Minutes

Terry began the meeting at 4:35pm.

Fr. Raj opened the meeting with a prayer.

Present: Terry Brennan, Brad DeSaye, Bill Jacobs, Eileen Grant-via phone

Absent:  Anne Welborn, Bob Dressler, Keoni Murphy

Staff: Fr. Raj, Jim Wren, Donna Maneely, Shelly Cooper, Fr. Gaspar

1. Minutes Approval:

• Bill motioned to approve the November meeting minutes; Brad seconded it; approved

2. Financial Statements:

• Bill motioned to approve the November Financials; Brad seconded the motion; motion approved
• Brad motioned to approve the December Financials; Bill seconded the motion; motion approved

3. Bank Statement Approval:

• Terry reviewed the November bank reconciliation; no discrepancies noted
• Eileen reviewed the December bank reconciliation; no discrepancies noted

4. Pastor’s Report:

• Lent begins tomorrow-February 22nd; Masses will be held Monday-Thursday at 5:30 pm during Lent
• Confessions are held on Mondays, Wednesday and Saturdays and more confession times may be added toward the end of Lent.
• Stations of the Cross will take place each Friday of Lent at 6pm in Spanish and 7pm in English.
• A Liturgy Meeting is scheduled in March.
• A Congress is being held for the Eucharistic Renewal in 2024. We hope to have ten parishioners attend.
• All the clergy from the Diocese will be attending a conference in June led by Amazing Parish. The conference will discuss how to make parish life fruitful and vibrant.
• Eight parishioners (including Fr. Raj) along with two Claretians are preparing to attend World Youth Day in Portugal this summer. Tickets have been purchased and another $6-7k needs to be fundraised.

5. Parish Manager Report:

• Charity and Development Appeal update: we are half way to our goal of $138k
• Solar panels update:  Bosch is not able to supply the panels. They have asked that we take the $75k offer instead. We haven’t received an estimate yet for panels. There is money in restricted funds to help with replacing the solar panels.
• Roof update: the church roof needs to be replaced; we have had numerous leaks.  Two estimates have been received and we plan to use Arrow Roofing. We have money from the Diocesan campaign and parishioner donations to help pay for the roof. We are waiting on final approval from the Diocese. Arrow Roofing estimates the project will take about 2 weeks depending on what is going on at the church, i.e. funerals.
• Jim had planned to travel to Lake Havasu to help Our Lady of the Lake Parish with their finances. It did not work out so he held a conference call with them. He answered a lot of their questions and made some recommendations. The Pastor would still like him to go there to meet. Jim plans to assist them with a needed capital campaign.
• Two bequests are in progress- one is slated for non-school youth programs. We cannot reduce the budget as of yet since we do not know when it will be finalized. The other is a $1,000,000 bequest for the school to be received at an undetermined time.
• Good Friday Stations of the Cross: We now have to schedule this within a certain time frame, pay an administration fee and a $1,500 deposit. Jim argued that we only use the sidewalk so we shouldn’t have to pay the deposit and Fr. Raj wrote a letter disagreeing with the deposit. We will still pay the deposit since it is an important event.  Yavapai County will be in charge of this directly next year, which concerns Jim.
• T-Bills:  The process to set up this investment has been difficult. BOK Financial did not invest the money until February and we started the process in November.  The Diocese required a resolution which was not initially known.
• Bishop Dolan made some changes to the reporting structure: Doug Pritchard now reports to the CFO, which makes more sense.
• Eucharistic Miracle exhibit by Blessed Carlo Acutis will be here March 17-20^th. Volunteers are needed to help with exhibit.
• Jim completed performance reviews for parish staff.

