Hello All Peoples!
I am — as you surely know by now, Deborah Novgorodoff, President of the Board of Trustees (for about 2 more hours!). Following this meeting, this our Spring Congregational meeting, the new Board will vote in its new President and Vice-President. I can tell you that the current Board enthusiastically endorses Alan Godsave for its next President, and I will let Alan tell you about the next Vice-President.
Today I am charged with giving you a brief recap of our past year, and what a year it’s been. This is our third year of interim ministry and we have accomplished a lot in this time. In fact, I sincerely thank you all for hanging in here through a period of considerable change. I also thank this Board of Trustees who has been simply amazing. They show up, they come prepared, they are engaged and smart and an inspiration. Thank you BOT! And I thank Alan Godsave for his support as the VP of the Board. I could not have wished for a better partner over the past year and a half. Jane Gross and I leave the Board this year, and we hope that you will vote in the nominees to replace us.
What have we accomplished together?
We have called our new settled minister! Yay! We are all excited by the choice of Rev. Bruce Beisner and we look forward to his arrival in August. I want to share with you a small but kind of important fact about that vote … remember last week’s nearly unanimous vote to call Rev. Bruce? Because we hadn’t had the practice vote we usually hold, Bernie double-checked the results and discovered that one person mistakenly voted yes and no. He called that person and confirmed that they intended to vote yes. So in fact we had a unanimous vote for Rev. Bruce! We are very grateful to the Search Committee who worked so hard for well over a year on the job of bringing us Rev. Bruce as our candidate for our settled minister. The team consists of Rick McChane, Hope Howell, Jean Koehler, Dawn Moretz, Dennis Neyman, Rob Kingsolver and Cedric Saunders. Today, I present this team with the President’s Award in deep appreciation for all they have done for us.
What else have we done this year? We have overhauled our bylaws and accepted these in a January Congregational meeting. This same team has turned to the Policy manual and is working its way through these revisions as we speak. It’s an arduous task. This team consists of Lori Sargent, Jon Henney, Paula Kingsolver, and Bernie Novgorodoff. This is much needed and outstanding work being accomplished by the Bylaws/Policy team and for this, I want to present these four individuals the Unsung Hero award today. Thank you Lori, Jon, Paula and Bernie.
The third award the President gives at this time of year is the Volunteer of the Year award. Oh my gosh there are so many people deserving of this – Lori and Steve Sargent for all of the work they have done on our buildings! Lesley Henney for her dedication and service on the SJC, JCC and now KUUJAN. And many more. But the person who stands out to me for this award this year is Ellen Wade. Ellen works so hard on our rentals, along with Wanda Ferrell. In fact, Ellen secured a commitment with the Gathering Club for Adult Daycare which – when COVID and the Commonwealth of KY allows – will substantially add to our income. Ellen, along with Jim Kidwell, secured a grant of over $23,000 for the security of our building from Homeland Security. You’ll see those changes implemented soon. She has served this year on the Name Change, the logo, and the Reopening Task Forces. She is a mover and shaker on Promotions – working tirelessly on our website and our Facebook page. AND she has subbed in the office in the past couple of weeks! The woman is a force of nature, we are grateful to her for all that she does and just hope that we feed her as much as she gives to us. Ellen Wade – our volunteer of the year!
Wait wait, there’s more to list in the way of accomplishments! We adopted a new covenant in order to lift up our own right relations as we work toward growing a beloved community here at All Peoples. Oh yes, and we changed our name to All Peoples from Thomas Jefferson Unitarian. This is part of our journey of exploring racial justice and our own role in seeking justice. We look forward to taking up the 8th principle this coming year as we further explore what it means to be a loving, just and diverse community. We are finalizing our first year of our Welcoming Congregation Renewal and already planning for next year’s recognition. Thank you, Rhonda Barnett, Lesley Henney and Ellen Wade for heading this up. Oops, I forgot to mention that Ellen served on this team as well!
With Rev. Dawn Cooley at the helm, this church took the lead in establishing the KY UU Action Network, or KUUJAN which brings together UUs from all over our state to work toward justice. We become the 23rd state to have a UU justice action network and we can look forward to the things we will accomplish, stronger together.
In the midst of a pandemic, you (the congregation) were asked to give financially even more, and you did. The goal of this year’s stewardship program was to meet a 9% proposed budget increase over 2021. We reached 95% of that goal. Pledges total $294,880. That is outstanding. You are outstanding.
We have met for coffee chats and happy hour virtually, 5 days a week for a full year now. We’ve had many enlightening discussions, and a year of informative, inspiring and entertaining speakers on our Wednesday chats. I thank Donna Riebel, Jane Gross and Martha Flack in joining with me to lead these chats.
And we’ve done all of this in a year of pandemic. In fact, we learned how to do church in this year of pandemic, meeting by Zoom on Sundays, upgrading our AV capabilities, and conducting chalice circles and committee meetings virtually. And gratefully, as a community, we have by and large stayed safe this year. There is much to be thankful for.
While we celebrate our journey, we need to begin to bid Rev. Kathy farewell. She has loved us, supported us, guided us. To have done all of this without her is unimaginable. Kathy, thank you, from all of us.
As I hand the metaphorical (and real) keys over to Alan as the next President of the Board, I have a personal thank you. This community has given me purpose during a hopefully once-in-a-lifetime pandemic. While it’s not always been easy, it is overall joyful and rewarding work. I have felt supported and loved by you, and I thank you for being an important part of All Peoples.