Our Governance

Our Board of Directors
2023 – 24 Board Members
Our fiscal year runs from July 1, 2023 – June 30, 2024 and board members are voted in at our annual June congregational meeting.
- Abby Gitlitz, President
- Jane McLeod, Vice President
- Bill Lonnberg, Treasurer
- Regina DiLavore, Secretary
- Mary Craig, at large
- Linda Pickle, at large
- Drew Schrader, at large
Our board meets monthly, on the 3rd Wednesday of the month at 7:00 pm in the church library. Board meetings are open to the public and everyone is invited to attend as a spectator, either in person or via Zoom. If you would like to join by Zoom, please email Abby Gitlitz for the link.
Board Meeting minutes back to June 2006 are available here on our website by clicking "show more."
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Congregational Meetings
Our congregational meetings take place twice a year, in June and December. Congregational meetings are open to all, though only church members are able to vote.
Congregational Meeting minutes back to 2000 are available here on our website by clicking "show more."
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Annual Reports
Annual Reports of the congregation are presented at the June congregational meeting. Annual Reports back to 2008 are available here on our website by clicking "show more."
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Ends Statements

Our congregation uses a form of policy-based governance, where the board sets forth a set of Ends statements which establish our general principles as well as what our congregation aspires to do. They expand upon our congregation’s vision statement, adopted in June of 2009, of “Seeking the Spirit, Building Community, and Changing the World” to provide spiritual and governance guidance to the ministers, staff, and lay leaders. The term “Ends” refers to the fact these statements are not policy which dictate “means” or how things are done, but are, rather, our expected outcomes.

The Ends statements were adopted by the board in September of 2010 during the transition to policy governance and are a living document maintained by the board with input from the congregation.

SEEKING THE SPIRIT

We have a meaningful liberal religious experience which includes:
A rich diverse worship life.
Compassionate pastoral care.
Life-long opportunities for spiritual growth through religious practice, leadership roles, and community action.
Knowledge of denominational and congregational history and traditions.

BUILDING COMMUNITY

We have a policy of nondiscrimination — we welcome all and are supportive of people of all ages, races, gender, sexual orientation, abilities, education, and politics.
We are generous with our time, talent, and resources.
We actively encourage shared ministry and lay leadership.
We responsibly manage our staff, resources, and facilities.

CHANGING THE WORLD

We are leaders in our community and world.
We are committed to social justice and equality for all people.
We advocate against prejudice, injustice, and oppression of any person or group.
We work with other congregations and institutions with shared values and goals.
We work with the Unitarian Universalist Association and the MidAmerica Region.
We help heal the earth.

Bylaws and Policies

Bylaws

The official Bylaws of the Unitarian Universalist Church of Bloomington were written and adopted by the Congregation, and are amended by formal vote of the membership. Last revised 6-7-2020.

UUCB Bylaws - June 7, 2020

Board Policies

Our Board Policies, adopted by vote of the Board of Directors, augment and clarify day-to-day church operations. Last revised 10-19-2022.

UUCB Board Policies - October 19, 2022

Bylaws Revision Process

The Board of Directors and the Bylaws and Policies Working Group have completed a months-long process of preparing a substantial, holistic revision of our Bylaws with the goal of making our governance documents clearer and more reflective of who we are as a community. During a comment period, members of the Congregation provided thoughtful feedback, which has been taken into account in the final proposed revision to our Bylaws.

The 2023 Proposed Revision of the Bylaws is now released to the Congregation for review. Members will vote on amending the Bylaws as proposed at a special congregational meeting on Sunday, October 22, 2023 at 2:00 pm in the Meeting Room.

The following documents are here for your reference:

BYLAWS recommended by the Board for amendment - Board approved September 20, 2023.pdf (Members will vote on this document on October 22, 2023.)
2020 Bylaws (Our current Bylaws.)
BYLAWS comparison August 16 version and September 20 final version.pdf

For additional background on the process, please see the August Perspectives newsletter. The proposed revision consolidates our Bylaws into 10 sections from the 13 sections of the current Bylaws as approved in 2020. Updated language aims at unified terminology that reflects how we say things. For example “meeting of the Members” is changed to “congregational meeting" throughout. We have used “will” instead of “shall” for more natural language. We have streamlined where possible.

Major structural changes include recombining existing sections about the Board, Officers and Committees to result in one section about the Board (including Officers) and a separate section about committees. Further, the Working Group determined that current sections 8.0, 9.0, 11.0 and 12.0 are no longer needed, as this material is addressed elsewhere in the Bylaws or has become outdated.

In the initial phase of presenting the proposed revisions to the Congregation, we offered detailed comparisons to show the differences between the 2020 Bylaws and the proposed revisions. You may find these documents useful in your review; however, they reflect an earlier phase in the process and do not reflect important congregational input and all final decisions. Those later stages are detailed in the final documents listed above.

For reference, here are documents that show the main structural changes between the current 2020 Bylaws and the Board’s proposed revision of Aug 16:

Summary of Changes in the proposed 2023 Bylaws, August 16 proposed revision (chart):
Graphic comparing both versions

Section-by-section comparison of the current text with the proposed revision:
Section 1 comparison
Section 2 comparison
Section 3 comparison
Section 4 comparison
Section 5 comparison
Section 6 comparison
Section 7 comparison
Section 8 comparison
Sections 9-10 plus old 11-13 comparison

Please contact bylaws@uubloomington.org with any questions.