Board member sworn in; volunteer clashes revealed

by Sue Serdinak

Feb. 27 RJRD meeting

The Richfield Joint Recreation District meeting opened with Richfield Township Trustee Don Laubaucher swearing in Holly Price as the newest member of the RJRD board, filling the unexpired term of Sandy Apidone.

“I’ve known Holly for about eight years and she will be a great board member,” Laubacher said.

Attendees to the meeting walked through puddles to get to the Lodge on this rainy night. It was a perfect setup for Park Director John Piepsny’s recommendation to pave the lot in front of the Lodge. The board approved hiring S&K Asphalt and Concrete to pave the area for $23,680.  

Piepsny said he received four bids for the job, and S&K was the lowest bidder. The company has done work for the recreation district in the past. He said the area needs to be re-graded before it is paved.

The board approved a $7,000 contract with Ponds Beautiful to treat the upper and lower lake for algae bloom in April through September.

The board approved a revised one-year contract with Shari Green as event director. Green will be paid $1,000 per month plus 10-20% commission on rental sales, based on a sliding scale. Piepsny said that he might ask for the contract to be revised when the Amity House is available to rent.

Piepsny reported that Green is working with volunteers Dave Kalal and Chris Moore to turn the former kitchen at the Lodge into a “first class” bridal room.

Conflict resolution

Sitting in as chair in the absence of Anita Gantner, Mike Selig reported on a conflict that arose between park volunteers and the park director and a meeting Selig held to resolve the miscommunications.

While volunteers working with the Friends of Richfield Heritage Preserve have been restoring the Amity House for rental and are responsible for eradicating invasive species in the park, other volunteers, under the direction of Piepsny, have been remodeling the Lodge kitchen to convert it to a larger bridal room. 

The Friends have been managing eradication of invasive species for several years under the direction of board member Jeff DeLuca, who resigned near the time of the discord. The group reported that their chemicals were moved, without their approval, to a location where water was not accessible, as required by law.

The locks to the park gate and buildings were changed without notifying the Friends.

Also, park volunteers sold bedframes the Friends had stored after cottages were razed. The Friends had tagged the frames and used them to make sign posts for their events.

The dispute escalated, and a park volunteer filed a police report about a harassing phone call from a member of Friends.

At the meeting Selig said, “We all were very surprised about this latter outcome and Corey [Ringle, president of Friends] conveyed to us that the individual has been talked to about the behavior and coached on how to better convey concerns going forward.” 

There also was a disagreement about the level of restoration work the park director asked the Friends to perform on the Amity house to make it rentable. 

At the meeting, Ringle, an architect, explained that a park building could be opened to the public with an access classification of “C.” She said it would be very costly to bring the Amity House to the higher level of access that had been requested by the event planner and park director.

Board member Mike Lyons said there should be an understanding about who has authority to make park decisions.

“Is there a way to understand the range of authority the director has been given? … My understanding is, if there is any dissatisfaction, it should go to the director and then to the board rather than have conflict between volunteers,” Lyons said.

Lyons added that the level of accessibility needed for buildings is a discussion that should be held at the policy level by the board.  He added that the Strategic Plan might address this.

Board member Dave Wehner agreed. “Who is going to bear the risk of seeing that we meet the guidelines?” he asked.

Board member Mark Robeson said there might be topics other than accessibility that need to be managed by the board.

Selig said more information would be gathered about Amity house and the park in general for the March 27 meeting.

“We’re really excited about the direction that things are going [in the park] and the momentum,’’ Selig said. “The Richfield Heritage Preserve has definitely evolved. We are meeting the expectations.”

Public comments

During the public comment part of the meeting Sandy Norris said she has been volunteering to clean the porta johns and to pick up dog waste for seven years. She said recently she has not been able to access warm water in the Lodge to wash her hands.

Piepsny said that he is in the process of having locks changed.

Pat Norris, Sandy’s husband and a former board member, read a lengthy statement saying the Richfield Heritage Preserve is not a nature preserve but a heritage preserve, and the buildings should remain part of the park. He said, according to Ohio regulations, a nature preserve would not allow animals, watercraft, campfires or rental properties.

Strategic plan

The board voted at the Jan. 27 meeting to adopt the park’s strategic plan. However, the verbage of the resolution was incorrect and the vote was actually to reconsider adopting. According to board chairman Gantner, a new vote will be taken at the March 27 meeting.

The board did not address the issue at this meeting.

Locked gate

It was later learned that the park gate was locked shortly after 6:30 p.m., and some people were not able to get to the Lodge to attend the RJRD meeting. ∞