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by Nick Strobel
This first part of the report gives you a taste of what an annual conference session is like with pictures. This second part has the low-down on what happened with some of the major resolutions along with my comments. All opinions expressed in this report are mine alone and are not necessarily those shared by our other lay delegate, Sherry Atkins, or Pastor Karen.
Links to the legislative items as PDFs with amendments as made at the ACS 2010. Move your cursor over the blue insert marks or yellow sticky notes to see the amendments.
If a resolution garners at least 85% in favor or opposition, it goes on the "Consent Calendar" to be voted upon as a block at once in the plenary session. An item can be removed from the Consent Calendar by someone getting ten signatures of voting delegates from the full plenary session. Abstentions are not counted and some delegates leave a section before all of the legislative items are dealt with, so they are not included in the 85% calculation.
Items 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and B dealt with pensions or other retired clergy issues. Item 1 was about 2011 retired clergy rental/housing exclusion. It passed on the Consent Calendar with 101 in favor and 0 against. Item 2 was about the 2011 Past Service (pre-1982) pension rate. It also passed on the Consent Calendar with 101 in favor and 0 against. Item 5 was about changing the standing rules about the Retired Clergy Association. It was on the Consent Calendar with 91 in favor and 0 against. Item B was about the 2010 "Past-Service" (pre-1982 service) funding plan. It was on the Consent Calendar with 98 in favor and 1 against.
Items 3 and 4 dealt with the direct bill proposal, so that local churches would be billed for the pension costs for their current pastor instead of having the cost tucked away in the apportionments. These are the two items of greatest concern because churches would have paid a lot less in the past will be paying more under the new plan and those churches with large apportionments will be paying less. Under direct billing about 100 churches (of the approximately 350 in our Annual Conference) will pay less than what they pay now in
our pension-apportionment system. A spreadsheet is available for download (Excel) that has what the 2009 pension apportionments are for all of the churches in the Annual Conference and what the 2009 direct bill pension payment would have been if they were already on direct bill. Wesley Church is number 212 in the list. Our pension apportionment for 2009 was $7862 (fully paid by the way). Under direct bill our pension cost would have been $9395.20 or about $1,533.20 more we would have had to pay. While our apportionment would drop by $7862, our pension bill would be $9395.20 so there would be a net increase of $1533.20. Wesley's pension apportionment for 2010 is about
$9100, so our net pension payment for 2011 would probably be less than the $1500.
The reasons for taking it out of apportionments are three-fold: 1) the Conference office is trying to reduce apportionments; 2) the Conference office is trying to make apportionments more missional-focussed---the pension apportionment line item had grown to 40% of the total apportionment which is very much out of balance from what apportionments are to be for; and 3) to make it clearer to local churches who want an ordained clergy appointed to their church what the actual costs are for that person. A lot of smaller churches said that this proposal would close them down. The Pension taskforce said that direct bill would not close them down. What the taskforce actually meant is that direct bill would not be the reason why a church would be closed down, but, rather, those congregations in financial straits are not the fruitful or sustainable ones. Churches with large direct bill pension bills that they cannot pay need to reconsider their pastoral needs---can they get by with a part-time ordained elder or a lay minister? Some churches in circuits have decided to pool their resources to help the financially-poorer churches in their circuit pay their pension bills for a few years. I recall the circuit that included Redding was going to do that. I proposed an amendment to have something like this happen conference-wide but it failed.
Item 3 was the proposal and required a simple majority and item 4 was the change in the standing rules that would actually allow it to happen and required a two-thirds vote. Needless to say, these two were not on the Consent Calendar and so we dealt with it in full plenary. Item 3 passed with 365 in favor and 129 against. After that victory for item 3, item 4 passed overwhelmingly.
We need to be aware that our Annual Conference is in last place by a significant margin in paying its apportionments to the general church. Sixty annual conferences pay apportionments to enable ministry in the entire church. Although 90% of the churches in our Annual Conference have fully paid the pension part of their apportionment, our Annual Conference pays just 50% of its overall apportionment to the larger church and the next Annual Conference in the list pays about 75% of the general church apportionment.
I was a bit torn by item 3 (and item 4) because I view apportionments as a way to enable other ministry to happen beyond the local church---we're stronger together than apart. So if my giving toward apportionments helps other churches continue their ministry, that's great. I value our connectional system, but I think the connectional philosophy is waning in our denomination and particularly in our Annual Conference. Was part of the reason some churches supported item 3 was so that they would be able to keep more of their money? On the other hand, if we're putting so much money into pensions, is that a wise use of our money and is it really being outward, future-directed? Shouldn't the money go toward starting new faith communities? Should the unsustainable churches be allowed to die so that something new can be started? On the other hand (again), a number of our smaller rural churches are the only United Methodist presence in their region and they are doing our ministry for the people in that region. If every ministry has to be self-supporting, then we should do away with the connectional system. I have not resolved this issue in my own mind yet.
