Pastorate Transparency Week 4: Facilities
What is the valuation of our properties?
What is the role of the Facilities Manager?
What major projects have been recently completed?
What future projects are being considered?
- Holy Family: Maintain the initial restoration including repairing scratches on the marble pillars; acoustic friendly flooring in the choir loft; LED lighting upgrade. The roof is 17-18 years old and currently in good condition.
- Holy Spirit: LED lighting upgrade, Parking lot
- St. John Paul II: Construction of rosary walk and garden or grotto to further immerse our students in the Catholic faith; beautification of the interior to support our Catholic values
- Tree Removal: All campuses have nearly 50 ash trees total that may need to be treated or removed, and potentially replaced, in the near future due to the emerald ash borer.
- Safety: We recently conducted a safety audit for all facilities with the Dept. of Homeland Security, and suggestions from that report are being considered. Details of any safety plan will not be shared publicly. However, please know that we are actively monitoring and improving the safety of our parishes and school building.
What is the status of the Holy Spirit parking lot?
How do we plan to fund long-term maintenance?
- Annual Budget Item through Offertory: For foreseen repairs and maintenance, we can include this in our annual budget and fund through regular giving and church support. This is a primary reason for our recent campaign calling for increased giving.
- Capital Improvement Savings Accounts: Each parish has capital improvement accounts where all building support contributions are deposited (this account does offer growth potential). These funds have been depleted with major projects and need to be built up.
- Endowment Support: Specific endowments through the Mitchell Catholic Foundation are designated for the care and maintenance of our facilities, or for the greatest needs of the parishes.
- Special campaign/request: While this is our last choice for funding, there are times where an emergency need arises, and we will ask for extra support from our parishioners to help cover the need.
A generous amount of services, repairs, and labor--big and small--are donated or discounted by parishioners and local businesses. We heavily credit the upkeep of our facilities to these generous acts and thank these individuals.
Pastorate Transparency Week 3: PLT
What is the pastorate leadership team (PLT)?
Who is on the Pastorate Leadership Team?
How is this different from the pastoral council?
What is “Amazing Parish”?
What is our organizational clarity?
- Why do we exist? (Purpose)
- How do we behave? (Values)
- What do we do? (Action)
- How will we succeed? (Strategic Anchors)
As our pastorate continues to evolve and grow, there have been changes, and with that, many questions. In this Pastorate Transparency series, we will aim to provide information and clarity for these questions over the next several weeks. For additional questions regarding finances, please contact Business Manager Tonya Meaney at 605-996-3639 ext 9 or
Why are we asking for an increase in giving?
- Offertory shortfall last year: Offertory collections were below budget by $50,000 for Holy Family and $20,000 for Holy Spirit.
- Overall increase in goods & services: As we are seeing a general increase in the cost of goods and services year-to-year, we haven’t seen the same increase reflected in regular giving.
Are there major projects in the budget?
Due to the offertory shortfall last year, no major projects or improvements (above $10,000) were included in this year’s budget. The staff and finance councils were mindful in keeping expenses and budget requests to a minimum.
What are the major expenses?
2025-2026 fiscal year
What percentage of parishioners give?
Holy Family: 61% & Holy Spirit: 72% of registered households had a recorded gift last fiscal year (2024-2025).
Do we rely on the generosity of a few families?
A small percentage of families are extremely generous to our parishes. However, we do rely on and need the gifts of all parishioners to meet our financial needs.
Will my small gift even make a difference?
Yes! Even a small gift makes an impact.
If only 25% of households increased their weekly gift by $10, our offering income would increase by nearly $50,000 for Holy Spirit and $125,000 for Holy Family.
As our pastorate continues to evolve and grow, there have been changes, and with that, many valid questions. In this Pastorate Transparency series, we will aim to provide information and clarity for many of these questions over the next several weeks!
How many staff members do we have?
Have we hired more staff recently?
Why have we added these positions?
- Organizational Structure: Previously, the pastor directly oversaw all 10-15 employees of the parishes. This simply wasn’t feasible for the pastor to provide oversight, support, and guidance to each of these individuals and all the councils, as well as perform his pastoral ministry. Now with a Business Manager, Facilities Manager, and Discipleship & Evangelization team, there are managers in place to support the employees in their department, providing greater support and morale among staff, as well as serve as liaison to the pastorate councils.
- Diocesan Directive: This was a directive of Set Ablaze in order to support our priests and create thriving parishes among a priest shortage.
- Growth: Our pastorate has seen fruitful growth in several areas:
- New parishioners, which increases sacraments needed
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New ministries such as Catechesis of the Good Shepherd, Semper, Spanish OCIA, Children’s Liturgy of the Word, Men/Women’s groups, Sacristans/Liturgical leads and more (while many ministries are led by volunteers, staff still need to be available to provide the administrative & facility support)
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Record enrollment in OCIA & “special Sacrament groups” (children who need baptism/first communion/confirmation outside of the traditional timeframe)
The 2025 Pastorate Annual Report for Holy Family Catholic Church, Holy Spirit Catholic Church, and St. John Paul II Elementary School in Mitchell, SD is now available!
We encourage all parishioners to read through the report for information on the Set Ablaze process, financial reports, ministry updates, and events highlights.
All parshioners are invited to the State of the Pastorate Presentation on Sunday, September 21 at 2 PM at Holy Family to hear more and for an opportunity to ask questions about the report or presentation.