "I think the budget problems have been all bundled up with 
the issues of the past four years ... the Re-imagining Conference, the 
discord between the GAC and the  Presbyterian Layman.'  We've never had a 
quiet time to really reflect on new ways of thinking about budgets. ... 
 
     "And," he said, "we've continued to [base our thinking] on past 
formulas." 
 
     The Executive Committee  is proposing that each program and service 
now offered be measured against whether it meets the critieria of the Great 
Ends of the Church referred to in the "Book of Order." 
 
     The Staff Leadership Team said it is prepared to recommend 
programmatic changes after getting input from the Council and from middle 
governing bodies.  February is the deadline to recommend a revised 1998 
budget to the GAC.  

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