Parish Council Meeting Minutes (20MAR18) Attendees: Father Mark, Betsy Adams, John Bielinski, Sue Loeffler, Lynn Norby, Bob Schlitz, Tim Springer
Absent: John Kohlhaas, Riyan Mendonsa, Jan Parsons
Opening Prayer
Capital Campaign Social Hall update: Discussion of items we put up in church. There can be issues with what you do with it when you want to take it down. Council and Fr. Mark are ok with disposing of the Grapevine. We would be open to giving it away but we aren’t aware of anyone who has a use for it.
There will be a meeting with the campaign follow-up committee 21MAR18 and the new person from Steier (Steve Bird). The goal of this group is to talk about the campaign process as a whole. This group gets together quarterly. Last month, they talked about the “adopt a pledge” idea.
Role of Parish Council Finance Council is required by canon law and has set duties. Parish Councils aren’t required, so role is up to the parish. What we expect of our parish council is to speak on behalf of the parish - to talk about things that we want a consensus on from the parish. The Council’s role depends on what is going on in the parish at the time. For example, they’ve been very involved in the Growth survey and the capitol campaign. Looking ahead, there are some good opportunities; Fr. Mark will try to point them out throughout our remaining agenda topics.
Parking Lot We’ve been approached from the car dealership who rents our side lot. They would like more space. We’re planning on re-doing the lot for the campaign. Maybe we can re-do it in a way to benefit the space we have for rental. As long as re-doing it, maybe can reconfigure it. We want to look at options.
Archbishop/Bishop Visit The Archbishop office sent a letter asking us to consider our upcoming events and if the presence of a bishop would help us reach our goals. Basically, if we’d like him to come to something we need to articulate how the visit would help the mission of the event. He wants to attend when he’ll have an impact. Some ideas: Gift Celebration; vigil; or Capital Campaign finale celebration. The date of the finale celebration could be somewhat flexible to fit around his schedule. We need to think about how having him here would benefit the mission; it doesn’t need to just be a financial benefit. He wants to get to know the people. But we could look at inviting him for next year’s gift celebration – it’ll be in early June. Let Fr. Mark know of suggestions.
FYI – There is a calendar planning meeting on 22MAR18 to plan the whole next program year; Fall 2018 - Fall 2019.
School Subsidy We just finalized our subsidy for the school for another year.
Parish Directory Previous information was incorrect. Parish Resource Committee won’t be involved at all, although individual members may be willing to help. If Parish Council feels strongly about it, we’d need to do a subcommittee to do it. Fall is probably the best time to do it. Do we know what percentage have been in last few directories? We could talk to LifeTouch for ideas. John Bielinski, Riyan Mendonsa, and Tim Springer will meet to discuss further.
Gift Celebration To be held 19-20MAY18. Terri Schuler, Pat Brennan and Mary Ueland suggested at a staff meeting that maybe the Parish Council could do a snack for the Gift Celebration. We don’t want to make this a sign-up weekend; it’s not about recruiting. We’re celebrating our gifts – e.g. “I’m raising kids. That might be my gift, so I don’t have time to be in other committees.” That’s ok.