Earlier this fall, a new task force was formed to help our congregation realize a new vision for our campus to ensure we can continue to meet the needs of our church family and community for decades to come. This new task force, the Way Forward Implementation Team (WFIT), is responsible for implementing the plan developed by the Way Forward Task Force. Reporting to Session, the WFIT will provide oversight and governance of the plan to transform our campus for the future, working closely with our consultants and community partners to guide you through options and decisions along the way. You will hear much more from the WFIT in the coming months. In the meantime, please take time to get to know the team, many of whom have been involved in this transformational work since the beginning.
Warren Henry Warren Henry, Sr. and his wife Sarah have been members for 28 years. They have two grown children (Doug and Marie) and two grandchildren (Feliks and Lili). He is retired from the banking industry, and his work focused on Risk Management. Past church service includes serving on the Session two times, serving as Clerk of Session and acting as Chair of the Associate Pastor Nominating Committee. He is excited to be on this project to translate the vision created by the Way Forward Task Force into reality.
Eric Banks Eric Banks and his wife Elizabeth have been Trinity members for over 10 years. Both Eric and Elizabeth have served many roles including Session, Sunday School, Organ Restoration Task Force, Communications, Usher, Buildings and Grounds Chairman and The Way Forward Task Force. Eric also served on the Board of Philips Academy. Eric and Elizabeth live with Elizabeth’s sister, Melissa, in the neighborhood adjacent to the church and have three children: Liz (32), John (30) and Caroline (18). Eric comes from the wireless network engineering and implementation industry, and Elizabeth is a former CMS teacher.
Brian Field Brian Field is a child of Trinity, baptized and raised in our church. He is married to Ali Field, and they have two children, Anna and Charlie, who were also baptized and raised at Trinity. Brian is a middle school history teacher and coach at Providence Day School. He has served Trinity as an Elder, chair of the ONC, a member of the APNC, organized the ushers for several years, and as a youth Sunday School teacher. For the past 3.5 years, he has served on the Way Forward Task Force and is looking forward to continuing this exciting work as a member of the Implementation Team.
Suzanne Sawyer Susanne Sawyer and her husband George have been Trinity members for 53 years. They have three married children raised in Trinity and seven grandchildren. She is grateful for the many Montreat weekends where questioning and celebrating one’s faith were welcomed, for Gilchrist Lectures which challenged and inspired, and for the many reminders from our own pulpit through the years of who and whose we all are. She has served as an Elder several times and on a number of Sessional Committees (WDS, Mission and Outreach, Christian Formation, Worship, ONC, and (2)APNC), taught Youth and Adult Sunday School, shared rich friendships, and is happy to experience new friendships among the young families drawn to this Trinity faith community. She is excited to be a member of the Way Forward Implementation Team.
Anne McGovern Anne, her husband Eric, and their two children, Maddy (7) and Wesley (11), have called Trinity home for the past 10 years. Anne’s love for Trinity has led her to support the church in many ways, including serving on Session and numerous committees, teaching Sunday School and chairing the Trinity Anti-racism Task Force. She is looking forward to bringing her skills as a communicator and decades of professional experience in public relations to the Way Forward Implementation Team.
Rev. Nick Cheek Nick is married to Rev. Ashley Cheek, and together they have three children: Lydia, Nicholas, and Ada. Nick has served congregations in various capacities, including associate pastor, senior pastor, chaplain, youth pastor, contemporary worship director, and supply pastor. He is passionate about preaching, pastoral care, visioning, and fostering healthy relationships. Nick views the Way Forward project as an expression of faithful stewardship for the land entrusted to Trinity. Over the past eight months, you may have heard him say, “God is up to something at Trinity.” He believes that God is indeed at work, and he feels blessed to be serving with you during this season of discernment and positive change.
Rev. Rebecca Heilman Rebecca has been ordained in the PCUSA denomination for more than seven years and has served at Trinity for a little over five. She attended Union Presbyterian Seminary in Richmond, VA where she met her now husband of three years, Douglas Campbell, who is a teacher in Cabarrus County. They share a son together, Marius, and three rambunctious black dogs – Sadie, Nymeria, and Skip. Her family keeps her grounded and reminds her to be present in the moment. In ministry, Rebecca feels called to fostering community, one on one relationships and the faith formation of children, youth, and adults. The Way Forward project invites us to embody our faith in the here and now. It encouraged us to listen to the present and future leaders of the church, the children and youth, who love this place as much as we do. May we look forward with hope, knowing God will lead us by the hand.
