Board OKs committee to study sale of Baptist Building

DALLAS—The Baptist General Convention of Texas Executive Board voted to create a committee to study the potential sale of the Baptist Building in Dallas.

The board authorized the BGCT president, along with the chair and executive director of the Executive Board, to serve on and appoint the committee, which also will include two board representatives and three at-large members. The associate executive director and the treasurer/chief financial officer will serve as ex officio members of the committee to study a possible building sale and staff relocation.

“The executive director has been approached about the possibility of selling the Baptist Building. The potential buyer seems to have a serious interest. Based on this, the formation of an ad hoc committee to study any offer and to study possible relocation possibilities seems advisable at this time,” the board’s administration support committee reported.

Baylor interested

Executive Director David Hardage told the board Baylor University had expressed interest in the BGCT Executive Board property as a possible site for its expanded Louise Herrington School of Nursing.

According to the recommendation approved by the board, the study committee will provide periodic progress reports and a final report as soon as possible to the Executive Board through its administration support committee.

The $11.5 million Baptist Building was constructed in 1988 at 333 N. Washington on land leased from Baylor Health Care System. The BGCT Executive Board used proceeds from the sale of property in downtown Dallas, combined with trust funds, to finance construction without using any Cooperative Program mission money. Ten years later, the health care system’s board of directors voted to give the land, valued at $2.5 million, to the BGCT Executive Board.

Forgive BUA debt

In other business, the Executive Board approved a plan to forgive debt Baptist University of the Américas owes the BGCT. Pointing to BUA’s primary mission to train Hispanic Baptist pastors and church leaders, Richard Rogers of Huntsville, chair of the administration support committee, called the debt-forgiveness plan “a chance to invest in the future of a changing Texas.”

BUA carries $9.8 million in debt, with more than $3 million owed to the BGCT. The plan offers a dollar-for-dollar forgiveness of every dollar BUA raises from donors toward debt the school owes the BGCT.

Also, when the school sells its old campus property, each dollar used to retire debt BUA owes Frost Bank will earn the school a dollar of debt forgiveness from the BGCT toward the amount owed on loans to the state convention. The BGCT guaranteed more than $3.4 million in loans from Frost Bank to BUA.

The BGCT Executive Board anticipates BUA should be able to retire loans from the BGCT in three to four years.

Honored Suzii Paynter

The board honored Suzii Paynter for her service as director of the Christian Life Commission, director of public policy and leader of the BGCT Advocacy/Care Center. She recently was elected executive coordinator of the national Cooperative Baptist Fellowship.

In her final legislative update to the board, Paynter introduced Stephen Reeves, Austin-based legislative counsel for the CLC, as director of public policy.

The board also voted to:

• Establish a missions mobilization coordinating team to advise and assist in development, implementation and promotion of state, national and international missions initiatives. The team will include at least three representatives from the BGCT Executive Board, with one appointed as chair by the board’s executive committee.

The team—approved by the BGCT Executive Board—also will include representatives from Texas Baptist Men, Woman’s Missionary Union of Texas and the Go Now Missions student missions program, along with an associational director of missions, a BGCT institution whose responsibilities include missions, the BGCT Executive Board staff liaison to associations and two at-large members from BGCT-affiliated churches.

• Use $250,000 from the J.K. Wadley Mission Fund to replace funds from the Southern Baptist Convention’s North American Mission Board that are being phased out and redirected to church-starting efforts in parts of the United States where Southern Baptists do not have a strong presence.

The board also directed the BGCT Executive Board staff to request that half of the funds the BGCT provides be designated to the Minnesota-Wisconsin Baptist Convention and half to the Baptist Convention of New England, longtime partners with the BGCT.