Approved by the Board of Directors 5-13-03

Each year at the Annual Meeting, with input and advice from the Finance Committee, the congregation adopts a budget to manage the Church’s funds for the next fiscal year. From time to time between Annual Meetings, there arise requests for funding which are in excess of, or outside the scope of, the specific items that make up the budget adopted by the congregation. The Board of Directors adopts the following procedures for dealing with such requests:

1. Each committee or paid staff member with budgetary responsibility has the authority to move funds among the set of accounts for which they are responsible, if the total budget for that set of accounts in not thereby increased. However, if that set of accounts includes appropriation for a paid staff position or any specific budget deviation, the use of those funds cannot be changed without approval pursuant to established budget policy.

2. All other requests for expenditures in excess or outside of existing budgets shall be submitted to the Treasurer or the Finance Committee. Requests of $1,000 or less may be decided by the Treasurer and requests of $2,500 or less may be decided by the Finance Committee. In either case, approval shall be granted only after exploring whether other budgeted appropriations might be reduced to cover the expenditure. On larger requests, the Finance Committee shall recommend action (positive or negative) to the Board, including how the request should be funded if approved.

3. The Finance Committee shall consider whether the possibility of an additional appropriation should be presented to the congregation or some segment thereof prior to action. (Note: This may be important, for example, with requests for conference or training program reimbursement, where other people might want to take advantage of the opportunity is only they knew it existed.)

4. Decisions of, or positions taken by, the Treasurer may be appealed to the Finance Committee, and decisions of the Finance Committee may be appealed to the Board.