Stephen started with a prayer.

Minutes of last Council Meeting were approved.

Larry presented the agenda .

Financial report; Emphasis on status of Operating budget and Building funds

Gerald Alonzo reported: We are about $7000 below expected income from pledges. Earnings are down also. This may be due to a seasonal lack of attendance. Some remedies were suggested: Pledge reminders will be in next newsletter; An announcement will be made in church. We will mention it in the bulletin and newsletter.

We do have money for improvements. However, bathroom projects may have to come out of the “search” fund for the bathrooms.

Old Business

Status of summer building projects; Brian Wood, Larry Lopp

Nursery, Sunday School both look beautiful, with new paint, new flooring, and a door has been placed between the nursery and the women’s bathroom. New windows are to be installed when they arrive.

Fire protection project: We are fixing leaks, will have inspection, then fill trench hopefully before Harvest Festival Saturday.

Bathroom upgrades: We haven’t made much progress but are working on the plans. New idea—rent port-a-potty for large events .

Funding needs to be appropriated for stalls in bathrooms.—a minimal cost upgrade. Both bathrooms will be redone, and possibly the utility room also. Heating for the nursery and two bathrooms will cost: $8600 for forced air. Cost for electric heating would be prohibitive as the heaters would have to be along whole side wall. Heaters are $600 apiece. Instead of continuing to look for the old gas pipe, we may put new pipe outside of buildings. The plan is to have a programmable thermostat in each room. Hopefully this will be done before the cold weather arrives. Whitaker hall will not have a new heating system. Windows are ordered and hopefully will be here by end of October.

The Main Drain will be moved. East wing entry and walkway will be made handicap accessible. However, how soon that will be done is not known at this time..

New Business

Committee reports;

Deacons: A small Samoan church is starting in Seaside. Deacons propose we help them affiliate with UCC. We could be a mentor church for this church. This would involve having social relationship, sharing worship. We should have a 3 person committee to take on the project of making connections with this church. Stephen proposes the four Santa Cruz area churches combine to be the connection. In care process could last one year to several years. Nancy Jo moved that the deacons proceed, John Gaffney seconded the motion. The council voted unanimously for the Deacons to proceed.

Trustees: Unfortunately, Bruce Victorine has resigned from the Trustees. His work schedule makes it impossible for him to continue. He will be missed. The position will remain open this year. We will post the opening next year.

Education: Holly reports that the Sunday School has a new curriculum which was written ;by Patricia Wood. Teachers report it is great to work with. Holly is looking for a new teacher to fill out the Sunday School calendar. She reported that she and Patricia Wood cleaned closets in their new ly redecorated room. They are very happy with to report that it looks beautiful. Kim Gautho youth group looks promising. Our new intern, Moira, will be involved with youth as resource person. Holly is looking for volunteers to provide activities for advent Sunday .

Missions, Jacque reported on our commitment to become a green church. We have had two audits. A general audits and an energy audit. They have generated a list of to-dos. We need to replace janitorial supplies with more earth friendly chemical, and purchase recycled content paper towels for bathrooms. We need to find ways of pest management which are earth friendly, also. The energy audit generated a report on upgrade recommendations. New lights costing $1022.75, have been purchased for Whitaker Hall, but have not been installed. We need to replace mercury vapor lights . Total cost installed cost; will be $1078.25. Total Rebate will be $243.66 . An estimate of annual savings which will result from going green will be $631.07.

Music and Arts: We are in good shape for Harvest Festival.

Women’s Group and pastoral relations committees have not met yet.

(New) Communications committee: Gina reported that this committee has decided its function should be: soliciting communications from church members, replacement of our outdated data base, documentation of processes, and providing a discussion format for members. The committee is trying to work toward doing our own publishing of bulletins and newsletters. One question is: how much info should be in Calendar sections. It is suggested we put a calendar summary in the newsletter calendar summary (Church related items only). Another suggestion is to have a calendar on back of the Sunday Bulletin. Stephen stated that he supports all of these efforts to improve church communications.

.Larry suggests all committees put their schedules for the year, And a brief summary of topics committees want to make visible to the Council, on the web calendar. Trustees and Council schedules are already on the calendar.

Council recommended, due to problems with attendance at trustee committee meetings, Trustees’ definition of a quorum be four for the rest of this year through Jan 2008. This will enable them to conduct business.

Larry reported that Bylaw Change recommendations are under consideration.

1. It is proposed that we create a permanent Communications Committee of the Church. We already have a working Communications committee, however it needs to be formalized . We also need to document updates to committee responsibilities for our Bylaws.

2. Do we want to formalize in the bylaws an annual “pledging project”.

3. Larry proposed we have a “Project Leader” position in our organization and bylaws. These project leaders would handle the 10K run, Harvest Festival, pledging and other once-a-year projects.. Larry recommends we institutionalize this description, put it in the bylaws. This would be a way to empower the task leaders. We will talk about this at the congregational meeting in January.

The After Harvest Festival cleanup project is being led by Jan Swayne. We are committed to making sure all left over items from the Harvest Festival are recycled in some way. Jan Swayne will be helping each booth leader to make the clean-up efficient and timely. All items should be out of booths by Saturday night, September 22. Booths will be taken down Saturday, September 29.

Budgets for next year: Committees need to work on next year’s budget now. Del Mahrle proposed that the Council Request the committees to look at their budgets for the year starting June 1, 2008, and have them ready to present at the Dec ember Council meeting. Jim Bowen seconded the motion. The motion carried unanimously.

Larry suggested that nominations for offices need to be thought about. Letting people sign up didn’t work. We need to create a culture in which people who sign up for committees come to meetings and participate. The nominating committee needs to pay attention to people who are not participating and encourage them to do so. Jan Swayne moved that each committee make a brief description of committee obligations, to be available by the October council meeting. Holly seconded the motion. After discussion, the vote was unanimous for the proposal.

Jerry Alonzo moved that the council recommend the committees elect their next chairman for the following year from the current year’s members. This is important to assure continuity in the committees. This would be done before the January elections. Holly Reed seconded the motion. The vote was unanimous for the recommendation.

Stephen closed the meeting with a prayer.

Edit | Back