ECFA Membership

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[Linda]

It was just called to my attention that GCC is a member of ECFA.

Also called to my attention (by the person I mentioned previously who was doing some research), ECFA membership states:
Every member shall be governed by a responsible board of not less than five individuals, a majority of whom shall be independent, which shall meet at least semiannually to establish policy and review its accomplishments. The board or a committee consisting of a majority of independent members shall review the annual financial statements and maintain direct communication between the board and the independent certified public accountants.

They go on to define independent as:

Board independence.  This Standard includes the following requirement, "Every member shall be governed by a responsible board of not less than five individuals, a majority of whom shall be independent...."
The following are examples of "independent" board members in ECFA's view (also see Standard 6 regarding related-party transactions which could impair board member independence):

   1.Persons who are not employees or staff members of the organization.
   2.Persons who may not individually dictate the operations of the organization similar to an employee or staff member. A person who is an uncompensated CEO, for instance, is not independent.
   3.Persons who are not related by blood or marriage to staff members. Blood or marriage relationships are defined for the purposes of the Standard as being spouse, parent, in-law, child, sibling, grandparent, grandchildren, aunt, uncle and first cousin relationships.
   4.Persons who are not related by blood or marriage to other board members.
   5.Persons who do not report to or are not subordinate to employees or staff members of the organization.
   6.Persons who do not report to or are not subordinate to other board members.
   7.Persons who do not receive a significant amount of consulting, speaking or any other remuneration from the organization.
   8.Persons who do not have relationships with firms that have significant financial dealings with the organization, officers, directors or key employees.
   9.Persons who are not the paid legal counsel, related to the paid legal counsel, or are employed by the firm that is the paid legal counsel of the organization.
  10.Persons who are not the auditors, related by blood or marriage to the auditors, or are employed by the auditing firm of the organization.

The organization should take care to maintain the reality, not just the appearance of independent board governance. Requiring the predominance of independent board members helps ensure the board will take official action without partiality, undue influence, or conflict of interest.

To assess the reality of board independence, ECFA looks beyond the majority of independent board members on the board roster. ECFA is just as concerned about the reality of board independence as with the mathematical determination of a majority of independent board members.
It is appropriate for the board to establish and adopt a conflict of interest policy, and ask board members to complete a conflict of interest disclosure statement annually.

Here's the link:
http://www.ecfa.org/Content/Comment2

Am I correct that no one on the board of GCC is an independent member by the definition stated in the requirements for membership to ECFA? I say this because I know of fine organizations who will not join ECFA because they do not wish to have an independent board, not because they don't believe in financial responsibility, but because they wish to have a self-perpetuating board to protect the purpose of the organization. (For example, a pro-life group may not wish to have an independent board because the board could take the group in a direction they do not wish to go philosophically).

What I mean is, I understand if GCC wants to control their board, but they can't have it both ways. You have to abide by the rules when you join organizations.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but GCC does not meet the requirements for ECFA membership. It seems to me that no one on the board is independent, much less a majority. Alert the media.

[newcreature]

Here is the list of names of the GCM board of Directors:
http://www.gcmweb.org/who/Board.aspx

It appears that only 3 out of 9 of the board members are from GCM: Dave Bovenmyer, Joe Dunn, and Greg Van Nada. However, if 2 of the remaining 6 board members are in some way related to GCM contrary to ECFA guidelines, then once again GCM is perpetuating its long history of "heavenly deception" instituted by Jim McCotter 40 years ago.

Here is GCM's latest 3-year (2006-2008) financial overview as reported on ECFA's website. There appears to be little variation in the revenues and expenses during that 3-year period. They brought in just under $14 million each year and spent just under $14 million each year. http://www.ecfa.org/MemberProfile.aspx?ID=12040&Type=Member

GCM's finances for 2009 are not posted for some reason. However, most ECFA members have already posted their 2009 finances. I did not examine every ECFA member, but I looked at over a dozen charter members (e.g., Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, Campus Crusade for Christ, Baptist General Conference, Dallas Theological Seminary, InterVarsity Christian Fellowship, Wycliffe Bible Translators, Young Life, Youth for Christ, etc.) and a few of the newest members (I selected a half-dozen totally random selections). All of the ones I looked at had posted their 2009 finances.
http://www.ecfa.org/CharterMembers.aspx
http://www.ecfa.org/NewestMembers.aspx

On the ECFA Member Profile for GCM, if you scroll down to Ministry Description, it says: Great Commission Ministries (GCM) is a world-wide church planting, church growth and leadership development mission organization. GCM focuses on leaders and prospective leaders on American college campuses, international churches, high schools, and campus outgrowth community ministries. (Emphasis mine -- I see their primary focus hasn't changed in 40 years.)

[Linda]

I was referring to the board of GCC.

