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Grand Lake Rec District won’t hire new manager until after summer

Tonya BinaSky-Hi Daily News

The Grand Lake Metropolitan Recreation District is getting its ducks in a row to exist without a general manager through the upcoming summer.Outgoing General Manager Bill Winfields last day is May 15. Instead of starting the search process and bringing on a new general manager during the heart of the districts golf season, board members have opted to fill an immediate director vacancy to navigate through the season.In the impending absence of Winfields position, the recreation district will revert to a liaison system that was in place prior to his hire.Each department head in the district is assigned a board member who specializes in that department.Superintendent Allen Browns liaison is board member Tom Goodfellow; for general recreation and marketing, Lisa Debevecs manager is board member Jeremy Kennell; heading the touring center is board member Tom Jenkins, to whom Janice Peck reports; Peck will also report to John Gould for trails; and for administration, Tim Thorpe will be the liaison for Bruce Crutcher.As far as golfing operations, the recreation districts immediate tack is to hire a director of golf operations, and in the absence of a general manager, Gould is assigned that positions liaison. Among responsibilities of the director of golf operations are golf shop, carts, rangers and personnel.Although the deadline for applications for the director position is fast approaching, the board reported last night that it has not received any applications thus far.Gould did not appear worried. If they receive none this go-around, he said, they intend to post the available position until they do.It may take about three months to do a nationwide search, interview and hire a qualified person for the position of general manager, from start to finish, Gould estimated. Although it may not happen this summer, it is the districts goal to start the process of filling the general manager position within the year.Budget bickering subsidesIn other business, the district board reviewed the lengthy 13-page minutes of the Feb. 19 board meeting, which was a special meeting held to discuss the districts budget.Two board members, Jeremy Kennell and Tom Goodfellow, brought up concerns that a budget adopted in December may not reflect the actual flow of district funds through different departments. Present at that meeting were Julia Stone and Amber Lindberg of the districts auditor Bondi & Co. Also present was attorney Rich Newton of Stern & Newton, Granby, who provided legal council. The minutes reflect that the auditors found no deception or illegal action in the budget, but left it up to the district to decide how they would like to proceed in fine-tuning the document if the board felt it necessary. The way the budget is structured is similar to other district budgets, it was said in the pages of the minutes, and the auditors confirmed that there are other ways to present a budget more thoroughly with the aim of defining fund separation among departments.The special meeting and auditors review cost the district between $7,000 and $10,000, Winfield was recorded as saying. When it was clarified that there was no foul play of the budget, Gould, for one, voiced that budget concerns should have been addressed sometime from October to December when the budget was being reviewed for adoption rather than two months later.At last nights meeting, the issue of a rift on the board that resulted from the budget dispute seemed to have subsided, as board members did not raise the topic. A discussion of budget details is scheduled for next months meeting.Trail funds kept in houseIn other news, the recreation district has decided to forego its annual donation of about $3,150 to the county-wide Headwaters Trail Alliance, the organization that is working to link each town in the county with a bike trail, and instead put those funds toward developing trails in and around Grand Lake, at least for this year. Peck is in the process of working on a master plan for a district trail system.Clubhouse bonesAnd finally, board members were presented an engineering report concerning the districts main clubhouse. The district had contracted engineers to review the structural integrity of the clubhouse to see if it is viable for a large-scale remodel using funds that were approved with the bond issue. Board members plan to review the report and bring it back to the table at the next district meeting.


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