Jim Miller Jim Miller and his wife Kaye have been members at Myers Park Presbyterian (where they met!) since 1980. They have two grown children (Lindsay and James IV) and one grandson (Luke). Jim is retired from his own small sewing thread business. His service at Myers Park includes several terms as active Deacon and Elder and he has served as Chair of Finance, Stewardship, Personnel, ONC, and Endowment. But most notably, he served as Building Committee Chair for 7 years during construction of the Outreach Center and renovation of Celebrate Worship and meeting space. He is honored to serve as a non-voting advisor to the WFIT. He is also Trinity’s Liaison to Presbytery.
As we discern God’s future for our congregation, this team will be there every step of the way to guide us. When you see these folks around Trinity’s campus, please thank them for their leadership and feel free to ask them questions about next steps. Starting in late January, you’ll start to receive regular updates on the team’s progress and opportunities to get involved in this important work.
December 2, 2025
Dear Trinity Family, Over the last 20 to 30 years most mainline Protestant denominations have suffered a decline in membership and overall financial resources. Trinity Presbyterian Church in Charlotte has seen a similar decline. Several churches in the Charlotte Presbytery have been forced to sell assets, merge with other existing Presbyterian churches or even close in the past 5 to 10 years as a result. Trinity’s congregation, pastors and Session have seen the overall trends and have talked about various ways we might stabilize those trends and be good stewards of our assets in support of our Weekday School, Philips Academy, our community and various mission partners and our congregational needs including maintaining several larger, older buildings. In late 2021 and early 2022 the Session continued to talk about these issues and came up with a specific plan that while honoring our traditions would chart a path for Trinity Presbyterian Church to thrive into the future. A Sessional Committee, the Way Forward Task Force (WFTF) began meeting in March 2022 and met regularly throughout the past 3 ½ years. As one of the first steps, Olanda Carr, from the Presbyterian Foundation, worked as a consultant with the task force, and the WFTF began the journey together by reading the book, Sailboat Church, by Joan Gray. Following the discussion of that book, the WFTF entered into a period of 40 days of daily devotional reading, prayer, and discernment before coming back together to begin conversations about what might be an exciting new future for Trinity Presbyterian Church. The discussions centered around ways in which we can utilize our land to best serve existing missions like the Weekday School and Philips Academy, while also exploring new mission opportunities like affordable housing that could serve the needs of our community. Initial discussions took place with organizations like Dream Key Partners, Give Impact Charlotte, and the YWCA, and extensive research was conducted on other churches that had undertaken similar work. In 2023, the Presbyterian Foundation performed a financial analysis of Trinity, and the WFTF continued to meet with organizations in the area to help us learn more about what exciting opportunities that might exist for our church. The Presbyterian Foundation completed a detailed financial analysis of our church which provided an in-depth overview of our operating metrics and trends that will help us better prepare for the future. Out of all of the prior work, the WFTF came up with a wish list that was dubbed, The Village at Trinity, that consists of:
A reinvigorated and refocused Trinity Presbyterian Church
A new facility for our Weekday School
Expansion of the facilities for Philips Academy
Attainable Housing
Market-rate real estate products
An open, park-like area throughout the Village
Room for retail or mixed use for appropriate partners
A community-type center
The WFTF presented this vision to session in May of 2023 for their feedback, which generated great excitement and an overwhelmingly positive response. Over the summer the WFTF met with some of the organizations previously mentioned to determine which partner or partners can best help us bring this vision to reality. After over eighteen months of prayer, discernment, research and meetings, as a next step the WFTF decided to partner with Give Impact to help take the next steps towards fleshing out our vision. In 2024, the Way Forward Task Force took its next critical steps by engaging Liz Ward and Maya Bullock from Give Impact Advisory Services. The team of the WFTF and Give Impact met regularly with a focus on digging deeper into our original vision, as well as doing research on zoning, deed restrictions, and property valuation. One notable adaptation to our wish list is a shift from a community rec center/gym to dedicated space for our church’s children and youth ministries. This came out of feedback from our membership on the need to prioritize these important ministries of the church, as well as discerning that a “gym” approach would not be the best use of our assets and resources. In 2025, the overall Villages of Trinity Plan came together. In consultation with our many consultants and partners, the WFTF put