Questions from February 21 meeting
At the meeting at Holy Cross Church on February 21, we ran out of time before being able to conduct the question and answer portion. Participants were asked to write down any questions, and we undertook to publish the answers on this site. Here are the questions we were asked!
Please note, if anyone would like to ask further questions, please email them to us!
The first question arose because in Fr. Maximos' presentation he listed, among possible challenges to our finding a permanent home near Valyermo, the need to conduct seismic tests. (This area is right on the San Andreas fault.)
Didn't St. Andrew's already do a seismic evaluation?
We presume so, and will certainly be asking St. Andrew's for any assistance or advice they can give. However, it is most likely that any such tests were limited to St. Andrew's own building and development plans. The property we are most interested in researching lies about a mile away from the abbey's main property. Almost certainly, then, given the different location and lapse of time, it will be necessary to conduct our own evaluation.
Are you ging to pay rent to St. Andrew's and will that come from your alotted monies for the new monastery?
We will be paying a small amount to compensate St. Andrew's for our board and meals. We will also be contributing our labor. However this rental payment will not come from the money set aside for our capital development. It will be a line item in our operational budget.
Will the [amount currently sequestered for capital purposes] $430,000 plus other monies end the project totally debt free?
The question of financing the acquisition and development of new land is a matter to be determined by the new Interim Capital Finance Committee, made up mainly of non-monastics, in consultation with the monks. The committee is only just beginning its work. We think, though, it is fair to say that there are no plans to go significantly into debt.
That said, we are investigating whether we might be able to take out a loan against the mortgage note we hold over the Newberry Springs property simply in order to have cash on hand to begin our project when the time comes. If this is possible, the loan would be paid off within a few years from the mortgage payments coming in from our Coptic brothers.No fundraising would be needed to pay off such a short term loan.