SELF DEVELOPMENT OF PEOPLE

Self Development Of People (SDOP)

Description

This Committee, in its composition and activity, must conform to the guidelines established by the national Self Development of People (SDOP) Committee of the Presbyterian Church (USA) and Presbytery level Committees must be certified through the national Committee. The purpose of the Committee is to implement, at the Presbytery level, the Self Development of People ministry program.

The Self Development of People (SDOP) ministry program seeks to develop partnerships with and to provide funding to groups of economically poor, economically and/or socially oppressed, and disadvantaged people who have organized to do things to help themselves.

The Presbytery SDOP Committee operates in three ways:

• It receives, reviews and acts on applications from groups of minority/marginalized people to fund projects, developed and controlled by those groups, which are designed to produce direct long-term benefits for themselves. Applicant groups do not have to be incorporated and SDOP Committee members are available to assist applicants with the application process and proposal development.
• It seeks out groups of minority/marginalized people engaged in self-help/self-development activity with an eye toward the possibility of further assisting and strengthening their endeavors through a successful application to the SDOP program.
• It responds to requests from the national or synod level Committees to evaluate applications they receive from groups within the bounds of our Presbytery.

Funds for SDOP projects come from money received through the annual One Great Hour of Sharing offering. One-third of that offering is set aside for SDOP projects. Of those monies, if a Presbytery has a certified SDOP Committee, half of the monies collected by that presbytery stay within it for its Committee’s use. The remaining monies go to the national Committee, approximately half being distributed to national projects and approximately half to overseas projects.

MEMBERSHIP: There are to be nine (9) members of our Presbytery’s SDOP Committee, nominated by the Social Justice Priorities Unit and elected each year by Presbytery.

Currently there are six (6) members, four of whom are from racial/ethnic minority groups and five (5) of whom are members of the Presbyterian Church (USA).

MEETINGS: This Committee has no regularly scheduled meetings, but meets a) when applications have been received (whether from a local group or, for evaluation, from a higher governing body’s committee) or b) when SDOP earmarked funds in the Presbytery are at a high level, with no applications having been received, that a search for one or more appropriate project to fund is warranted.

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