# Secret Ballot for Congregational Voting on Budget Required?



## Mushroom (Dec 18, 2011)

In the PCA? Or what is the standard practice? Any?


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## toddpedlar (Dec 18, 2011)

As with any vote taken in a congregational business meeting, if someone calls for a secret ballot, I believe that request must be honored. However, I have never seen that happen in my PCA experience.


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## fredtgreco (Dec 18, 2011)

In the PCA, the congregation does not vote to approve the budget. The Session does.


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## Marrow Man (Dec 18, 2011)

Fred, does the congregation vote to _adopt_ the approved budget? That is the way it is in the ARP, and our Form of Government often follows the old Southern Presbyterian way of doing things (diaconate presents to session, session approves, congregation adopts). I've never known a congregation not to adopt the budget. My question has always been what if the congregation does not adopt it? It's not like it's appropriate to amend it right there. I'm guessing it would have to be sent back to the session for change.


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## Mindaboo (Dec 18, 2011)

It was actually the Pastor's Call we voted on, not the budget.


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## Edward (Dec 18, 2011)

My recollection that the congregation elects pulpit committees, deacons, elders, calls pastors and associates, dissolves relationship with pastors and associates, deacons and elders, elect property trustees if unincorporated. Some churches require membership votes for buying, selling or mortgaging property, but that can be delegated to the corporate officers. 

I think that covers what is in the BCO.

The only reference I can think of with regard to secret ballots is the call of an associate or assistant to be senior pastor without an intervening service elsewhere. Supermajorities are also required for that. 

Most congregational meetings will follow some form of Robert's Rules, and reference might be had to them as to forms of balloting.


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## fredtgreco (Dec 18, 2011)

Mindaboo said:


> It was actually the Pastor's Call we voted on, not the budget.



Most votes for officers and pastors are secret ballot. That is the way I have always seen it in my years in the PCA. I don't think I have ever witnessed a hand vote for officers or a pastor.


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## Edward (Dec 18, 2011)

fredtgreco said:


> Most votes for officers and pastors are secret ballot...I don't think I have ever witnessed a hand vote for officers or a pastor.



We use neither for officer votes. 

We mark our choices on the front of the ballot and put our name on the back. The vote counters then check to ensure that the ballot is from one entitled to vote, and then tallies the vote. 

It's been some years, but I think I recall a show of hands being used to call an associate pastor.


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## Scottish Lass (Dec 18, 2011)

Just today, we had a voice vote to elect two elders. I could count on one hand the times I've done any sort of written ballot--once or twice in the PCUSA and maybe once in the ARP.


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## Romans922 (Dec 19, 2011)

BCO 12-5.b. states what Fred stated above (forget the 1. Part I'm on my iPad and don't know how to get rid of it):


 To examine, ordain, and install ruling elders and deacons on theirelection by the church, and to require these officers to devotethemselves to their work; to examine the records of the proceedingsof the deacons; to approve and adopt the budget; 



So the session approves the budget. The only the congregation does is receive the report of the budget if the session reports on the budget. No action is needed by the congregation, no congregational meeting is needed. Thus, definitely no secret ballots are needed.


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## jwithnell (Dec 19, 2011)

During our annual congregational meeting, we hear a detailed description of the budget. People from the congregation may ask about specific items (and it seems like there have been a few times where an error was caught) but the actual approval rests with the session. 

I've seen both secret ballots and an open voice count for officers. In the latter, I was once the only no vote for an elder. Awkward? Yes. But I believed I needed to do the right thing before God and, sadly, time proved me correct. Even on a secret ballot, if I have some comment, I will give me name. It only seems right. (We had a candidate here that I supported in every way except that I had not seen him function in one manner required for office and noted that on the ballot.)


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## KMK (Dec 19, 2011)

fredtgreco said:


> Mindaboo said:
> 
> 
> > It was actually the Pastor's Call we voted on, not the budget.
> ...



Funny story: Six years ago, an officer from a local Baptist church invited me to come to a business meeting because their pastor had left 'in the middle of the night' and they were looking for pulpit fill. When I was introduced to the group there was a number of them who sneered at me, but the presiding officer called for an open ballot and the sneerers were too chicken to say 'Nay'. Today I am the Pastor of that church and the sneerers have all left.


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## Jack K (Dec 19, 2011)

In the PCA churches I've been a part of, it was normal practice to use secret ballots for electing officers and calling pastors.


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## Edward (Dec 19, 2011)

jwithnell said:


> I was once the only no vote for an elder. Awkward? Yes.



Back in my youth in a PCUS church, I voted 'no' for a slate of deacons because I thought one of the candidates was a skunk, and they didn't give an option as to individual candidates. He was a son-in-law of an elder, and I was the only no vote, so it was recorded as the slate having been elected by acclamation. Of course, within a few years, he'd dumped his wife and moved on. Turned out he was an even bigger skunk than I thought.


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## Scott1 (Dec 19, 2011)

This is interesting.

Our PCA church has always had a congregational meeting to vote on the budget, usually preceded by a forum at which the congregation may ask questions about it. The vote being by voice vote.

The budget goes through a multi-step process where the Diaconate, and finally the Session votes on it. It is termed the Session & Diaconate approved budget before being submitted to the congregation.

I have always appreciated this system and thought it instructive of Presbyterianism.

I think many think the budget needs to be approved by the congregation before it is accepted, but now, looking at the BCO, it does not appear this is the case.


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## fredtgreco (Dec 20, 2011)

Usually it is helpful to have the congregation vote to "receive" the budget.


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