Permanent Board minutes | August 4, 2018

12-62 Opening Worship: We opened in waiting worship.

12-63 Roll Call: The Recording Clerk called the roll.

Present: Edward Baker, Holly Baldwin, Travis Belcher, Deana Chase, Susan Davies, Jeremiah Dickinson, Eric Hill Edwards, Ben Guaraldi, Galen Hamann, Jan Hoffman, John Humphries, Nancy Isaacs, Sandy Isaacs, Mary Knowlton, Allan Kohrman, Rebecca Leuchak, Dwight Lopes, Christopher McCandless, Robert Murray, Bruce Neumann, Sara Sue Pennell, Suzanna Schell, Carolyn Stone, Philip Stone, Jane Van Landingham, Donn Weinholtz, Fritz Weiss, Carl Williams, Rosemary Zimmermann

Regrets: Jennifer Baily (Personnel Committee, Clerk), Debbie Block, Sarah Gant, Linda Jenkins (Past YM Presiding Clerk), Karen Sanchez-Eppler, Patricia Shotwell, Ruah Swennerfelt

Ex-Officio: Ed Mair (Treasurer), Jacqueline Stillwell (YM Presiding Clerk), Jonathan Vogel-Borne (YM Secretary)

Guests: Marian Baker, Nancy Haines

The Clerk reported that Donald Mick has resigned from Permanent Board.

12-64 Minutes of 5/12/2012 and 7/14/2012 were approved with corrections.

12-65 Memorial Minutes: Friends heard memorial minutes read for Katherine Perry (Providence) and Ruth Virgadamo (Providence).

Friends approved forwarding the minute for Katherine Perry to Sessions.

12-66 Update on the Yearly Meeting Secretary position: The Clerk reported on his conversations with Noah Baker Merrill, following the July meeting of PB. Noah met with his Oversight Committee prior to stating his willingness to accept the position if PB’s recommendation is approved at Sessions. He also asked that a public announcement of his decision be delayed for several days, allowing him to share the information personally with a number of people first. Noah agreed to an initial salary of $58,000, with a step increase of $2,000 in FY2014, followed by an additional $1,000 step increase in each of the two subsequent years.

12-67 Report from Coordinating and Advisory Committee: YM Presiding Clerk Jacqueline Stillwell reported for the Coordinating and Advisory Committee (C&A).

YM Secretary transition: Personnel Committee will meet with C&A during the fall and then present a detailed transition plan at the November meeting of Permanent Board.

Continuation of Employment for Yearly Meeting Secretary: The Coordinating & Advisory Committee recommends continuing employment for Jonathan Vogel-Borne as the YM Secretary through January 31, 2013, providing for a one-month overlap with the incoming YM Secretary. Friends expressed unity with that recommendation and approved bringing that recommendation to Sessions for approval.

Continuation of Employment for Friends Camp Director: The Friends Camp Committee recommends continuing employment of Nat Shed as the Camp Director. Friends expressed unity with that recommendation and approved bringing that recommendation to Sessions for approval.

Unity Agenda: Jacqueline reviewed the items in the Unity Agenda to be presented for approval by Sessions on Sunday evening. It was pointed out that the Nominating Committee report included in the advance documents for Sessions contains some errors. The decision was made to withhold the Nominating Committee report from the Unity Agenda, and allow the Committee to present a corrected and expanded list of nominations later in the week.

12-68 YM Nominating Committee Proposal: Christopher McCandless, Co-convener of YM Nominating Committee, reviewed the Committee’s minute presented at the May PB meeting (see PB Minute 12-49) and included in the advance documents for Sessions. He asked Friends to consider how to engage the YM in the process of discernment about changing the YM committee structure.

