Below are recommendations 8 and 9 of the Great Commission Resurgence Task Force report, which will be considered for adoption Nov. 15-16 by messengers at the SCBC annual meeting.
[The GCR task force] recommend[s] that:
8. The Nominating process be altered so as to allow the CEOs of our ministry partners to have greater input into the nomination of its trustees, by way of a process that would result in mutual agreement between ministry partners and the convention.
South Carolina Baptists, the Nominating Committee, and the CEOs will all submit names for consideration as trustees, as they have in the past. The Nominating Committee would be subdivided into groups that would be assigned to work with each of our seven ministry partners. The Nominating Committee sub-group and the CEO of each ministry partner would continue to work together until agreement could be reached as to who the nominees would be. Both the CEO and the sub-group would maintain the right of refusal. Once nominated by the entire Nominating Committee, the Convention would maintain the right to elect or reject any nominee. If a nominee were to be rejected by the Convention, the process would be repeated until the Executive Board, meeting in the absence of the Convention, would elect the trustee of the CEO and Nominating Committee’s choice. If a name were to be rejected by the Convention, that name could not be re-submitted until the Convention meets again at its next annual meeting.
9. The ministry partners of our state convention be allowed to have as many as one-fifth of their trustees from out of state.
Rationale: Some fear that surrendering some of our control over trustee selection would open the door for our ministry partners distancing themselves from the convention. However, several things need to be remembered:
? The convention will always have the final vote on trustee election.
? The nominating committee will maintain the right to vet all nominees and ultimately they will not be placed in nomination without committee approval.
? Our educational ministry partners attract far more students from out of state than they once did.
? Many fine, duly elected trustees have been lost through the years, simply because they moved from one state to another during their term of service. ie. Frank Page, was forced to resign as a trustee at Anderson University when he left our state.
? If a man/woman loves the Lord, is committed to Southern Baptist work, has a high view of Scripture, possesses the abilities, skill sets, and resources needed by our ministry partners and is recommended highly by the pastor of a cooperating Southern Baptist church where he or she is actively involved, why would we not want to utilize that person simply because they live outside South Carolina?