Items 7, 10, 11, 14, 15, 18, 23, 38, and A had to do with the budget in some fashion or other and weren't under the pension/retired clergy area discussed above.
Item 7 allowed the Annual Conference to operate with a smaller reserve than permitted by our standing rules. The Annual Conference has cut to the bone by using its reserve for cash-flow purposes. Supposed to be a one-time suspension of the standing rules on the reserve but will this be back in 2011? Consent Calendar 92 in favor and 0 against.
I discussed my legislative section's work on item 10 about a registration fee for Annual Conference section in the first part (see "Day Two"). A number of the same sorts of arguments were heard in the full plenary session. A critical question raised was would those who didn't pay their registration fee be barred from the Annual Conference Session? The answer is "No, they would still be allowed to attend." With an unenforceable registration fee, it was decided by 355 in favor and 285 against to REFER this back to the Annual Conference Session Committee to investigate a way to charge only those churches who do not fully pay their apportionments a registration fee. (However, if a registration fee is not going to be enforced, we've just punted the issue to next year.)
Closely allied with item 10 is item 11 about where to hold the Annual Conference sessions for 2012 and 2013. Item 11 was on the Consent Calendar (I don't have the vote tally) to continue meeting in the Sacramento Convention Center (2011 is also in Sacramento by action of last year's Annual Conference Session). Points in favor of Sacramento is that is more-or-less in the center of the Annual Conference and the Convention Center is the only place with a large enough space for 1000 to 1100 people to sit at tables. Years ago, the Annual Conference used to meet in Stockton at the University of the Pacific, a liberal arts college founded by Methodists. However, the Annual Conference Session had grown too large for UOP and UOP has had to move away from an overt Methodist connection because of federal funding laws. Points against the Sacramento Convention Center is the expense of the place (~$87,000 for 2011), and the expensive hotels and restaurants. Wesley Church budgeted $1000 for Pastor Karen to attend the Annual Conference Session and that's about right. (We budgeted only $800 for our two lay delegates to attend, so we'll need to address that in our local church budget next year.)
Items 14 and 38 had to do with a change in how we calculate the minimum compensation for our pastors (ordained or local pastor or lay minister). As explained to us at the April orientation, item 14 was to allow us to change the Minimum Compensation Rules to increase flexibility in tough economic times, simplify the formula and make it fairer to the churches. The Equitable Compensation Commission (a required group specified in the Book of Discipline) would be tasked with setting annually a single figure for elders conference-wide and a single figure for certified local pastors conference-wide. These figures will get rid of the minimum comp range that includes years of service and they will not use the Denominational Average Compensation that has tended to artificially inflate salaries despite what is happening in the local economy. The Equitable Compensation Commission will use a set of indicators/factors to set the two conference-wide figures but the proposal does not say what those indicators will be. However, item 38, which gives the actual formula DOES use the Denominational Average Compensation. Items 14 and 38 were TABLED by a significant majority of the full plenary.
Item 15 about conference and district "advance specials" (specially-designated givings) easily passed onto the Consent Calendar by my legislative section 87 in favor and 0 against. Item 18 was about selling the old Golden Gate District Parsonage and use the proceeds to pay off the mortgage on the United Methodist Center and the Bishop's residence in Sacramento (so those expenses would be removed from our apportionments). That item was removed from the Consent Calendar but passed easily on the full plenary floor when it was explained that the old parsonage in question was not being used and it was a Conference property so the funding could rightfully return to the full Annual Conference.
Item 23 was about distribution of the printed Journal (contains all of the business of the Annual Conference Session and pages and pages of tables and directories). This line in the apportionments has seen ever decreasing payment by the local churches, so it was passed on the Consent Calendar by 50 in favor and 1 against to pass the cost onto those who wanted the bound hardcopy (about $24 if memory serves me correctly). The downloadable PDF version is free.
Item A was the full budget recommendation for 2011. We were given two possible budgets. The recommended one was if all of the budget-related items passed and one if none of them passed. The actual final budget adopted was in-between. The adopted budget does NOT have a conference registration fee in it and there will be no changes to the minimum compensation items. Comments on some of the budget line numbers:
Item A did pass overwhelmingly.
Items 8, 9, 12, 13, 16, 17, 29, 34, 35, 39, 40, and 41 all had to do with how we structure ourselves at the Annual Conference level.
