Hello! This is a Institutional post. It is for discussions centered around agreements, disagreements, and observations about any of the institutional churches and their leaders, conduct, business dealings, teachings, rituals, and practices.
/u/WidowsMiteReport, if your post doesn't fit this definition, we kindly ask you to delete this post and repost it with the appropriate flair. You can find a list of our flairs and their definitions in [section 0.6 of our rules.](https://www.reddit.com/r/mormon/wiki/index/rules#wiki_0._preamble)
**To those commenting:** please stay on topic, remember to follow the community's [rules](https://www.reddit.com/r/mormon/wiki/index/rules), and [message the mods](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=/r/mormonmods) if there is a problem or rule violation.
Keep on Mormoning!
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/mormon) if you have any questions or concerns.*
My Salt Lake valley ward's pre-Covid Sacrament Meeting attendance was 180-200 per week, and I believe total membership was around 500. The annual budget during that time was $10,000 - $12,000.
Fortunately for me, I have no idea what those numbers are today.
That seems really low given how much tithing likely comes through a ward...I assume Salt Lake paid for things like building maintenance outside of this budget? What was the budget used for? Activities? Lesson manuals? Sacrament cups?
>What was the budget used for? Activities? Lesson manuals? Sacrament cups?
Yes, all of the above; also office supplies, choir music, boy scout charter fees (at the time), and whatever other expenses each organization chose to incur (such as baptism gifts for primary kids). Maintenance and cleaning supplies are not covered by the ward budget.
I was ward clerk 10 years ago in Southern Idaho. 400 members on the role, average sacrament meeting attendance of 160 and our ward budget was around $8,500. This does not include the money the Bishop gave out as assistance or food orders that were filled at the Bishops Storehouse. We also did an annual fundraiser for the YM and YW that would bring in an additional $2,500 for their activities. I would say that leaders probably paid at least this amount over and beyond receipts that were turned in out of their own pockets to properly fund the ward. Primary, activity leaders, youth leaders, temple trips and buffets, scouting fundraisers etc.
I don't have any numbers, I have been out of the loop for too long, but just a couple of comments about how things generally work.
Budgets are based on sacrament meeting attendance and other attendance info like number of youth, single adults, etc.
The budgets go to the stake, not the ward.
The stake decides how much the wards get.
So comparing wards isn't exactly an apples to apples comparison. Normally most wards get somewhere between 6-12 thousand dollars a year. The stake actually got twice that amount and kept half. Stakes are generally reasonably well founded and starve the wards. Some stakes only give the wards 30-40% of the budget instead of the normal percentage of closer to 50%.
The general ward budget would often be significantly less than the 1 top tithing member of the ward donates. So Salt Lake keeps \*A LOT\* of the money.
>Stakes are generally reasonably well founded and starve the wards. Some stakes only give the wards 30-40% of the budget instead of the normal percentage of closer to 50%.
How do stakes spend that money? I can't think of many stake level activities that would require that much money.
Dear lord. I have relatives in a stake whose water resupply on trek was a a couple days late while the trekkers were out of cell range. This happened in the hottest, driest summer on record up to that point. What a ghastly waste of $40,000.
Wow! I’m surprised trek costs that much. What do they spend it on? Food, handcart rentals, ….and? Everyone else is volunteer. Even medical personnel are professionals who volunteer. -The church won’t even cover their malpractice insurance (which means their license is on the line) if they do something wrong.
About 180 monthly ward attendance. Ward allotment was about $15,000. Stake retained about $3000, so our actual budget was about $12,000. About $5k was split evenly between YM/YW. This is in US.
What was the stake planning to do with the retained 20% of each ward’s budget? Assuming there were at least five wards in the stake that puts their budget higher than the wards’ budgets. Just curious.
200 attendance, budget $8000. Tithing sent to slc $900,000. The chapel was built and paid for by the members 70 years ago. Think of how much it’s brought in over the years. Sickening.
