Parish Council Minutes Nov. 20th, 2012

Parish council minutes for Nov. 20^th 2012

In Neil’s Harbour 6:30pm ending at 9:20pm

Meeting attended by:  Linda Symes, Helen Budge, Dale Hussey,

David Donovan, Keith Hussey, Dean Carl Fraser, Stewart Best,

Lenora Dunphy, Steve Coutts, Wayne Budge, Kelvin Hussey, Darlene Williams,

Clara Hardy-Scott, Rev. Warren, Eleanor March, Valerie MacKinnon.

Meeting opened with prayer. 

Rev. Warren graciously agreed to chair the meeting.

Clara read the minutes from the previous meeting. Hearing no errors or omissions the minutes were accepted as read by Kelvin and seconded by Steve.

Business Arising

Land papers sent to Dan Chiasson were only for the land Van Seffland Bros. is interested in.  Wayne will drop in to check on these and to inquire about deeds for Parish property while there.

Co-op land update:  Co-op Atlantic will be making a presentation to the local board on Dec. 3^rd.  The plan is to go to the right of the existing store about half the size again, extending the parking lot as well and covering the area where the little building is.  The land in the back toward the ocean was viewed and determined not to be usable by them.  There was discussion as to the land they have included in their plan being in fact usable as there is a culvert running through the area. 

Layreaders:  One gathering so far, two new people have shown a slight interested in joining the group, they will be getting back to Rev. Warren.

Messy Church:  No takers on this.  However Clara may be interested in starting a Church School had has made inquires to the school board to use Cape Smokey. 

Insurance: No updates, Valerie thought Sheldon had the copy of the Church inventory for St. Andrew’s and will check on this.

Kelvin explained that as it stands presently St. John’s has full replacement, an AA rating coverage on St. John’s Church of $630.000 with a cost of $1807 and the hall of $507.900 at $1466 This replacement is prorated and you must replace.  If they were to switch to B Ratting and an allowable cost of $300.000, it would cost $1633 for the Church, only a savings of $174 but with the B rating you get a cash settlement of the full $300.000. 

Dean Carl felt that this is something we should consider………if St. John’s burned, would we want to replace it as it stands now or with 5 buildings in the Parish would it be not a smart idea?  Food for thought.

Travel: Review for the 3^rd quarter is complete. Rev. Warren asked council to direct Bev Hawley not to pay him a travel cheque for the month of December 2012.  Steve made the motion and Wayne seconded it. 

Parish Treasurer: Kelvin still has not heard from Bev Hawley concerning a meeting to discuss procedures with Kelvin taking the position as Parish Treasurer in January 2013 this is of the upmost importance.  Valerie agreed to phone Bev and ask her to meet with Kelvin.  The paper work for this matter was filled out and signed by Eleanor March at this meeting so it may be forwarded to the Diocese.    

Sexual Misconduct Policy: Rev Warren will put these in the Churches for signatures.

Correspondence:

David MacKenzie who did our building inspections has not gotten back to Eleanor yet with the written documentation of recommendations.  She has left several messages.

Irving Maintenance Agreement for the Rectory Furnace has been renewed.

St. John’s General Account is up this month because the ACW gave them a $3000 donation.  Lenora now is believed to have the correct numbers for allotment and stipend fees, as she has been without since January, she made a guestamit and St. John’s has been overpaying approximately $200 a month so presently has a credit.

The wardens met with Rev. Warren and discussed a door to door campaign to try and increase our many ministries.  Perhaps develop a check list to ask, who in the household is Anglican? What talents or gifts you may have time to give to the Parish ministries.   What are we missing as a Parish that we are not giving you?  It was suggested by Wayne B. at St. Andrew’s vestry meeting to do a positive letter up, visit with the letter and return two weeks later for discussion.  Items such as PAR, What programs people care about?

Dean Carl mentioned we all get mail asking for money…………remember if you go door to door and/or do a letter remember that this is about your ministry not money.  Knock, shake their hand and let them know we care about you. How can we help you?  Do you have any questions? Can we restore your relationship to the Church?  He then did an interesting exercise by asking those present individually in one word to describe how you feel about our current financial situation.  Scared, perplexed, hopefully and proud that we had come so far and concord so much in the last year. He asked this because some may think we are in crisis.  We are not.  We have money in the bank, our bills are paid.  What we are is a Parish with a Challenge.

 He suggested we plan the annual meeting dates, think about what we are going to talk about, the positives and the issues. A letter about your future together needs to go out to let people know you are going door to door, think about what we want our Parish to look like. Think about the next years budge and ask yourselves, will we be in a position in Sept. 2013 to hire a priest? Think about officers to represent you.

Motion was made by Keith and seconded by Kelvin to accept the Parish Financial Statement.

No Warden’s report

Rector’s Report

Rev. Warren is very proud of where we have come and the hope that is here. You have overcome your goals, and keep talking about your ministries, keep focusing on that. They have a load of items ready for the dump.  The many lists required to be in order before Warren’s departure are coming to together many thanks to everyone for their assistance.  

Dates:

Vestry meetings: December 3^rd St. John’s, 4^th St. Andrew’s and 11^th for the Parish in Ingonish. Clara will contact Brenda Drake to see if she needs to speak with us about ministry Brenda’s wishes for travel times will determine the time of the meeting. Clara will be in touch with everyone. Clara as well will contact the Diocese Stewardship group and ask if they may be able to work with us on our approach with the door to door campaign.

Candlelight services St. John’s Dec. 18^th and St. Andrew’s 19^th

Christmas Eve: St. John’s at 8pm, St. Andrew’s at 11pm. 

Farewell service Dec. 30^th 11am at St. Andrew’s with lunch to follow in the hall.    

Tentative dates for Church Annual Meetings FEB 17^th and 18^th

Parish annual Feb. 19^th

New Business:

Carl’s celebration of New Ministry into live as Regional Dean is taking place at St. John’s in North Sydney at 7pm on Wednesday, Nov. 28^th.  He is looking for a person from each Parish to give a little speech about how life is in our Parish. Every Parish has also been assigned another Parish to pray for on this night.

The meeting closed with the Grace. 

Respectfully submitted by

Clara Hardy-Scott

Happy New Year

Happy New Year

We begin our 2013 year with changes to our Parish, our priest Rev. Warren and his family leave us this week for new adventures in Saskatchewan.  We wish them safe travels and much happiness in their new life. 

Rev. Gloria McClure Fraser was announced this week as being our “Priest in charge”.  Rev. Gloria is a dear friend of this Parish and we are excited to be working with her.  The Wardens are meeting with Rev. Gloria this evening, January 06 at 5:30 to discuss scheduling. We will send out calendars once the schedule is in place.

The Parochial Committee was elected as you know on Dec. 11^th.  Clara has been working on the Parish Profile.  The Parochial Committee will need to meet this coming week to finalize the written copy and review what has been completed.  It is then entered electronically into an on line form and forwarded to Archdeacon Brenda  who will read it, make suggestions and then return to Ingonish for a meeting with Parish Council to be voted on.  This all needs to take place by Feb. 9^th.   January will certainly be a challenging month but we will do our best to keep everyone updated.