wfn.org | Team denies request for mail ballot to elect agency executive

[NewsDesk <NewsDesk@UMCOM.ORG>]

Aug. 27, 2001 News media contact: Thomas S.
McAnally7(615)742-54707Nashville, Tenn.     10-71B{364}

By United Methodist News Service

A vote on the election of the Rev. Jerome Del Pino as top staff executive of
the United Methodist Board of Higher will have to wait until late October,
following action taken by the Servant Leadership Team of the General Council
on Ministries (GCOM).

The 18-member team, which operates much like an executive committee, turned
down a request from the Board of Higher Education and Ministry that a mail
ballot be issued to allow GCOM members to vote immediately on the
nomination. The team met Aug. 22-24 in Seattle.

By church law, as outlined in the Book of Discipline, governing bodies of
churchwide agencies nominate their top executives, but final approval rests
with GCOM, which elects all general secretaries.

Del Pino's name will be placed on the ballot at the fall meeting "when
nominees from other agencies for whom GCOM has responsibility are also
considered," said Bishop Edward W. Paup, GCOM president, in a statement
following the Seattle meeting. Paup leads the denomination's Portland (Ore.)
Area. 

GCOM's entire governing body will hold its regular semi-annual meeting Oct.
26-30 in Miami. When Del Pino's nomination was announced June 25, Higher
Education and Ministry officials said he would begin full-time duties Oct.
1, if elected.  

While members of the Servant Leadership Team would not elaborate on Paup's
announcement, they did acknowledge that discussion of procedures related to
the election of top executives took up a major portion of the meeting. Larry
Powell of Las Vegas is chairperson of the team's subcommittee that deals
with the election of general secretaries.

Issues related to the tenure of executives prompted lively discussion and
debate during GCOM's May 5-8 meeting in Phoenix, the agency's first regular
meeting of the new four-year work period. Many of GCOM's new members
expressed concern that they not be a "rubber stamp" for churchwide agency
nominations. That sentiment likely accounted for the Servant Leadership
Team's decision not to issue a mail ballot immediately.   

Whether staff executives should remain in office beyond 12 years was a major
issue at GCOM's May meeting. The Book of Discipline directs the council to
elect annually the top staff executives after they have been nominated by
their respective agencies. The issue was a hot one for the council because
of a rule that "no elected general program agency staff shall hold the same
position more than 12 years." However, another sentence in the Book of
Discipline says the agency responsible for the election of such staff "may
annually suspend this provision by a two-thirds ballot vote." Since the
system began, no nominee has been rejected by the GCOM.  

The issue hasn't been as difficult for the council in previous years because
time of service for executives before Jan. 1, 1989, was not counted. In
April the governing members of the Board of Global Ministries asked GCOM to
allow their executive, the Rev. Randolph Nugent, to continue for another
year. He has served in his position since 1981. GCOM members will vote on
that request in October. 

The Servant Leadership Team approved a "Forums on the Future" proposal from
the United Methodist Network on Research.  United Methodists from throughout
the world will be invited to engage in a "conversation about significant
issues, trends and ideas affecting and shaping the future into which we are
living." A series of five teleconferences, beginning in the fall of 2002,
will focus on five "transformational directions" Four of the teleconferences
will originate in the United States, and the fifth will be in a central
conference elsewhere.

In other action, the Servant Leadership Team welcomed the Rev. Twila Glenn
of Des Moines, Iowa, as a replacement for the Rev. Susan Ruach, formerly of
Bloomington, Ind., who is now a staff member of the Board of Discipleship in
Nashville, Tenn. Also welcomed as a voting member was the Rev. J. A. Rumph
of Fairfield, Ala., a clergyman of the African Methodist Episcopal Church.
The 2000 General Conference directed the United Methodist Church's general
agencies to seek members from the three historically black Methodist
denominations. The four denominations are discussing possible union.

Team members worked on plans for the fall meeting, which will have as its
theme "Empowering the Connection for Ministry."  Bible study leader will be
Bishop Joseph Yeakel of Smithsburg, Md. Plans were also approved for a
meeting of the team in Harare, Zimbabwe, in July.
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United Methodist News Service
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