ELCA NEWS SERVICE

September 4, 2003

ELCA Board of Pensions Launches "Healthy Leaders" Campaign
03-166-SS*

     MINNEAPOLIS (ELCA) -- Moving against the tide of the U.S.
healthcare industry's illness model, the Evangelical Lutheran
Church in America (ELCA) Board of Pensions staff and trustees
discussed plans for the board's health and wellness initiative.
At their July 30-Aug. 1 meeting, board trustees heard Bradley
Joern, the Board's health actuary, describe potential health plan
design changes for 2005.  Rather than simply pay to get people
well after they're ill, these changes would promote plan members
staying healthy.
     "We want to keep the ELCA plan affordable and also promote
health and wellness within the ELCA," Joern said.  "It would be
nice if good health were a reward in itself, but we know
incentives help."  Such incentives may mean in the future that
plan members could include as eligible expenses such things as
the cost of weight loss programs, spiritual direction, smoking
cessation programs and exercise equipment, Joern said.
Additional study will determine the role of incentives in a
wellness program, he added.
     The pension unit launched a "Healthy Leaders Enhance Lives"
campaign.  The campaign included the September unveiling of a
wellness Web site customized for plan members and other ELCA
rostered leaders -- a site operated by the Mayo Clinic,
Rochester, Minn.  The site is a joint effort of the ELCA Board of
Pensions and the ELCA Division for Ministry.  In addition, plan
members will receive a monthly health newsletter.  Other
resources and tool kits for synods, congregations, institutions
and plan members are possible in the future.
     The health and wellness effort "is really about Romans 7,"
said the Rev. Ronald T. Glusenkamp, the Board's vice president
for customer outreach.  "The good [healthy] things we want to do,
we don't; and the bad things we don't want to do, we do."  The
health and wellness initiative has three stages: educating
members in 2003, members setting personal health goals in 2004
and a redesign of the health plan to emphasize wellness in 2005.

Ease, Not Raise, Stress
     "We don't need to raise the stress of our clergy,"
Glusenkamp said.  "We want to give them a 'get to' and not a 'got
to.'  We realize they're part of systems in congregations so we
need to encourage healthy congregations too."
     Trustees and staff have discussed health and wellness at
several meetings.  "This is really exciting," said the Rev. Larry
C. Kassebaum, a trustee from Mesa, Ariz.  "We've been talking
about this for so long. Now we can see some of the details."
     "I love what I see" on the health and wellness initiative,
said Nancy J. Haberstich, Lincoln, Neb.  "Please keep the
creativity going.  I'm proud we're [establishing a relationship]
with Mayo.  Everyone knows Mayo.  By putting their reputation
with ours, we all look good."
     The Rev. Jon R. Lee, a trustee from Dallas, also urged
attention to depression.  "We need to address emotional health
too, not just physical.  Clergy are subject to more depression,"
he said.
     A wellness wheel adopted by the board and developed through
an Inter-Lutheran Coordinating Committee on Health and Wellness
includes emotional, physical, vocational, intellectual and
social/interpersonal well-being wrapped around by spiritual
well-being and with baptism as its center.

Other Matters
     The trustees also:
     + Approved 2004 health plan contribution rates, which
represent an overall increase of 10 percent for sponsored members
in the six rate classes.  The disability plan rate will increase
from 2.2 percent to 2.5 percent in 2004.  The administration and
retiree support rate will decrease from 1.7 percent to 1.4
percent.  The survivor plan rate was suspended for the third year
in a row because of sufficient funding.
     Total incurred claims for active members are projected to
rise from $89.5 million in 2003 to $104.1 million in 2004, an
increase of 16.3 percent, Joern said, adding that the Board's
healthy contingency reserves mean the rate increase can be lower
than it otherwise might have been.
     + Terminated the AELC Retirement Plan, freeing its members
to elect cash or the rollover distribution options.  The
Association of Evangelical Lutheran Churches (AELC) was one of
three church bodies that merged to form the ELCA in 1988.  The
AELC plan offered limited fund choices.  Its members now can
elect the broader range of services offered by the ELCA plan.
     + Endorsed an interim report that outlines possible changes
to the benefits program to make it more flexible for seminaries
and other large employers and also to provide plan options for
lay employees in congregations.
     + Elected Bradley C. Engel, Burlington, Wis., board chair;
Mary S. Ranum, Circle Pines, Minn., vice chair; Jane C. von
Seggern, Atlanta, secretary; and Karen S. Southward,
Pickerington, Ohio, treasurer.
     + Heard more about the Special Needs Retirement Fund,
created to help retired clergy with low pensions.  An option for
other retired clergy to contribute a portion of their benefits
continues to make the fund grow.
-- -- --
     The ELCA Board of Pensions has its home page at
http://www.elcabop.org/ on the Web.

* Sonia C. Solomonson is managing editor for The Lutheran, the
magazine of the ELCA.

For information contact:
John Brooks, Director (773) 380-2958 or [log in to unmask]
http://www.elca.org/news