Deacon Meeting Minutes

Westminster Presbyterian Church

June 27, 2004

7 PM, Room 105 

Moderator Shayne Ruffing called the meeting to order at 7:00PM.  Attending were Elena Cleary, Dan Milam, Bill Scott, Mickey Herrin, Jim Tatum, Scott McLeod, Dana Lange, Barbara Rynerson, Mitch Dozier, Morris Griffin, Betty Berghaus, Sara Pottenger, Carol Cunningham. 

Scott opened with a prayer.   

The celebration of Volunteer Sunday was noted and thanks offered to organizer Doug Wellemeyer (in absentia). 

Approval of the minutes of the April and May meetings was deferred as they have not been received. 

Linda Parker, from NCCU Presbyterian Campus Ministries, was introduced.  She outlined a program she is organizing called Peer Ministry.  This program seeks to match dropouts from the Durham schools, and especially single mothers, with NCCU students, who will act as counselors and mentors and help them work toward GEDs.  She seeks funding for computers, software for the academic materials and on-campus space for the tutorial and counseling sessions.  She has approached African-American churches and all of the churches in the presbytery for funding.  She mentioned that Doreen Palermo from WPC has been working with her to help get this program going.  A motion was made and approved to provide her organization a cash gift of $200, and the offer to try to get some reconditioned hardware for her; further, we stated our intent to send the message that we are very interested in her efforts and that we want to gather more information about the program to perhaps provide more funding as the program gains momentum. 

Shayne reported Rebecca M-M’s announcement that the Hyde County effort by the WPC youth raised $18,928, and with a matching gift of $10,000, was nearly at its $30,000 goal.  Go Youth!

 Barbara Rynerson reported no benevolence requests for our consideration. 

Sara Pottenger relayed the Mission Focus committee request that the Deacons donate some personal funds for a themed basket for IHN’s Sept 11^th fundraising gala.  The Deacons responded that they would prefer that this donation request be taken up at the joint meeting of the Deaconate and the Session on July 11^th to allow the Elders the opportunity to participate.  Shayne will make sure this gets put on the advance agenda of that meeting so that all will be prepared for this request. 

Elena Cleary reported that Terry Allred from DCRC had made several presentations to various groups within the church, including Stephen ministers and Sunday School classes, about domestic abuse and violence.  Both talks were well-received.   

Shayne reviewed the calendar for the summer including the called joint meeting of the Session and the Deaconate on July 11^th at noon.  After considerable discussion, a plan was made to have the Deaconate budget meeting after the called meeting on July 11^th, to begin about 2 PM.  Let the fun begin!!  All agency liaisons should review the WPC benevolence budget and their agency’s funding therein, to determine if that amount is appropriate for the coming year.  Do your homework, folks; we’ll get out of there a lot faster!!   

Finally, Shayne invited us to a shin-dig at the Ruffing residence on 8/21.  Actually, this lovely invitation is extended to the old and new deaconate and will be a celebration of the past year and the “proper” welcoming of the new deacons. Directions and engraved invitations with further party information will follow.  

A motion was made and approved to use Deacon Discretionary Funds up to $510 to pay for 10 books of DATA bus passes to distribute to our four Mission Focus agencies as our July benevolence.  Barbara will include our intent to purchase these in the Deacon’s Corner and the invitation for others to participate in this effort as she does for each monthly collection item, but in recognition of the difficulty of collecting these funds as part of our monthly benevolence, the approval of this money for this use was deemed appropriate. 

As an aside, Elena described the Sunday nursery needs as acute and the plea was made for assistance.  Suggestions were advanced that strong effort should be made to sign up parents who use the nursery and should be attempted on Sunday mornings when parents are dropping off their children.   

Mickey offered a closing prayer.  The meeting was adjourned at 8:45.  

Respectfully submitted,  

Sara T Pottenger

Substitute Scribe 

Some budget information from Shayne is attached for your  review before the July 11^th budget meeting.