All members are eligible to nominate any five members of the congregation to serve on the search committee.  The members whose names appear most often on the nomination ballot will be contacted to verify their willingness to serve on the search committee.  The top ten who are willing to serve will appear on an election ballot submitted to the membership.  As you are considering who to nominate to serve on the search committee, please keep in mind the qualifications and exclusions below.

All members of the search committee should be:

• Known and respected by others in the congregation.
• More strongly committed to the congregation as a whole than to any subgroup.
• Well informed about the demands and time requirements of search committee membership. (During some stages of the search, the committee may meet weekly.  In 2019 there will be times when the committee will meet with a candidate from Friday evening through Sunday afternoon.)
• Members should promise to attend every meeting, and expect to give about 250-400 hours over the coming year and a half.
• Balanced by sex, age, interests, and tenure of membership to reflect the diversity of the congregation.
• Major areas of church life such as religious education, social action, property management, finance, and music should be represented by participants, not partisans
• Balanced by attributes:  organizational ability, broad theological awareness, computer skills.
• Not paid members of the church staff,
• Pledged to conduct a search that is fair and nondiscriminatory with respect to race, color, disability, sex, sexual orientation, age, and national origin.
• Committed to maintain confidentiality and to seek consensus.
• Capable of both self-assertion and compromise.
• Not prone to extreme reactions to ministers. The previous ministers’ strongest supporters or opponents are rarely the best choice.
• Well suited to teamwork:  a search committee is no place for Lone Rangers!

Members who are not eligible for election to the search committee are:

• members of the previous search committee – Jon Cleland-Host, Judith Hill, Michaele Malecki
• paid staff – Sandy Hay, Heather Cleland-Host, Andrew Schulz, Wendy Altmeier
• 2018 board members – Sara Clavez, Jill Haver Crissman, Sara Schulz, Andy Salogar, Barb Rajewski
• Transition Team members – Pete Carlson,  Linda Rector, Dan Sealey

For more information about UUA recommendations regarding the search process:
https://www.uua.org/sites/live-new.uua.org/files/settlement_handbook.pdf