St Michael Smarden PCC

Minutes of virtual meeting of the PCC held on 5th May 2020 at 10am

Present: Tom Hay(Chair), Alex Bienfait, Tony Lush, Ewa Loffstadt, Mike Barkway, Edward Demery, Stu Tucker, Tanya Ling (Minutes secretary)

Item Action 1 The meeting opened in prayer. 2 Apologies for absence Vivienne Rose. 3 Minutes of the previous meeting held on 25th March 2020 The minutes were adopted as a true record and virtually signed by Tom Hay.

4 Matters Arising  Item 4 – Double ropes and clips – Action Office to carry forward to PCC Office meeting when the church is open.  Item 4 – Legacy policy review – see Finance  Item 5 – Smarden account details -continue monitoring the payee name inconsistencies and see if it causes any problems for Tony or Ewa.  Item 6 – Online services – costs incurred - Joint account is paying £60 per month for Zoom access which allows 40 mins plus and more than 100 people which is useful for funerals, large services such as Easter. Need to consider what to charge during a funeral service.  Item 12 – Tony will look at signs and costs when the shops are open. Action Office Office to carry forward to a PCC meeting when the church is open.  No response from vFast as yet. Action Office to add to agenda for June. Office 5 Open Forum Smarden PCC would like to officially thank Alex and Stephanie for his temporary withdrawal of his resignation. 6 Covid 19 update • New APCM date for October 2020 – Action Provisional date to be confirmed by the Office/AB Office and Alex. • Online services and prayers – many hours using Zoom for services, prayers and funerals for Biddenden, Smarden, High Halden and Woodchurch. Our online presence has been well received. Feedback is very positive and all our work is greatly appreciated. Yesterdays funeral was greatly received with 124 online attendees. Very proud on how far we have come and what has been learnt. Need to agree what the verger charge will be – extra data, Zoom subscription costs incurred. During funerals a technical person may be required to help. Possibly £60 pounds and discuss further with biddenden at churchwardens meeting tomorrow. Action Office Office to check after meeting and confirm to both PCC groups. Possible plan to offer 2 services simultaneously at the end of the month. • Other clergy have been sending out emails, recorded services and posted onto Youtube. Zoom offers full interaction with the community which is very powerful. • Increased social needs have arisen due to isolation and loss of income – in Biddenden there are various neighbourly groups which Alex is part of a weekly co- ordination meeting as part of the village networking. In Smarden, Alex was unable to attend the Smarden neighbourhood meeting. • Telephone tree to contact the self isolating members of the village – electoral roll has been divided into groups who are ringing those in isolation. Working well and positive feedback has been received. • Need to regularly check the church while it is still closed to ensure there are no problems such as burst pipes, etc. • Smarden village shop is now open and competitively priced. There will be a grocery list online shortly to offer a click and collect service with social distancing. 7 Nave Altar update  Samples of wood have been sent and are in the church to be reviewed.  Adam does not have the kit to make the altar until September at the earliest. 8 Correspondence • Ethos email received – credit note received but not relevant as invoice not paid 9 Finance update • 2019 Annual APCM accounts are nearly complete. Steven Crowe, a local accountant is happy to help examine the accounts as he did last year. 15th June 2020 is the new deadline given by the Diocese to submit the figures. • Tom to look at the accrued Gift Aid claims and work out what is due. This will have a significant impact on the bottom line but will not affect the bank balance as it is a balance sheet issue. Action Ewa, Tom and Steve to arrange a meeting to EL/TH/SC discuss this. • Two types of 2020 accounts (YTD and Jan-Dec) were sent to the PCC before the meeting. PCC like to see both types going forward so Ewa will manually do this. • Predicted Finance Report for 2020 – a loss of £13k predicted which is £3k worse than budgeted for. A key expenditure cut is the 3 month holiday for the joint account credit which is £1800 – this will restart in august and start with £350. • Staff salaries – organist(Mark Wilson) and cleaner cannot be furloughed. It was previously agreed to continue to pay the cleaners. Organist salary was discussed - pay at full rate or to cut to 50%? Biddenden PCC felt that his stipend should be reduced. It was agreed to pay Mark in full until end of June. Action Alex to speak with Mark to let him know of the PCC decision .Action Edward to speak ED/AB with the cleaners to say that their pay will be reviewed at the end of June. • Parish Share split between Biddenden and Smarden is to be reviewed. Subgroup has been formed– Alex, Churchwardens, Treasurers, Mike Barkway and Paul Webster who wll be meeting shortly. Targeting to have a proposal for the joint meeting at the end of May. • Diocese have requested to carry on making parish share payments as normal. At what point will we be unable to pay the parish share - our reserve policy is to have a minimum of £11K (3 months) in the current account. It has been noted that finances of the Diocese were critical before the Covid 19 crisis. This year there is a potential of only 70% of parish share payments being made. Diocese may be receiving government grants so should some of this saving benefit the churches? This is assuming that clergy recruitment is still ongoing but questionable how some churches will fund some of these roles. Action Alex has a weekly meeting with Archdeacon Darren where this will be discussed. Alex is also sending a letter to Darren to formally raise these concerns on Parish Share AB payments Action Office to send a copy of the letter to the PCC. We will continue Office to pay the parish share until the next meeting where it will be reviewed. • Legacy policy draft has been sent out by Ewa before the meeting for review and feedback. PCC have reviewed this and agree it should be placed on the website, possibly a poster, on the new welcome leaflet, parish magazine. Should the draft include a clear definition of what a legacy is. Action Ewa/Alex to update the EL/AB document further and send to the Office. • Tom is drafting a donation email appeal to the congregation to encourage to give online due to loss of donations while the church is closed. Stewardship account to be used which automatically sorts out the Gift Aid contributions. 20% of what is raised will be shared with local charity, 10% to Ashford Food Bank and 10% to Christian Aid. Article could be put in the magazine. Action Tom/Alex to forward TH/AB/TL the article to Alan and Tony. • Office home-working has required the useof a 2nd hand Apple Macbook Air from the Apollos Trust. Approx £150-200. Alex proposes that the Joint PCC pay for this. Alex to discuss further with Tanya and churchwardens. 10 Ministry update • All items covered above.

11 Magazine • Tony would like to thank the printers for staying open. 12 H&S  No updates.

13 Churchwardens report  Downpipe on the northwest side - water gushing out so needs to be looked at.  Gutters will also need to be looked at at some point  Porch is currently being worked on by AT Palmer. Working alone, possibly his son may be helping. 14 Events update • Tom has asked the PCC to start to think about a short notice fundraising event All PCC that could be held when we are allowed to open the church. members Date of the next meeting is a joint pcc meeting on 26th May at 7pm – Zoom virtual meeting .

The meeting closed with prayers at midday.