6. Old Business:

• I-Bonds: Diocese agreed to approve the formal resolution as an exception to invest in I-bonds. We are waiting for Bishop Dolan’s signature to go forward.
• Rentals: 233 Summit had a fire on New Year’s Eve. The house has been cleared out and we are going to rebuild. We are working with Catholic Mutual. Everything will be covered by insurance including lost rent.  Since it is in an historic district, the roof has to look similar to the old one. The tenants would like to move back in once it is rebuilt.
• Jim spoke with a real estate agent to get average square footage rental prices in Prescott. They run between $1.80 and $2.00 a square foot so we should raise rents since we are under charging for most of the houses. Bill suggested hiring a property manager to take care of collecting rents and maintenance requests.  Fr. Raj was not sure about hiring a manager. He is concerned about a conflict of interest with our Catholic values. But he would agree to it if the Diocese approves. Jim puts in a lot of time with this so it would be nice to have a property manager. Brad agreed that we should have a property manager. He spoke from experience as he has a rental. He will share his property manager information with Jim. The cost is 10% of the rental income.

7. New Business:

• 2024 Budgets: Jim explained that we left some of the budgets out of balance so the council could see the issues we are facing. The school, in particular, will have a hard time balancing.
  • Shelly explained that it is hard to bring in new families; it is a transient town. ESA -Universal Vouchers- brought in a few new students. CEA can only be used for tuition and if using ESA, a student cannot use CEA. Fewer families will use CEA next school year and so the CEA revenue budget has been reduced. Kindergarten is not fully funded with ESA so those families may use CEA and if a student needs services from the public-school system, they cannot use ESA. Shelly also explained that ESA charges a 2.5% fee.
  • The school did not have a Gala this year and Shelly cannot find anyone willing to volunteer to chair it.
  • Shelly feels that Kindergarten will be full so the school will hopefully start building from the bottom.
  • Brad asked Shelly how she recruits students: word of mouth, chamber of commerce, St. Germaine’s, St. Catherine’s, advertise in bulletin. Brad suggested adding information about ESA which should appeal to families. He also suggested running radio ads in June and July. He offered to help Shelly.
  • Shelly is hoping to get the 400 club up and running again and is putting it in the budget. She would also like to increase the number of Bingo nights. She would like parents to take it over. Bill suggested asking the Knights of Columbus for help with Bingo.
  • Preschool is having budget issues, as well. The Catholic School’s office is not recommending taking Quality First money due to changes that do not align with our Catholic beliefs. It will be difficult to get more students without having scholarships from Quality First. ESA will cover preschool tuition for any child who will turn 5 by 12/31/23.
  • We have not heard from the Diocese yet about benefits or parish salary increase recommendations.
• Bill recommends increasing the reserve transfer to $20k per month from the current $18k next fiscal year.
• Jim briefly spoke about the Blue Cross and Blue Shield hospital issue. Our insurance is not being accepted by the hospital in Prescott which may cause problems for some of our employees if they need to be admitted the hospital or have a doctor affiliated with the hospital.
• Bill asked if there has been any discussion about reaching out to our parishioners to increase the collection plate. Jim explained that we need to find the right time for it. With CEA and the CDA going on right now it is not a good time; maybe at Easter since attendance is high.

Fr. Gaspar ended the meeting with a prayer at 5:48pm.

Respectfully submitted by Donna Maneely

Terry began the meeting at 5:00pm.

Fr. Raj opened the meeting with a prayer.

Present: Terry Brennan, Anne Welborn, Dan Putschoegl, Brad DeSaye, Bill Jacobs, Bob Dressler

Absent:  Eileen Grant

Staff: Fr. Raj, Jim Wren, Donna Maneely, Shelly Cooper

Guests: Keoni Murphy (future council member)

1. Minutes Approval:

• Bill requested that the following be removed from the October minutes: “Bill suggested using the money in the Reserve checking account” as he did not state this. Minutes will be amended.
• Anne motioned to approve the October 26, 2022 amended meeting minutes; Brad seconded it; approved

