1. Ministry Teams Meeting Minutes: 13 May 2015
Ministry Team: Buildings and Grounds
Members present: Ken Tessier, Rick Burts, Ann Burts, David Feraco, Alfred Christensen
Agenda Items:
• Follow-up on last meeting’s action list.
Action Item Assigned To Due Date Comment
Organize team to solicit ideas for
the silt pond area. Coordinate with
environmental team
Ken T. 5/13/2015 Both B&G and the
environmental team
recommend using the area
for a rain garden.
Discuss possible Eagle Scout
projects with Jack
Diana 5/13/2015 No status. Carl Sigel is
trying to contact Jack.
Remove old broken basketball goal Matt 5/13/2015 Done
Discuss broom, dustpan and new
garden hose suggestion with Chris
Diana 5/13/2015 Broom and dustpan in
each of the buildings. See
below for details.
Finalize definition of emergency
response team
Diana and
Alfred
5/13/2015 Postponed – Diana and
Alfred will work on it.
• Removal of the two dead (or dying) oak trees next to the driveway
o We now have three bids that all include both of the trees and grinding the two stumps.
Everett’s tree service: $3,200.00
Leaf and Limb tree service: $6,150.00
A+ Tree and Care services: $2,600.00
o Items for discussion:
Should we ask them to chip all the smaller branches and leave the chip in the area at the end of
the new parking lot? We can use that chip when we start establishing the old silt pond area.
• YES.
Should we ask them to cut the larger branches and trunks into 18 inch long pieces and leave
them at our property? I have access to a splitter, so I can split the logs into firewood sized pieces,
which we can then use for a fund raiser – for example, one of the youth trips, or to buy plants for
the old silt pond area, or??
• YES: use as fundraiser for plants for the rain garden
I do not know if any of those two suggestions will impact the price in any way (up or down), but if
we decide to go that route, we will discuss it with the chosen tree service company.
• Ideas for maintaining the area around the big oak tree and the parking lot islands
o Our current landscaping company does not maintain the area around the big oak tree or the parking lot
islands.
o We may need to mow the grass around the oak tree occasionally (maybe once a month). There are lots
of roots in the area, so don’t mow too close to the ground.
o There are weeds that grow around the driveway and in the islands – should we treat them with Roundup
or just cut them down when they grow too big?
o Whenever anyone sees a fire ant hive, please treat it with the chemical we have on the upper shelf in the
corner closet in the printer room.
o Can we organize someone (or a team) to “adopt” one or more of the islands and maintain them with
flowers, like the one next to the walkway in front of the church building?
A small article has been placed in the June issue of Glad Tidings:
• Plant an island
Have you noticed the beautiful parking lot island in front of the nursery entrance? Lucy
Maloney has maintained that for a number of years and it looks wonderful. If you are
interested in adopting one of the other parking lot islands and making it as beautiful as
the one Lucy Maloney maintains, please contact the Junior Warden or someone from
Buildings and Grounds, and we will help you get started.

2. • Benches along the Memorial Garden walkway
o How can we organize a way to build and/or install some benches around the Memorial Garden itself and
the walkway leading to it?
o Could this be a youth project or maybe an Eagle Scout project?
General agreement that this would be a good idea. Will wait for a good opportunity to build or
purchase benches and install them.
• Landscaping service – mowing 2015
o Our current landscaping company (Fetsko) is in the process of providing us with an updated estimate for
maintaining our grass areas this year.
o We have told them not to mow the area off the new parking lot. The environmental team has suggested
that area be turned into a grass meadow for the benefit of wildlife (birds, butterflies, etc.).
o With the expanded Nativity Garden, the area to be mowed has actually decreased, but Fetsko may still up
the price.
The estimate came in a few days after our meeting. They upped the price with $5 per moving to
$86 per mowing/blowing event.
Discussed with Diana and we will let them continue this season, but will prepare for new bids
before the 2016 season starts.
• Anything else we need to discuss in today’s meeting?
o How to provide information to all members about water shutoff valves, breaker panel locations, etc.
Diana and Alfred will look at this in the context of the emergency response team.
Most of the information is already in our Church Facility Management (CFM) system, but only
Alfred has access to that at this point in time. Alfred will work on making it available to others.
o Brooms and dustpans:
Chris has organized a broom and a dustpan in each of our three buildings:
• Estill House: In the storage area between the kitchen and the staff office
• Education Building: Currently in the bell choir room
• Church Building: in storage closet between the Narthex and the men’s restroom
Chris has also organized a new hose and hose reel. It is currently located to the right of the
Memorial Garden walkway.
o The environmental team has started a small exploratory group to determine how and when Nativity can
install a solar panel system. B&G will be involved in many of the practical issues concerning such a
system.
o The Nativity Community Garden now has a watering system where each planting bed has its own water
faucet. It is assumed to be much more efficient to use soaker hoses or drip hoses with timers for each
planting bed instead of large scale sprinklers, which we used last year.
Action Items Assigned/Tracked:
Action Item Assigned To Due Date Comment
Emergency response team Alfred and Diana
Contact A+ Tree service to have the two dead oak
trees taken down.
Alfred
GT article about island “adoption” Alfred Done
Make CFM accessible to others Alfred ??

3. Ministry Team: Pastoral Care
Members Present: David Lynch, Susie Holmes
Agenda Items Discussed:
We reviewed the rest of the parishioner list. Phyllis will let us know about the people she has checked on. We recommend
reviewing the entire list of parishioners again in two to three years.
We then reviewed confidential information about specific parishioners, as we will do every month, and make sure that a
team member is in touch with the parishioner and aware of the status.
Action Items:
Ongoing care for all parishioners in need as they arise.

