St. Andrew's United Methodist Church

Finance Committee

Finance Committee meets the first Tuesday of every month at 7:00 pm to 8:30pm.Lois Brighten - Chair

Finance Committee – (Church Council Chair, Lay Leader, Treasurer, Financial Secretary)

Chair Sandra Dlugosz         
Lois Brighten                          
John Clark                                          
Ann Bowman                                      
Virgil Clarkson                                  
Jim Loomis

Any member of the church has available to them the finances of the church, just contact Kathy in the office and put in a request to Lois for information.

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September 26, 2017

To: Finance Committee, St. Andrew’s United Methodist Church

Re: Examination of the Fiscal Year End 12.31.2016 Financial Statements

I have examined the financial records of St. Andrew’s United Methodist Church as of 12/31/2016. Based on the review, I believe that the Balance Sheet as of 12/31/2016 and Income Statement for the period 1/1/2016 through 12/31/2016 fairly represent the financial position of St. Andrew’s s of this date.

Sincerely,

James A. Loomis

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Kuula Fund Clarification

In 2009, John and Gloria Kuula’s estate left $480,000 to St. Andrews. One of the uses of this bequest, in 2010, was to payoff our outstanding building improvement loan with the Conference. At that time the balance owed was $108,000. The church had been making monthly payments on the loan, and many members of the congregation were making monthly donations specifically for the loan payments. After paying off the loan, most of these donations continued.

When the Finance Committee made the decision to pay the loan off, they also decided to let the monthly congregation donations continue. The purpose of continuing was to, over time, pay ourselves back the amount of the payoff, i,e, $108,000. This came to be known as the “Kuula Fund” to distinguish it from the remaining unspent, bequest money. Unfortunately, no decision was made at the time as to what the Kuula Fund would be used for. Presumably, it was to just accumulate until the $108,000 had been “paid back”.

The Finance Committee decided to discontinue paying ourselves back.

Over time many members have continued to donate but changed the designated use of their donation to the General Budget. Currently there are a few members still donating to the Kuula Fund. This fund is currently at about $35,000.

Since there had been no specific designation for the use of the Kuula Fund, the Finance Committee has used the money as a reserve fund. More specifically, at the end of the calendar year, money is transferred from the Kuula Fund to the General Budget to zero out the annual deficit and start the new year at zero. We have been running a yearly deficit for several years.

The Finance Committee plans to continue using the fund as a reserve fund and those contributing for the payback may continue to do so, recognizing that they are paying into the reserve fund not a payback ourselves fund. The Finance Committee is open to comments or suggestions.

Rich Green June 2018