Here is the link:
http://www.gccweb.org/about/gcc-board/

Looks like the members are Dave Bovenmyer, Dennis Clark, Mark Darling, John Hopler, Brent Knox, Herschel Martindale, Tom Short & Rick Whitney.

It looks to me like none of the GCC board is independent. And, old school GCC, at that.

The director of GCM actually posted on here and said GCM was not affiliated with GCC. He has no idea. You could find his comments by doing a forum search with the words "Tom Mauriello".

My point in bringing this up was that it seems to fit the mold of misrepresentation to get something.

As EAS pointed out on a different thread, they seem to have misrepresented themselves as a student organization to gain access to campus facilities for their church meetings. GCM said they were part of the NAE when they hadn't even applied for membership yet. (I called NAE and spoke with the director of membership. They applied after we pointed that fact out on this forum.)

It looks to me like they have done the same thing with the ECFA membership. If that is the case, it troubles me greatly, because I do know of a fine organization that wished to be a part of this group, but respected the membership requirements on this point and did not apply for membership because of it.

[newcreature]

The director of GCM actually posted on here and said GCM was not affiliated with GCC. He has no idea.

Ahhh... now I understand. You know, this reminds me of the old shell game the hucksters play at county fairs and carnivals. You can never guess the right coconut shell because the guy is so slick and so quick. There are so many fronts to this organization... it reminds me of the many Iowa newspaper investigations posted in here that exposed all the hidden connections between Jim McCotter = ISU Bible Study = Ames Fellowship Church = THEOS = Life Herald = Today's Student = The Cause = etc, etc, etc. ===> GCXXX.

Looks like the same thing is going on with GCAC, GCC, GCM, GCX, GCY, GCZ, GEEEEEEZ!

I did look at your GCC link, and sure enough, all 9 directors on the board are at the very top of the GCx food chain and are linked for life at their GCx hip joints. EFCA must not know, or must not care. The same goes for Tom Mauriello. I could possibly understand it if they didn't know. But if they are sticking their heads in the sand about GC's alphabet soup, that is sad and disturbing.

[nelliepooh]

I find this very interesging because GCC and GCM are seperate organizations with the EFCA, however the churches I think most of us think of as GCM are actually GCC.  I find it interesting because for example WCCC claims to be a GCM church as far as I can tell but its leaders stem from GCC.  The financial profiles of these two groups are very different and its interesting to me that GCM and GCC share so much in common.  Something just seams fishy.

[Linda]

Tom Mauriello wrote back and forth with Terry and I a few times in February of 2008, I think. He said he was going post a list of GCM churches. He never did. He did send me a letter naming the GCM churches and gave me permission to post his answer in the private forum, which I did. I won't post his letter in the public forum, but here are the churches he named as GCM churches. He said all other churches not on the list are GCC churches. He also said that if a GCC church had a campus ministry it was a GCC ministry, not a GCM ministry.

GCMC Churches (Tom used GCMC so now we have yet another GC acronym) as of 2008

Ball State Revolution
Bowling Green, Ohio - sent a church plant to Kent State
H2O Orlando
Illini Life, U of IL
Illinois State Illini Life
New Life Church, U of M Campus Church
Ohio State
University of Maryland Church
The Rock, University of Missouri
New Life Campus Fellowship, Virginia Tech
Riverview Church, Lansing, MI
Texas A & M University
University of Texas
University of North Texas
Kairos & Kairos West, Los Angeles
Heritage Church, Ohio

This was Tom's list of GCM churches. He said he was going to post a list here and he never did. It seems odd that GCM doesn't list it's churches anyplace. Where he just gives names of colleges, he did not give the name of the church. He did say that if the church is not on this list, it is a GCC church.

Clear as mud.

[AgathaL'Orange]

WCCC is a GCC church with multiple locations staffed with GCM missionaries.  Right?  Same with Evergreen, Stonebrook, and RW's churches.

[newcreature]

Linda,

It also looks like Tom Mauriello inadvertently exposed a violation of ECFA membership conditions by listing the churches in his letter to you. It now appears that 5 of the 9 board members are not independent from GCM -- Dave, Greg, and Joe as mentioned previously, and now: Noel Heikkinen, Pastor of Riverview Church in East Lansing, Michigan; and JR Woodward, Pastor and church planter at Kairos Church in Los Angeles.

For all we know, the remaining four board members at GCM may be GCX-lifers as well. Controlling the corporate culture is vital for GCX leaders in order to maintain their power structure. Like you mentioned before, it's fine for an organization to have its own like-minded, closely-affiliated board members. However, they can't have it both ways and simultaneously claim the majority of their members are independent.

How does Tom redefine the meaning of "independent" to include five GCM leaders as legitimate board members in light of the ECFA policy? Please tell me if I am missing something here. Otherwise, I might conclude it's another prime example of spritual manipulation and deception. Are the leaders so utilitarian in their motives that the ends justify the means at every branch of GCX?

