Resolved, the House of Bishops concurring,

That, the General Convention Office initiate a study, with appropriate outside consultant support, for delivery to Executive Council by September 1, 2023 and for publication that month, for the purpose of determining the extent to which the obligation to pay pension and health plan contributions for clergy and lay professionals at the current contribution rates discourages deployment of clergy and lay professionals to historically non-white and small congregations, as compared to the statistical average congregation in The Episcopal Church; and be it further

Resolved, That the General Convention Office and its outside consultant are authorized and encouraged to use existing appropriate data sources, including data as may be reasonably requested from the Church Pension Fund in this work, and data from other denominations; and be it further

Resolved, That the General Convention Office and its outside consultant be encouraged to seek additional data by means of surveys of: Bishops and Diocesan deployment personnel, and Non-white congregations, clergy, and lay leaders; and be it further

Resolved, That to the extent reasonably feasible using existing labor economic models, the Study also estimate how many more full and part-time paid clergy and lay professionals would be deployed to non-white and small congregations if these obligations were completely funded (or reimbursed) from another source; and be it further

Resolved, That for the purposes of this resolution, the term “small congregation” shall mean a congregation whose pledge and plate income is in the lowest twenty percent for their diocese, and without significant income-generating resources of their own, and the term “increasing deployment” shall mean increases in the number of personnel deployed to such congregations as well as an increase in the number of compensated hours they work; and be it further

Resolved, That the General Convention request the Joint Standing Committee on Program, Budget and Finance to consider a budget allocation of $40,000 for the implementation of this resolution.