nineteen hundred and forty-six - Amazon Web Services

RELIEF AND ANNUITY BOARD 437
In 1937, the actuary of the Board reported that the fund would require
additional financing, the methods above mentioned having yielded only a very
small sum of money. Upon the earnest and urgent appeal of the Board
through Executive Secretary Watts and Vice President Collins, a committee was
appointed by the executive committee of the Southern Baptist Convention to
make a study of the needs of the Relief and Annuity Board and report its conclusions
to its pre-convention session the following May. In the meantime, there
were unexpected developments in connection with the refinancing of the convention
indebtedness which enabled the executive committee to recommend to
the convention that an additional allocation be made to the Relief and Annuity
Board specifically for its (Old) Annuity Fund. This allocation was to be three
and one-third per cent (3 1/3%) of distributable Cooperative Program Funds,
the sum to be remitted regularly and continuously to the Relief and Annuity
Board until the (Old) Annuity Fund was completely funded. This allocation
has already brought to the reserves of the (Old) Annuity Fund a sizable sum
each year.
However, subsequent to the foregoing (1943), Actuary Huggins reported to
the Board that the reserves of the (Old) Annuity Fund were being drawn upon
very heavily and faster than they were being built up. The aggregate of these
reserves at the close of 1943 was $2,537,251.51. Also, due primarily to the
retirements and deaths, the number of paying members was steadily decreasing
while the number of annuitants was being steadily increased. Hence, a further
appeal was made to the executive committee with the view to securing an increased
allocation from the Cooperative Program receipts by means of which
this fund might be built up to the maximum of its requirements over an estimated
period of years. A committee was appointed by the executive committee to
come to Dallas and investigate, with the aid of the actuary and the officers of
the Relief and Annuity Board, the matter of the Board's financial needs relating
to the (Old) Annuity Fund. In the meantime, Actuary Huggins made
a thoroughgoing actuarial study and brought to the committee, meeting in
Dallas, a full report and tabulation showing just what the need was. A result
of this conference with the actuary is a matter of record in the minutes of the
executive committee of the convention and in the convention minutes for 1944.
The report of the committee, with J. H. Buchanan, chairman, was as follows:
"A full day was spent in conference with the following results:
1. It was found that all funds of the Board are kept separate and sacred to the
purpose for which they have been designated.
2. It was found in addition to the funds available for servicing the (Old)
Annuity Plan, there will be needed approximately one or the other following
plans:
(1) Total amount to be provided in the near future of $3,500,000. This
$3,500,000 drawing interest would provide the amount needed.
(2) If the necessary funds are provided as needed, year by year, the annual
payments would begin in 1945 at $133,922.00. It would gradually
increase, year by year until 1958 the amount for that year being $175,
159.00. The payments would then decrease, yearly, until the year 1981
when only $4,392.00 would be required. The total of annual payments
would amount to $4,598,452.00
"Your committee makes the following recommendations:
1. That the Relief and Annuity Board provide one-half (y2) of the funds
needed, year by year, to completely service the (Old) Annuity Plan. This
the members of the Board present agreed to undertake, provided the Board
would be permitted to transfer 2 per cent of the present 7 per cent going for
relief to the service of the (Old) Annuity Plan. In other words, fix the
allocation for relief at 5 per cent.
2. That the Convention provide for the other one-half of the amount needed by
increasing the allocation of funds to the Board, or by some other method.
Your committee believes that an increase of 4 2/3 per cent to the present
3 1/3 per cent going to the service of the (Old) Annuity Plan would
provide sufficient funds to meet the Convention's part of the needed funds."
The recommendations of the special committee as recited above were modified
in the amended report of the executive committee, so that, instead of increasing
the previous allocation by 4 2/3 % it was increased by 5%, and this
5% was made a preferred item in the undesignated Cooperative Program funds.