Saint Mary's LRP--Background and Intro

St. Mary's Long Range Plan
2006-2008

Background and Introduction:

In 2005 four major activities occurred leading to the development of this three year long range plan for St. Mary'’s Episcopal Church and its congregation:

• In January Stephen V. Smith became Rector of St. Mary's after the congregation had been without a permanent rector for over two years.
• The Vestry in concert with the new rector developed and adopted an updated mission statement.
• The Vestry and the Rector agreed to develop and implement a three-year plan for our St. Mary'’s.
• A comprehensive survey was conducted among all members of the congregation in concert with an “every member” visitation program.
  

The Mission Statement:

St. Mary'’s is a community of faith striving to live intentionally as the Body of Christ in the world. We express our faith through worship, spiritual formation, care for others and responsible stewardship of all of our resources.

• We base our worship on the richness and diversity of Anglican liturgy and music.
• We provide opportunities and resources to guide the spiritual development of our multigenerational congregation.
• We reach out to help fulfill the material needs of those in our local community and beyond.
• We invite everyone to participate in the life of our community through sharing their time, talents and tangible resources.
  

The Parish Survey

In June 2005 St. Mary'’s polled 400 families in a Questionnaire designed to determine their levels of activity, areas of interest and feelings about the church, and to update our data base. From our 200 responses we determined that 60% of our parish is retired, 70% attend at least weekly, and people with a history of active involvement outnumber those seeking to serve. There was considerable interest in Dinner Groups, Current Events Forums, and Adult Bible Study. When asked about St. Mary's’, most indicated that caring people, spiritual home, sense of belonging, appreciation of clergy, liturgy, sermons and music were most important to them. 95% had met Steve with enthusiasm. The survey was the foundation for a visitation program which reached families; both will help in planning going forward and the refinement of our record keeping.


The Long Range Plan

Why a Long Range Plan?

• Carry out our mission as a congregation
• Uncover problems and opportunities within Parish.
• Set priorities for the work of the clergy, vestry and the congregation as a whole
• Insure that spiritual, fiscal, and community goals are established and met
• Guideline for management over three- year period. 2006-09
  

Parameters Used To create the plan:

With the Mission Statement in place and after reviewing the results of the Parish survey several interactive sessions were held to review and assess the current and future needs of the parish. The Vestry and Rector Smith agreed to develop plan organized around eight focal areas of development. A team leader(s) was identified for each area to manage the effort from plan to implementation.

Parish growth and participation (Marian Ferguson)

Spiritual Growth ( Phyllis Bradley and Kris Lewis)

Stewardship (Sharon Donegan)

Communications (Patrick Ramage)

Christian education (Liz Rabideau and Kris Lewis)

Outreach (Lisa Barr)

Buildings/Grounds and Property Management ( Matt Palmer)

Music (Bruce Johnson)


The Vestry recognizes the responsibility of continuing to evolve the rich spiritual life and traditions of St. MaryÂ’s. It also wishes to protect and improve the magnificent physical plant and gardens that are part of our heritage.

The long range plan assumes that in the next three years St. MaryÂ’s parish will not seek to expand in a manner that would require significant additions to the physical plant or professional staff.

The plan will insure the short and long term economic stability of the Parish.

We will establish specific and quantitative goals within each area of the plan and a process to be managed by the Vestry to insure that goals are met on a timely basis and with relevance to overall objectives.

We will make every effort to communicate this plan to our entire congregation in the hope that we will have both their support and active participation.


Long Range Plan Goals

Overall

• Insure that our mission is fulfilled by making our parish a focal point in the lives of our congregation.
• Create and implement the means for the Parish to be self supporting for ongoing expenses and insure that capital income is devoted to capital expenses and other special projects.
• Insure that an organizational structure and process is in place to carry out and manage the goals of the strategic plan.
• Insure that the elements of the strategic plan are adequately communicated, integrated, evaluated and evolved as needed.
  

Parish Growth and Participation

• Retain and engage current membership to achieve 70% involvement in parish life-attend, pledge, church school or volunteer.
• Maintain an active membership list of 400 families by 2008.
• Cultivate new leadership and succession plans for all key parish activities.
  

Spiritual Formation

• Broaden St. Mary'’s offerings of opportunities for spiritual formation in terms of variety, time and location so that programs meet needs of all parishioners.
• More effectively communicate availability of offerings and other resources in area,
  

Stewardship

• Increase number and level of pledges over the next three years to fund operating budget and discontinue use of capital funds and interest income for operating expenses.
• Increase St. MaryÂ’s endowment principal and increase sources of income.
• Develop a more formalized planned giving program.
  

Communications

• Develop and implement an integrated communications plan for St. MaryÂ’s that reflects needs of all key constituencies and employs most effective and relevant channels of distribution.
• Identify and implement means to have ongoing and effective dialogue among parish clergy, vestry and members.
• Consistently reinforce mission in all communications.
  

Christian Formation: Children and Youth

• Strengthen existing Church School program to nourish our children in faith as they grow.
• Develop a comprehensive Youth program to meet educational and spiritual needs of this age segment.
• Work with Spiritual formation to provide opportunities for development across life span.
  

Outreach

• Define the mission and scope of the Outreach activities at St. Mary'’s
• Integrate and coordinate all outreach and charitable giving within the Parish.
• Increase participation in outreach activities.
  

Buildings, Grounds and Property Management

• Identify, prioritize, and estimate costs for property and grounds projects requiring capital funding in the next three years.
• Insure the continued maintenance of St. MaryÂ’s Garden .
• Create an energy efficient physical plant and develop on-site renewable energy sources to demonstrate environmental stewardship and realize cost savings.
• Develop set of policies and guidelines for use of Parish physical assets.
  

Music

• Increase the size of the adult choir to 20 full time members and 12 additional voices for special services.
• Add paid section leaders to the bass and soprano sections.
• Add a part time assistant director.