The following is the final fifth segment of a debate between presidential candidates Rev. Dr. Laurel Hallman and Rev. Peter Morales that took place at Eliot Chapel at the Boston headquarters of the UUA on January 15, 2009.
The full transcript is taken from their site http://www.uua.org/aboutus/governance/elections/president/128768.shtml which also hosts the linked audio versions.
UUA board secretary Paul Rickter introduced the event explaining that from 33 questions brought up by board members five subjects had been selected for this 90 minute event. (Read his full introduction in the original transcript).
Link to original audio at UUA.org: UU Polity
Rickter: We’re ready to go onto the final segment which is UU Polity, which will be moderated by Eva Marx.
Eva Marx: Thank you. Hello Peter and hello Laurel. I am going to be asking some questions about things that have not, that don’t really fall under policy governance as we’ve been talking about it now, and I’d like to start with the General Assembly Planning Committee which, as you know, is an elected body and certainly not in keeping with the kind of polity that we would visualize with policy governance. So how would you interpret the President’s relationship to the GA Planning Committee? And would you intend to continue an entity similar to what is now the General Assembly and Mission of the Association Partnership which is a group that represents the administration, the Board and the Planning Committee and that convenes regularly to discuss overarching issues? So my question is how do you plan to relate to the Planning Committee?
Hallman: Well, I certainly think it doesn’t fit the policy governance model that we’re moving into. And it would take some time to morph, I guess, into a new way of running GA. And I would want to hear the Fifth Principle Taskforce report before I’d make a specific decision about that. But, generally knowing what I know about governance and what I think I know about GA, I believe it should become a staff function and should not be an elected… and this is actually a perfect example of a committee that’s made up of people from all the different parts which, in fact, then changes the clarity of accountability and mission. And so I would, just from what I know now, say that the General Assembly Planning Committee or the actual General Assembly falls under the staff side. You can have ends from the Board about what you want to have accomplished there, but it is implemented by staff. That’s not to say not professional people, but the accountability would be on the staff side.
Morales: It’s a lot less fun when we agree. [LAUGHTER] But I have no substantive … let me add a couple of things. One of the things that’s a real challenge for us, as a culture, as a movement, as the UUA is recognizing that something exists that probably doesn’t make a lot of sense and then talking about it for decades. [laughter] And that will not serve us. And this is actually probably not the most important one.
In my darker moments when I was director of district services, some of you have heard me say this, I said that if you hired a management consultant and they proposed our current district structure with its funding you could sue them for malpractice and win. [laughter] And win. It’s sort of an accident that happened some years back, and I’m looking at Harlan, he’ll corroborate this, if you haven’t explained the funding in a week, you have to go back to your notes, even if you’re director of district services. It is so Byzantine and it’s a money laundering operation where, you know, the districts send money over here, then we send it back and they send it over here so we can pay the stuff. And the formula changes with every district. That’s one. The size of this Board makes no sense, especially as we move to policy governance. It is a supertanker of a board. [laughter] It is not agile. I’ve been a board member, so it has nothing to do with any individual member of the Board. We have to get culturally past the place where we tolerate something that clearly doesn’t work. The GA planning thing is one, and we need to make that transition, but it’s just one of others.
Hallman: You may be possibly going to this question, but I have come to some insight about districts. And that is that some of the reasons they are the way they are, and I would take my own district, which is the Southwestern Conference, as you understand it, and this could be UUA, as a historical entity. And I have come to a new appreciation of history and tradition in what we do. That’s not to say that we don’t need to make changes, but we cannot pretend that we don’t have a history and that it’s easily overwritten. I just want us to take that into account as we make these changes. The changes are necessary, but I want to make sure we take that into account.
Marx: That’s your long-term view, but the planning committee exists now and you’re going to have to relate to them in some way. And I guess I didn’t really hear an answer to that.
Morales: Specifically about this group?
Marx: Yes.
