Agent Ward

I have been ward clerk now for about 10 months. With the coming new year, our ward will become the agent ward. There are 3 other wards in our building. How can I find out all of my responsibilities. I know some of them but I don't know all of them. The clerk of the ward that is currently the agent ward is newer than I am, I know him quite well and have been helping him with his duties, but he knows nothing about the duties that come with being agent ward.
Can some help me out here? With out me asking a ton of specific questions.

Thanks
Newt

Newt wrote:With the coming new year, our ward will become the agent ward.

The responsibility of the Agent Bishop is defined on page 163 of the CHI. He mainly coordinates assignments for member participation in meetinghouse care and maintenance, coordinates safety and security procedures for the meetinghouse, and coordinates scheduling of the building with the stake and other wards that use it.

As a ward clerk, you will have the privilege of assisting the bishop in doing all of this, if he so desires. [grin]

Most agent bishops assign another member to do the scheduling, and the handbook supports this.

Each of our wards has more than one satellite operator. The operator in the agent bishop's ward serves as the primary each year, with the others as backup.

Some buildings look to the agent bishop or one of his assigned counselors to coordinate with the stake physical facilities representative on all building needs.

One guideline used by some is, if it does not have to do with transient welfare needs, it is the responsibility of the agent bishop.

I think the key is that the bishops counsel together and decide what they would like the agent bishop to take care of, and what they will take care of in their individual wards.

And, of course, the agent bishop will still make assignments to the other wards to help with meetinghouse maintenance, care, and cleanup, as needed.

Those are a few things off the top of my head. I am sure there are others.

Another area that catches a few by surprise is the meetinghouse library. Important in that regard is the building copier expenses and expendables. The agreement on handling copier expenses varies but you should have an agreement between units and organizations that use the building. This area can become a real pain if someone does not get a handle on it early.

Sacrament Cups! - commonly owned by Agent Ward

Thanks for the help. Those are some great things to start with.

Newt

I have been a ward clerk for all of 2 months. Library supplies have been something I have had to handle lots of. The issue I have run into is, what do I handle and what should be handled by the Facilities Management peolple?
For example we have had a TV go out, and the space heater in the library burned up yesterday.

sportstats wrote:what do I handle and what should be handled by the Facilities Management peolple?
For example we have had a TV go out, and the space heater in the library burned up yesterday.

TVs are definitely in the realm of the FM group. Work with your Physical Facilities Rep (the high councilor responsible for interfacing with the FM Group) to get it fixed or replaced.

A space heater was most likely provided by someone at the local level (ward or stake), and so would be replaced at the local level. But the FM Group might have concerns about the use of a space heater -- I hope the term "burned up" wasn't entirely literal!

Newt wrote:With the coming new year, our ward will become the agent ward. There are 3 other wards in our building. How can I find out all of my responsibilities...
Can some help me out here? With out me asking a ton of specific questions.

Actually, no harm in asking a ton of specific questions, as we all love to give advice!

lajackson wrote:The responsibility of the Agent Bishop is defined on page 163 of the CHI. He mainly coordinates assignments for member participation in meetinghouse care and maintenance, coordinates safety and security procedures for the meetinghouse, and coordinates scheduling of the building with the stake and other wards that use it.

lajackson and others summed up the way we operate in his post. Are you in a new building or a new rotation, as I'm surprised there isn't a rotation already in place. These things are usually as much tradition as they are church policy from the handbook.

I'm really not adding much, but here is how we operate it:

In October (yeah, already past) The old agent ward meets with the soon to be agent ward to coordinate a "hand-off," as some of the issues involve new callings and scheduling.

1) agent ward for the coming year calls the building scheduler, and prepares the "building Schedule" for the new year. (each ward has their own ward scheduler, and these interface with the building scheduler.) The building schedule directs the rotation of the building assignments such as weekday nights for relief society and Youth, and sunday meeting times and locations for all three wards. It also details the sunday set-up and clean-up duties, and the major weekly building cleaning. I'll attach a copy of one of these from a past year -it is very comprehensive and is past from ward to ward each year. If this isn't done by now, aren't your organizations asking for it?

