|
My dear Saint Markans,
It will surprise none of you to hear that our staffing structure is untenable. A few years ago, in an effort to achieve a balanced budget, our community made significant cuts to our expenses. Much of the burden of those cuts has fallen on our staff: both our paid employees and our volunteer ministry team. Every one of these people gives sacrificially of their time. Our paid staff work beyond their assigned hours and without regular pay increases. Our volunteer lay and clergy ministers give their evenings, Saturdays, and often time during the week. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that some of our volunteers work as much as 20 hours/week to help our community flourish. All of these people–whether they are paid or not–give well beyond what is expected of them, and they do so because they love our community and because it is their community, too.
Our commitment to realizing a balanced budget every year is a commitment to long-term sustainability. We understand that if we continue to live beyond our means financially, we will deplete our endowment and move toward greater and greater instability. And yet, for the moment, we continue to live beyond our means with our staffing. This structure is not only unfair to individual paid and volunteer staff, but it is also unhealthy for our entire community, because it gives us an unrealistic understanding of our capacity and our needs.
Hidden within our commitment to a balanced budget are a number of equity issues as well. In January of this year, we offered our paid staff a Cost of Living Adjustment (COLA) as a recognition that inflation continues to eat away at their salaries. This was the first time in many years that we had provided a COLA to our paid staff. Without a yearly COLA, we effectively cut staff salaries every single year. That means that, in addition to the extra hours our paid staff work, they are, in real terms, being paid less money year on year. This is only one of a number of equity issues connected to staffing.
Our baptismal covenant calls us to seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving our neighbor as ourselves. How can we love our neighbor if we do not love and care for those members of our community who give sacrificially of themselves to help the whole body of this Cathedral flourish? Our love of and care for our neighbor begins with loving and caring for the members of our church family.
I do not believe that these issues with staff hours and pay reflect a lack of caring on our part. Rather, they arise from a lack of transparent understanding of the reality with which we have been living. I have heard nothing but gratitude and love for the ways that our paid and volunteer staff support our common life. But I also believe that looking directly at the real costs of our staff structure will embolden us to address this deficit with compassion and intention.
I am working with your vestry to further understand our staffing deficits and to address the equity issues that are becoming clearer to all of us. In order to live the vision God is calling us to today, we must first rebuild our foundations and create financial and staffing structures that are equitable and supportive, both of our individual staff members and of our entire Cathedral community. We have everything we need to do this work. With God’s help, we will rebuild a staffing structure founded on compassion and care that can become a reflection to all of us of the way God loves and supports us, both individually and communally. I am excited to be partnering with you in this work.
Your brother in Christ,
| 
