From time-to-time I find it necessary to remind everyone what the Property Team is and how it works. For whatever reason the congregation has generally adopted or accepted the view that the Thursday Morning Group and the Property Team are one in the same … just different labels. I imagine this view persists regardless of my occasional crusades to clarify the point because the Thursday Morning Group is the most visible of the overall components of the Property Team. It is also true that the Thursday Morning Group in its earlier days was substantially larger than today and would have been even more visible working on various property projects on Thursday Morning and at other times as well. This past history probably also contributes to the label confusion. The problem with the label today is that is does not serve us well in as much as it fails to recognize significant and valuable property work done by property volunteers that provide their service primarily, and even exclusively, at other days and times as best suits their individual preferences and availabilities.
Property Team is the proper and appropriate label for what our overall body of property volunteers do. The Thursday Morning Group is what it is … a subset of property volunteers that choose to do their volunteer work primarily, but not exclusively, on Thursday mornings. The Thursday Morning Group is an important and vital part of the Property Team, but the Property Team has a much broader scope. When you give it some thought, it is clear that the Thursday Morning Group must limit its scope to work that is amenable to the short period of time when they are gathered each Thursday. Often projects such as painting and others cannot be completed in a couple of hours and can be disruptive to church activities if left in a partially completed state. Some basic property tasks can take days, not hours, to complete. A few years ago, the Property Team took on the task of getting the exposed aggregate floor in the sanctuary cleaned. Even using a professional cleaning service to do the cleaning work, a significant team of property volunteers was needed to move the chairs in the sanctuary. The work was done over a period of about three days, during which time the sanctuary and gathering areas were not available for normal use. This is just one example of a Property Team task that would have been impractical for the Thursday Morning Group to tackle. Other examples include the removal of the old organ and related rearrangement of the sanctuary, reconfiguration of the Wiggle Room and creation of a new conference room, oversight of the parking lot maintenance work, and oversight of the installation of the new church sign. These days it is also not unusual to have more tasks to do than can reasonably be done by the Thursday Morning Group alone. Also, some property tasks, such as maintenance of the heating system, require specialty experience that the Thursday Morning Group does not typically have available. That's where the balance of available property volunteers step in to do their thing, on their schedule, as time permits. Property volunteers may work individually or in teams or groups as the needs of a given task may dictate.
The point of this whole discussion is not to resolve some fine point regarding a team description or terminology. The more important message is that the various property related tasks needed to keep our building and grounds operational, safe, and presentable require a wide range of volunteers, sometimes working in conjunction with professional outside service providers. The needs vary with the seasons, but there is always something to be addressed. We are not a standing team with regular team meetings or the typically trappings of a team. Everyone involved in this effort is part of the Property Team. The number of volunteers who self-identify with this team effort today is smaller than it has been in many years. If you are such a volunteer, I personally offer my thanks to you on behalf of the congregation. If you are not involved with the Property Team, but may be interested in helping in some manner, I would be interested in discussing possibilities with you. David Mercer, Property Team Leader (pro tempore).