| Conference settles into new center By Erik AlsgaardUMCONNECTION STAFF The staff and employees of the Baltimore-Washington Conference have settled into a new conference center, located about three miles from the previous one. Thats the easy part. The hard part, if congregations do not support connectional ministry and mission at the anticipated 100 percent level, might be paying for the unanticipated expenses of providing a new, healthy working environment for the more than 50 people who work at the conference center.  Theres no money in the budget for the expenditures of the conference move and building-out the new center, said the Rev. Byron Brought, chairman of the Conference Council on Finance and Administration. We need congregations to be faithful to the budget that they adopted last year and pay their apportionments at 100 percent. If we do that, well be all right.
Conference leadership, including Bishop Felton Edwin May, CFA and the board of trustees, have been meeting since the situation began last November, searching for a resolution to problems that have plagued the conference center for nine months. Our number one concern, right from the start, has been the health and welfare of the conference staff, said Brought. It has been our goal to provide healthy working conditions for staff and any visitors that may come to the conference center. The previous conference center, at 9720 Patuxent Woods Drive, was discovered to have mold lacing the building just before Thanksgiving. Staff and employees moved quickly to vacate the building, moving across the parking lot to offices at 9730 Patuxent Woods Drive. CFA and the trustees determined that returning to the 9720 building would seriously cripple the staffs ability to carry out ministry. Returning was not an option, said Thomas Starnes, an attorney working for the conference, because many people on the staff feared the building would have a continuing negative impact on their health. In a report given at the meeting, he noted, A significant percentage of the Conference staff would never have accepted returning to the old building. If the Conference had insisted on that course, many of the staff might simply have quit. The conference, however, was bound to a lease on the 9720 building that does not expire until 2006. CFA and the trustees determined the best course of action for the conference was to terminate the lease and pay the landlord, Nottingham, Inc., a severance settlement. We have gone through the process with care and integrity, said Brought. Weve met jointly with the trustees, with legal counsel. This whole process has been properly done. The trustees and CFA agreed to pay $219,000 to terminate the lease early. If the conference were to have paid the remaining three years on the lease, it would have cost $1.5 million, according to Starnes. CFA authorized spending $400,000 of reserves to cover costs of the move and remediation efforts at a meeting this summer. However, by conference policy, the conference reserves must equal 15 percent of the conference budget. The conference reserves, as of August 7, were at $1.1 million. The conference budget is set by annual conference every year, and is $15 million for 2003. For every dollar placed in a United Methodist offering plate, 83.2 cents stay in the local church, 12.8 cents are used for Jurisdictions, Annual Conference and District support, and 4 cents go to support general church and United Methodist Womens ministries. No new monies are being asked for, said Bishop Felton Edwin May. All were asking is for churches to be faithful to the 2003 apportionments. The expenditure of these monies was necessary to provide a safe and healthy working environment for our staff. It was done in good faith that the churches will respond to this extraordinary situation. The conference has already provided $500,000 from operating and reserve line items for the move and related costs, the bishop said. The trustees have begun the process of selling a piece of property the conference owns, located on Varnum St., NW, in Washington. That property was the parsonage for the Washington-Columbia District and is being sold as the new superintendent, receives a housing allowance. The trustees also expect to receive money from the sale of the St. Paul Christian Center in Baltimore. Those funds, combined, are expected to total $800,000. The trustees voted to use the money to re-supply the reserve fund, with full faith that local congregations would continue to support the ongoing ministries of their conference. | 
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