New GVR board member resigns

Green Valley Recreation board member Joe Roth has resigned from his position after only three months.

Roth was elected to a three-year term in March.

“What it really boils down to, more than anything,” Roth said, “is my style of getting things done just not being effective in the board environment.”

Roth, a member of GVR’s Bylaws and Planning and Evaluation Committee since last year, said he found it difficult to adjust to the pace at which the board worked.

“I come from a background working in a lot of fashion-based, really fast-moving environments,” he said. “So that’s how I work. The Green Valley Recreation board is a very deliberative body. They take a long time to make decisions. They miss opportunities many times because of that, or they lose track of decisions that they may have made or should make.”

Roth, who moved to Green Valley in 2005, has nearly 40 years of business experience working with companies both large and small, including toy maker Mattel.

The 12-member board of directors is responsible for helping oversee GVR for more than 12,000 households.

The board, Roth said, has suffered from its inability to establish a consensus in a timely manner.

“I don’t know why it’s that way. I know boards have to be consensus driven, but consensus doesn’t mean unanimous votes on every project,” he said. “The board consequently moves very, very slowly.”

Roth said that one of the biggest consequences of the board’s pace is the chances that are missed.

“I think they’ve got to speed it up or they’re going to miss some opportunities.”

GVR Board Secretary and former President Roberta Konen said she was sorry to hear of Roth’s decision, but feels that it is a poor decision if he wants to address the concerns he raises.

“He’s a bright guy, a hardworking guy with lots of good ideas.” However, Konen said, “I don’t think that’s a way to solve a problem to keep the group going.”

Although she agrees that the board may be slow at making a decision at times, Konen said she doesn’t think that has happened in the time Roth became a member.

“I think that’s a good thing to be when you’re on a board and running an organization like the Green Valley Recreation,” she said. “I think deliberation is good.”

Roth said the consequences of his perceived inaction by the board are too great.

“For years we’ve talked about, for instance, long-range financial forecasting, and for some reason, they just don’t do it,” he said. “And I think that has caused things to fall through the cracks and I think that has caused things to end up being more expensive than they may have been.”

An example, he said, is the woodworking shop, a project he said took too long to come to realization.

“Consequently, it turned into a $700,000 project, which is an extraordinary expense for GVR, extraordinary. It literally has sucked up all of the available funds for other projects, for at least this coming year.”

Green Valley Recreation Executive Director Anndrea Blackshear said the Planning and Evaluation Committee had considered the project for more than eight years — however, funding for other projects, and finding new funding slowed the process.

Konen said that despite Roth’s concerns, the board is planning for the financial future of the GVR.

“On looking into the future, there are a lot of strategic plans that are being talked about and worked on,” she said. “We are talking about the future of the way we run the financial part of Green Valley Recreation.”

Roth said in order to meet its full potential and fulfill its duty to its members, the board needs to be restructured and it’s bylaws reconsidered.

“Twelve people is an unwieldy body for the kind of work that it needs to do. I think a more reasonable number would probably be seven,” Roth said.

Roth said he has no hard feelings about the members themselves, and feels that they all want what is best for their community.

“I recognize that they’re good people. They’re dedicated people,” he said. “They want stuff to happen, they just don’t have the habits in place to allow that to occur.”