MGLC Congregational Meeting Minutes
Call to Order - Todd Treml called the meeting to order at 12:15 pm.
Opening Prayer - Pastor Durk opened with prayer.
Approval of the January 2006 Budget and Finance Meeting Minutes – motion by Michael Branch and seconded by Charles Berger. All Approved
President’s Report - Todd thanked everyone for joining us on this lovely day.
Todd: All our positive accomplishments for 2005-2006 are so exciting:
In His Service…
(2005-2006)
New purpose statement Engaged Kairos for Capital Appeal
Vacation Bible School Kairos Survey
Voted to sell land and engaged broker New Organizational Structure
New Facilities Team Youth Work Camp
New Youth and Young Adult Director Partnering with Jordan New Life
New Communications Director Christmas Programs – 781 attendees
Expanding Caring Ministries Architects Hired
New Worship Coordinator New logo
MGLC Foundation
All these things are very encouraging.
Pastor’s Reports -
Pastor Durk’s Report: Todd has done a great job – thanks for your leadership. Thanks to all council and staff for their time and talents. Hope you’ve all had a chance to meet Todd Grover.
By end of May/early June we’ll have a staffing pattern prepared for the front office.
Thanks to the Facilities Team and to Teri Johnson, their leader.
Kairos Process – We’ve responded to a lot of the feedback and concerns raised by the Kairos Survey: Open communication has become a priority; we made a decision on the Fernbrook land.
For the fall – we’re really going to be focusing on the people and getting more people involved.
Pastor Durk’s goal for next year: To develop leadership within our congregation. Several of you have been on my mind! We’ll have leadership training in the fall so we have a pool of future leaders to draw from.
I continue to feel very blessed to serve here and my family and I love it here and we love all of you!
Pastor Chris’s Report: We are such a richly blessed, richly talented congregation. I also feel blessed to serve here.
Our new Arts and Environment Team continues to grow and is doing beautiful work not just in the sanctuary, but also throughout all our space.
We had lots of special services this year – one I would certainly like to do again was when we had the military speaker.
The “For Sale” sign came down in front of our building and we suddenly have a lot more weddings planned for this year.
Sue Schwedler helped me a lot this year on incorporating lay service into our worship – especially during our Lent services. We looked at how to share our Christian ways to serve God at home, at work, etc.
Befrienders – not always a very visible program, but it’s such a valuable program and it continues to grow.
I attended the ELCA Churchwide Assembly and found it very interesting. If any of you are ever asked to serve, I would strongly encourage it.
Facility Team Update - Teri Johnson – Facilities Team Leader shared: our group was meeting weekly and now meets bi-weekly. There are 8 members on our team: Teri Johnson, Chuck Johnson, Bob Johnson, Dick Halzle, Jen Besser, Greg Goeke, Renae Renstrom and Doug Cassady.
SMSQ architects have been hired. They are the leading church architectural firm in the nation and we are thrilled they were willing to work on our project. It’s very exciting each meeting to see the many options they are coming up with for us.
A General Contractor has also been hired – Langer Construction. They are going to be very involved in the whole process and their project leader for our church is going to attend all our Facilities Team planning meetings, so they always know what’s going on.
SMSQ presented some initial thoughts at meetings in April and hopefully a lot of you attended. They love the beautiful wood in our building and want to keep it and work with it. We’re still in the very preliminary planning stages, but we’ve got lots of exciting possibilities.
We want to maximize this site, and in order to do that, we have realized the project will have to be done in phases. One real goal of the new sanctuary and renovations will be to let people know we are here. Want to make it a more visible church, with a welcoming entrance so you know where to come into the church. Also, when things are going on at night, you can’t even tell if anyone is in the building – want to make it is well lit so people know there is lots of activity going on here.
If you haven’t already pledged to the Capital Appeal, I would ask you to please prayerfully consider your pledge. We will determine what we can do in which phases, by what our pledges are. So, we need everyone’s pledge.
Steering Committee Update - Chad Thomas – Steering Committee representative: We have selected Colliers Turley Martin and Tucker as our broker for the Fernbrook land, after interviewing four firms.
They were selected partly because their lead broker has been intimately involved in the area development west of our property and they know the area very well.
A “For Sale” sign is up on the property now.
Chad believes the timing is really good to bring this land to market. Maple Grove Parkway will be installed soon, along with other road changes. In addition, three other developments will be going on in the area.
We’ve had lots of conversations already with the three other brokers interviewed who were not selected, because they all have clients who are currently looking for land.
