28 workers will lose jobs under plan approved by GAC panel

by Jerry L. Van Marter, Presbyterian News Service
[5-13-04]

LOUISVILLE -- May 7, 2004 -- The executive committee of the General Assembly Council (GAC) has approved a 2005-2006 budget-cutting plan that will cost 28 employees at the Presbyterian Center their jobs.

The plan also outlines new work to be undertaken by the GAC, especially in the areas of communication, mission funding and support for connections between Presbyterians and worldwide mission partners.

The plan was approved as developed by senior GAC staff. No changes were proposed by the executive committee, which is meeting at Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary May 7-8.

The spending plan permanently reduces the General Assembly's two-year mission budget by $4.6 million, to $114.4 million.

"We've worked very hard with lots of sweat and tears," GAC Executive Director John Detterick said of the plan. "It's a quality product … especially because of the work you've done on the Mission Work Plan."

That plan, adopted by the council in February, establishes four priorities -- evangelism and witness, justice and compassion, spirituality and discipleship, and leadership and vocation -- and 24 specific objectives, for the council's work. Staff leaders said their budget decisions were made in keeping with those objectives.

In proposing the elimination of the leader-development office in the Congregational Ministries Division, for instance, Director Don Campbell said: "Six of the seven leadership objectives addressed ministers, so we had to look at lay leader development. Perhaps in the next cycle the needs and objectives will change."

The most hotly debated proposal was the elimination of women's ministries staff deployed in synods, which saved eight positions and $487,000.

Although no motion was made to reverse the cut, GAC member Emily Wigger raised a number of issues related to the proposal. Wigger, who has been active in women's ministries in the Presbyterian Church (USA) for more than 40 years, contended that "the women's staff in the synods has been the most effective means of communication the church has had."

"When you put (their elimination) beside our expressed desire to improve our communication, I ask ''What have we learned?'" she said.

Wigger particularly opposed a draft plan presented by National Ministries Division Director Curtis Kearns that would separate Presbyterian Women (PW) and women's ministries in NMD's management structure, placing PW within his office and leaving women's ministries in the justice area. "Since reunion, we've been very intentional about putting all of our ministries with women under one umbrella," Wigger said. "This feels like a divide-and-conquer strategy."

Kearns replied that Presbyterian Women, as an autonomous organization, is a different kind of entity. He said his desire is to spread the management responsibility around the division, and said the justice area is already heavily loaded.

Wigger's motion that PW and women's ministries both be located in the justice area was defeated, as was her subsequent motion to require that they be put together somewhere in NMD's structure. After voting "no" on the overall budget plan, Wigger said, "I acknowledge the priorities and objectives, but felt compelled to vote ''no' because of my commitment to women and to justice."

Kearns said final decisions on the structure of NMD have not been made, adding, "I hear the concerns about Women's Ministries and Presbyterian Women, loud and clear."

Detterick told the committee: "Some may read about this vote and interpret it as a vote against Presbyterian Women and Women's Ministries. I assure you that is not the case. We will do everything we can to move forward to find new ways to do those ministries and to support them."

A list of the 28 national staff members who have lost their jobs and their years of service to the PC(USA) will be published by the Presbyterian News Service on May 10.