The Fargo Diocese is expanding its properties and facilities review beyond the Fargo metro area to include all diocese schools and their affiliated parishes.
That study will provide demographic and other information on both the parishes and communities, said Scott Hoselton, project coordinator for the study. Parishes that operate a school are the largest entities the diocese has outside Fargo.
"The best thing that we can do to help them is to give them data that they can use in planning the future in each of those communities," said Hoselton, who is also finance officer and secretary for finance and administration for the diocese.
Hoselton said they are not going into the process with plans to close schools. But he did say they want to keep all options open, including new construction or closure, as they go about the study.
"We have purposely left everything open because we don't want to have blinders on to have anything predetermined," Hoselton said. "You know, how can we be open to what the Spirit's calling us to do if we've already decided what we're going to do?"
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In April, diocese leadership announced that Cardinal Muench Seminary in north Fargo was to close at the end of the 2010-11 academic year and that the use of all diocese properties in the Fargo metro area, including the seminary facilities, was to be reviewed.
At that time, the review was limited to properties in Fargo, West Fargo, Kindred and Horace, N.D.
The Fargo Diocese has schools in parishes in Belcourt, Fargo, Grand Forks, Devils Lake, Rugby, Langdon, Jamestown, Valley City and Wahpeton.
"The name might be 'Diocese of Fargo,' but we don't just live and reside here in Fargo," Hoselton said.
Fargo Diocese Bishop Samuel Aquila has also asked the consulting firm on the project to look at the organizational structure and personnel of the Diocesan Pastoral Center in south Fargo, a June article in "New Earth" said.
"I think that with any organization, you need to take an inside look at yourself once in a while and say, 'Are we structured properly?' Are we ... trying to deliver on mission and ministry?" Hoselton said.
Hoselton said the discussion of organization and personnel is not a euphemism for job cuts. But he did say they are keeping all possibilities on the table as they proceed with the study.
Diocese Communications Director Tanya Watterud said one reason for this portion of the study is to determine if there may be a way to move seminary employees into the diocesan structure.
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The diocese hired TeamWorks International Inc., a firm based in Centerville, Minn., to guide the review, which Hoselton said is currently in the initial stage of gathering data. Plans are to complete the study next May, he said.
The Forum of Fargo-Moorhead and the Herald are owned by Forum Communications Co.
