On Pledge Sunday, October 8, 2023, Rev. Kathleen Rolenz delivered a sermon called Let Hope Become Courage, the theme of Unity's fall pledge drive. With this issue of Board Walk and Talk, your trustees want to urge everyone to participate in this pledge drive to help ensure Unity Church is financially well positioned for the arrival of our new settled minister who is slated to start in August of 2024. 

To prepare the 2024 budget for approval at the November annual meeting, the Executive Team needs to know your pledge amounts and allocations as soon as possible!

Our HOPE for the future means making COURAGEOUS choices today.

We have three asks of you: 

1. For those who already pledge, please consider whether you have the financial capacity to give more than you had originally planned. If you have already pledged, upward adjustments will be graciously accepted!    

For those of you who do not make a pledge and benefit from Unity’s faith-based programming -- whether you sing in the choir, attend chalice circles, participate in religious and adult education program -- please consider making a pledge of any amount that fits your budget and your engagement with the congregation.

Need a framework for considering your pledge? Please see our Giving Guide that outlines levels of giving based on annual income.

2. If you are someone who contributes to both our operating and capital budgets, we request that you allocate 85% of your giving to the operating budget, and 15% to capital. We have sufficient capital reserves to cover both our long-term debt (to be paid in full by the end of 2026) and several projects planned for the next few years with a 15% allocation to capital. If everyone who gives money to the capital budget were to make this shift in allocation, it would add $75,000 to next year’s operating budget. If you have already pledged and would like to change your allocation, let Barbara or Song know.

3. Attend Bagels & Budgets with Barbara on Sunday, November 12, between services (10:15-11:15 a.m.) in the Center Room. Barbara plans to retire in spring, so this will be your last chance to hear her share the stories behind the numbers! It will also be an opportunity for you to get your questions answered.

The why behind the asks:

Wage Justice for Unity’s Staff          

Staff salaries are the largest expense in our budget at 70 percent. We are blessed with a dedicated and talented staff who embody generosity of spirit in a myriad of ways. The pandemic and interim years asked a lot of them, and they met the challenges with creativity and grace.

For the past 25 years, we have compensated employees based on a national church salary survey. In late 2022, the UUA introduced new compensation guidelines for staff at all levels, and the difference between these two pay scales is significant. We are in search for a UU minister who is looking at other UU congregations offering salary within these guidelines and Unity will be doing the same. Therefore, it is imperative that we work to have all staff compensated using the same standards of equity.

Unity's leadership has made a multi-year commitment to move all staff salaries to these new, equitable levels. We need your support to make this real. The goal for 2024 (year one) is to move all staff to 85% of the UUA’s minimum range, which will require $200,000 more in pledges. The longer term goal is to compensate everyone at the mid-point range in the coming years. This is Unity living out its values through fair compensation to the people who work to provide so much of what Unity means to each of us, day in and day out.

As Rev. Kathleen Rolenz said in her sermon, we are a generous congregation giving away over $100,000 each year to like-minded organizations. Please do not wait until the October 31 deadline to make your pledge. We ask that you let us know how much you intend to pledge as soon as possible, and to give as generously as you are able, so we can acknowledge our staff with more equitable compensation. Together let’s turn hope into courage.

Unity Church-Unitarian | 651-228-1456 | unity@unityunitarian.org

www.unityunitarian.org