Publishing area’s debt forgiven, credit extended By Paula R. Kincaid The Presbyterian Layman Volume 32, Number 5 Posted November 11, 1999 SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico – The Curriculum Publishing program area of the Congregational Ministries Division got a new lease on life after the General Assembly Council agreed to forgive nearly $3.3 million in debt and to extend it a $1.2-million line of credit. The division’s publishing arm will introduce three curricula in 2000, Covenant People, BibleQuest and The Present Word. But John Detterick, executive director of the Council, said he’s not sure that the publishing agency can recover the cost of developing the new books. “We don’t yet have the marketing and sales skills to market the curriculum,” he said. He called that the short-term issue. The longer term, and more important issue, said Detterick, is whether curriculum should be self-supporting, as has been the case since 1996, or whether it should be subsidized by mission dollars. No financial expertise Joanne Hull, the chairperson of Congregational Ministries, said its publishing arm came out of Christian Education. “It became a new program area when we received the responsibility of curriculum several years ago.” Curriculum publishing was set up to be self-supporting, but development and debt costs were not considered, she said. When the publishing program area began, said Hull, it didn’t have people with the expertise to handle financial matters. “We basically birthed this operation from the ground up. We had an editorial staff and that’s it. That’s why we are where we are,” she said. GAC to the rescue The General Assembly Council voted to forgive cumulative debt of $1,802,909 for 1996-98 and projected debt of $1.5 million for 1999. The Council approved a $1.2- million line of credit from the Presbyterian Mission Program Fund. The terms for the credit included possible renewal in 2001. The Council also approved other allocations to the publishing agency: $400,000 from the mission program fund for staff adjustments and $300,000 to revise sexuality curriculum as mandated by the 1999 General Assembly.

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