6.

Submit Unit and Boundary Changes

The stake president sends any requests for unit and boundary changes needed to implement the master plan via the paper application form or online boundary leadership tool accessed through Leader and Clerk Resources (LCR). General Handbook, section 36 contains the current guidelines approved by the First Presidency for handling boundary changes. Leaders should carefully review these guidelines prior to developing and submitting changes while keeping in mind that strengthening the Church and its members should always be the end goal.

Changes to unit boundaries can often be disruptive to well-established patterns and friendships to which members have grown accustomed. While requests accommodating membership growth are a welcome reality of a growing Church, boundary change proposals should not be submitted to address needs or circumstances that could otherwise be addressed through training and ministering more effectively to local priesthood leaders and members.

Although the planning process is forward-looking, requests to the Boundary and Leadership Change Committee should be based on the current situation of the Church units involved. Change requests could include such considerations as:

• Strengthening the youth, reducing financial travel burdens, increasing missionary opportunities, and accommodating aging membership.

• Addressing situational factors such as dangerous conditions, aging priesthood holders unable to serve effectively, and the impact of large apartment complexes (requests for noncontiguous boundaries), as well as large unit sizes and travel considerations.

Please provide sufficient background information detailing the need to adjust the units, such as the reasons for membership migration patterns, loss of priesthood leadership, or internal strife. Please include what efforts local priesthood leaders have made to address these issues through training, teaching doctrine, and ministering.

All proposals should be fully endorsed by the presidents of all stakes and missions affected by the proposed changes.