One of the criticisms of the role of Senior Pastor is the lack of accountability. I think that’s why God intended the church to be lead by a plurality of elders, so that they can each be accountable to each other. Here is how the elders at Capital Hill Baptist do accountability as a team of elders:

One of the practices that our elder board has adopted is accountability with the entire elder board.  Once a month, one of the elders will be examined by the entire board and asked a variety of questions about his spiritual state, family life, work priorities, evangelism, etc.  We hope that by giving time to examining each other, we are looking out for one another.  We do this with only the most loving of intentions.

A few other notes:

• This practice should never preclude an elder from seeking 1 on 1 accountability with others.  We encourage all of the elders to be regularly seeking 1 on1 accountability relationships with elders or other brothers!
• We don’t allow visitors to watch this because of the very personal nature of the questions.
• We limit the time to about 25 minutes and then take a few minutes to pray for the life and ministry of the elder who has been examined.
• There is a high level of respect and trust among our elders for each other.  This type of examination is done in a very gracious and loving way.  It is never intended to allow for anger, fighting, disdain, shaming or revenge among our elders.

If there is no accountability among your elders, you might consider encouraging your elders to pursue 1 on 1 accountability and also accountability with entire elder board.

From Bill Minchin at the Acts 29 2006  Troy, NY Boot Camp

Reference Materials

• Church and Clergy Tax Handbook by Richard Hammer
• National Association of Church Business Administration
  • Includes compensation data
• Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability
• National Sex Offender Registry
• VolunteerSelect

Guiding “Theology”

• We live in a litigious society and the church is not immune from that
• God has placed us in positions of responsibility and has called us to be faithful stewards
• Therefore, we should give proper attention to the corporate side of the church

Misc

• Make sure that sub-contracting vendors have adequate insurance
  • Liability ($1 million)
  • Have vendor name you as “additional insured”. Makes the vendors insurance primary and yours secondary
• Exempt and non-exempt employees
  • To be classified as exempt, making over $26k, pass duties test
  • Non-exempt gets minimum wage and overtime
  • simply paying an employee on a salary basis doesn’t automatically make them exempt
  • Non-exempt cannot volunteer to perform the same duties for which they are paid
  • Non-exempt should document hours on a daily basis

Sexual Abuse Prevention Policy

• Written application
• Interview
• Institutional reference
• Six month rule (need to be member six months before serving)
• Two Adult Rule
• Maybe Criminal Background Test (VolunteerSelect)

15 Passenger Vans – 1o Point NHTSA bulletin

Gross Negligence

• Board members can’t be sued for normal negligence
  • Can be sued for gross negligence
• 15 Passenger Vans (no safety measures)
• Sexual Abuse (no screening)

Tax Issues

• Housing allowance is tax exempt
  • Must be recorded in official board minutes
  • Must be done every year and is NOT retroactive
• Employee vs. independent contractor
  • IC – worker who contracts to do work using his/her own methods and is only supervised as to end product
  • 3 different tests (in Hammer’s book)
• Tax deductibility for contributions
  • Must be a gift of cash or property
  • Services are NEVER deductible
  • Contribution must be unconditional and without personal benefit
  • Contribution must be made to organization or for the use of the organization
  • IRS wants to see “Full administrative and accounting control to use gift consistent with churches mission and purpose”

From Dominick Brignola’s talkat Acts 29 Boot Camp

1. Incorporate
2. Adopt by-laws
3. Apply for Federal recognition as church
4. Apply for State recognition as church
5. Get benefits available for ordained ministers
   • Housing allowance
6. Religious Corporation Structure
   • If you sell things (bookstore, etc)
   • Define membership structure, board structure, voting age
   • With big decisions, there needs to be definition of how approval happens
7. Association
   • Group of people joined together for common purpose
   • Leaves individual members of church to legal action
   • Sometimes associations can’t own real estate
8. How to incorporate
   • Fill out paperwork (charter) with state
   • Need corporate name
     • Isn’t federally protected. to do that, need search at LOC
   • Need corporate management (trustees, etc)
   • Identify membership and rights vested in members
   • Define corporate purposes
9. Draft set of by-laws
   1. Membership participation clause (including discipline)
      • Christian arbitration (you will not sue church)
   2. Non-discrimination clause
      • Have right to limit membership / involvement based on religious reasons
   3. How to replace elders (build something that will outlast you)
   4. Housing allowance
      • has to be renewed each year by IRS. By having in by-laws, you can say “treat money given to pastor the same as last year” so that you don’t get dinged at audit time.
   5. Have designated contributions clause
      1. Money’s given to church are distributed at the church’s discretion

Misc

• Get IRS Tax Guide for Charities and Non-Profits
• IRS has 15-month lookback
  • Created Jan 1, 2006
  • Paperwork comes back Jan 1, 2007
  • All donations given in 2006 are for sure deductible
• Getting 501c3 makes things much, much easier when it comes to deductions
• Have clause in by-laws to indicate that church works hard to confirm where money is going