2) Agent ward's Physical Facilities person becomes "agent contact" for the building, and interfaces with the others wards in the building to make sure all three wards are doing their assigned weekly and monthly cleaning duties and watches the lock-up of the building carefully. He receives feedback from the other wards and communicates needs with the stake on maintenance or cleaning issues. He makes sure the snow shovels and ice-melt are ready when needed, and put away when needed, etc.

3) Agent ward appoints "Building Librarian(s)" These become the head librarian in charge of materials ordering, maintenance and sometimes check-out or scheduling between the three wards. Agent Ward orders and initially pays for supplies, and we split the cost of library (copier) supplies quarterly with each ward. (Keeping a "copies" tally sheet keeps all three wards a littler happier that this is somewhat fair.)

4) Agent ward makes "landscaping" assignments, which includes purchasing and planting/weeding flowers for a few flower beds, and assigning a bi-yearly clean-up of the grounds between all the wards. Agent ward also does (or assigns) indoor "special cleaning" assignments as needed in the chapel, kitchen or gym - these areas get a weekly cleaning, but sometimes it is a little too "quick" to give it a through job.

5) Agent ward supplies sacrament cups, as mentioned.

6) Interfaces with the other bishops about "problems" that come up. These are most often cleaning, scheduling and building lock-up, or security issues.

1. "So and So" wards youth had a party and didn't clean up so building was dirty later in week for another event
2. last ward in building Sunday didn't empty diaper pail in mothers lounge and by the next Saturday nobody could enter the room.
3. Basketball players from some ward aren't out of building so lock up guy can't lock up...
4. Snow shovelers from some ward didn't shovel tuesday night and other ward had big RS party or funeral
5. This list is endless...

sportstats wrote:I have been a ward clerk for all of 2 months. Library supplies have been something I have had to handle lots of.

Our Agent Ward assigns a "building librarian" and for that year the library is their kingdom- they magnify their calling. They make their own purchases for supplies through the agent wards budget, and our Finance clerk keeps tabs on expenses, and every quarter or so divides them in three and "bills" each ward. Every year the new agent ward appoints a new "ward Librarian" to take over- and it is usually just a "promotion" of one of their ward librarians.

That's just the way we work it in our building with three wards....I'm not sure what the CHI says about it...

kisaac wrote:That's just the way we work it in our building with three wards....I'm not sure what the CHI says about it...

Posts in this thread that cite references to the CHI are obsolete since the Handbook was newly released in November 2010.

The Handbook does not mention an agent ward. It does describe the responsibilities of an agent bishop. This may sound like semantecs to some but the responsibilty for each meetinghouse is assigned to a bishop by the stake president and not to a ward. There is little in the way of guidance in the Handbook. But what there is can be found by looking in the index under agent bishop's responsibilities.

You will find that a majority of how an agent bishop handles his responsibilities is left to revelation since there is little guidance in the Handbook.

Additionally, I have helped influence in our stake that the Agent Ward be the First Ward in the building. Nothing worse than being out of ink in the copier and having the toner locked up in the clerk office of the agent ward meeting 3 hours from now....

That way the Agent Ward eats their own dogfood sunday morning, sacrament cups, snow shoveling, copiers, etc...

jshawut wrote:Nothing worse than being out of ink in the copier and having the toner locked up in the clerk office of the agent ward meeting 3 hours from now....

And here I was thinking it was best if they were the last ward - that way they get the responsibility for closing the building and emptying the diaper pails.

Supplies can run out at any time.

jdlessley wrote: The Handbook does not mention an agent ward. It does describe the responsibilities of an agent bishop. This may sound like semantecs to some but the responsibilty for each meetinghouse is assigned to a bishop by the stake president and not to a ward....

Thanks for the clarification. While our bishop is indeed in charge, and ultimately responsible, we as his ward members are the subject of his delegation, and we take a much more active role (and do much more work in all these areas) when he is the Agent Bishop. In this way, I feel it's a ward accomplishment.

RussellHltn wrote:And here I was thinking it was best if they were the last ward...
...Supplies can run out at any time.....

Middle ward is the cake! No set-up of cultural hall, RS or Primary rooms, and no take-down of same! Ditto for diapers- We just supply the dirty ones!