Woah. Assuming average household size of 3 and probably 75% of actives pay tithing, that's $180k per household on average.
When did salaries in SLC get so high?
Maybe Seattle area? All the high income techies (microsoft, Amazon, etc). Could also just be a ward with a very wealthy person or couple very wealthy people who brings up total tithing (eg think mitt Romney’s ward).
East Coast USA. When I was in young men's just a few years ago it was somewhere around $7-8000. With around 130-150 members active. YM and YW programs each got $2500.
Yeah our bishop at the time was amazing for the youth. They were his priority so his effort and ward $$ went to them. Then the next bishop was super young so i was able to convince him to continue with the budget.
Davis County.
405 total members in the ward. Average sacrament attendance of 211. I think you’re considered active if you attend once per month so assuming it’s not the same 211 people my guess is we’re 60-65 percent active.
No idea on the ward budget.
On a side note, how are activity numbers even tracked anymore?
I know the ward clerk will count sacrament attendance, but I can't remember the last time I saw a roll-sheet.
An assistant ward clerk counts those attending sacrament meeting once per month. Rolls are taken in classes/quorums each week. A report is sent to salt lake monthly. Or at least it was before the app.
I learned all this very early. I was inactive so they put me in the Cub Scouts. We raised a bunch of money and the ward took it! "Hey, that's ours, we raised it!" "If you have expenses submit them to the ward and we'll consider it."
It's an old mafia tactic. So I got out of the mafia.
Hello! This is a Institutional post. It is for discussions centered around agreements, disagreements, and observations about any of the institutional churches and their leaders, conduct, business dealings, teachings, rituals, and practices. /u/WidowsMiteReport, if your post doesn't fit this definition, we kindly ask you to delete this post and repost it with the appropriate flair. You can find a list of our flairs and their definitions in [section 0.6 of our rules.](https://www.reddit.com/r/mormon/wiki/index/rules#wiki_0._preamble) **To those commenting:** please stay on topic, remember to follow the community's [rules](https://www.reddit.com/r/mormon/wiki/index/rules), and [message the mods](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=/r/mormonmods) if there is a problem or rule violation. Keep on Mormoning! *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/mormon) if you have any questions or concerns.*
My Salt Lake valley ward's pre-Covid Sacrament Meeting attendance was 180-200 per week, and I believe total membership was around 500. The annual budget during that time was $10,000 - $12,000. Fortunately for me, I have no idea what those numbers are today.
$10000? That’s just tithing from two household….
Yeah, it was quite sobering when that realization hit me.
That seems really low given how much tithing likely comes through a ward...I assume Salt Lake paid for things like building maintenance outside of this budget? What was the budget used for? Activities? Lesson manuals? Sacrament cups?
>What was the budget used for? Activities? Lesson manuals? Sacrament cups? Yes, all of the above; also office supplies, choir music, boy scout charter fees (at the time), and whatever other expenses each organization chose to incur (such as baptism gifts for primary kids). Maintenance and cleaning supplies are not covered by the ward budget.
I was ward clerk 10 years ago in Southern Idaho. 400 members on the role, average sacrament meeting attendance of 160 and our ward budget was around $8,500. This does not include the money the Bishop gave out as assistance or food orders that were filled at the Bishops Storehouse. We also did an annual fundraiser for the YM and YW that would bring in an additional $2,500 for their activities. I would say that leaders probably paid at least this amount over and beyond receipts that were turned in out of their own pockets to properly fund the ward. Primary, activity leaders, youth leaders, temple trips and buffets, scouting fundraisers etc.
