2024 Midwinter Meeting Summary

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First Unitarian Church of St. Louis 
2024 Midwinter Meeting Summary
25 February 2024
held in the Sanctuary and virtually
Policy Board President Steve Wilke called the meeting called to order at 11:43 am with 73 members present in the Sanctuary and attending virtually. 
1) State of the Church- Steve Wilke

  • We now have 213 church members.  We have added 5 members in the past month, including one who signed the membership book just prior to our Midwinter Meeting!
  • Our latest Unfish Fry was a success, with 290 participants including 30 volunteers.
  • Rev. Kim Mason will be taking a sabbatical January-April 2025.  
  • The Policy Board has been working on a process to approve political actions in the church (e.g. Ballot Petitions).  Members who are interested in taking such actions should go through the appropriate committee and articulate how this action aligns with the mission and values of our church.  The committee will then make their recommendation to the Policy Board. If time is of the essence The Board can make a final decision via email as opposed to during the monthly meeting.
  • Regarding ballot petitions, signature collectors should set up in Fellowship Hall and collect signatures after the service.

2) State of the Social Action Project- Lisa Ross, Outreach and Social Action Cluster Coordinator
Lisa provided a brief history of our discernment process for developing our congregational social justice programming, beginning with the Active Hope Project last year and continuing this year with two Community Outreach and Engagement Summits held in October and January.  
At the January Summit, we discussed 5 potential organizations with whom to partner, and selected these three as worthy of greater consideration: 

A congregational vote is planned for our Annual Meeting May 19.

You can find Lisa’s complete report here: https://www.firstuustlouis.org/sites/default/files/midwinter%20meeting%20notes_summit%20update.pdf

4) State of Nominations- Margaret Weck, Chair of the Nominations and Leadership Development Committee
Margaret gave a brief overview of our church’s governance structure and announced which positions are open for next year:
POLICY BOARD:

  • President (1 yr. term expiring in 2025)
  • Vice President (1 yr. term expiring in 2025)
  • Treasurer (1 yr. term expiring in 2025)
  • Up to three Trustees (3 yr. terms, one expiring in 2026 and the other two in 2027)

CHURCH COUNCIL:

  • Growth and Engagement Cluster Coordinator (3 yr. term expiring in 2027)
  • Outreach and Social Action Cluster Coordinator (3 yr. term expiring in 2027)

You can see Margaret’s Power Point presentation here: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1gGpPd9C4rX9jyePA-j1XV20TJrV0xuECGfVFaanJ1ew/edit?usp=sharing
4) State of the Building- Tom Finan, Facilities Cluster Coordinator
Tom presented a proposal that seeks to answer the question, “What would ‘success’ look like for our First Unitarian campus in terms of optimal utilization and maximizing future funding streams?”
Last year we replaced a portion of our roof, but there are a number of other maintenance issues we have yet to address that cannot be postponed.  Tom believes that “success” for our campus demands looking beyond these maintenance issues.  He ended his presentation with the request that “Church Leadership develop a vision and plan for the future of the First Unitarian campus.” You can read the full report HERE.
5) Our final order of business was a joyous one when the First Unitarian Church of St. Louis voted upon our intent to ordain George Grimm Howell.
Respectfully submitted,
Alison Lamothe, Acting Secretary