 Issue 36: February 2007, Page 3< Page 2 | Table of Contents | Page 4 > UUA Trustee’s ReportJohn Blevins General AssemblyIf you’ve ever considered going to General Assembly, this would be a great year to move beyond consideration — and GO! Why? A grand experiment in member involvement will be carried out. Plenary meeting time is reduced dramatically to make room for several sessions of facilitated “Open Space” time to identify your dreams for our movement. This is a special time for you to be heard in new ways. Your gathered dreams will guide the UUA Board in its work to allocate our resources to your visions. My dream is that EVERY Prairie Star congregation will have at least one delegate there. Portland, Oregon, June 20-24. See http://www.uua.org/ga/ for all the scoop.On top of this, where else will you find Daniel Ellsberg, former Senator Mike Gravel (Pentagon Papers), Rashid Khalidi (The Iron Cage, and Resurrecting Empire), Ben Cohen (Ben & Jerry’s), Amy Goodman (Democracy Now), Kathleen Norris (Dakota and Amazing Grace), Welton Gaddy (Interfaith Alliance) and Barry Lynn (Americans United) on the same dais? And on top of all that, one of our PSD congregations has been selected as a 2007 Breakthrough Congregation, and will present their story at GA. UUA Health PlanThe long awaited (and self-funded) UUA Health Plan for church employees came to life on January 1, 2007. WOW! Just under 600 persons are now enrolled. Prairie Star resident Kathryn Burek of our Fridley, MN congregations has been elected as a Trustee of the plan (from a very strong slate of candidates from across the country). Congratulations and our appreciation are both due to Kathy. UUA GovernanceThe UUA Board has been increasingly engaging in moving the Association toward a new form of governance. To that end, a new “working group” on governance was formed at our January meeting to guide this transition. I am serving on this group. We are moving toward our own variant of “Policy Governance”, and are targeting to synchronize the major part of the transition with the induction of the next President of the UUA (2009). Election of Next UUA PresidentIncredibly, Rev. Bill Sinkford’s remarkable time as our President will end in 2009, and candidates to seek the office are already exploring the path. By By-laws they may not publicly raise money until the end of GA 2008. To support our democratic process, the UUA Board is seeking ways to reduce the personal costs of running for office, and to allow all viable candidates to get in front of you, the delegates. To this end the members of the Board covenanted with each other in January to do no public endorsement of candidates, nor to do fund raising for candidates, until after the 2008 GA. In addition, we plan to host a “public forum” of all known candidates at GA 2008, which will be streamed live over the internet. Youth Ministry SummitThe Summit, which will gather in July 2007, will bring together a diverse group of youth and youth leaders to decide how the Association will respond to all the learnings from the surveys and conversations that many of you have been engaged in this past year. Read more about it at http://www.uua.org/TRUS/youth/ Minneapolis 2010 General Assembly — CancelledTo our great disappointment, the plan to host GA in the Twin Cities in 2010 has been cancelled. With potential labor disputes, as several hotel employees' unions renegotiate contracts in the Spring of 2010, we faced the risk of having to cross picket lines to enter our convention space. Many, many UUs will NOT cross picket lines. The GA Planning Committee is already seeking a date in a later year, but it now appears that we will have to go out several more years to find another date. See you in Minneapolis on April 13th, at the Prairie Star District Annual Meeting and Conference. They’ve got more great plans afoot! Thanks for all you do! Midwest Leadership SchoolExperience a whole new level of Unitarian Universalism! Leadership School is an intensive week of workshops, discussion groups, interactions, and fun with UU peers. July 21–28, 2007 |