Layman monitors commissioner assignments By Parker T. Williamson The Presbyterian Layman Friday, May 21, 1999 LOUISVILLE, Ky. – The Presbyterian Layman dispatched an observer team to Presbyterian Church (USA) headquarters on April 21 to monitor the process of assigning General Assembly commissioners to committees. The standing rules of the General Assembly call for this selection to be conducted by a “random selection process.” Layman observers were unable to verify that the results met the random selection requirement. A five-day gap In a series of written communications with the Office of the Stated Clerk prior to April 21, The Layman learned that results of the April 21 “blind” selection would not be made public until April 26. The rationale given by staff for this five-day gap was that they wanted to review the April 21 list and adjust it for any possible “conflicts of interest” or if two persons from the same presbytery appeared on one committee. The Manual of the General Assembly calls only for a “random” commissioner selection process in which ministers and elders are distributed evenly. It makes no provision for additional adjustments to the commissioner list by staff members. Public access denied The Layman requested that a copy of the April 21 list be given to members of the press at the close of the day in order that this list might be compared with committee assignments announced on April 26. In a letter written on April 20, Stated Clerk Clifton Kirkpatrick denied the request. Kirkpatrick said his staff would give a confidential list to two elected members of his OGA committee. Complexity and cost On the morning of the selection, observers were met by Clifton Kirkpatrick who said that this meeting did not fall under the General Assembly Open Meetings Policy since it was “staff work” that was not normally open to the press. Asked why a hand procedure requiring a full day of work by two employees was not accomplished by computer, Kirkpatrick said that the “complexity and cost” involved in writing such a computer program would be prohibitive. Angela Treadway, a computer information systems professional on the staff of the Presbyterian Lay Committee, says most off-the-shelf computer spreadsheet programs (Microsoft Excel is an example) include random number generators that can easily handle a job this small.

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