together a potential site plan that lays out visually how all of the various parts of our campus, both existing and planned, will look. The Session continued to be informed and was excited by the plan. The Villages of Trinity Plan was reviewed and approved by the Session in August 2025.To recap, over the past 3 1/2 years, the Way Forward Task Force worked diligently to discern a future plan for Trinity Presbyterian Church – one that is true to our history, while creating a lasting legacy that serves our community and the church. This group has dreamed, researched, met and talked with many experts, received feedback from the congregation and our partners on our campus, and prayed, resulting in an exciting and compelling vision for the path forward. We want to thank the members of this task force Louise Sanford, Sherese Smith, Eric Banks, Brian Field, Christie Jameson and Gary Sugg, Jr. for all of their efforts. They have laid out an exciting path forward. Their work is now complete, and the Way Forward Task Force has been dissolved.For the next step in this important work, a new task force called the Way Forward Implementation Team (WFIT) has been created, still reporting to our Session, to implement the plan that the Way Forward Task Force has laid out. This group is charged with oversight and governance of the overall project, coordination and project direction, congregational and community communication, and alignment with our mission. While a few members of the Way Forward Task Force will remain on the WFIT, the team has several new members chosen for their specific skills to help guide the overall efforts and timeline. You will get to know these members a bit more with subsequent communication. The WFIT will also rely on various consultants who have done this type of work before – some within our congregation, but many at other organizations, including subject matter experts in various fields. The WFIT has already met a couple of times to begin to lay out the timeline and plan for the critical communication efforts that will come early in this process. WFIT is setting up ways to receive additional feedback, and they are also planning for a series of Town Hall type meetings to show a lot more detail on the plan, receive public feedback, and answer questions. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away. Behold, the new has come. 2nd Corinthians 5:17 Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland. Isaiah 43:18,19 The Way Forward Implementation Team
August 29, 2025
Dear Trinity Family,
We know many of you have questions about the progress of the Way Forward Task Force. As your Session, we want to share an update on our conversations with the Task Force and the important work they are doing to help us discern a faithful vision for Trinity’s future.
This year, the Task Force has continued its careful due diligence, working to bring the Trinity campus vision to life. They have also been developing a proof-of-concept that will give us confidence to move forward with a bold vision for our campus. At the heart of these conversations is our deep and ongoing commitment to children, youth, and families. This includes providing modern facilities for our on-campus educational partners. Our intergenerational ministries, our Weekday School, and our partnership with Philips Academy remain foundational to who we are as a church and vital to ensuring Trinity’s long-term health and impact.
In support of this vision, last Sunday the Session voted to reaffirm our long-term commitment to Philips Academy as an integral part of our Trinity community. We will share more details soon about what this continued partnership will look like.
In the coming months, you will hear about the proposed recommendations from the Way Forward Task Force for the Weekday School, Phillips Academy, and our Trinity Church grounds. We are eager to continue these conversations with you and to imagine together how God is calling us to grow as a community of faith while we evolve our campus for future generations.
With gratitude and hope,
Your Session
May 28, 2024
Since our last update in February of this year, the Way Forward Task Force has met with Give Impact on eight occasions, continuing to dive into the necessary due diligence work required for a project of this magnitude. These meetings have included a site visit to Trinity by Give Impact and a potential development partner, meetings where we continue to flesh out all of the details surrounding deed restrictions and zoning requirements for our church property, and to further discuss our priorities from our Wish List for the Village at Trinity, along with potential implementation strategies. One notable adaptation to our wish list is a shift from a community rec center/gym to dedicated space for our church’s children and youth ministries. This came out of feedback from our membership on the need to prioritize these important ministries of the church, as well as discerning that a “gym” approach would not be the best use of our assets and resources. This vital work will continue through the summer and our goal is to host a Town Hall meeting with the congregation in the early fall to share a more detailed update along with conversations to further explore the topic of Affordable Housing and how God is calling Trinity to respond.
