The new 2024-25 Board of Trustees met Tuesday, July 9, 2024 for its first monthly meeting of the new fiscal year. Going forward this congregational year, monthly Good Governance posts (like the one below), will include personal, spiritual, and relational perspectives of Board members about the ongoing work of the Board. Thank you to UUCC’s Congregational President Laurie Coltri for sharing this month to get us going.
If you’d like to view recaps of topics discussed at monthly Board meetings, you can find meeting minutes on UUCC’s website as they become available.
At the first meeting of UUCC’s 2024-25 Board of Trustees on July 9, we excitedly welcomed three new Board members. UUCC is fortunate to be adding a past Board president, in Steve Parr (2nd Vice President); a past UUCC bookkeeper with amazing institutional memory, in Lorien Haavik (Treasurer); and a compassionate activist who can bring us perspectives we’ve been sorely missing, in Alex Horn (our very first Youth Trustee).
In our first session, we got to know each other a little better, and we learned a little about how a UUCC Board meeting works. We followed that introduction with a more detailed nuts and bolts orientation on July 15.
In August, the Board will greet our new Interim Minister, the Rev. Lisa Bovee Kemper; and on August 10 we will meet in retreat, as we do every year, to set a vision for the upcoming year. We are eager to get input from Rev. Lisa — helping congregations orient positively to change is her specialty. I, as your President, am very optimistic and excited about the direction and collective work we will take this upcoming year. My positivity is due to the above-and-beyond-hard work of the Interim Search Committee (Regina Verow, Meagan Lopes, and Becky Reese) in preparing for and selecting an Interim Minister; to Valerie Hsu (our intrepid Executive Director), without whose support the transition would not be possible; and to our paid staff: Michael Adcock, Kelli Danaker, Sara Davidson, and Hannah Nelson. Plus Linda Adcox-Kimmel, who volunteers in the office! And of course, to the Rev. Paige Getty, who embodied love in action as our minister, and left us in a good place. And to all our volunteers, too numerous to name. Showers of gratitude, UUCC!
One important thing to know is that UUCC’s Board meetings are OPEN — any person in the UUCC community can observe the proceedings.* The Board is responsible to YOU, the congregation, to uphold our shared values and mission, so we’d like our board to specialize in open communication! The Board meets regularly at 6:30PM every 2nd Tuesday of each month. You can see information about upcoming meetings in the online events calendar. You can also talk to us after worship at the Board Corner — located at the small table in a corner of Sanctuary B on Sundays during social hour.
Finally a few “housekeeping” notes: We will continue to offer a Good Governance blogpost once a month. Rather than just list what we did at our meeting, which is also set out in the minutes, each blog will give a sense of what the Board is focused on, featuring the personal, spiritual, and relational perspectives of its author about the ongoing work of the Board.
Each month’s board minutes are formally adopted at the subsequent month’s meeting. We also formally approve an incidentals report (what’s going on, from the perspective of the Executive Team) and a treasurer’s report covering up to two months prior to the meeting (for example, at the August regular board meeting we will approve a Treasurer’s Report covering the period ending June 30). These documents, plus board agendas, are linked from the Board webpage: uucolumbia.net/governance/board.
In anticipation of an exciting, challenging, and vibrant year to come — yours, Laurie Coltri
* Once in awhile, we do have to go into “Executive Session” to discuss an especially sensitive matter.
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