Summary Minutes of the UUFRC Board Meeting, March 30th, 2021
Board meetings are public; every member is invited to attend.
Attending: Steve Hill, Chris Stovall, David Stoutamire, Polly Ragusa, Tovis Page, Graham Abra, Rob Davis, Rev. Brian Ferguson.
Started at 6:30 pm. Brian provided opening words and we had a check in.
Religions Education program discussion – Bruce and Maeve Knoth lead a discussion on possible enhancements to the church’s Religions Education programs. A wide range of topics were discussed including: the importance of RE to bringing new families into the church, the possibility of a significant redesign of RE in the church, plans for next year etc.
Accept the consent agenda – David motioned, Rob seconded. Passed unanimously.
Program Committee Report: Tovis reviewed the agenda at the latest Program council meeting including the report from John Cooney on the results of the meeting of the video support committee. The video committee decided to try some small scale, and simple, video/recording experiments in the next few months, to gather data and feedback from the congregation and the tech team about what can work for future video plans. The program council is responsible for the video committee’s work.
Covid Task Force: Polly relayed that the committee has met and discussed when and how the sanctuary will be reopened.
Church Budget: The board reviewed next year’s budget proposal. The board will have to approve the budget next meeting.
Professional audit of Church financials: The finance committee charter has a requirement that the church finances be professionally audited approximately every five years. This requirement has not been satisfied for many years, but instead has been deferred due to the cost (approximately $10k-$15k). The finance committee is requesting to do so again this year. This raised the question to the board if a professional audit is legally necessary, and if the charter needs to be updated to reflect the church’s actual practices. Graham will investigate the origin of the five-year professional audit rule and ways to satisfy or change it.
Frequency of Financial reports: Cyndi Williamson and Brett Dyer have requested that the current financial reports for the board be created and presented every other month instead of the current monthly schedule. The monthly reports require a significant investment in time and are not very useful when viewed in monthly increments. The board discussed this and agreed that the board would be happy with quarterly financial reports. Polly Ragusa motioned to allow the finance committee to only provide financial reports quarterly. Seconded by Tovis Page, passed unanimously.
Bank signature cards: The bank signature cards were not updated for the latest board but have been sufficient for now. It was decided that at this point we can wait for the newly elected board in July before updating them.
Strategic Plan Task Force: The first meeting of the strategic planning committee is scheduled to take place on March 31st .
Our next meeting will be Tuesday April 27th at 6:30 pm
Respectfully submitted,
Rob Davis, Recording Secretary