2020 June Stewards Minutes

Seekers Church

Stewards minutes

June 7, 2020

Present: Marjory Bankson, Peter Bankson, Ken Burton, Joan Dodge (Moderator), Michele Frome, Elizabeth Gelfeld, Judy Lantz (Recorder), Dave Lloyd (Meditation) Brenda Seat, Keith Seat, Deborah Sokolove, Glen Yakushji, Sandra Miller, Trish Nemore, Margreta Silverstone, Jacqie Wallen, Cynthia Dahlin, Vince Shepherd.

Visitors: Rebecca Wheaton, Liz Gould-Leger, Pat Conover, Katie Fisher, John Morris*

Housekeeping:  Stewards will meet on Sunday, July 5 at 5:30 pm using Zoom as the meeting format:

Moderator – Deborah

Meditation leader – Sandra

Recorder – Marjory

Agenda:

This meeting’s worship was led by Dave.  He read Psalm 8

Marjory announced that Deborah is a new member of the FOG team.

Carroll Café – Sandra

There are currently no plans for future concerts, except holding Jesse in advance for possibly next April 2021.  Discussion of tax on ticket sales concluded that, while holding the current price steady, the price will include the sales tax of $1.08 per ticket.  Expenses will be curtailed further for now by canceling the Constant Contact account that is costing $37.50 per month.

Servant Leadership Team – Brenda

The team has decided against reopening in-person worship on Sundays until further notice.  Zoom meetings are going well and filling our needs.  There is the added advantage that Zoom allows for a wider worship community that includes people from a far distance, ill persons and those unable to drive to participate.  Next month Deborah will offer a proposal from T&S for managing the Zoom technology for worship.

Building Use by Others – Deborah for T&S

Our private school tenant, the Preparatory School of DC**, has requested use of Seekers building M-F for the school year starting in September.  The Groove band camp has asked for possible use of the building in July.  T&S recommends allowing this.  Dave will review our insurance coverage and advise re: will it be affected while Seekers does not hold worship services.  We ultimately voted “yes”, with two abstains, to give T&S authority to decide.

The Citadel of Champions church, an existing tenant, has asked to use the Conference room at 3:30 pm on Sundays beginning in August.  We would require them to use only the bottom level.  Stewards voted unanimously in favor of T&S authority to make this decision.

Servant Leadership Team on Special Needs – Trish

SLT recommends that Seekers donate $1,000 to each of San Mateo church in Hyattsville and the Capital Area Food Bank for their extreme needs during the Pandemic.  Continued conversation suggested that we establish a Pandemic Gift Fund.  We affirmed.

Dave revealed an International Giving request from Rebecca Wheaton that had not been completed for 2020.  It is $2,000 for the Los Leones boy’s group in Nicaragua.  He requested approval which was affirmed.  Marjory then suggested that we take the approved $4,000 from the One-time Gift account.  We agreed to do so.

Interim Financial Report – Marjory   (see attached summary here)

Pastoral Concerns and Soul Talk concluded the meeting at 7:45 pm.

Submitted June 14, 2020 by: Judy Lantz

*In previous versions of this post, Katie Fisher and John Morris were erroneously left out of the list of visitors to the meeting.

**This sentence has been corrected to reflect the correct name and status of the school, which previously had been referred to as a charter school, DC Preparatory Academy. The school is, in fact, private, and is called the Preparatory School of DC.