We have completed the first quarter of our fiscal year. The good news is we ended that quarter in the black by approximately $5,000. That said, it should be recognized that we achieved this in large part by having received the first half ($20,000) of the Endowment Grant Available Distributable Amount (ADA) at the beginning of the year. But we also paid down a utility debt held over from last year, and some significant costs associated with the change in administrators.

Income from your annual pledges appears off to a somewhat weaker start in the first quarter of this fiscal year than in the first quarter of last year. While no two years are identical, and it is really too soon to be predictive, I encourage you to keep them coming. As someone who has yet to adopt automatic withdrawal methods to make my donations, I must say that from a bookkeeping point of view it is really helpful to be able to count on a regular income stream. My thank you to those of you that already use automatic payments of one form or another.

To those of you who attended our recent discussion workshop on how best to resolve the unfunded income line 143 in this year’s budget, I hope it felt like a success. From my perspective I appreciate that we all generally kept our cool. I heard a lot of earnest questions and thoughtful perspectives. I hope the Board/FinCom team was able answer them sufficiently. Know that I will do my best to respond to questions and requests from you at treasurer@rvuuf.org at any time. I hope you can all attend the next discussion on Nov. 2. Together we will find a best way forward.

I need to give another shout out of gratitude here to Joe Martone for leading the Finance Committee for the many years he has done so. He has provided much more to the financial accountability and record keeping of our church than I suspect most of you (and I, as a newbie) are aware. His leadership is already missed, and his continuing to lead from behind has proven itself crucial. We will let you retire eventually, Joe.

In fellowship,

Tom Ferrel, Treasurer