Hallman: The Planning Committee.
Morales: I don’t know a lot about it, but what I’ve heard, I mean it serves a real function now. And, hopefully, it will be help in a transition to something that we ought to have. In fact, it would be great if it could get to the point where it recommended that change. That may be magical thinking, but we’ll see. I would like to see that.
Hallman: Yes, I think it will go rolling on. Whenever we think about it, I certainly would relate to the group and to the people who are running GA and the decisions for the GAs in the future and the Fifth Principle Taskforce. All of that’s coming together now in a really nice way. By the time of the election, I believe there will be some new possibilities. I don’t think what we have said is very way off in the future. I think those changes are going to be made soon.
Marx: Moving on, and, Laurel, in a way you anticipated this next question: What do you see as the role in the longer term for districts in our association?
Hallman: I actually believe that the districts need to remain. Now, there will be, I know, some regional areas. We already have the New England Regional Conference. And regions are easier. And Texas is a little hard to think of a region when you’ve already got, you know, a quarter of the continent in your district. [laughter] So it varies from area to area about how you’re going to create the connections. Now, one thing that I found interesting in my own experience is that the large churches have come together in a lateral association, not a geographical association. And we started to create that. The mid-sized conference, for example, is a lateral association. So I think we’re going to end up with a matrix of different ways of being together. I do not believe that we can, quote, do away with the districts and create something else. I went through the period of the inter-district representatives when we were in hard times and they were driving all over the country. That was difficult. And I think we need to be as attentive and as close as we can geographically. But the districts, as I said before, have a long history and some vitality. It varies but they have vitality and they’re one way of being connected. I don’t see us doing away with them.
Morales: I don’t think it’s a realistic possibility to do away with them. And we need to find ways, as an association, of serving our congregations through intermediaries. It’s much more efficient and effective than the current structure. And some form, however formal it is, of regionalization is almost inevitable and is a good thing because it would really help, it would bring a lot of flexibility, the ability to put resources where they really need to be, a career path for our best people. It has a lot of wonderful pluses. And so, I mean I’m in Mountain Desert, I mean talk about a big district. I mean we go from Mexico to Canada. I mean we have to flow to meetings in Mountain Desert. And, you know, Pacific Northwest …And oh, yeah, we have Alaska, don’t we? And, you know, it’s that dynamic. And I don’t see those going away, but I see a lot of coordination among and around. For example, why should there be someone with a lot of experience, terrific expertise sitting in Pacific Northwest not working with a team of two or three other people to do something in Mountain Desert or in Pacific Southwest? We’re doing more and more of that, but it’s like you have to run around to do it and do all these funny things. We need to make it an expectation and bring coordination to that, make it a whole lot less accidental and opportunistic but create structures that encourage and nurture that kind of collaboration.
Hallman: One of the things that the districts are a little stuck in are their regional meeting or their annual meetings and the kinds of things that happen around the annual meetings and the specific things that have always been done that way. That is one thing I would like to change: the new ways of community so that we can be online with other congregations in our districts. We can be, and we’re already, I mean listserves from the district, the ministers are on listserves. I mean there’s a lot electronically happening that’s going to make a difference, especially in the districts like mine that are so far apart, where the congregations are so far apart.
Marx: OK. Shifting gears a big. Organizationally, how do you see the role of the President’s Council from a governance perspective? What is their role in setting priorities, for example?
Morales: It’s for you. [laughter]
Hallman: I’ve served on the President’s Council, and I don’t believe they have a role in setting priorities. My understanding with donors, and this is what … it’s a donor group … it’s the Board that sets the priorities and then the President who implements. And so, in setting priorities in that way, I would say the President’s Council is, it’s a body that was created to be, because I was around when it was created, and it was created to be a way to involve people and communicate what was going on in the UUA, have people more understanding more what was happening. And it’s a wonderful fellowship. It’s a friendship group that’s endured and has been very important to the people who are in it. It is sometimes, though, the people who are in it see themselves as taking on some of the functions of a ward, and I think that’s a cautionary issue. So the function of the President’s Council can be advisory. And I also think that occasionally there are gifts that come in that will further the goals of the Board and the President and the staff, but they shouldn’t ever, ever derive it.
