Commission on the General Conference
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 15, 2019
Nashville, Tenn.: As reported on August 10, the Commission on the General Conference adopted the recommendations of the task force created by the Commission to oversee an independent investigation into allegations of voting improprieties at the 2019 Special Session of the General Conference.
The task force had four recommendations which were presented to the Commission during its August 7-9 meeting in Lexington, Ky. The Commission unanimously adopted each of the recommendations, which are included in the task force report. One of the recommendations is to refer allegations that still need to be investigated but which are outside the purview of the Commission on the General Conference to the Council of Bishops. Details about those allegations were not included in the report, since it might compromise the work that still needs to be undertaken.
"Integrity is at stake and the further review must be done properly. If information is released prematurely it can easily compromise any attempt to act on the deeper issue(s) that have violated trust and integrity," said Bishop Thomas J. Bickerton, an ex-officio member of the Commission on the General Conference, representing the Council of Bishops.
The report is available online at https://s3.amazonaws.com/Website_Properties/news-media/press-center/documents/Final_Report_of_COGC_on_Task_Force.pdf.
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About General Conference
General Conference is the top policy-making body of The United Methodist Church. The assembly meets at the beginning of each quadrennium to consider revisions to church law, as well as adopt resolutions on current moral, social, public policy and economic issues. It also approves plans and budgets for church-wide programs for the next four years. General Conference 2020 will take place May 5-15, 2020, at the Minneapolis Convention Center in Minneapolis, Minn.
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