 Committee supports plan to close Historical Society center in Montreat By Craig M. Kibler The Layman Online Monday, June 19, 2006
After nearly 10 hours of discussions, presentations and debate, the Committee on General Assembly Procedures voted (27-14-6) late Saturday night to approve the plan put forward by the Committee on the Office of the General Assembly. That plan states:
Earlier in the afternoon, the committee had voted (25-20-3) to disapprove the plan. After spending several hours going back and forth over the issues involved, a motion to reconsider the plan was approved, leading to the final vote. Many commissioners expressed their hope for what they called a "win-win" outcome that would take into account the savings envisioned by the plan and the emotional response of many opponents to the plan evidenced by seven overtures that sought to maintain the facility in Montreat. Throughout the day, commissioners heard presentations and testimony from people on both sides of the issue. "The church, indeed, does celebrate its history," Steve Grace, moderator of the Committee on the Office of the General Assembly, said in explaining background information on the plan put forward by that office. "The records we preserve are testaments to the men and women who have served our church," he said. "All three of our main predecessor denominations in the reunited Presbyterian Church (USA) have a long tradition of collecting, preserving and sharing the rich history of our church." That said, though, he said that "the challenge for any part of the church that seeks to serve and support the church, its members and other entities, is 'How to do so." Grace described what he called a multiple-year process, including the consolidation of staff and facilities, aimed at keeping the historical center "the rich center that it is." The Committee on the Office of the General Assembly, he said, "put together a task force a couple of years to study the consolidation of staff and facilities as one piece of this Presbyterian Historical Society transformation." Kathy Ulrich, who chaired the task force, said that its members had three parameters -- "constitutionality, accessibility and financial feasibility." She described how the task force collected data and "considered some innovative ideas about how to move all of the records either Philadelphia, Montreat or Louisville." Philadelphia and Louisville, she said, would make the collection easily accessible since "most of the material would need to be stored off-site. This is radically different from the way the collection is used now, when people can just walk in and use it." Ulrich explained how the task force "carefully and prayerfully spent time talking about the facility in Montreat" and how they were "made aware of the enduring and endearing presence of the Presbyterian Historical Society at Montreat." Stated Clerk Clifton Kirkpatrick said that he "genuinely believes that the plan being proposed to you will accomplish the goal of preserving the historical resources into the future." Nancy Hummel, an elder from De Cristo Presbytery, asked Grace, "Would we even be having this discussion if per capita giving hadn't dropped?" Grace said that, "Certainly, the timing of our review was driven by the practicalities, but it also was part of a larger, multifaceted look at the operations of the Presbyterian Historical Society. So, yes, there were certainly some practicalities of it." Rev. Russell Smith of Cincinnati Presbytery said he had compared the budget figures and that the projected savings by closing the Montreat facility "look very slim. We're looking at savings of $75,000 in 2007 and $250,000 in 2008, and the Friends of Montreat say they have $1 million." Fred Heuser, director of the Presbyterian Historical Society, responded that the long-term projections envision savings of "half million dollars a year" by closing the facility. Advocating for one of the overtures (078), Rev. Steve Clark, a minister/member of Salem Presbytery and a lawyer, said that, "In 1927, the Texas Historical Society donated their entire Presbyterian Historical Society of Texas collection up to that point in time." Clark said that the Montreat Historical Foundation is "a corporation formed in 1927. It's still a living corporation today. The property in Montreat owned by the Historical Foundation, a corporation registered in Buncome County, North Carolina." He said more than $1 million has been given to the foundation over the years to keep up the facilities and maintain the collection. "If you want to open a can of worms, talk about other uses for that money, which was given for a specific purpose. In North Carolina, you can't do it unless you get a court order. That money cannot be taken and used for other purposes." "What we're trying to do is get the Historical Foundation to step up to the plate and do what it was meant to do. Jo Petty, a member of First Presbyterian Church in Houston, said that, "Our records were sent to Montreat in the full faith that the original agreement will be kept. There were promises made, and promises should be kept." |
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