FAQs for The Way Forward Task Force Why are we doing this? Our church is changing, and we are blessed to have the assets and vision on hand to live into “a new vision for a new Trinity” and create a sustainable Trinity for years to come. This Village will literally put our church at the crossroads of a number of communities, providing new and exciting opportunities for mission, engagement, and service. What exactly is affordable housing? Generally speaking, affordable housing is defined as housing on which the occupant is paying no more than 30 percent of gross income for housing costs, including utilities. The kind of affordable housing that our group is recommending would be targeting incomes in the range of teachers, first responders, single working parents, etc. Will we lose any buildings? While the campus site map has yet to be determined, we do not anticipate any major loss of building space. Will the worship service be changed? Given that our scope has always been about more than any single church ministry, the task force has no plans to recommend any changes to our 11am worship service. Who exactly is Give Impact and why are we working with them? Give Impact is a local organization that “provides local market expertise and advisory services to assist with the assessment of property for disposition, redevelopment or incorporation of community benefits such as affordable housing, workforce development or related commercial uses.” We’ve hired them to help our task force laser-focus our vision before eventually meeting with a developer. How will the church cover the Give Impact Fee? Session has elected to fund the expense out of the gains and dividends from our endowment, since this work aligns with the endowment’s purpose to “further the church’s mission.” Our intent is that this expense will be replenished on the back-end of the project. What further out-of-pocket investments might this project require from Trinity? Although additional investments are possible, our committee does not foresee any. Discussions with possible developers indicate the upfront costs of the project will be covered. The compensation for the developers will be provided from the revenue at the back-end of the project. Will any land be sold? While that is still to be determined, we anticipate a strategic mix of ground lease and land sale to bring this vision to reality in a way that enhances the church’s mission. We’ll rely on input from our partners, including Give Impact, on how best to do this (and of course, all of this must be approved by the session and the congregation). What about issues such as deed restrictions and communicating with our neighbors? We’ll be leaning on our partners to advise us on these matters. A recent ruling from the North Carolina Supreme Court opens up the possibility that the deed restrictions will not restrict us as much as they have in the past. We will also be sure to communicate our plans to the neighborhood in a timely fashion – we want them to be informed. Who will do the construction/development? While we are in conversations with a potential partner, that is still to be determined. How might Trinity profit financially from this? The goal of this project is to create a Trinity that is reinvigorated missionally and fiscally sound for its future. The ground leasing component is one way our church will benefit financially. We also plan to address some long-standing capital needs in our facility that will save us money in the long run. Finally, we hope to bolster our endowment, getting us closer to our $5 million goal, which will have a transformative effect on our church. How long will all of this take? We plan on providing an anticipated timeline as part of our final presentation to the session and congregation, but we are looking at multiple years to fully bring this vision to reality. Where will the new Weekday School building be, and how will it be paid for? The location will be determined when we begin working with a developer. It will be funded by proceeds generated from targeted land sale and for-market project components. How much will all of this disrupt church life on our campus? While some disruptions are bound to occur, we will make it clear to our developer to craft a timeline that minimizes disruption to the regular rhythms of our church and the two schools as much as possible. What happens next? Once we have a comprehensive plan from Give Impact and other partners, we’ll present it to the session for approval. Following that, we’ll schedule an information session with the congregation and a congregational meeting a few weeks after, where you all will approve it. Along the way, we’ll keep the presbytery informed. What can we do to support the effort? Talk to us – we welcome your feedback/thoughts and are more than happy to answer any questions. And pray for Trinity – this is truly exciting and transformative for our church!
February 13, 2024
Since our last update in October, the Way Forward Task Force took its next critical steps by engaging Liz Ward and Maya Bullock from Give Impact Advisory Services (https://www.giveimpact.org/). The team has been regularly meeting since December with a focus on digging deeper into our original vision, as well as doing research on zoning, deed restrictions, and property valuation. We appreciate your patience as we continue to gather important information. This discovery process will be instrumental to ensuring alignment with the implementation alternatives we will be considering. We look forward to sharing our progress during an Informational Meeting with the congregation later this spring. We will also use this meeting to further explore the topic of Affordable Housing and how God is calling Trinity to respond. Please stay tuned for more details about this meeting in the coming months.
