The Congregation Board

Written by  Rev. David Clark

I hope it will be helpful to describe our new Congregational Board and how it works. After all, this is the body set up to oversee St. Andrew’s Kirk’s ‘temporal affairs’ – usually understood to mean the finance and property

matters. This means that our Board has responsibility for substantial capital reserves, an annual ‘turnover’ of about £250,000, two church buildings, two suites of halls, two manses and various other properties. So it is important that the congregation at large is fully informed about how the Board is set up and does its work.

Our Board was set up at the congregational meeting on 4 September when we agreed that the Board would have 18 elders, appointed by the Kirk Session, and 17 non-elders elected by the congregation. The Constitution requires us always to have more elders than elected members. George Vidits and I are also members and it was agreed that I would act as the first chairman of the Board, while George is moderator of the Kirk Session. David Mitchell was appointed Clerk to the Board, with Douglas Sammon as Depute Clerk.

At our first Board meeting on 7 September we approved a Practice and Procedure document which provides both structure and working patterns. We will meet at least four times every year. There are three permanent committees (Financial Administration, Christian Stewardship, Property and Maintenance) and we also set up a special committee (Buildings Development) to take forward our plans for the new halls alongside and linked to the church. We are already making progress on this matter and on 26 October we agreed a detailed brief to guide our selected architect in his design of the new premises, with an indication that the project should be contained within a maximum of £1.75m. Clearly, this development is going to be the focus of much of our energy and fundraising over the first years of St. Andrew’s Kirk and all members of the congregation will be asked to get involved with their time, talents and money to bring the project to fruition as a real asset to church and community.

The following members comprise the Congregational Board, listed according to the four committees (* indicates elder appointed by Kirk Session) :