4. Ministry Team: Communications
Members Present: Gail Christensen, Sarah Bernart, David Cariss, Jason Pace, Becky Christian, Ben Huckaby
Agenda/Items Discussed:
1. Request for an electronic “bulletin board” - meeting with Stephanie
a. Essentially, how can we have a way for members of the congregation to make announcements themselves that
isn’t an “official communications channel” (such as Facebook, Twitter, church bulletins, etc.)? This needs to be as
low maintenance as possible and digital.
b. Some ideas
i. Glad Tidings
1. The challenge here would be that it’s as much as a 6-week turnaround before the news gets
posted. This is not the most efficient solution.
ii. Another Constant Contact weekly email
1. Or just tack a section onto the existing weekly email with announcements from the congregation.
This could still have the problem of competing with the official voice of the church.
2. A second, opt-in email could be a way to balance this.
iii. Listserv Email Group
1. Would have to create a sign-up link for people to opt-in.
2. Listservs have a bit more options as far as how frequently they get the emails.
iv. Facebook
1. The main Nativity Facebook is not a good venue for this. However, what about creating a
community page that is open to members posting?
v. Website
1. Presents potential confidentiality problems (e.g. pictures of a single child, more personal
information, etc.)
vi. Physical bulletin board
1. Ruled this out because it is not a digital format and we didn’t feel like anyone would look at it.
c. Initially we will want to keep the categories of what can be promoted through the list pretty limited
i. Honors: school, Eagle Scout/Gold Award, scholarship to University, etc.
ii. Professional honor or promotion of adults
iii. Graduations: HS, College, Graduate School
iv. Internships
v. Retirement - from named place
vi. Performances (e.g. bands, theater, etc.)
vii. Fundraisers for non-profits
viii. Help wanted/services available from church members
ix. Community Service Opportunities
x. Recipes
d. What is NOT allowed on this list
i. Politics
ii. Private sales
e. Decided on trying out a Listserv to begin with
i. Name: Nativity Bulletin Board
ii. Ben & Jason will research Google Groups and figure out if there are any limitations we need to be aware of
and, if so, research some other options
iii. Once a recommendation is made the church office will set up the group
2. Other groups that use Nativity--information and events
a. Could we add a page to the Nativity website that shows what groups outside of Nativity use our space?
i. Title: Nativity’s Friends and Neighbors
ii. File the page under the “Serving” header
iii. In addition, add some information about who to get in touch with if you are a group that is looking for
space.
b. Around Nativity itself we want to add some physical signage for who to call when stuff happens (e.g. plumbing
problems, door needs locking/unlocking, HVAC is off/broken, etc.)
3. Upcoming roadside banners and/or posters
a. Jason presented his designs for service times banners. Summer banner to be posted on May 31. We liked the
designs (as always)!
b. Pride Packs web banner and posters
i. David designed a great poster. We agreed they should be posted around the campus throughout the
month.

5. Action Items Discussed/Tracked:
Action Item Assigned To Due Date
Research Google Groups/Listserv Options Ben, Jason 5/20/15
VBS Banners, Posters, Website banner David 6/8/15
Set up Nativity’s Friends & Neighbors page Ben 6/1/15
Create emergency response group contact list Stephanie 6/1/15
Discuss with Stephanie re reinstating birthdays list in GT Gail 6/1/15

6. Ministry Team: Outreach
Members Present: Pete Crow, Cheryl Waechter, Noah Showalter, Carl Sigel, René Garcés.
Agenda Items Discussed:
1. How to meet our objectives with the Leesville Elementary Tutoring initiative, minus the grant funding which we did not
get. Pete
Grant funds were not granted to COTN, so need to come up with some perhaps by shifting $500 from Farmworkers
ministry, and $500 from IFFS. The money would be to fund the Academic Saturday to help tutors help students, and, the
money would also address additional training for the tutors to help students with special needs.
2. Stop Hunger Now decisions: date for packing; how many meals to shoot for. René
6/14, 8/23, and 8/30 are the dates suggested by Stephanie, and Stephanie pointed out summer schedule would be in
effect so the food-packing could be done after the 10:30AM service. Decided to have Stop Hunger Now on 8/30. SHN
indicated the cost of the meals is $.29/meal, regardless of how many we do, and we actually end up packing to the next
full box, which never works out to be a nice even number, so, the SHN contact estimated 10,152 meals would result in a
cost of $2,944. Need to contact Communications team about getting posters to advertise Stop Hunger Now.
3. From Environmental Stewardship Committee, an exploratory team to look into a solar project at Nativity. Carl
An article is going into Glad Tidings to do exploratory study to put solar panels on the Education building. The thoughts
are they may solicit donations from parish, and possibly from other congregations/resources, instead of having the panels
financed by a group of parishoners forming a LLC, whereby the LLC would own the panels until such time the cost of the
panels is reimbursed.
4. Progress report on Pride Packs initiative. Cheryl
The first Sunday in June will be the last collection for this academic year at LES. Needs are being met between donations
and other sources.
5. Should we have an outreach series or special occasion in the Spring, to complement the Fall Stop Hunger Now
packing and Winter Day of Giving? If so, what? Pete
Pete suggested something surrounding Outreach should be done in the Spring, where it would be fun for all.
6. Meetings and communication during summer months? Pete
Yes, we should meet second Wednesday in the months of June, July, and August, and, I should plan to lead August
meeting since Pete will be out of town, and August's discussion should mostly involve preparation for Stop Hunger Now
on 8/30.