FAQs for The Way Forward Task Force Why are we doing this? Our church is changing, and we are blessed to have the assets and vision on hand to live into “a new vision for a new Trinity” and create a sustainable Trinity for years to come. This Village will literally put our church at the crossroads of a number of communities, providing new and exciting opportunities for mission, engagement, and service. What exactly is affordable housing? Generally speaking, affordable housing is defined as housing on which the occupant is paying no more than 30 percent of gross income for housing costs, including utilities. The kind of affordable housing that our group is recommending would be targeting incomes in the range of teachers, first responders, single working parents, etc. Will we lose any buildings? While the campus site map has yet to be determined, we do not anticipate any major loss of building space. Will the worship service be changed? Given that our scope has always been about more than any single church ministry, the task force has no plans to recommend any changes to our 11am worship service. Who exactly is Give Impact and why are we working with them? Give Impact is a local organization that “provides local market expertise and advisory services to assist with the assessment of property for disposition, redevelopment or incorporation of community benefits such as affordable housing, workforce development or related commercial uses.” We’ve hired them to help our task force laser-focus our vision before eventually meeting with a developer. How will the church cover the Give Impact Fee? Session has elected to fund the expense out of the gains and dividends from our endowment, since this work aligns with the endowment’s purpose to “further the church’s mission.” Our intent is that this expense will be replenished on the back-end of the project. What further out-of-pocket investments might this project require from Trinity? Although additional investments are possible, our committee does not foresee any. Discussions with possible developers indicate the upfront costs of the project will be covered. The compensation for the developers will be provided from the revenue at the back-end of the project. Will any land be sold? While that is still to be determined, we anticipate a strategic mix of ground lease and land sale to bring this vision to reality in a way that enhances the church’s mission. We’ll rely on input from our partners, including Give Impact, on how best to do this (and of course, all of this must be approved by the session and the congregation). What about issues such as deed restrictions and communicating with our neighbors? We’ll be leaning on our partners to advise us on these matters. A recent ruling from the North Carolina Supreme Court opens up the possibility that the deed restrictions will not restrict us as much as they have in the past. We will also be sure to communicate our plans to the neighborhood in a timely fashion – we want them to be informed. Who will do the construction/development? While we are in conversations with a potential partner, that is still to be determined. How might Trinity profit financially from this? The goal of this project is to create a Trinity that is reinvigorated missionally and fiscally sound for its future. The ground leasing component is one way our church will benefit financially. We also plan to address some long-standing capital needs in our facility that will save us money in the long run. Finally, we hope to bolster our endowment, getting us closer to our $5 million goal, which will have a transformative effect on our church. How long will all of this take? We plan on providing an anticipated timeline as part of our final presentation to the session and congregation, but we are looking at multiple years to fully bring this vision to reality. Where will the new Weekday School building be, and how will it be paid for? The location will be determined when we begin working with a developer. It will be funded by proceeds generated from targeted land sale and for-market project components. How much will all of this disrupt church life on our campus? While some disruptions are bound to occur, we will make it clear to our developer to craft a timeline that minimizes disruption to the regular rhythms of our church and the two schools as much as possible. What happens next? Once we have a comprehensive plan from Give Impact and other partners, we’ll present it to the session for approval. Following that, we’ll schedule an information session with the congregation and a congregational meeting a few weeks after, where you all will approve it. Along the way, we’ll keep the presbytery informed. What can we do to support the effort? Talk to us – we welcome your feedback/thoughts and are more than happy to answer any questions. And pray for Trinity – this is truly exciting and transformative for our church!