[Linda]

That's interesting about the GCM board. I hadn't looked up the guys and only recognized a couple of names.

Like you mentioned before, it's fine for an organization to have its own like-minded, closely-affiliated board members. However, they can't have it both ways and simultaneously claim the majority of their members are independent.

How does Tom redefine the meaning of "independent" to include five GCM leaders as legitimate board members in light of the ECFA policy? Please tell me if I am missing something here. Otherwise, I might conclude it's another prime example of spritual manipulation and deception. Are the leaders so utilitarian in their motives that the ends justify the means at every branch of GCX?

You are correct. They can't have it both ways and they definitely seem to be in violation on the ECFA membership standards which go on to say that you can't be part of a group that reports to the board, or subordinate to anyone on the board, or receive remuneration from the organization. And, as if that were not specific enough they state, The organization should take care to maintain the reality, not just the appearance of independent board governance."

5.Persons who do not report to or are not subordinate to employees or staff members of the organization.
6.Persons who do not report to or are not subordinate to other board members.
7.Persons who do not receive a significant amount of consulting, speaking or any other remuneration from the organization.
The organization should take care to maintain the reality, not just the appearance of independent board governance.

Here are some guesses:
1) They never read the rules, so don't know they are in violation
2) They didn't think anyone would notice (just like they didn't think anyone would call the NAE to find out that they claimed NAE membership at a time when they hadn't even applied for membership)
3) This little tip will help the GCC/GCM people come up with their story. They will state on a "technicality" that GCC/GCM  are different than the organizations they represent. In other words, Whitney doesn't "work" for GCC, he works for Vintage Faith Church, etc. However, that doesn't pass the other standards, including maintaining the reality and "not just the appearance" of board governance. This is a board that makes decisions that affect the churches that the board members attend. If a church is struggling financially, they could send money, for example. (Not saying this happened, I'm just pointing out that all of the members of the board are in a position where their church could benefit from a decision of the board, therefore it is not an independent board.)

[Linda]

WCCC is a GCC church with multiple locations staffed with GCM missionaries.  Right?  Same with Evergreen, Stonebrook, and RW's churches.

I forgot to comment on this. Yes, Agatha, that's what Tom told me. In other words, in the cases of GCC churches with campus ministries involving staff that is supported by contributions made to GCM, GCM is just there to collect and distribute funds. They have no spiritual control or oversight over those people or the group they serve.

[IWishToRemainAnonymous]

The last auditor's report from Evergreen (in 2009) shows over $717,000 invested in mutual funds. Is this unusual? Does ECFA membership permit investments of this sort?

[bothered]

Linda thank you for bringing this to light.

Just to add my two cents into who the board is...

Greg Guevara, the chairman of the board, was also a former GCM staffer of some kind.

This article tells a little bit about each director:

http://www.christianpost.com/news/great-commission-ministries-appoints-three-new-directors-13308/

Blurb from article:

"Greg Guevara has served as GCM’s Managing Vice President since January 2001, and prior to that has worked as Director of Development. Previously an attorney with Jones, Day, Reavis & Pogue in Columbus, OH, Guevara graduated from the University of Michigan, he has been involved with the Great Commission movement since 1985, and was ordained as a pastor in 2000."

So, yeah, Greg really isn't "independent" either. After things fell apart at the national level, he left GCM and went back to the legal world.

Also, it is interesting about the GCMC acronym. I remember Greg Van Nada using that acronym on his linkedin profile a few years back. But I am not sure if he still uses it or has one profile.

Some of them wanted to distance themselves from the unhealthy practices they were seeing, but they were not really honest about how difficult that was going to be, nor were they really public about it. There really isn't any public narrative about what is going on. You basically have to find out via forums like this.

Consider h2o orlando, this church was so dysfunctional on so many levels. I know Greg at one point was involved in the church and then left to be a part of another church while in Orlando and wasn't a part of h2o anymore. He was a GCM "national leader" at the time and still is one.

[Linda]

Is Tom Mauriello still the head of GCM?

The link is interesting. I think it was before Tom's time, but it references Great Commission churches. Tom said GCM is not affiliated with Great Commission Churches. What a complicated mess.

All I know is that GCC does not have an independent board.

As far as investments go, I believe a group is allowed to make them with extra funds and still be in good standing with the ECFA. I just wonder why a church would be asking families to give sacrificially during these difficult times and then have 3/4 of a million extra to "invest" in the market during risky times.

[MidnightRider]

As far as investments go, I believe a group is allowed to make them with extra funds and still be in good standing with the ECFA. I just wonder why a church would be asking families to give sacrificially during these difficult times and then have 3/4 of a million extra to "invest" in the market during risky times.

I have no knowledge of this particular church. But there are legitimate reasons why a church would have money saved like this, e.g., a building fund.