22-cent per-capita increase proposed for 2002 budget
By John H. Adams, The Layman Online, February 20, 2001
LOUISVILLE – The per-capita support for the Office of the General Assembly and the General Assembly Council will increase by nearly 5 percent in 2002 – if the denomination’s ongoing membership decline is not reversed.
In 2002 budget year proposals presented Feb. 19 to the two elected bodies, Stated Clerk Clifton Kirkpatrick and John Detterick, executive director of the council, called for a 22-cent increase – raising the per-member apportionment to $5.20. Additional per-capita apportionments are assigned for the work of synods and presbyteries.
The 2000 General Assembly increased the per-capita by three cents, to $4.98, for the 2001 budget. The 22-cent increase for 2002 was described as needed because per-capita reserves that have underwritten operating costs in recent years will fall to 30 percent of the budget – the minimum reserve set by the denomination’s policy.
The reserves totaled $6,348,952 for the 2000 budget year, but they are expected to decline to $4,381,554 in 2002. That $4.4 million is approximately 30 percent of the projected budget of $13,553,660 in 2002.
Membership losses
The budget bases revenue projections on anticipated membership losses of about 20,000 – about the same as the past two years. When major controversies rocked the denomination in past years, however, membership losses were nearly double that number. A loss of, say, 30,000 members instead of 20,000 would reduce the revenue from the per-capita apportion by $52,000.
Another factor that could dramatically affect the budget would be a decision by church sessions not to pay their per-capita. Sessions currently are not required to pay per-capita apportionments.
The 2001 General Assembly is expected to consider an overture that would require sessions to pay their per-capita apportionments. Similar proposals have been defeated in the past as General Assembly majorities have decided that they do not want the apportionment to become a “tax.”
Controversial issues
Some issues have had a dramatic impact on how willingly sessions pay their per-capita apportionments. The 1993 ReImagining Conference, for example, resulted in a major revenue loss after Presbyterian leaders defended the denomination’s financial assistance for the conference and the participation of several women in leadership in the goddess-worship movement.
A current controversy over the denomination’s practice of showcasing non-Christian presentations at conferences may prove to be another case in point.
More than 1,500 individuals and scores of church sessions have protested a speech by the Rev. Dirk Ficca at the Presbyterian Peacemaking Conference, in which he asked, “What’s the big deal about Jesus?” Many local church leaders have indicated that if the General Assembly Council does not require its program planners to respect Scriptural standards, they will cut off funding to the denomination.