October 30, 2023
The Way Forward Task Force was commissioned in March 2022 to prayerfully discern a spirit-led vision for our beloved church and its facilities. Our overarching goal through this process was to respect Trinity’s traditions, honor its core ministries, and enrich our ties to the greater community. We have surveyed our entire congregation for feedback, held small group meetings with members of our Session, and engaged in informal discussions with the leadership at Philips Academy and the Weekday School. Our discussions have centered around ways in which we might utilize our land to best serve existing missions like the Weekday School and Philips Academy; while also exploring new mission opportunities, such as affordable housing, that could serve the needs of the greater community – and do it in a way that enhances Trinity’s mission and ensures the church’s long-term sustainability for the future. We’ve had initial conversations with multiple organizations like Dream Key Partners, Give Impact Charlotte, the YWCA, Wesley Community Development, and Shook Kelley Associates. We’ve also talked with and visited several other churches, both locally and across the country, that have done similar work. Lastly, The Presbyterian Foundation recently completed a detailed financial analysis of our church which provided an in-depth overview of our operating metrics and trends that will help us better prepare for the future. Out of all of this, our task force has come up with a wish list that we have dubbed “The Village at Trinity” that consists of: A reinvigorated and refocused Trinity Presbyterian Church. We envision our congregation growing in new ways as a result of the campus transformation. Our church will anchor the “Village” around the core of our existing buildings, so the church is at the center of it all. A new facility for our Weekday School that would meet code requirements for a full-day program in addition to the current half-day program. This would be funded by proceeds from other components of the campus transformation through ground leases and/or partial land sale. Expansion of the facilities for Philips Academy, a school that serves middle and high school-age children with various learning challenges. This would include designating current Weekday School space to Philips Academy as well as the creation of one or two townhomes for PA’s “Bridges Program” that focus on developing life skills for older students in a home-type setting. Affordable housing in the form of apartments/condos/townhomes within the Village. The affordable housing component routinely comes up as a high priority in conversations with our congregants (for an explanation of what affordable housing is and the kind that we’re recommending, please see the attached FAQ). Market-rate real estate products such as condos or townhomes to help fund the overall project as well as provide greater economic intersectionality within the Village. An open, park-like area throughout the Village that would facilitate community-building and intersectionality across all of the various communities on and neighboring our campus. Room for retail or mixed use for appropriate partners, such as a Bitty and Beau-type coffee shop, that would bring those not already on campus to the campus, serve as a “community connection” hub for the Village, and provide service/internship opportunities for Philips Academy’s students. A community-type center (such as the Cornwell Center at Myers Park Baptist) run by an outside entity that would serve the surrounding neighborhoods as well as our campus partners in the Weekday School and Philips Academy. Our Task Force presented this vision to session back in May for their feedback, which generated great excitement and an overwhelmingly positive response. Over the summer we met with some of the organizations previously mentioned to determine which partner or partners can best help us bring this vision to reality. After over eighteen months of prayer, discernment, research and meetings, as a first step, our Task Force has decided to partner with Give Impact (www.giveimpact.org) to help us take the next steps towards fleshing out our vision. Trinity’s Session has approved $20,000 to fund this partnership. We know that you have many questions about this vision and what our next steps might be. While we welcome any of your questions, please understand that there are some answers that are still getting worked out and we might not be able to answer them at this time. With that in mind, we have included some FAQs that we anticipate many of our congregants might have. We’ve included those below. We hope that you will be as excited about this transformational vision for our campus as we are. If you have questions or wish to offer feedback, some of our task force /members will be available following worship this Sunday and would be happy to chat with you. The Way Forward Task Force Eric Banks Brian Field Christie Jameson Louise Sanford Sherese Smith Gary Sugg Jr.
