Conference would share Area name The Upper New York Annual Conference is the proposed name for the new Annual Conference which will come into being in 2010. Name suggestions for the new Conference – which brings together United Methodists in the New York State portions of Troy and Wyoming Conferences and North Central New York and Western New York Conferences – were solicited in email blasts, on Conference websites, at Annual Conference sessions, and in Conference publications earlier this year.

The suggestions were reviewed by the Communications Planning Team, which includes members from all four of the existing conferences. Some proposed names included metaphors touching on the theological and the geological, including: Mighty Waters, Living Waters, and Koinonia. Others were more descriptive geographical names, such as Upper New York, Upstate New York, and Adirondack.

The Communications team recommended to the New Area Conference Team that the conference adopt a geographic name, which does not “lock in” one metaphor, but leaves open the possibility of attaching ministry-focused tag lines in keeping with vision and mission. In other words, a simple Conference name allows for statements such as: Upper New York Conference - Reth inking Church Together; or Upper New York United Methodists: Being God ’s Love, Living in the Way of Jesus.

New ACT agreed with the team ’s recommendation and asked the communications team to announce Upper New York as the possible new name and to solicit c omments.

You are invited to send your comments to uppernewyorkarea@gmail.com , to share them with others on Facebook, http://facebook.com/uppernewyork or on blogspot.

The Episcopal Area to be created from the New York West Area and parts of the Albany Area has already been named the Upper New York Area. The College of Bishops of the Northeast Jurisdiction, meeting in July 2008, had the responsibility for naming the Area. The Annual Conference name, however, will be adopted by the uniting session of the new Annual Conference, meeting June 19, 2010 at the ON Center in Syracuse.

Marilyn J. Kasperek
Director of Communications
North Central New York Conference
of The United Methodist Church
PO Box 1515
Cicero NY 13039
MarilynKasperek@ncnyumc.org