2022-2023 BFUU Board of Trustees Members

Current fiscal year 2023-2024 approved Board Agendas and Minutes - Note: folders are empty until approved Agendas and Minutes are available.
Previous fiscal year 2022-2023 approved Board Agendas and Minutes
Previous fiscal year 2021-2022 approved Board Agendas and Minutes
Previous fiscal year 2020-2021 approved Board Agendas and Minutes

Margaret Hurlbert (she/her) President

Margaret Hurlbert has been coming to the Fellowship for many years, and has been active in the Choir, Chair of the Music Committee, and has taken part in many events and concerts. She has also been active in the Social Justice Ministry. Some projects she has worked on include going to ICE detention centers and protesting the internment of children, going to Climate Change marches with BFUU, helping with concerts and dances and the ukulele group at BFUU, and organizing making soup at BFUU for Consider the Homeless.

Jean Marie Stine (she/her) Vice President

Jean Marie Stine officially became a Unitarian-Universalist in 2002 in Northampton MA, though she had long admired UU principles and thought that if she ever joined a “church” it would be the UU. After moving to Berkeley CA, she discovered the BFUU and, along with her partner Frankie Hill, joined the congregation, where they served on the Sunday Services, Hospitality and Caring Committees, helped clean and straighten the Fellowship Hall after services each week. In the process, they developed an attachment to BFUU that has never waned. When circumstances caused them to move to Oregon, where they joined the Unitarian-Universalist Church of Eugene, their hearts remained behind. Now that they live in Mexico, where they have joined the Unitarian-Universalist Fellowship of San Miguel de Allende, Jean Marie volunteered to fill an empty space on the BFUU board until the next election. She is a much published writer and the proprietor of a very small publishing company.

Ben Burch (he/him) Treasurer/Secretary

Ben Burch: I grew up in Davis, and attended a UU Sunday school at the Davis Fellowship (later Church) in the ‘60s, and was later involved in LRY (UU youth group) there as well. After flirting with anthropology and East Asian studies (BA and MA), I got a library degree, and worked in that area until my retirement in 2009. I was already active in BFUU at that point (having joined around 1997), and continue to do, having served on the board several times. Currently serving as Treasurer, I hope to continue to play a role in making BFUU a sustainable beacon for our 7 principles, as well as continuing to move us toward truly building a beloved community, and at the same time encouraging us to bring our principles to our participation in the broader local community.

Phoebe Sorgen (she/her)

Phoebe Sorgen became a BFUU friend 27 years ago when she enrolled her boys in the RE program. Though unavailable on Sunday mornings due to work, she became active via the Social Justice Committee, which she eventually chaired. After becoming a BFUU member, she was elected to the Board during the time that BFUU transitioned from lay led and hired Rev. Kurt Kuhwald in hopes of increasing membership. She served on the then newly reconstituted Personnel Committee, and has also been on the Aesthetics and Nominating Committees.
For effective peace, democracy, and human rights advocacy, Phoebe was a 2005 Outstanding Woman of Berkeley and 2015 Tom Paine Courageous Spirit awardee. As a Peace & Justice Commissioner, she wrote many Resolutions that were adopted by the City of Berkeley. Some were adopted by other cities.
Phoebe is a Green Party County Councilor and state delegate to the GP-US National Committee (the decision making body.) She serves on the GP-US Peace, International, and Conflict Resolution Committees, and is active in the Women’s Caucus. Despite those responsibilities, and being on the Steering Committees of Move to Amend and Berkeley Citizens Action, she also serves as a BFUU Board of Trustees Alternate because our beautiful BFUU community means the world to her.

Simone Chiodini (she/her)

Simone Chiodini is a recent graduate of Starr King School for the Ministry, and she has been attending services at BFUU since the autumn of 2016. She considers herself a Taoist Unitarian Universalist. A published writer, her novels include Infinite Power Defied & Infinite Love Decreed. She is a proud proponent of LGBTQ+ equality, Black Lives Matter, and Climate change awareness.

Christine Dickson (she/her) Alternate

Christine has long been an active member of SJC, and has supported BFUU in many ways over the years. She is a veteran Scene Technician from Cal Performances, etc. Her crew started UPTE local 9119 (the University’s Technical Employee Union), and she was one of the first two women in this local. Christine has lots of experience working with kids in art and interpretive training with the Shorebird Nature Center. She has shared her talent and skills in artistic design, co-coordinating the Better World Festival, audio/sound support, gardening skills, and more. She has resumed a role on the current Open Mic team.

Tom Luce (he/him) Alternate

In 2000, Tom joined his hometown – Barre, Vermont – UU Church because they were the only church supporting the same-sex marriage law. As an already defrocked Catholic priest for having married, this was a final departure. And now another personal social justice fight. After retiring from teaching in his hometown and moving with wife, Judy, to Berkeley in 2005, Tom, as a member of Oakland UU, began working in 2006 with Cynthia Johnson on the “Declaration of Peace”, a national campaign for stopping the Iraq war that was proposed at the GA in Louisville Kentucky as an AIW. Soon after, he joined BFUU and has continued to promote antiracist work, e.g. convincing BFUU to endorse the #8 Principle calling for accountable antiracism work.