churchandschool
Junior Member
In Virgina,
We have a small legally recognized church. We have a Board of Trustees which was appointed in Sept 2006 with the acceptance of our By-laws. We have an IRS Tax ID number and are registered with the IRS as a church. About a year ago, we lost our Financial Officer, and for the interim, the Chair (our head minister) took over the positions duties. We elected a new Financial Officer in March. This is where things started to unravel. Since then the head minister has repeatedly 'forgotten' to turn over the financial records and account access to the elected Financial Officer. It was found out by the Recorder, that sometime between Jan 2, 08 and Feb 2, 08 the web site hosting service, which was set to automatically take payment from the church account, was changed from the church account to an unknown account. (and since then we have nearly lost our web site host due to non-payment, even though there is supposed to be plenty of money in the church account) We also have several email lists for which we use to communicate between members and share special interests. Last month, the head minister managed (not sure entirely how) to seize the ownership and moderator privileges of these lists (through Yahoo Groups) from the other members of the church and Board who started these lists. The email lists have been set now so only email messages that the head minister approves can be posted. The head minister has also gotten a hold of the signed copy of the By-laws and the church seal and will not turn them over to the Recorder of the Board, who is outlined in the by-laws as the holder of all records and properties of the church that are non-financial. The Recorder has managed to prevent a takeover of the church website by the head ministers son-in-law. (The son-in law had resigned some time ago from the church, but had while in the church gotten the passwords for the website account. When they went in, they created an email account connected to their Yahoo ID. Yahoo did assist in getting the website password reverted, but has not helped us with the email lists.) The head minister has recently said that they own the church and the email accounts, even though this is expressly against our by-laws that they had signed. Another matter we had found out, is that the head minister has another website, in which they connect the church with their private businesses of nursing ( is registered, but has not practiced in years) and counseling (NOT trained or registered) which was done without the Boards knowledge or approval. We have been given reason to believe that if the Board presses the matter of getting the head minister to release church property to the Board members who are assigned those duties, that the records will be destroyed. What do we (the Board Members) do in this situation?What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)?
We have a small legally recognized church. We have a Board of Trustees which was appointed in Sept 2006 with the acceptance of our By-laws. We have an IRS Tax ID number and are registered with the IRS as a church. About a year ago, we lost our Financial Officer, and for the interim, the Chair (our head minister) took over the positions duties. We elected a new Financial Officer in March. This is where things started to unravel. Since then the head minister has repeatedly 'forgotten' to turn over the financial records and account access to the elected Financial Officer. It was found out by the Recorder, that sometime between Jan 2, 08 and Feb 2, 08 the web site hosting service, which was set to automatically take payment from the church account, was changed from the church account to an unknown account. (and since then we have nearly lost our web site host due to non-payment, even though there is supposed to be plenty of money in the church account) We also have several email lists for which we use to communicate between members and share special interests. Last month, the head minister managed (not sure entirely how) to seize the ownership and moderator privileges of these lists (through Yahoo Groups) from the other members of the church and Board who started these lists. The email lists have been set now so only email messages that the head minister approves can be posted. The head minister has also gotten a hold of the signed copy of the By-laws and the church seal and will not turn them over to the Recorder of the Board, who is outlined in the by-laws as the holder of all records and properties of the church that are non-financial. The Recorder has managed to prevent a takeover of the church website by the head ministers son-in-law. (The son-in law had resigned some time ago from the church, but had while in the church gotten the passwords for the website account. When they went in, they created an email account connected to their Yahoo ID. Yahoo did assist in getting the website password reverted, but has not helped us with the email lists.) The head minister has recently said that they own the church and the email accounts, even though this is expressly against our by-laws that they had signed. Another matter we had found out, is that the head minister has another website, in which they connect the church with their private businesses of nursing ( is registered, but has not practiced in years) and counseling (NOT trained or registered) which was done without the Boards knowledge or approval. We have been given reason to believe that if the Board presses the matter of getting the head minister to release church property to the Board members who are assigned those duties, that the records will be destroyed. What do we (the Board Members) do in this situation?What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)?