Letter to Flushing Meeting

This letter asks a small Monthly Meeting to break its cycle of dependence on trust funds and other people’s money, and take 'ownership' of its life. This would be done by each member making a substantial increase in financial commitment of themselves in addition to asking members to consciously know that they have to grow in number over a period of time.

Flushing Monthly Meeting (NYYM) is housed in a historic meetinghouse (built in 1694) with relatively large operating costs spread over its 27 members. Flushing Meeting owns large trust funds. Members do not have a direct connection to the Meeting because they feel they don’t need to or ' can't ' give of themselves in a larger monetary way.

In 2007, Flushing Meeting has successfully petitioned the City and State governments to help them with their capital improvements. This process is rife with ‘red tape’ with labor and time needed by the small number of members to accommodate government bureaucracy, which will fund the necessary long-term building projects. The hypothetical financial plan noted below does not include capital items. My letter merely deals with the operating environment which up to this time, has been funded mostly by other people’s money. (Operating Budget ~ $33,000, member contributions ~ $11,000)

QiN-Friend

6/11/2006

Dear Flushing Friends,

Thank you for the opportunity to worship with you today. My succinct message is that each member of Flushing Meeting is a part-owner of the Meeting. The Testimony of Equity, or Equality, as some call it, might say that we are all part owners of the physical assets, as well as the spiritual process in the manner of Friends. So then, the physical expenses of the Meeting are an outline for the expression of the Life, in your local community. The Quaker ‘Rule of Thirds’ is meant to allow any Friend, whether that person considers themselves ‘financial’ or not, to ‘see’ how costs are apportioned more easily than by looking at full pages of numbers, which no one really likes to do.

After some inability to hear my message right away– or mistakenly hear my portrayal of the Flushing budget as criticism - I think is due to disproportionate cost of maintaining the magnificent physical structure - the historic landmark – the meetinghouse. This is a large responsibility for a small group of people, and this responsibility does affect your Meeting life – there is no denying this. We sometimes admire those who take what life hands them cheerfully, as remarkable persons. For what are Friends thankful about the building? I drank in the scent of centuries of history today while hearing sounds of modern hurried life outside during the 4 hours I spent there. Value – priceless.

So, in effect, the life of your Meeting is affected by the cost of maintaining the meetinghouse. But the expression of the Life – as outlined in the size and apportionment of other expenses relative to the building, and relative to the number of members – need not be affected by this responsibility all at once. And Flushing Meeting cannot go on indefinitely in this mode of living on bequests and other people’s money. The alternative, make plans to end the cycle of dependence, and make definite plans to change it slowly,

My recommendations can be summed up in the following:

1. Try not to ever say, ‘we can’t do that’.
1. Getting ‘atop’ of our problems in this world is a Quaker suggestion to - think out of the box. There are solutions to problems, which are not always evident when one is enmeshed in the affairs of the Meeting. This is why it is good to have visitors from other Meetings come from time to time. (not necessarily me in this visit, per se, but visitors in general.)

2. Increase membership
1. Consciously announce as well as possible, in free and paid ways, the existence of your community, in non-partisan, Testimony-diverse ways, to the general public.

§ Website enhancement to help traffic direct to your site

§ Published Meeting phone number with voice mail and message (not someone’s home number)

§ Maintenance of the sidewalk in front of the building (weeds growing next to stone wall makes it look like it might be an old abandoned building)

§ Tasteful lighting in and on the building or sign at night

§ Outdoor tag sales / used book sales for extra income, also are outreach for new attenders

§ Classified display ads similar to http://DowntownMeeting.org in a local Queens newspaper

§ Hang a banner announcing the Meeting on the front of your Meetinghouse – ‘We’re the Quakers’

§ Hire an actor to dress in plain dress and stand in front waving an orange traffic flag into the parking lot on First days. (OK, that last one was a little off the wall).

3. Create a direct connection to the Meeting through financial giving by members and attenders that means something to the giver and to the community. Create more unity, or give occasion for more peace, through a unified vision for the mission and purpose of Flushing Meeting.

1. Create a unified Operating Budget plan over a 5 year period

i. Budgets are plans, they can be modified as time goes on. However, having a plan - a vision of mission and purpose of the Meeting, as outlined in the size and proportion of the costs - allows decisions to be made sooner than later, and more easily, with less pressure to make last minute decisions. Having a unified, approved plan allows week-to-week conflicts to be taken more in stride.

ii. Consider temporarily taking Caretaker and Utility costs out of the operating budget and placing these costs in the care of the Building Fund,

1. Until membership grows to a sufficient size to ask members to volunteer to take over the Caretaker’s duties, or to ask the larger number of members to contribute the full cost of the Caretaker and the utilities, temporarily place these costs off the operating budget. Friends would then reimburse the Building Fund each year in increasing quantities over this five year period (as membership grows and as more Friends feel moved to give more of themselves, to the unified Operating Budget which includes Nurture and Witness Costs – see below) . Each year Friends would be apprised by the Treasurer, the size of the deficit, the annual contribution to the Building Fund, over the actual costs incurred. The Meeting would consider increasing the donation, or self-rent back to the Building Fund each year to balance the Caretaker and Utility costs with the donations from the Meeting operating budget at some point.

