[ENS] Executive Council begins fall meeting faced with 2011 budget constraints

[<mdavies@episcopalchurch.org>]

>Episcopal News Service
>October 23, 2010

Executive Council begins fall meeting faced with 2011 budget 
constraints

Members also expected to consider plan for rebuilding Haiti

>By Mary Frances Schjonberg

[Episcopal News Service -- Salt Lake City, Utah] The Episcopal
Church's Executive Council began its three-day fall meeting here Oct.
23 with an agenda that includes consideration of a Church Center 2011
budget that is five percent lower than the version adopted by General
Convention in 2009.

Revenue in the proposed reduced budget is $2.1 million less than
originally projected, with income from dioceses projected at $682,946
less than expected. The revenue reductions come "as a result of an
unpredictable delayed payment by one diocese," as well as major cuts
in Church Center spending that also will result in less revenue,
according to a memo to council members from the church's Finance
Office. The specific diocese has not yet been disclosed.

Total revenue is projected to be $37,147,458, while total expenses are
budgeted at $36,966,829.

The proposed budget calls for ceasing publication of the Episcopal
News Monthly and Quarterly publications; closing the Episcopal Books
and Resources retail bookstore at the Church Center in New York City
and its online store; and ceasing the resource-shipping operation that
serves EBAR as well as Episcopal Church Foundation, Episcopal Relief &
Development and United Thank Offering. Those agencies have been
offered alternatives for fulfilling their orders.

The proposed elimination of EBAR and the two publications means a loss
of revenue, but also reductions in Office of Communications expenses.
Proposed expense cuts in the Office of Communication total $812,332.

Episcopal News Service's online operation will continue and is due to
be expanded in terms of multimedia. Its stories are available free to
other church publications. The "Episcopal Church Welcomes You" signs,
currently unique to EBAR, would be available for sale from the
Christian Alliance for Media (an Atlanta-based organization that began
in 1945 as Episcopal TV and Radio Foundation).

Another $790,000 would be cut from 2011 Mission Program operations
under the proposal and the Mission Funding Office, meant to solicit
major gifts to the church, would be reconfigured. The budget proposes
hiring a full-time development director who would work with an
existing support staff person. "Donor cultivation, communication and
outreach will be provided by part-time consultants," according to the
finance office memo.

If approved by the council as is, the budget would require elimination
of several positions at the church's New York office. The scope of
those losses has not yet been made public.

When the triennial meeting of General Convention passes a budget for
the next three years, it expects that the Executive Council will
adjust each year's budget to take into account changes in revenue
projects. The goal is to end the triennium with a balanced budget.

In July 2009 General Convention passed a $141 million budget for
2010-2012 that asked for less money from dioceses and drastically
reduced church-wide spending by $23 million. The budget changed the
formula for asking the 110 dioceses to contribute to the cost of
funding the wider church. The then-current request for 21 percent of
diocesan income (known as "the asking") was preserved for 2010, but is
due to drop by one percent in 2011 and 2012. In addition, convention
raised the $100,000 income exemption to $120,000, thus leaving more
money with the dioceses.

Approximately 40 staff positions out of 192 in the Episcopal Church's
New York and regional offices were eliminated and the reductions
prompted the need to rethink the work of church center staff.

The convention-approved 2010-2012 budget is here:
http://www.episcopalchurch.org/documents/2010_-_2012_DFMS_GC_Budget_Adopted
 _July_16_2009.pdf
and the details of that budget are here:
http://www.episcopalchurch.org/documents/2010-2012_-_GC_Budget_Detail.pdf.

As to the 2010 budget, another Finance Office memo to council members
says that budget results through September "look very favorable
compared to the full-year 2010 budget" and that "with constrained
spending, we expect to complete the year in line with budget." A
summary of current budget results is here:
http://www.episcopalchurch.org/documents/2010SeptemberBudgetarySummary.pdf.

Endowment performance through September showed a 6.3 percent gain, the
memo said. A summary history and management policies are available
here: 
http://www.episcopalchurch.org/finance_59401_ENG_HTM.htm?menupage=5 
9397

The council's Finances for Mission Committee began discussing the
budget on the afternoon of Oct. 23. That discussion will continue Oct.
24 and council is expected to act on the proposal either later on Oct.
24 or on Oct. 25.

During its Oct. 23-25 meeting, the council also will be asked to
consider a plan to flesh out its February challenge to the church to
raise $10 million to help rebuild the Episcopal Diocese of Haiti. At
the request of Bishop Jean Zaché, the money would be targeted to the
diocese's Holy Trinity Cathedral complex in Port-au-Prince. The
complex once contained two schools and a convent, as well as the
cathedral church with its world-renowned murals depicting biblical
stories in Haitian motifs, which were crafted by some of the
best-known Haitian painters of the 20th century.

Members of the council's Finances for Mission and World Mission
committees heard during a joint meeting on Oct. 23 that members of the
Haitian diocese see restoration of the cathedral as a source of
diocesan and national pride, and symbolic of the efforts to resurrect
the country following the Jan. 12 magnitude-7 earthquake.

The Executive Council carries out the programs and policies adopted by
the General Convention, according to Canon I.4 (1)(a). The council is
composed of 38 members, 20 of whom (four bishops, four priests or
deacons and 12 lay people) are elected by General Convention and 18
(one clergy and one lay each) by provincial synods for six-year terms,
plus the presiding bishop and the president of the House of Deputies.

-- The Rev. Mary Frances Schjonberg is a national correspondent for
the Episcopal News Service and editor of Episcopal News Monthly and
Episcopal News Quarterly.

http://www.episcopalchurch.org/79425_125352_ENG_HTM.htm