2. Financial Statements:

• Bill had some questions for Shelly about bingo night: will the school be holding bingo permanently and where did they get the bingo equipment. Shelly said that the school did not buy professional equipment since it was a fun night of bingo and that it would be too hard to find a chairperson to hold bingo every month but that the school is planning to have another bingo night.  Bill suggested asking the Knights of Columbus for help.
• Bill asked if any thought had been given to how to increase collection revenue especially since it looks like online giving is decreasing. Jim stated that we have lost some large donors lately due to moving or passing away and that although we are getting many new families each month, they do not donate as much. Fr. Raj does not want to have a special appeal at this time.
• Terry asked if there is any concern about the decrease in the CCF endowments. Jim stated that we are concerned but there isn’t anything we can do about it.
• Anne asked if there was any concern about our overall results so far this year. Jim stated that we are doing well compared to other parishes; we have no debt and quite a bit of money in reserves. The market will turn around some time.
• Brad asked about attendance at the Masses. Fr. Raj said that attendance is up since Covid except at the 5pm Sunday Mass. Jim added that we average 10 new families a month.
• Terry questioned Shelly about speaking more about CEA. Shelly said that the school has quite a bit of extra CEA money banked and many families have moved to using ESA Universal vouchers for their tuition so they are reallocating the CEA funds to other families.
• Terry asked about the big difference in vacation accrual on the balance sheet from last year. When we switched to accrual accounting a few years ago, this was missed.
• Dan motioned to approve the October Financials; Anne seconded the motion; motion approved

3. Bank Statement Approval:

• Bob reviewed the October bank reconciliation; no discrepancies noted

4. Pastor’s Report:

• Fr. Ralph had a medical procedure and is now back in the rectory. We are getting help from Fr. Tony Diaz. Fr. Gaspar is helping at St. Catherine’s.
• Tina and Lisa Tucker are retiring at the end of the year. Alma is taking Tina’s position and we are in the process of hiring someone for Alma’s position. The Cook position is still open.
• The Advent Mission is on Sunday, December 4^th and Monday, December 5^th.
• Holy Hours for the Lord will be December 16^th from 3-6pm.
• New ministry groups are going well: Vocation committee, World Youth Day, and the Saturday morning prayer group. The prayer group is finishing up and would like to do another session next year.

5. Parish Manager Report:

• Collection plate in October: $82k, online giving: $46k.
• Advent Mission-Sr. Regina Marie a Carmelite nun from LA is our speaker. The mission is on Sunday after the 5pm mass and Monday at 9:30 am and 6:30 pm.
• Staffing update: we are still looking for a full time Custodian for the school. We received 3 calls this week about the job. Someone had accepted the Cook position but then she got another job. We will advertise again for this position at the beginning of the year.
• We received 6 applications for Alma’s job; many were over qualified. A parishioner applied and we offered her the job. We are waiting for her reply.
• John is the next employee who will be retiring; in April.
• Lisa and Tina did not want a party so we are having an office meet and greet on December 16^th.
• The Blessed Carlo Acutis exhibit will be March 17-20, 2023 in the Forum. Someone has to be present at the exhibit at all times.
• Bishop Dolan is setting up an Office of Mental Health at the Diocese. Jim will be attending the ground breaking on December 13th.
• Two parishes, recommended by the Diocese, have reached out to Jim for help in the last two weeks: Camp Verde and Lake Havasu. The Lake Havasu members are flying here to meet with Jim on December 15^th.

6. Old Business:

• Jim thanked Brad for his advice and education on IBonds. IBonds can only be purchased up to $10,000 per year and must be purchased directly from Treasury Direct, which has been overwhelmed  because of the great demand for the high-yielding IBonds. Per Doug Pritchard, Diocesan policy does not allow parish staff to make investments through Treasury Direct. Doug indicated  that he had other ideas but has to run them by CFO Joe Anderson. No information has been received since. Therefore, we are not proceeding with IBonds until we hear from the Diocese.
• The Diocese also does not permit investing in T-bills through Treasury Direct. We must use a platform. BOK can offer this service. Jim read an email from Scott Sas indicating that current rates are:
  • 4-week bill – 3.53 %
  • 2-month bill – 4.13%
  • 3-month bill – 4.13%
  • 6-month bill – 4.5%
  • 1-year bill – 4.54%
  • 2-year bond – 4.3 %
  • 2-year agency debt – 5-5.5%
• Reviewing the October balance sheet, Bill Jacobs noted that we have $660K in PNC general account, $220K in PNC Money Market Account and $253K in BOK Operating Account for a total of about $1.1 million in available funds. We will need to retain at least $300K in Operating cash to support regular operations, leaving about $800K available to invest. There was some discussion about laddering investments in various maturities. Ultimately it was decided to be conservative and invest $600K – $300K in a 3-month bill and $300K in a 6-month bill.
• Before investing, the Council asked Jim to determine what BOK fees will be to do these investments for us.
• Brad made a motion that, assuming fees are reasonable,  to transfer $600K from a combination of the three operating accounts to invest through the BOK platform in a $300K 3-month treasury bill and $300K in a 6-month Treasury bill.   Dan seconded the motion and the motion passed unanimously.