2. Take some time and look over the Five Year (hypothetical) budget plan and use your imaginations as to what the Meeting will look like in 5 years with 20 new adult members and an operating budget of about $60,000 –80,000 per year – at which time the costs of Caretaker, Utilities, and other Administrative costs will be fully paid from member and attender contributions. (right now the annual operating budget, including the off budget funds of PSA and another, as well as the costs of Caretaker and Utilities is about $40,000, member and attender contributions are only $13,000).

iii. In light of advocating a unified budget:

1. I encourage Friends to integrate the two off-budget witness funds back into the operating budget, as well as to remove temporarily the maintenance costs above.

2. I discourage Friends from creating more earmarked, off budget funds for special witness or nurture needs of the Meeting.

a. This is an accounting slippery-slope, creates disunity in the Meeting, and more complexity for the Treasurer and Auditor, especially with the addition of more earmark funds as time goes on. Please do not go down this road any further. The unity of the Meeting, as portrayed by a circle, the integral whole should be just that, something that every member feels in unity with.

4. Thresh out during and after the expenses are re-apportioned for a five year plan, how Friends feel about giving to Flushing Meeting – the whole Meeting - building, maintenance, utilities and all – the best of their abilities – no matter what the amount given will be in relation to others. What is important – and I didn’t speak to the income side of a Meeting’s life on 6/11/06 other than to give the Clerk copies of writings from FGC on how this might be done – is that each Friend gives to the best measure of his or her ability, or the household’s ability. This might mean giving up something many times - which has profound importance in changing our community as well as us as individuals. Where the physical and spiritual worlds meet, is a remarkable faith called the Religious Society of Friends.

Again, on my visit, it was very gratifying for me to see those of you I’ve met before, and to meet those whom I haven’t.

God Bless.

QiN-Friend

			2005	2006	2007	2008	2009	2010	2011
Flushing Meeting Expense Projection
	Adult Members		27	28	30	35	40	45	52
	Member Contributions		$11,000	$11,500	$12,400	$20,700	$32,700	$47,500	$55,000
	Avg. Member Contrib.***		$407	$411	$413	$591	$818	$1,056	$1,058
	Attender Contributions		$2,000	$2,500	$3,000	$4,000	$5,000	$6,000	$7,000
	Investment Income*		$6,300	$10,000	$8,000	$7,000	$7,000	$6,000	$6,000
	Other Income**		$500	$500	$500	$2,500	$4,000	$4,000	$4,000
	Total Income		$19,800	$24,500	$23,900	$34,200	$48,700	$63,500	$72,000
	Total Operating Expense		$35,750	$39,750	$23,900	$34,200	$48,700	$63,500	$72,000
			2005	2006	2007	2008	2009	2010	2011

* Investment income will go down due to draw down of building fund to pay for Caretaker and Utilities Insurance, etc in the transition period when member contributions do not equal expenses. During this transition period, these costs will be removed from the operating budget. In 2012 the costs of operating the building will be integrated back into the operating budget and the investment income will go up again.

** Book Sales, Bake Sales, Tag Sales, Event Sales

*** Average Member Annual Contribution will go from $407 in 2005 to $1,056 in 2011. Each member will have more reason to give to the Meeting due to the more integral proportion of expense in the operating budget. This concept of member equity participation, or ownership should enhance members and attenders desire to give. By 2011, a larger number of members will be able to support a self-sufficient operating budget.

Wider B.	NYYM Payment		2,500	3,500	4,000	6,000	10,000	13,000	17,000
	NYQM Payment		200	200	500	1,000	1,500	3,000	4,000
Total QM/YM			$2,700	$3,700	$4,500	$7,000	$11,500	$16,000	$21,000

Building/Admin
Operating Expenses					15,000	20,000	28,000	34,000	30,000
	Labor		17,000	18,000	0	0	0	0	0
	Utilities		14,800	16,800	0	0	0	0	0
Capital Expense
Finance Exp.
	Treasurer				200	200	200	200	200
	Insurance				200	200	200	200	200
Clerk's Exp
	Newsletter		400	400	200	200	200	400	400
	Directory
	Web Site				600	200	200	200	200
Total Building/Admin			$32,200	$35,200	$16,200	$20,800	$28,800	$35,000	$31,000
			2005	2006	2007	2008	2009	2010	2011

Witness	Queens Homeless				200	500	500	1,000	1,500
	Counter Recruiting				200	500	500	1,000	1,500
	Protest March				100	200	200	1,000	1,500
	Meals on Wheels				300	500	500	500	1,000
	PSA		500	500	700	700	1,500	1,500	2,500
	AVP				200	500	1,000	1,000	2,000
Total Witness			$500	$500	$1,700	$2,900	$4,200	$6,000	$10,000
Nurture	Religious Ed.		100	100	400	800	800	1,200	2,500
	Quaker 101				100		200		500
	Advancement/Outreach		250	250	600	1000	1000	1500	1500
	Fair
	Library					400	400	800	1000
	Hospitality				400	800	800	1000	1500
	M&O					500	1000	2000	3000
Total Nurture			$350	$350	$1,500	$3,500	$4,200	$6,500	$10,000