The sale of the Pasadena property is progressing slowly. We must have passed through three or four dates to close escrow. The completion of the sale keeps getting set back farther and farther. And although the developer has a positive attitude about closing by midyear, other parties remind us it could go even longer. That’s the day late part.

As for the dollar short, our February mail income total was $1.48 million. The mail income for February last year was $1.73 million. That is about a 14 percent decrease.

As I have often mentioned in these financial updates, our prayer is that we find a consistent level of giving and that we can then build our future budgets on a dependable level of income. But, alas, we don’t seem to have reached the bottom yet.

Our combined mail and seasonal offering income for the first two months stands at $3 million. That, coupled with our other sources of income, such as estate donations, Legacy Partner’s escrow extension payments and an auction sale in January, has kept us close to our projected income budget of $3.7 million.

Our projected expense budget for the first two months this year was $4.5 million, but because some annual expenses are paid in the first quarter, we have had to dip into our reserve fund for just over $1 million.

To avoid additional cutbacks in operations and to keep all current salaried pastors on the job, we plan to have expenses exceed income by almost $4 million between January and the end of June, when we anticipated the close of escrow.

For every month beyond June, we can expect to impact our reserve fund by about $700,000. If escrow were to extend to the end of the year we could decrease our reserves by $8 million! I think you can see that would be a major financial blow to the church.

Therefore, as I write this month’s column, in Finance & Planning we are working on a variety of budget scenarios to discuss in management meetings. Needless to say, all the scenarios mean reduction of staff and projects.

Please do not become discouraged at the slow pace of the property sale. Believe me, Bernie Schnippert, church treasurer, and his staff, along with Legacy Partners and Grubb and Ellis sales personnel, are doing all they can to complete this project. We are all just as eager to see this come to fruition as you are.

On a more positive note, we are continuing work on a restructured financial program that is more locally focused. Some congregations are ready to participate in pilot programs that will be implemented nationwide in 2002 and fully implemented by 2003 (at least those are our target dates).

Turning to a different subject, we haven’t said much about income tax deductions for a while. I think you are all aware that the U.S. government allows a tax deduction for approved charitable giving. The WCG has had Internal Revenue Service approval for more than 50 years.

However, to claim this deduction, charitable giving, along with other deductions such as home mortgage interest, property tax, business expenses and other deductions, should exceed the standard deduction that taxpayers generally receive. The new Bush administration budget plan may include a regulation that will allow some tax deduction for contributions to approved charities, even though a taxpayer may use only the standard deduction. This could be a financial blessing to millions of people who contribute to charities.