Hiawassee United Methodist Church      Date:  Sept. 18, 2008

 Administrative Council Minutes

The minutes from the August meeting were reviewed and approved.

Scouts – Richard Everhart  

Richard gave an update of Boy Scout and Cub Scout activities that had resumed for the Fall.  Meeting in the pavilion will be one Boy Scout

Troop and five Cub Dens.  They have many activities planned for the next several months.  

Lay Leader - Harry Strickland  

Harry began a discussion of how best to greet our guests on Sunday mornings in the sanctuary.  Members had varying suggestions or opinions on how they prefer this recognition.  The majority of those present were in favor of members wearing name tags.  How to store these name tags was another concern.  Jim will look into ways other churches do this.  Motion was made and seconded that the church purchase and use names tags for meetings and on Sunday Mornings.   The implementation will be worked out by Worship Committee.    

Treasurer’s Report – Jane Carter  

Copies of the Treasurer’s Report were furnished to the members present.  Line items were discussed.  An undated Balance Sheet was also presented and discussed.  All investment CDs have been renewed and are reflected on the Balance Sheet.  The reports were approved as presented.  

Finance Committee – Gene Jackson  

Jane reported for Gene that no CD’s had been cashed or monies transferred to pay mortgage payment for September.  So far we have had enough in the debt retirement fund to meet the payments on the 20^th of the month.  Finance is in the process of gathering budget amounts from committee chairmen for the 2009 budget. The Proposed 2009 Budget will be presented at Charge Conference on October 11^th for approval.  Council must approve the budget first, so we suggested that we move October Council meeting time or have a call meeting prior to Charge Conference.  

Council agreed; so the Council meeting for October was moved to October 9^th at 10:00 am.  The Proposed 2009 Budget will be approved at that time.

Finance Committee will meet again on October 7^th at 1:00 pm to finalize the budget and finalize plans for the Fall Stewardship Campaign that begins on October 19^th.  

Worship – Delores Lawrence  

Jim reported for Delores.  Several upcoming events were mentioned and discussed.  There will be Coordinators of Children’s Ministries beginning in 2009 and also a Coordinator of Nursery.  Each will have line items in the 2009 Budget.  Also he will workout details of name tags for members with Worship Committee.  

Youth – Bob Lambert  

Bob reported that several events are being planned for the Youth for the next several months; another Car Show in May of 2009, possible concerts this winter and the Youth will be doing the entire worship service on October 26^th.  Youth Sunday will involve all the youth and they will take charge of the entire Sunday Worship hour.   

UMW – Carol Simpson  

We will be having our Fashion Show and Dessert Event on September 27^th at 2:00 pm in the Fellowship Hall, $10.00 donation.  The money will be used for Missions.  Our next meeting will be October 13^th at 1:00 pm in the Fellowship Hall.  All ladies of the church are invited.  

UMM  

Reminder to all members of church picnic on the 20^th at the pavilion.  Food provided by men.  

Barnabas – Lee Miller  

Barnabas is doing well.  

Trustees – Conley Carter  

Air conditioning unit has been installed in the Youth room upstairs. 

Fellowship Hall Projection & Screen System has been installed.  No one is to operate the system until they have received instructions on its use. Remote controls for the system are to be kept in the church office and will be checked out by the person using the equipment.   

New gravel has been applied to the driveway at the parsonage.

Pastor’s Report – Jim Blair  

Jim reported that the Leadership Selection Team (Nominating) had mostly finalized our team leaders for 2009.  He had encouraged these new appointees to begin now attending their chosen committee meetings to begin familiarizing themselves with the responsibilities for their committees so that there would be smooth transition in January. The Leadership Selection Team Committee will continue to meet every other month.  

Ashley will begin sending reminders for all meetings in an effort to encourage better attendance at meetings.   

Fall Stewardship Campaign “Soar” will have its kickoff on Sunday, October 19^th and end on November 9^th with a report of the results.  Please be in prayer for this campaign and its results.   

Old Business  

Advertising in the theaters at Fun World was discussed at length.  Joan Carothers had submitted to Dale a report on the cost involved should we decide to do this.  There were three plans ranging from duration of 3 months to 1 year. The Council decided on a three month plan with a cost of $275 per month or $825.00 plus a set-up fee of $200 with us providing the pictures.  The ad shows on all 6 screens during the commercial times of 15-30 minutes before the feature film.  Each ad is usually shown twice during each commercial time.  The exact details will be worked out by Jim and Hope.  We hope to do this during the holiday months to reach the largest audiences.  We will hear more at the Oct. Council meeting.  At the end of the 3 months, Council will evaluate the effectiveness and determine if we want to continue.  

New Business  

Discussion on a calling system, “ONECALLNOW” for the church that would notify all church members via phone of information that needed to be gotten out immediately, for example – ice on the driveway.  Lions Club uses a similar system to notify its members quickly.  The Office makes one phone call to system with message and the system calls members.  The cost is nominal; approximately $23.00 per month.  Jim will look further into this and report back to Council in October.  

Additional worship service and expansion needs in the future were touched on.  Just be thinking!  

Council voted to NOT participate as an advertiser in the Towns County Chamber of Commerce Map this year as we will probably us our advertising money to do the ad for the movie theaters.  Members felt this is better use of our advertising dollars.  

The following were in attendance:  Dale Gardner, Jane & Conley Carter, Jay Still, Richard Everhart, Ron & Lee Miller, Harry Strickland, Margaret Sawada, Dick Fields, Carol Simpson, Kathryn Stewart, Lorrane Anderson, Cindy Bradshaw, Jim Blair, and Bob Lambert  

Submitted by Administrative Council Recorder – Jane Carter, Acting Recorder

HM