Chancellors’ Report: How real property is held within the Episcopal Diocese of Fort Worth

From Stand Firm:

In the early 1980s, a decision was made to carve a new Diocese – the Diocese of Fort Worth – from the old Diocese of Dallas. It would include Tarrant County and 23 other western and neighboring counties.

At this same time, there were discussions on how to retitle the property within the new diocese. Prior to this time the property had been held in the name of the Bishop of the Diocese of Dallas or his successor in office. This was traditional in most dioceses of the Episcopal Church and had served well for literally decades. In these new times, however, there were occasions when our bishop would be away from the diocese for extended periods. Therefore, real estate closings had to be continued until such time as the bishop was back in residence. Today fax machines, e-mails and FedEx would help us keep things going but those were not universally available, if at all, in the early 1980s.

A new plan was adopted to retitle the real property of the diocese in the name of a corporation which would be called “Corporation of the Episcopal Diocese of Fort Worth.”

This not-for-profit corporation was set up to hold and service the real property within the diocese, and it became infinitely more efficient than waiting for the bishop to return from an extended trip since the corporation was always open for business. It did, however, take a far-sighted and gracious bishop to agree to relinquish the real property traditionally held by him. . .

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