CHCA House Tour Effort Illuminates Problems
We received the following e-mail Thursday evening. Given the excuses provided by CHCA for the smaller than expected profit (in the Jan 26 Local story about the house tour), these readers contribute their experience with the event and its planners. From their e-mail, we read, "To add our voice to the blog, I submit the attached letter -- sent to the Local on January 4, and again on January 6 when the Editor called to say she'd misplaced it. The letter never made it to the pages of the Local, I hope you'll add it to the blog!" The letter follows.
January 4, 2006
To the Editor:
We are firm believers in the mission of the CHCA and the community of Chestnut Hill. In an effort to support the CHCA this year, we volunteered our home to be part of the CHCA Holiday House Tour—the single biggest fund raising event of the CHCA calendar.
Our experience was less than ideal— the Association couldn’t get out of its own way to get the event off the ground. The lack of accountability within the committee and by those board members that chose to lend their name (not their efforts) to this very important revenue producing event was disappointing, to say the least.
As a result, an event like the house tour, which could build on past successes, failed on its primary objective-- to generate adequate revenue for the CHCA.
As we saw during our House Tour experience, there is an accountability issue within the CHCA – with so many board members, everyone wants to take credit, yet no one wants to take ownership. There is no clear process and no clear leadership.
It is time to re-engineer the CHCA board – its mission and its size. Primarily, the responsibilities and duties required of every board member need to be clearly delineated before they accept their seat. Strong leadership and vision is clearly lacking and needs to come from the top down.
Success of an association like ours is entirely dependent on volunteerism. However, this volunteerism must carry with it accountability and responsibility, two components that have been sorely lacking over the course of the last year.
Regards,
Bill & Maryellen Lamb
posted by Anonymous at 1/26/2006 09:54:00 PM
2 Comments:
How unusual for an editor to misplace a letter, call the letter writers, and then not publish the replacement letter. One has to wonder if the editor actually did not want to publish the critical remarks of people who obviously support the CHCA but not the current board. Did she "misplace" the letter in the hopes the Lambs would not send a copy? At this point, I put nothing beyond these people and the editor in their pocket.
A Disgusted Resident
P.S. When WILL the job of editor be advertised?
Hurray! Ms. Boynton has found the Lambs' letter and finally published it in the Feb. 16th issue of the Local -- but only after a letter praising the event was produced and published in the same issue. The complimentary letter singles out Maxine Dornemann and Pamela Waters for special praise, a comic touch considering how defensive Ms. Dornemann has been about the Holiday House fiasco.
In the same issue, Ms. Waters --in her lengthy letter positioned in the space usually reserved for an editorial -- hurled some very serious accusations at Lawrence Walsh. She had better have some serious evidence to back it up. Sexual harrassment is a serious matter. So is libel.
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