Detterick ‘concerned’ about the budget
The Layman Online, September 26, 2001
TEMPE, ARIZ.– John Detterick, executive director of the General Assembly Council, applauded the council’s budget planning process, but expressed concern that it may be irrelevant to new realities facing the church and nation.
“We have an improved budget planning process that is underway,” Detterick told the council’s executive committee Sept. 26. He said the council, at this meeting, will be thinking about the key priorities of the 2003 budget, and a budget proposal for 2003 will be presented at the 2002 February council meeting.
“Given what has happened to this country, I am concerned,” he said. “We are in an unstable environment in several respects.”
Detterick said it will be very difficult in January 2002 to predict what will happen in January 2003. He said he would like to change the budgeting process so that major decisions would not be made so far in advance.
“As we come together in February, we need to continue to be aware of what is happening in the nation,” he said.
Detterick also gave an update on the prioritization process that the council initiated last September. The 2002 budget was based on that process, he said.
The council’s rationale in setting priorities was that it would reallocate scarce mission dollars toward those programs that received the highest priority ratings. But when several of the denomination’s social activist programs – the Washington lobby, for example – received low ratings, staff planners decided not to terminate them. Instead, they shuffled the deck, attaching unpopular programs to popular ones in a dollar-sharing scheme.
Detterick highlighted a new partnership between Church and Society Magazine and the office of Theology and Worship as an example of priority adjustments that had been instituted. Church and Society, a low-priority publication that focuses on political and social issues, has made changes in some of its future topics. The last issue of 2001 will focus on evangelism and justice, and the first issue of the new year will focus on racial-ethnic evangelism and church growth.
In both cases, Detterick said, there is an “emphasis on evangelism that had not been scheduled.”
Another partnership, called “Enough for Everyone,” is being forged between the National Ministries Division and the Worldwide Ministries Division. This program includes two thrusts, The Presbyterian Coffee Project and “Sweat Free Ts.” The coffee project identifies sources of coffee grown in environments “that are responsive to the needs of people who do the work.” Detterick said denominational agencies have published a list of coffee companies that “reflect the church’s commitment to the world.” He said more than 200 churches are purchasing coffee from companies that are on the list.
“Sweat Free Ts” is a campaign to force improvements in wage and labor conditions among international “sweat shops.” Among companies that have been targeted by several international “sweat shop” campaigns is Wal-Mart, whose stores purchase merchandise that is manufactured in low-wage areas of the world. The company’s Helen Walton is a major benefactor of the Presbyterian Church (USA).