Item 8 was about reducing the the number of districts from seven to four. As mentioned in the April orientation it is the hope that this will improve consistency as the district superintendents will be in more frequent contact with each other so that they can speak with one voice rather than acting as 7 different “silos”. The Annual Conference Session could only vote on the number of districts. It could not vote on district boundaries although a map had been distributed earlier. I don't have a copy of the map but I do have the list of churches and clusters that will be in the new larger districts available for download. Fresno District will become part of the "Central Valley" district on September 1st with Mariellen Yoshino as our D.S. Other district offices will be housed in the United Methodist Center in Sacramento but the Fresno District office was given another year to make the move. Four district superintendents will have their offices in Sacramento. There will be two conference district superintendents, one tasked with assisting the bishop in leadership development and creating the new structure and another one tasked with new church/ministry starts. There will an even greater reliance on the cluster structure to take care of administrative matters and the four (true) district superintendents will be relying more on internet technology to communicate with the churches in their area. (Could we do a "Second Life" version of an Annual Conference Session?) Item 8 passed overwhelmingly.
Item 9 was about a suspension of Division V of our standing rules to allow the various committees, boards, agencies to work together on restructuring the administrative structure to make it flatter. We have no idea what this will mean for how the accountability tasks will get done. Item 9 passed overwhelmingly. This fall I'm sure that the Board of Higher Education and Campus Ministry will be meeting with the youth committee and the young adult ministry group. A similar item was item 13 which updated the language in our standing rules to reflect the current structure. Item 13 was on the Consent Calendar 87 in favor and 0 against. Item 16 added a committee to our structure to create a Committee on Pacific Islanders Ministry---Consent Calendar by 81 in favor and 0 against. Pacific Islanders are composed of three major cultural/ethnic groupings: Micronesians, including indigenous peoples principally of the Mariana, Caroline, and Marshall island groups; Melanesians, including indigenous peoples principally of Fiji, the Solomon Islands, and Papua New Guinea; and Polynesians, including indigenous peoples principally of Tonga, Samoa, Tahiti, the Cook Islands, Hawaii and New Zealand.
Item 12 passed on the Consent Calendar by 86 in favor and 3 against to modernize the Annual Conference guidelines for local church parsonages. Insurance coverage and more green technology were the main additions.
Item 29 dealt with the different ethnic background congregations sharing the same building and the need for the Conference staff to provide some training of the congregations in the culture of the other congregations. Consent Calendar by 88 in favor and 0 against.
Items 34, 35, 39, 40, and 41 dealt with discontinuation of churches that were no longer viable. Because the local church property belongs to the Annual Conference (and not to the local church members), the whole Annual Conference needs to vote on a discontinuance. With sadness but thanks for the past ministries these churches provided years ago, the congregations of Dunsmuir UMC, Corning UMC, Hamilton UMC (in San Francisco), Rising Hope UMC (in Alameda), and Faith UMC (in San Leandro) were discontinued. I suspect we will see more discontinued congregations in the future as people leave the smaller towns and move to the larger urban centers. We're also going to see a move away from church buildings to gatherings in homes and on the internet but that's discussion for the following section.
Items 31, 32, and 33 dealt with pushing churches to move into the 21st century and use the internet technology tools to reach out to the 18-34 year old demographic that is the focus of the "ReThink Church" denominational campaign. Item 31 said that pastors need to have an email account that they use---Consent Calendar by 72 in favor and 4 against. Item 32 said that each local church shall have a "Communications Coordinator" position (volunteer or paid) to make sure that all published information, especially on the internet, about the church is accurate and up-to-date. At Wesley Church we have several people who do this. I take care of the church's website and Pastor Karen keeps our Facebook place up to date and Terry collates the articles submitted by church members for our newsletter. The main point of item 32 is to identify a single contact person at a local church that the Conference Communications office could work with. It passed by a significant majority on the full plenary floor. Item 33 said that each local church needs to have their own web presence. (If you're reading this report, you know that we're already set on this one.) Item 33 was on the Consent Calendar with 59 in favor and 9 against.
One example of a new way of doing church that makes use of the internet to create the community is The Table. It focusses on the young adults who are spiritual but are not churched. The Table does have face-to-face interaction including covenant discipleship groups that meet in homes or various places around town but they also use the internet to keep people connected with each other. All of the gatherings focus on the three rules of John Wesley: Do all the good you can, Do no harm, Stay in love with God. The church is going to start weekly worship services at Central UMC in Sacramento sometime in the fall. It will be interesting to see how that develops.
