Finance Council Meeting Minutes-March 24, 2021
Fr. Raj opened the meeting with a prayer at 5:01pm
Present: Bill Jacobs, Anne Welborn (by phone), Terry Brennan, Dan Putschoegl, Eileen Grant, Brad DeSaye
Staff: Jim Wren, Donna Maneely, Shelly Cooper
- Minutes Approval: February Meeting Minutes approved
- Dan motioned to accept the February meeting minutes; Bill seconded the motion; motion passed
- Financial Statements: February Financials approved
- Eileen asked about the new piano and why choir expense increased so much. We were able to get a nice used piano from our piano tuner. We also found a school in Phoenix who took the old piano for kids who can’t afford lessons. Choir expense increased since we bought the new song books. The price of the song books increased quite a bit from the first quote.
- Dan remarked that unrestricted contributions income to the school was high. The school received a large donation at the beginning of school year. He also asked why the substitute salary expense was high. At the beginning of year a teacher was out on maternity leave and recently one of the teachers was out due to health reasons.
- Dan asked about the missing bulletin rebate check. Per LPi, it will be late but we should be getting it soon.
- Bill wants to discuss a line item in more detail at each meeting to expand on it. He asked about choir expenses. Choir Expense is for music expenses like tuning the piano and supplies for the choir.
- Eileen motioned to approve the February Financials; Brad seconded the motion; motion approved
- Bank Statement Approval:
- Bill reviewed the February bank reconciliation; no discrepancies noted
- Pastor’s Report:
- Holy Week is next week. More people are feeling comfortable and are coming back to Mass so we have set up more chairs in the Gathering Place.
- Raj thanked the council for their ideas on the survey about how to plan for more parishioners coming back to Mass.
- The new songbooks and missalettes are being put back into the pews. We are asking the parishioners not to take them home.
- Some of our Ministries are starting to return to having their meetings at the church. Knights of Columbus and Legion of Mary are back meeting at church.
- The Chrism Mass is on Monday, March 29th in Phoenix. The priests will be attending.
- held a meeting to discuss the future of Youth Ministry. It was decided we should continue to have a full time Youth Minister and we will recruit locally first. We are planning a feast in June to welcome the youth families back.
- sent a letter to Bishop Olmsted asking him to lower the Bishop’s Assessment since our collections are low.
- Parish Manager Report:
- Stacy has resigned due to a new job. We have hired Alma to take over her position. Alma had brought her resume to Fr. Raj a few weeks ago. She has experience working at churches in a similar capacity as Stacy. It was a seamless transition. Stacy was able to train her before she left.
- The Lenten Mission by the Franciscan Friars of the Renewal on March 30th and 31st will be livestreamed through the Catholic Community Foundation (CCF) website and on a link on our website.
- We tested a new form of livestreaming that eliminates Facebook. It is streamed directly to the website. We are getting prepared in case Facebook won’t let us livestream anymore. Also many parishioners do not have or like Facebook. We plan to try it the Sunday after Easter. Jim will post it separately to Facebook as a recording.
- Employee evaluations are completed; Jim only has one employee left to speak with. He did not discuss salaries and he built the Mission Vision Values into the evaluations.
- Donna and Jim attended the Diocesan webinar which was a review on the new payroll system. Performance evaluations can be done through the new payroll system; Jim will look into.
- Jim has done some outreach for Holy Week: the Chamber of Commerce allowed us to publish our Holy Week schedule in their newsletter, he advertised on KLove and there will be an article in the Daily Courier. Hopefully this will inspire Catholics to come back to Mass.
- We have $30k remaining from the Diocesan Capital Campaign money to redo the floor in the Forum. Jim and John looked at flooring yesterday. It is a textured design to protect the floor. The product will lighten the room. It will be done in June after Preschool gets out. The cost will be $23k-$25k.
- Jim received another letter from CCF about having a retirement Estate planning seminar. Our parishioners would benefit from it. We will schedule it when it is safe to do so.
- Jim would like to have a large event with a well-known Catholic Speaker so we can use the Online Giving grant money this fiscal year. The Diocese will not allow us to carry the grant over to next fiscal year. We need to make a decision by June. Ideas for a speaker include Chris Stefanick or Scott Hahn. Jim asked the council to think about it. Dan suggested Cardinal Dolan.
- The Light of the World retreat will take place this June. It will be offered for free due to the Online Giving grant.
- Old Business:
- There is no new information to discuss on the 2022 budget. We should have more information on benefits at April’s meeting. We will send you the new version before the April meeting.
- Parish investments: Bill Jacobs will speak with Chris Kissel to get his recommendation on how to better manage our investments. Bill will speak about it at the next meeting.
- New Business:
- Jerry Shugars built a new collection box after some concerns about the collection baskets. It locks in the back and it is on a turntable so it is easy to get the envelopes out of the back.
Fr. Raj made some concluding remarks:
We are blessed in many ways: ministries are coming back and the school is reopened.
Money is for our mission and our mission is evangelization and responding to the call of Jesus.
Fr. Raj would like to have a strategic plan for the post Covid future of our Parish.
Fr. Raj led a closing prayer at 5:50pm
Respectfully submitted by Donna Maneely