7. New Business:

• The next meeting was changed to February 15^th since Fr. Raj will be in India until the beginning of February.
• Keoni Murphy will be our new Finance Council member as of our next meeting, February 15^th.

Dan ended the meeting with a prayer at 6:08pm.

Respectfully submitted by Donna Maneely

Terry began the meeting at 5:00pm.

Fr. Raj opened the meeting with a prayer.

Present: Terry Brennan, Anne Welborn, Dan Putschoegl, Brad DeSaye, Bill Jacobs, Bob Dressler

Absent:  Eileen Grant

Staff: Fr. Raj, Jim Wren (via phone), Donna Maneely, Shelly Cooper

1. Minutes Approval:

• Anne motioned to approve the September 28, 2022 meeting minutes; Dan seconded it; approved

2. Financial Statements:

• Anne questioned the low collection numbers (compared to budget). Collection income is higher than last year, though we may have budgeted too high.
• Anne motioned to approve the September Financials; Bob seconded the motion; motion approved

3. Bank Statement Approval:

• Anne reviewed the September bank reconciliation; no discrepancies noted

4. Pastor’s Report:

• Heritage Week went very well. More parishioners attended the Festival. The committee did a great job.
• Fr. Raj reported on the attendance count that the Diocese requires each week in October: 1700-1800 parishioners are attending Mass each week and 1200-1400 are receiving communion. Anne asked why the Diocese needs this information. The Diocese sends this information to the Vatican.
• We have a new staff member, Dora. She is Jimena’s new assistant.
• held a Sacristan formation meeting; more meetings for liturgical ministers are planned.
• Fr. Raj would like to resurrect the Vocation Committee; the first meeting is in November.
• The Claretian Missionaries will partially sponsor attendees to World Youth Day (WYD) in Portugal in the Summer of 2023. There will be a meeting in November for anyone interested in going to WYD.
• The Ministry Fair was a success. Many parishioners signed up as new volunteers.

5. Parish Manager Report:

• Collection plate in October: $72k, online giving – $41k.
• 10% of the 5^th Sunday collection in October is going to Operation Deep Freeze (Winter Warm Up).
• Sr. Anne is still in a hospital in Phoenix; we do not know when or if she will return to work.
• Patti Indelicato has taken over Sr. Anne’s responsibilities for the Winter Warm Up program. Sacred Heart is responsible for bringing dinner each night in November.
• Jim met with a couple who is going to make a provision in their will to Sacred Heart. They wanted to know about any future projects. Jim put together a report for them. They will be meeting with their attorney and will designate a specific project in their will.
• St. Vincent de Paul is forgoing their donation again for the next 3 months. We gave this month’s donation to the Bishop’s Disaster Relief fund for Hurricane Ian instead.
• Profits from the Heritage Festival will be going to the Claretian Missionaries. The Bounce Houses, Hawaiian dancers/food were all positive additions. The weather was good and we had 3 times as many people as last year.
• About 40 new parishioners attended the new parishioner dinner. Dinner was well received and some new parishioners are interested in joining the Knights of Columbus, helping with counting the Sunday Collection and serving on the Finance Council.
• Scout Solar inspected the solar panels. They notified us that we can have electronic access to our production; we were never told this. They also said that the system is disconnected. There is no dire fire danger as were told by Sun Valley Solar. Jim recommends taking the new panels and having Scout Solar install them. We are waiting for the Diocese to confirm what Scout Solar’s next steps will be.
• Blessed Carlo Acutis is the patron of the 1^st year of the Eucharistic Revival. Before his death he created panels of all the Eucharistic Miracles. This exhibit is traveling around the world. The Diocese is hosting the exhibit throughout the Phoenix area. Jim asked if the exhibit could come to Sacred Heart. It will be here in the Spring. No date has been set.
• The Advent Mission is scheduled for December 4^th and 5^th. Sr. Regina Marie is our speaker. We will not be having a Lenten mission; instead, Fr. Jim Sichko will be presenting a mission in May.