The United Methodist Church is going to have to contend with the young adults who do not have a sense of denominational loyalty, even a distrust of institutions but who do understand the need for and desire a spiritual connection to God. They also realize that the things of this world (money, power, etc.) are ultimately empty. However, these same young adults want to pick and choose from a variety of denominations, even religious faiths to create their own individual "religion" or spirituality. Therefore, things like church buildings, pastor & conference staff compensations and pensions and committees are going to drive them away. This is a different set of values than the majority of the current membership of the United Methodist Churches. How will Wesley Church function twenty years from now with people showing up for only a particular project or type of worship service at our church and doing another project or worship service at another church and yet another project with some non-profit group? People will create their own community but one person's community will probably be shared by only a handful (at most) of other people. Because the church (and I mean by this the church universal/world-wide as well as Wesley Church itself) is of God, it will survive but it is going to be very different from how it is today. How will we let go of the old that needs to go away so that the new can be born?
Items 6, 19, 20, 21, 22, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 30, 36, and 37 are all dealing with social justice and outreach ministries.
Item 6 was to establish a Cambodia Mission Emphasis. Passed on Consent Calendar 95-yes; 0-no.
I already talked about item 19 ("confronting heterosexism") in the first part of this report (see "Day Two"). Passed on Consent Calendar 71-yes; 8-no. I also talked about item 20 ("fair sentencing of youth") in the first part of this report. Passed on Consent Calendar with 83 in favor and 1 against.
Item 21 was in favor a more humane California state budget that does not cut services to the neediest citizens. Passed in full plenary by a large margin. Item 22 was about health care reform. It was withdrawn at the beginning of Annual Conference by the writers of the resolution so it was not discussed at all. My guess is that it was withdrawn because national health care reform had passed after the resolution was submitted.
Item 24 was a request to have the denomination's Judicial Council reconsider its ruling about the pastor in Virginia who refused church membership to a practicing gay person. This whole item was ruled out of order by the Bishop since our Annual Conference was not part of the original decision---it was a decision related to what happened in another Annual Conference (in Virginia). I believe that when the Bishop makes a ruling like this, the ruling is automatically reviewed by the Judicial Council to make sure the ruling is legal by the UM constitution + Discipline.
Item 25 was withdrawn as a resolution and then presented as a resource for churches to use in discussing the Palestine-Israel conflict by the Board of Mission's Israel/Palestine Task Force. The document that the item wants congregations to use is the "Kairos Palestine Document" that sees Israel as the aggressor/occupier and the Palestine people as the victims. As a petition from the task force, it was not formally adopted by the Annual Conference. I think the general body wants a more balanced approach to the conflict than the Kairos Palestine Document provides. It is my opinion that both Israel and the Palestinians have committed egregious sins against the other and are at fault. We need a way to move the parties beyond "an eye for an eye".
Item 26 was about the relocation of Japanese Latin Americans to the United States internment camps during World War II. These Japanese Latin Americans were used in prisoner exchanges during World War II because they wouldn't have knowledge of the United State. The resolution calls on our national senators to create a commission to look into ways of redressing the Japanese Latin Americans still living and their families. Passed on Consent Calendar with 80 in favor and 2 against.
Item 27 about every church identifying a social justice concern to focus on and celebrating Peace with Justice Sunday passed in the full plenary by a significant margin after it was removed from the Consent Calendar. As part of the focus on a social justice concern, the church needs to identify a program that engages each congregation member in how their individual lives mesh with that social justice concern.
Item 28 about the public financing of election campaigns generated a lot of discussion with a slim majority (266-yes and 215-no) in favor of it. This resolution was in response to the recent Supreme Court "Citizens United" decision to have corporations be treated as individuals. While I agree that the Supreme Court made a mistake in this decision and that there need to be limits on money and time spent on the campaigns, the part I did not like was making the changes with an amendment to the U.S. Constitution. I think that this was the sticking point for a number of other folks as well. Unlike our state constitution that is amended every week (it seems), amending our nation's constitution should require a much greater problem or crisis to remedy with an amendment.
Item 30 in support of the self-determination and independence to the people of East Turkistan passed on the full plenary floor by a significant majority.
Item 36 was about releasing 43 health workers (including Dr. Alex Montes serving as a Person in Mission from the General Board of Global Ministries) in the Philippines jailed by the Philippine army as alleged terrorists and tortured. This item was on the Consent Calendar with 85 in favor and 0 against.
Item 37 was about stopping the Laiban Dam Project in the Philippines. Passed on full floor.
Well, that completes my report for ACS 2010. All opinions in this report are mine alone. Congratulations if you made it to here and let me know what you think!
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