LAKE PLACID, N.Y. (BP)–Four former convention presidents will study a proposal to change the name of the Baptist Convention of New York, and messengers to the convention’s Nov. 4-5 annual meeting increased the Cooperative Program percentage for the SBC.
The four presidents were named to the study group which will look at the name change since the convention area includes northern New Jersey and southwestern Connecticut. The two areas are not now readily identifiable as part of the Baptist Convention of New York, a convention spokesman said.
A second study committee, to be named by the president, will focus on the composition and selection of the convention’s executive board. The two committees will report at the 2000 annual meeting, Nov. 2-3, in Albany, N.Y.
The 1999, 30th annual meeting drew 180 messengers. The BCNY has 350 churches with 24,390 members.
Messengers approved a $2,932,157 budget for 2000 which includes an anticipated $606,766 in Cooperative Program receipts from BCNY churches. Of that amount, $147,141, or 24.25 percent, will be sent to the Southern Baptist Convention’s Cooperative Program for missions and ministry causes. The SBC portion is a .25 percent increase, the first since 1996.
Edward J. Hatcher, pastor of Central Hunterdon Baptist Church, Flemington, N.J., was re-elected president. Other officers include: first vice-president, Delmer Olds, layman from Terrill Road Baptist Church, Scotch Plains, N.J.; second vice-president, Samuel Wong, pastor of Chinese Promise Baptist Church, Brooklyn, N.Y.; and recording secretary, David Shepherd, a professor at the Northeast Branch of Mid-America Seminary in Schenectady, N.Y.
Special guests at the annual meeting included former convention executive directors Jack Lowndes and R. Quinn Pugh. Bob Reccord, president of the SBC’s North American Mission Board, was the featured speaker for the convention’s Founder’s Banquet.