We need to be working closely with the school district, because of the land’s proximity to the schools.
Friday Chad had a meeting with Maple Grove City Staff and our broker to get everybody on the same page.
Still trying to get rid of the excess soil on the property.
Chad feel’s confident that in the next 12 months or so, we should have a contract for sale of the land. Once that happens, a purchase agreement would then be drafted and the party would have 60 days to do due diligence on the property. We would be keeping the congregation apprised of any of these things as soon as they happen, but know that if someone is interested, we will need to be moving fast. That is one thing most developers will ask when dealing with a large selling entity, such as a church, is how quickly can decisions be made.
Property will be listed on the broker’s website and also on commercial property databases.
As soon as we hear anything, we’ll keep you all posted.
A question was asked from a member – When then land is sold will that money go to pay off our debt?
Chad Thomas: Yes – land sale should pay off Fernbrook land and all existing debt on this building.
Sue Schwedler: What’s happening with the eight acres adjacent to our land? At one point we had an agreement with them – are we bound in any way to that original agreement?
Chad Thomas: We may provide a few cubic yard to them, as the friendly thing to do, but our legal counsel says we are not legally bound at all to the agreement, since we are no longer selling this building. We don’t see that agreement posing any problems. The other party is actually much closer to the sale of their land than we are.
Elections –
Todd Treml: Thanks to all outgoing Council Members for all their work.
Outgoing council members:
As you know, organization structure is changing.
Council Member Nominees
Here is the group nominated to serve on council, with staggered council terms so we don’t have big turnover every year.
Committee Chair Nominees
Steve Hanson: Pastoral Review Committee needs two at-large congregational members added this year. Doug Hum and Brad Stamas were identified by the Nominating Committee and were nominated.
Suzanne Wimer moves to accept the nominations of Doug and Brad to serve on Pastoral Review Committee. Michael Branch seconded. All are in favor.
Steve Hanson: Rick Moulton will lead the Nominating Committee next year. We need two outgoing council members to serve and also three at-large congregational members.
Tanya Peplinski: I’ve done it three times and it’s not bad! Anyone can do it.
Heidi Schwedler nominates Sue Schwedler – she accepts.
Jane Larson nominates herself.
Deb Kropp nominates Christy Stern – she accepts.
Doris Vaughn moves to accept all nominees. Jim Vaughn seconds. All are in favor.
Vote on Constitutional Changes -
Steve Hanson: We need to vote on our constitutional changes, which were shown to the congregation at the January meeting, then submitted to the Synod for approval and they have approved.
We will vote to accept the constitutional changes and then have one year to review and we will come back have vote on them again next year at this meeting. Changes don’t reflect any major changes – just keeping our constitution up-to-date with our bylaws and keeping everything current.
Lisa Hewers moved to accept the constitutional changes as submitted. Michael Branch second. All are in favor.
Newly Elected President’s Report -
Steve Hanson: Benefits of change:
Don’t worry, I won’t be running the whole show! Todd and four others will come back to council next year from this current council to guide us. Mike Eggers will go from council to lead Outreach and Jennifer Martinson will go from council to lead Parish Life.
Things that happen today on a day-to-day basis really won’t change. We just are able to focus council on strategic planning and Committees will focus on their ministry areas and we won’t have one person responsible for both of those things.
Five minutes into my term I think it’s going pretty well. I’m a brief communicator; so if you feel you need more information, please ask! We don’t want any secrecy. Todd will continue to be around also and you can always talk to either of us or any council member.
Let’s pray for our leaders and let’s pray that those from our congregation not currently involved in leadership or ministry areas get involved.
As long as we keep doing what we’re doing, we’ll get that new building. It will demonstrate to the Maple Grove Community that God is a priority to us here. We have an opportunity to make a difference, and need to take our message to the public.
New Business or Questions:
Kurt Schwedler: with the new council structure, I think you need to look at voting procedures. I know the previous council ran into e-mail/technology issues. If congregants can’t vote absentee via e-mail for congregational meetings, should council be allowed to vote via e-mail? Our by-laws were written at a time when the electronic technology we have today wasn’t available, so I urge council to look at the by-laws and decide what our e-policy on voting will be.
Bob: What’s the vote?
75 total votes:
72 yes (for all candidates)
3 no (for all candidates)
Pastor Chris closed the meeting with a prayer.
Meeting adjourned at 1:00 pm.
82 members signed in to attend the meeting.
Submitted in His service,
Shelly Halverson
MGLC Council Secretary