6. Old Business:

• I-bonds: According to Scott Sas, BOK cannot be custodian but he will research for us who can. The question is how much to transfer to an I-bond. Brad said it is limited to $10k a year but there is no limit on Treasury bills which are typically shorter and can reinvest when mature.  It was suggested that we use the money that we usually send to the reserves each month.  Jim will research treasury bills first. Bill also suggested looking into brokered CDs.
• Several recommendations regarding rental properties were discussed. Fr. Raj will need to discuss with the other priests.

7. New Business: none

Fr. Raj ended the meeting with a prayer at 5:52pm.

Respectfully submitted by Donna Maneely

Terry began the meeting at 5:00pm.

Fr. Raj opened the meeting with a prayer.

Present: Eileen Grant, Terry Brennan, Anne Welborn, Dan Putschoegl

Absent:  Brad DeSaye, Bill Jacobs, Bob Dressler

Staff: Fr. Raj, Donna Maneely, Jim Wren, Shelly Cooper, John Gust

1. Minutes Approval:

• Eileen motioned to approve the July 27, 2022 meeting minutes; Dan seconded it; approved

2. Financial Statements:

• Eileen asked for confirmation that the $11,380 expense is for the Chiller maintenance contract; yes, it is.
• Eileen questioned why we are keeping a BOK account open with only $3.62. Jim will contact BOK. Eileen suggested we put the money we are sending to the Reserve accounts into a savings account until the market improves.
• We finally received confirmation from the Diocese that we can go forward with purchasing I-bonds as long as they are placed through an approved custodian. Jim will contact Scott Sas from BOK to check if they can be the custodian.
• Anne motioned to approve the July Financials; Eileen seconded the motion; motion approved
• Dan motioned to approve the August financials; Anne seconded the motion; motion approved

3. Bank Statement Approval:

• Bill reviewed the July bank reconciliation; no discrepancies noted
• Brad reviewed the August bank reconciliation; no discrepancies noted

4. Pastor’s Report:

• Fr. Raj thanked the council for participating in the Staff and Council Day of Reflection and Synod meeting.
• Fr. Raj would like the Finance Council to assist the Pastoral Council with being available after Masses to answer questions.
• The Ministry Fair took place on September 25^th and will continue on Sunday, October 2^nd .
• Two new ministries have formed: Saturday morning prayer group and Women’s Circle of Faith and Friendship.
• Fr. Raj would appreciate the council’s support and presence during Heritage Week.
• The Annual Corporation meeting was held on September 15^th. Terry, Martha Lamb and Fr. Raj met with Bishop Dolan.
• The Eucharistic Revival is taking place over the next 3 years. Fr. Raj would like more direction from the Diocese about the Revival.

5. Parish Manager Report:

• Collection plate in September: $70k, online giving $45k.
• Our Sunday Visitor, our online giving provider,  is increasing their fees.
• Many staff positions will be opening up soon and some have been hard to fill:
  • Our Cook, Lisa, is retiring in January.
  • Our Maintenance Supervisor is retiring in the first quarter of next year.
  • Lisa Baynes, the Catechesis of the Good Shepherd Director is unsure of her date of retirement but she will most likely job share.
  • We are still looking for a custodian for the school. We had two and one suddenly quit.
  • The Assistant to the Hispanic Ministry Director position has been difficult to fill.
  • The RCIA Director, Muriel, is retiring the following year.
• The new parishioner dinner is October 20^th. Eileen volunteered to attend on behalf of the Finance Council.

6. Old Business: none
7. New Business: none

Fr. Raj ended the meeting with a prayer at 5:30pm.

Anne moved to go into an Executive Session at 5:30pm; Eileen seconded it; motion approved

The Executive Session ended at 6:08 pm at which time the meeting was adjourned.

Respectfully submitted by Donna Maneely