Goal: Explain the deferred maintenance and facility needs of Holy Family Parish, not to obtain a loan, but a recommendation for Archbishop to provide necessary funding for Feasibility Study prior to a Capital Campaign.

Architect Kevin Broderick, who has been meeting bi-weekly with our Parish Building Committee since March, will present the specifics regarding deferred maintenance and proposal for multi-purpose facility, which will be the basis for the Feasibility Study. Before his presentation I will give a brief history:

--The need for a multi-purpose facility has been discussed by Holy Family Parish Council and parishioners going back to days of Fr. Byrne and earlier. (From 1981 to 1987 I was priest minister for Hispanic Community at Holy Family Parish. At that time about 150 attended the Spanish Mass.)

--When I returned from Peru in 1994, Archbishop Murphy assigned me to Holy Family. The Hispanic Community had grown to about 900 at Sunday Mass. The total Mass count was 1650. Within four years our Mass count grew to 2800, mainly because we added two Spanish Masses. The pressure on the facilities was enormous. We did some necessary maintenance, e.g. sealing the sandstone bricks on church as is required every seven to ten years, fixing columns which had been damaged by water seepage, some work on church sanctuary, replacing bathroom in rectory/office building. Also we replaced the boilers in school and Ailbe House (former convent) which gave out in winter of 1999. We are still paying back the long-term loan on the boilers.

--In the late 90’s, after consultation with our parish council, I established a building committee, headed by parish administrator Greg McNabb, to address overall building needs. The most pressing need was seismic upgrade of our parish school to make it safer in case of earthquake. The hope was to do this without a capital campaign so that we could launch a full campaign for a new multi-purpose facility. The building committee, thanks in part to a $200,000 grant from the Gates Foundation, did raise the major part of what was required to replace the school porch. School mom Debbe Hirata organized an auction at W Hotel. Also many other smaller fund raising projects (sale of Mexican and Filipino food, etc.) went into this project. We have repaid in full the loan from the Archdiocese for the replacement of our school porch and the securing of the brickwork on the façade of our parish school. We have not yet done the inner seismic retrofit of the school; although, thanks be to God, the building did withstand the Ash Wednesday earthquake with only very minor damage.

--About two and half years ago, our parish council established a subcommittee, headed by parish administrator Tom Weber, to address the overall facilities need. They developed a master plan which was presented to the parish in a series of listening sessions which included meetings with the Filipino, Vietnamese and Hispanic Communities, as well as participants in Eucharistic Adoration, school families and other groups in the parish. The results of the listening sessions are contained in the first part of your booklet. I should mention that in the past year or so, our Mass count has gone down (to about 2,500) partly because some long time parishioners have left to attend neighboring parishes, but mainly because a Spanish Mass was initiated at St. Philomena. Our noon Mass has dropped from an overcrowded 1100 to 750. In the process we have lost about a thousand dollars per week parish income, principally because of the drop in our Spanish Masses. In spite of these setbacks, this Spring we were able to acquire a piece of property, contiguous with our main parking lot. Back in the 50’s, Monsignor McGrath attempted to purchase it, but was rebuffed by the owners who have since passed away and whose children put it on the open market. Two weeks ago our school roof sprung a major leak. It was patched with funds from Catholic Mutual, but will need to be replaced earlier than initially projected.

--As I mentioned, since March of this year, Kevin Broderick has been meeting with our parish building committee. They have studied the deferred maintenance needs of our five parish buildings and grounds. Also they have developed a proposal for a multi-purpose facility, which is contained in your booklet with a breakdown of costs which Kevin will now explain.