During the discussion that followed, Friends raised several concerns and questions:

• Scope: Changes in one part of the YM structure affect all the other parts; perhaps it would be best to have a single committee given the charge to review a broad range of structural issues, rather than an ad hoc committee focused just on the committees.
• Participation: How should we identify the areas that need attention? Some friends expressed concern about the prospect of a small group – or even PB – defining the scope of the charge to such a committee and wondered how we might use the opportunity of Sessions to gather input from Friends throughout the YM.
• Urgency: At the same time, several Friends expressed concern that the committee structure and nominating process require urgent attention, with one Friend sharing the image of a bucket with holes (if one fails to patch the holes, all the water may drain away before a new bucket can be constructed).
• Stewardship of time: Are our lives too busy to do God’s work?

The Clerk and the YM Presiding Clerk will discern how to present these concerns to Sessions.

​​​​​​​12-69 Report from the Yearly Meeting Secretary: Jonathan Vogel-Borne, YM Secretary, reported on recent and upcoming activities, including:

Sessions – Jonathan and three other staff (Kathleen Wooten, Sessions Coordinator; Jeffrey Hipp, Communications Director; and Abigail Kelly, Office Assistant) have been onsite since Tuesday, and along with the rest of the Sessions team, including about 45 youth programs volunteers, they are preparing for today’s arrival of the participants. Overall attendance will be lower this year (registration is at 580, compared to 700 or more in some recent years); as a result, Sessions expenses may exceed income from registrations by as much as $20,000. Part of the explanation for the drop is the number of people from NEYM who attended the Friends General Conference Annual Gathering, held in RI in July.

New England Friends Home Property: Referencing the Progress Report distributed with the advance documents, Jonathan reviewed some of the developments since the May meeting, including:

• Jonathan has filed a request to have the MA Department of Unemployment Assistance (DUA) recognize the New England Friends Home as an unincorporated subsidiary of NEYM, making it a religious nonprofit organization not liable to pay unemployment insurance to the State. Once that designation has been obtained, we expect the DUA to rescind a bill of more than $500,000 for past-due unemployment insurance premiums and interest, and instead require us to pay only about $20,000 to cover unemployment compensation collected by former Friends Home employees.
• The former caretaker of the property has filed a lawsuit against the new property owner.

12-70 Approval for Closing Retirement Accounts: Jonathan Vogel-Borne, YM Secretary, reported on the need to close the 403b retirement accounts managed by ING for the New England Friends Home. Friends approved authorizing the YM Secretary to take the necessary steps to close these retirement accounts.

12-71 Discernment Regarding the Polly Starr Legacy Gift: Holly Baldwin, Convener of the ad hoc Committee established at the May meeting (see PB Minute 12-47), reported that the Committee met three times by conference call. The Committee has concluded that:

• The process should include deep seasoning, starting with the MMs and working through the QMs, but also open to input from other channels; and
• Tthe conversation must begin with a focus on how we, individually and corporately, understand the role of money.

The Committee is prepared to initiate the dialogue during Sessions, with queries included in the anchor group facilitator’s guide, feedback cards for individuals to fill out, and an evening interest group session that will seek input on the overall process. The Committee recommends appointing a new ad hoc committee that would serve as a resource for MMs and individuals, more fully design and oversee the discernment process, and also receive proposals for how the money might be used.

Friends approved forwarding these recommendations to Sessions and appointing a new ad hoc committee at next week’s PB meeting. Suggestions for people to serve on the new committee will be received by the current and incoming PB Clerks and the YM Presiding Clerk.

12-72 Treasurer’s Report: Ed Mair, YM Treasurer, reviewed the third quarter report printed in the advance documents for Sessions. Contributions from both individuals and monthly meetings are well below where they were at this time last year, while expenses are higher than at this time last year.

12-73 Report from Development Committee: Nancy Haines, Clerk of the Development Committee reported for the Committee. Recognizing the significant gap in individual contributions this year, Nancy challenged PB to “lead by example,” noting that only 60% of PB members have made financial contributions in this fiscal year, while only 40% of Finance Committee members and 30% of YM committee clerks have done so. With 25% of the budgeted income anticipated from individual contributions, the current shortfall is of significant concern.