FAQs for The Way Forward Task Force Why are we doing this? Our church is changing, and we are blessed to have the assets and vision on hand to live into “a new vision for a new Trinity” and create a sustainable Trinity for years to come. This Village will literally put our church at the crossroads of a number of communities, providing new and exciting opportunities for mission, engagement, and service. What exactly is affordable housing? Generally speaking, affordable housing is defined as housing on which the occupant is paying no more than 30 percent of gross income for housing costs, including utilities. The kind of affordable housing that our group is recommending would be targeting incomes in the range of teachers, first responders, single working parents, etc. Will we lose any buildings? While the campus site map has yet to be determined, we do not anticipate any major loss of building space. Will the worship service be changed? Given that our scope has always been about more than any single church ministry, the task force has no plans to recommend any changes to our 11am worship service. Who exactly is Give Impact and why are we working with them? Give Impact is a local organization that “provides local market expertise and advisory services to assist with the assessment of property for disposition, redevelopment or incorporation of community benefits such as affordable housing, workforce development or related commercial uses.” We’ve hired them to help our task force laser-focus our vision before eventually meeting with a developer. How will the church cover the Give Impact Fee? Session has elected to fund the expense out of the gains and dividends from our endowment, since this work aligns with the endowment’s purpose to “further the church’s mission.” Our intent is that this expense will be replenished on the back-end of the project. What further out-of-pocket investments might this project require from Trinity? Although additional investments are possible, our committee does not foresee any. Discussions with possible developers indicate the upfront costs of the project will be covered. The compensation for the developers will be provided from the revenue at the back-end of the project. Will any land be sold? While that is still to be determined, we anticipate a strategic mix of ground lease and land sale to bring this vision to reality in a way that enhances the church’s mission. We’ll rely on input from our partners, including Give Impact, on how best to do this (and of course, all of this must be approved by the session and the congregation). What about issues such as deed restrictions and communicating with our neighbors? We’ll be leaning on our partners to advise us on these matters. A recent ruling from the North Carolina Supreme Court opens up the possibility that the deed restrictions will not restrict us as much as they have in the past. We will also be sure to communicate our plans to the neighborhood in a timely fashion – we want them to be informed. Who will do the construction/development? While we are in conversations with a potential partner, that is still to be determined. How might Trinity profit financially from this? The goal of this project is to create a Trinity that is reinvigorated missionally and fiscally sound for its future. The ground leasing component is one way our church will benefit financially. We also plan to address some long-standing capital needs in our facility that will save us money in the long run. Finally, we hope to bolster our endowment, getting us closer to our $5 million goal, which will have a transformative effect on our church. How long will all of this take? We plan on providing an anticipated timeline as part of our final presentation to the session and congregation, but we are looking at multiple years to fully bring this vision to reality. Where will the new Weekday School building be, and how will it be paid for? The location will be determined when we begin working with a developer. It will be funded by proceeds generated from targeted land sale and for-market project components. How much will all of this disrupt church life on our campus? While some disruptions are bound to occur, we will make it clear to our developer to craft a timeline that minimizes disruption to the regular rhythms of our church and the two schools as much as possible. What happens next? Once we have a comprehensive plan from Give Impact and other partners, we’ll present it to the session for approval. Following that, we’ll schedule an information session with the congregation and a congregational meeting a few weeks after, where you all will approve it. Along the way, we’ll keep the presbytery informed. What can we do to support the effort? Talk to us – we welcome your feedback/thoughts and are more than happy to answer any questions. And pray for Trinity – this is truly exciting and transformative for our church!
January 2023
The Way Forward Task Force began meeting in March 2022 and has continued to meet regularly throughout the year. Olanda Carr, from the Presbyterian Foundation, has worked as a consultant with our task force, and we began our journey together by reading the book “Sailboat Church” by Joan Gray. Following our discussion of that book, we entered into a period of 40 days of daily devotional reading, prayer, and discernment before coming back together to begin conversations about what might be an exciting new future for Trinity Presbyterian Church. Our discussions have centered around ways in which we can utilize our land to best serve existing missions like the Weekday School and Philips Academy, while also exploring new mission opportunities like affordable housing that could serve the needs of our community. We have had initial discussions with organizations like Dream Key Partners, Give Impact Charlotte, and the YWCA, and have also researched other churches that have recently done similar work. In early 2023, we will begin a financial analysis performed by the Presbyterian Foundation and continue to meet with organizations in the area to help us learn more about what exciting opportunities might exist for our church.
Signup
Map and Contact
Our Location
3115 Providence Road
Charlotte, NC 28211
Main Phone
704-366-3554
Church Office Hours
9:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m. Monday - Thursday
9:00 a.m. - 12:00 p.m. Friday
Weekday School
Office Phone: 704-366-3556
Office Hours: 8:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m.
Classroom Hours: 9:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m.Sermon Archive