Morales: This is another one where not only there’s no substantive disagreement, we met with stewardship and development staff together Wednesday night and talked about ways to restructure and go to meetings, so I think we’re in substantive agreement on that. Let me anticipate a follow-up question which is about stuff being donor-driven.
Marx: Yes, that’s the next question.
Morales: What a surprise. [laughter] Well, there’s a real danger in that for an organization. The easiest thing to say is absolutely not, you know, we have our priorities, we have clear vision and we’re not going to let donors distract us from that. The reality is let’s, if a donor is really hot to fund the second priority and less hot to serve the first, I don’t know. I mean that’s something that I think you need to think about because you don’t want to make the perfect the enemy of the good. However, what you never want to have is a situation where you’re doing something, you don’t think it’s valuable, isn’t worth the kind of staff support, is going to suck other resources and distract the organization in order to make some major donor happy. And let me also add that what needs to happen, however, is a relationship, an ongoing relationship with a major donor who comes and says, you know, “I think we ought to do X.” And you’re convinced that’s not a very good idea. You say, “I understand what you’re trying to accomplish with that. I don’t think that’s the best tactic for that. We believe that this other would be.” But also, at some point, one of the monsters I live with is that if cannot say no, you don’t have a strategy. And sometimes you have to be willing to say, “no thank you.”
Hallman: If we can plan ten years ahead then we can align our donors with that plan. If we are short this year and we have something we really need to fund, we then go to people and say can you fund this, can you fund that? We’re in a much more vulnerable position in terms of our strategic direction. I have found over the years that — and I’ve had some wonderful, wonderful donors in my time in the ministry, and I’ve not had a donor who has, you know, taken his or her marbles and left because of some disagreement. They’re usually quite wonderful about the giving of their money. I mean they are generous people that can, they have the resources and they love our faith. And so, alignment of the donors with the strategic plan is very, very important. And, if we don’t have that, we’re more vulnerable to the whims of people because they’re trying to help. Not because they’re trying to take over, because they’re trying to help.
Morales: The most effective thing I believe we can do for fundraising, major and minor fundraising, is to be effective. I mean, one of the truisms in funding is that money follows mission. If we show that we have the clarity and the discipline and we’re effective, a donor is like any one of us. I’m much more excited about giving to an organization in which I believe and whose leadership I trust. One of the barriers that we face in fundraising is that we hadn’t always been that effective, and we have instituted programs that were not as effective as they night have been. That has a long-term effect on anyone’s ability to raise funds from donors. So one of my big concentrations would be to get results, because once you’re getting results people will be happy to give you funding to do that.
Hallman: I also would like to add that risk-taking is part of this. The donors that I know will fund something that is a risk, that will give us new information, will give us new ways of looking at things. And, even if something didn’t come out the way they planned, I have people who work in hospitals and raise money for research and the research doesn’t come out the way they planned. And their belief is that if we have learnings and it effects what we know, it’s worth it. So it’s effectiveness and it’s learning from the experiences and trust, those three things, that are the most important.
Marx: Thank you.
Morales: Which is one reason it’s so important, in any significant initiative, to build in rigorous outside evaluation at the beginning, which is what any foundation insists upon so that those, so that you get early signals from things that aren’t going well, and so you get learnings drawn by people who were trained and competent to do that.
Rickter: OK. Thank you. I think we’re finished with this segment, and we’re finished with this forum. So, in closing, I’d like to thank the five board members who served as moderators for the five segments. And I especially want to thank our two candidates.
Morales: Thank you.
Hallman: Thank you.
Rickter: Peter Morales and Laurel Hallman, thank you.
[applause]
