Confusion continues over the North American Mission Board’s (NAMB) new national evangelism initiative, God’s Plan for Sharing (GPS).
What began with then-Southern Baptist Convention President Frank Page’s vision in 2006 has now blossomed into a 10-year emphasis planned for state conventions that want to take part.
The confusion? The funding — both for NAMB’s internal responsibility for GPS and how much state conventions are going to have to ante up for publicity of GPS.
In December, NAMB President Geoff Hammond told The Christian Index newspaper there was no line-item budget for GPS, because it was supposed to be mixed into all aspects of NAMB’s work.
Then in January, Hammond reported a tightening of NAMB’s budget and announced that all budgets were being cut 90 percent, except for state partnerships and the GPS budget.
Wait a minute. In December, he said there was no specific budget for GPS, but in January, he said the GPS budget is not going to be cut.
Mike Ebert, publications and media relations coordinator for NAMB, said there is definitely funding for GPS. “The primary dollars we are using to fund GPS is from overages,” he said. “We have $750,000 set aside from a previous year.”
This money was “carried over” in the evangelism office’s budget, so it does not reflect “on the books” as money for GPS, Ebert said. “All along, that was the plan.”
Hammond explained that the money was left over from the 2006 Annie Armstrong Easter Offering (AAEO) and that in 2007 the board of directors voted to let him decide how to use the money. He decided to earmark it for GPS, if needed, he said.
“But we hope the money will come from the 2009 Annie Armstrong Easter Offering,” he noted. “This is a step of faith.”
Hammond said NAMB will spend about $1 million in 2009 on GPS, some of that for media buys in the pilot states of Georgia, Texas, California, South Dakota and Pennsylvania. Of that, $750,000 will come from evangelism/AAEO and $250,000 will come from other areas.
Ebert said NAMB’s communications office will spend about $150,000 in production of media advertisements.
Hammond also noted that more than $500,000 was spent on GPS in 2008, but figures for 2007 and 2006 were not known at press time.
As far as the state conventions’ expected funding, the amount is unclear at this point.
“There will be no blanket approach,” Ebert said. “It is more of a regional approach.”
According to a Feb. 3 Baptist Press (BP) story, NAMB announced plans to invest up to $1.2 million in 2010 for a national media buy, which would include television, radio, newspaper and Internet ads.
Exactly where that money would come from or how it would be distributed was not explained, but it was noted that states able to contribute more money would be encouraged to do so. Hammond said Feb. 13 NAMB would pull from reserves if necessary.
NAMB would coordinate the media buys, produce the various media promotional pieces and provide those media resources free to state conventions choosing to participate in GPS, according to the BP story.
But the confusion is that original discussions in the GPS planning stage suggested NAMB would need to provide several million dollars for a national media buy. Then last summer, during a directors of evangelism meeting at NAMB, Hammond told the group NAMB would provide no money for a media buy.
Then comes the Feb. 3 announcement of $1.2 million for a media buy with no explanation of the journey from an assumed large amount to none to the current amount.
Brandon Pickett, communications team leader for NAMB, said the confusion over the media buy investment comes from miscommunication. While Hammond had no specific plans for a media buy initially, he always intended to do that, Pickett said. While NAMB’s 2010 budget is a work in progress, there are still plans to keep the money for the media in the budget despite the existing concerns with the economy. This is evidence of NAMB’s commitment to the success of GPS, Pickett said.
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