The wife just got back from a one-day special circuit meeting (or whatever they call it) at the regional assembly hall. It's got a capacity of about 1,200, fully paid for, staffed by volunteers and in use for less than eight hours. Then the guy making the announcement tells the crowd that the one-day expenses for the gig was about $6,600 (?!!!)... What's up with that?
$6,600 Expenses For a One-Day Assembly At a Fully-Paid-Up Hall? WTF!
by Room 215 34 Replies latest watchtower bible
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Witness 007
YES I AGREE! I helped pay for the friggin hall....I helped clean it for free afterward and YET they charge me $800 dollars an hour for electricity and water......WTF indeed! Non-profit my ass!
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Robert7
I've thought about that too when I've been to assemblies. I wonder if it's a fully loaded average. Even though it's used for 8 hours, it is still probably heated and cooled every day. Plus add taxes and maintenance. That being said, that's $343,000 per year at $6,600 per weekend, so that sounds quite high if it's paid up.
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Justitia Themis
I think it goes like this: When the elders have that "meeting" during the assembly, they vote on a resolution to send X amount of dollars to the WTBTS as a donation. Then, they include the donation in the expenses column, and present it to the rank and file as a cost of having the assembly.
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Doubting Bro
There's a cost per assigned publisher + the circuit elders make a "donation" to the world wide work and to the kingdom hall fund. In my circuit, they actually gave the amounts from the last time and I realized that the actual cost for the facility was actually less than 1/2 of the total expenses. If I remember, the total expenses were around 6k but there was 2k given to the www and 2k given to the khf so I think the real expense was 2k.
The WTS started putting pressure a few years ago on circuits to donate a set amount as opposed to just donating the surplus. This way, Momma can count on a steady cash flow.
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Justitia Themis
I became suspicious when the KHs in our circuit starting paying in advance the per-publisher fee, and yet we would still have thousands of dollars more in expenses. I remember questioning just what those expenses might be since we owned the facility, didn't have food, and everthing was staffed by volunteers.
The part I find most reprehensible is that the donations are presented to the publishers as expenses related to the cost of having the assembly.
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outofthebox
This is how it happens: A bunch of High Elders meet in a room. The leader is sent by "Mother" to make a resolution: "Let's add a $5,000 contribution to the ted Jaracs retirement fund (I am being ironic here)". Everybody agrees (or else) and now we have magically created a deficit for the poor unknowing attendants. Praise Jah!
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sir82
$6,600 divided by 1200 attendance = $5.50 per attendee.
Someone decided far in advance that the expenses for the "special" assembly day would be $5.50 per person, et voila! You get a $6,600 "expense".
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Mickey mouse
This should answer your question.
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Room 215
Oh, and another wrinkle... they placed three more contribution boxes for the friends to trip over SMACK DAB IN THE MIDDLE OF THE FOYER!!