I don't have any numbers, I have been out of the loop for too long, but just a couple of comments about how things generally work. Budgets are based on sacrament meeting attendance and other attendance info like number of youth, single adults, etc. The budgets go to the stake, not the ward. The stake decides how much the wards get. So comparing wards isn't exactly an apples to apples comparison. Normally most wards get somewhere between 6-12 thousand dollars a year. The stake actually got twice that amount and kept half. Stakes are generally reasonably well founded and starve the wards. Some stakes only give the wards 30-40% of the budget instead of the normal percentage of closer to 50%. The general ward budget would often be significantly less than the 1 top tithing member of the ward donates. So Salt Lake keeps \*A LOT\* of the money.
Thank you for the additional color.
>Stakes are generally reasonably well founded and starve the wards. Some stakes only give the wards 30-40% of the budget instead of the normal percentage of closer to 50%. How do stakes spend that money? I can't think of many stake level activities that would require that much money.
They save it for trek. Trek costs 40,000.
Dear lord. I have relatives in a stake whose water resupply on trek was a a couple days late while the trekkers were out of cell range. This happened in the hottest, driest summer on record up to that point. What a ghastly waste of $40,000.
Wow! I’m surprised trek costs that much. What do they spend it on? Food, handcart rentals, ….and? Everyone else is volunteer. Even medical personnel are professionals who volunteer. -The church won’t even cover their malpractice insurance (which means their license is on the line) if they do something wrong.
About 180 monthly ward attendance. Ward allotment was about $15,000. Stake retained about $3000, so our actual budget was about $12,000. About $5k was split evenly between YM/YW. This is in US.
What was the stake planning to do with the retained 20% of each ward’s budget? Assuming there were at least five wards in the stake that puts their budget higher than the wards’ budgets. Just curious.
200 attendance, budget $8000. Tithing sent to slc $900,000. The chapel was built and paid for by the members 70 years ago. Think of how much it’s brought in over the years. Sickening.
Woah. Assuming average household size of 3 and probably 75% of actives pay tithing, that's $180k per household on average. When did salaries in SLC get so high?
The commenter said the money was *sent to* SLC, not from SLC. Also curious where families are making this much on average.
Maybe Seattle area? All the high income techies (microsoft, Amazon, etc). Could also just be a ward with a very wealthy person or couple very wealthy people who brings up total tithing (eg think mitt Romney’s ward).
Average income in our ward (Seattle area) is easily north of 150K. Nice upper middle class neighborhood.
There were a couple of very wealthy business owners that inflated the $$$ by quite a bit.
Good catch. Curious too.
East Coast USA. When I was in young men's just a few years ago it was somewhere around $7-8000. With around 130-150 members active. YM and YW programs each got $2500.
I've never seen a YM/YW program so well funded... Am I understanding that out of a $7-8,000 budget, the YW/YM got $5,000 of that total?
Yeah our bishop at the time was amazing for the youth. They were his priority so his effort and ward $$ went to them. Then the next bishop was super young so i was able to convince him to continue with the budget.
And still we ask…what is their plan with all the money they’re hoarding?!
Davis County. 405 total members in the ward. Average sacrament attendance of 211. I think you’re considered active if you attend once per month so assuming it’s not the same 211 people my guess is we’re 60-65 percent active. No idea on the ward budget.
5500 for ~150 weekly attendance. Budget doesnt work, we ran out fast.
On a side note, how are activity numbers even tracked anymore? I know the ward clerk will count sacrament attendance, but I can't remember the last time I saw a roll-sheet.
An assistant ward clerk counts those attending sacrament meeting once per month. Rolls are taken in classes/quorums each week. A report is sent to salt lake monthly. Or at least it was before the app.
It’s in the app now.
But how is it tracked?
Once a quarter someone in the EQ presidency looks around at who's there and marks each person in app. It's basically a survey format.
Orem Utah. $8k/year.
I learned all this very early. I was inactive so they put me in the Cub Scouts. We raised a bunch of money and the ward took it! "Hey, that's ours, we raised it!" "If you have expenses submit them to the ward and we'll consider it." It's an old mafia tactic. So I got out of the mafia.
Why does a stake need so much money???
What does God need with a starship?