Aligning Our Facilities with Our Mission & Our Values
Task Force Mission
Gathering Together
Ensure that everyone, regardless of mobility capacity, will be able to attend services and meetings at EUUC.
Living our Vision of Just and Sustainable World
Add solar collectors and replace fossil-fuel powered equipment so that EUUC is powered without adding to global warming.
Nurturing the Spirit
Foster the joy of knowing we are living up to our values and inspiring us to fully support creating facilities that better support our values and mission.
News
2/3/2025
This month and throughout 2025, we will be exploring what projects we want to do to align our facilities with what we believe in.
It can be easier to revise things than to start a first draft of a plan. For that reason, the Aligning-our-facilities task force will provide a first draft of what might be done. This first draft is the absolute opposite of written in stone. It is what might be called a “discussion document”. The expectation is that it will change, and maybe change completely. It’s just to get the discussion going.
So far, the task force (Nick Maxwell, Charley Beltman, and Zoe Coolbaugh) has not created this first draft yet.
Here are some of the kinds of things that people have asked for. They are the kinds of things that might go into such a first draft:
- Heat pumps and cancelling our natural gas
- Solar panels
- Parking lot revisions to allow for someone who uses a rollator to park and get into Chapman Hall
- Currently, we have concrete paths between the parking spaces, but there is no handicap-accessible ramp at the end of the paths, or between cars, and pushing a rollator on the gravel does not work.
- Accessible bathrooms
- Something to deal with the inaccessibility of the loft
- A charging outlet or two in the back parking lot for members and for car campers; charging outlets for employee parking (something every employer should be providing)
- Better car camper facilities
- Maybe a small heated emergency space to allow campers to get indoors in extremely cold weather
- Complete double pane windows
- Fixing and adding to the insulation
- Revised toilet stalls to upgrade away from the American style of needing to be able to peek in on people in the the stalls
- Heat recovery ventilators
- Some solution to the problem of groups meeting in the evening in a room away from the doors and not wanting the doors unlocked and unattended
Are there projects you hope we will consider as we settle on how we want to better align our facilities with our values? If so, let Nick, Charley, or Zoe know about it.
2/1/2025
In addition to our congregational stands, EUUC shares documentation about our values and mission in three webpages:
The “Our Values” page starts with this:
Our principles, values, and beliefs are deeply intertwined, with much of our focus centered on living our social justice values. We encourage sustainability in our congregation and our personal lives. We have divested our investments in fossil fuels, and moved our financial accounts to a community bank. Our congregation welcomes people of all races, ethnicities, sexual identities, and abilities. We believe that by living our values, we can transform both ourselves and the world.
1/28/2025
EUUC is considering what to do as we prepare our facilities to better support our values and our mission. This is a time for you to share what you hope for.
Our mission is:
Gathering Together,
Nurturing the Spirit,
Living Our Vision
of a Just and Sustainable World
Some of our values (but not all) are documented in our congregational stands:
- LGBTQ+ Justice & Equity
- Global Warming and Climate Justice
- Racial Justice
- Money In Politics/Democracy
We expect to take 2025 for discernment to explore our thinking and commitments, to support a capital campaign in 2026, and to update our facilities in 2026-2027.
This page is a log what is happening with updates on our progress.
1/26/2025
Nick Maxwell shared this report with the EUUC Board of Trustees.
The report provided a copy of the Task for Charge that was approved by the 2024 Board of Trustees, and this update on steps so far and next steps:
Steps so far
- So far, the task force includes Nick Maxwell (primarily focused on getting natural gas out of the building), Charley Beltman, and Zoe Coolbaugh (primarily focused on ADA).
- Charley and Nick met with Tom Balderston to review the facilities. Tom is a building energy auditor. Tom has volunteered to provide a set of recommendations about what should be done.
- A highlight was that the insulation of the ceiling above Chapman Hall and probably elsewhere is set up for holding heat like a sieve for holding water – slots and open spaces are provided for the heat to flow around the insulation.
- The transformer that serves EUUC will need to be replaced.
- Some of our natural gas appliances are getting close to, or past, their recommended lifetimes.
- Charley and Nick met with Kay Crider, and Kay is scheduled to come help EUUC get launched on this work.
- It would be ideal to have someone with architectural experience on the team. Nick has reached out to Nancy Gladow to ask whether any of the new members are architects.
Next Steps
- Get this log that you’re looking at right now going, and start sending updates to the TWAE.
- Kay Crider is coming and meeting with many people the weekend of February 22nd.
- Kay is a congregational consultant who helps congregations as they think about capital campaigns, mission, vision, leadership, or values.