Tri-Regional Council Evaluation (WOWCoF)

Your voice is essential to this evaluation process!
Community of Faith survey is at the end.

January 1, 2019 marked the largest reorganisation of
The United Church of Canada since our formation in 1925.

On that day presbyteries and Conferences ceased to exist and instead regional councils and the Office of Vocation were launched with new purpose for the General Council also. Antler River Watershed, Horseshoe Falls and Western Ontario Waterways Regional Councils were formed from much of the previous London Conference, all of Hamilton Conference and some of Toronto Conference. The three regional councils determined that they would work together with shared staffing and a common governance model.

When the Regional Governance Model and shared staffing model was adopted by each of the three regional councils in 2019, a commitment was made to review the governance and staffing model in three years to determine that it was meeting the original stated objectives.

The Tri-region Evaluation Group consisting of the three presidents and one other elected member from each regional council along with the Executive Minister met in the Spring and again in the Fall of 2022. They contracted out the evaluation to Bill Allen and Jenny Stephens to begin January 2023 and report to the May Regional Council Executive meetings.

The review objectives are to assess:

1. The effectiveness and efficiency of the governance structure

2. The effectiveness and efficiency of the three-region shared staffing model

3. The effectiveness of providing support to Communities of Faith

4. The extent each Regional Council is meeting stated goals

Purpose statements (goals):

ARW – Holding and encouraging communities of faith.
HF – Support, connect and empower communities of faith.
WOW – Connecting, Supporting, Transforming.

Values:
Love Unconditionally, Seek Reconciliation, Risk Courageously

Commitment to be:
Affirming, Anti-Racist.

Responsibilities laid out in The Manual 2023 section C. https://united-church.ca/sites/default/files/2022-12/the-manual-2023.pdf.

Bill and Jenny are grateful for the opportunity to gather information and to identify strengths, areas needing improvement, gaps in understanding as to the role, work and structure of the regional councils for future attention, and to provide input that will enable regional councils to connect with and engage more of their members. With your input these three regional councils will become the best resource for communities of faith.

Our approach is multi-faceted –
Step 1 - questionnaires to staff, regional council members and elected leaders
of communities of faith (January – February).
Step 2 - attending various regional council meetings to understand how the work
is done and receive amplification on data arising from returned
questionnaires (February to mid-March).
Step 3 - one on ones with staff or communities of faith or commissions as necessary.

We will move to analysis in later March and write in April.

In advance we thank you for your participation during this process of evaluating how effective the three regional councils are meeting their stated purposes through governance, staffing and engagement.

Here’s a bit about us.

Bill had a thirty-year career with the Ontario government with the Ministries of Agriculture & Food, Natural Resources, Citizenship and Immigration and finally as Deputy Minister of Tourism and Sports. Following retirement from the government, he has spent the past fifteen years consulting on board governance primarily with not-for-profit organizations. Consulting projects ranged from strategic planning, governance reviews, board governance training and board performance evaluation. Bill currently volunteers on a number of charity boards. He resides in the rural community of Rockwood and is a member of the Stone United Church. In his spare time, Bill is an avid road cyclist and cross-country skier.

Jenny is United Church clergy and a member of WOW as she lives in Cambridge with Mocha, her 13-year-old Wheaten Terrier. She retired at the end of April 2022 from the Office of Vocation (OV) at the General Council Office where she facilitated drawing the learning from previous projects to design the OV. OV has specific responsibility and collaborates with regional councils around ministry formation, admission, and oversight and discipline of ministry personnel. Hiring staff, training volunteers and getting the OV up and running was fun! 16 years as Conference Personnel Minister in Hamilton Conference informed the design and approach. Ministry in Neepawa and Area larger Parish in Manitoba for 4 years provided opportunity to test the call to ordination and lots of learning about team ministry and rural life. Settled in Underwood-Wesley pastoral charge (former Bruce presbytery) and serving for 7 years allowed more engagement in rural life along with presbytery and Conference Ministry, Personnel and Education type work. Then the move to the Hamilton Conference Office and another great team.

You can contact us through the regional council emails:

Antler River Watershed: arwrc@united-church.ca
Horseshoe Falls: hfrc@united-church.ca
Western Ontario Waterways: wowrc@united-church.ca

*** Click here for your survey ***

Bill Allen Jenny Stephens

Connecting, Supporting, Transforming