Acknowledging a significant difference in organizational cultures, the boards and staff of the River Forest Park District and the River Forest Community Center have been meeting and sitting in on each other’s board meetings in an effort to get better acquainted.
On July 14, Community Center Executive Director Dick Chappel sat in the audience with the president of the center’s board of directors, Bill Thomas, as the subject of a possible merger between the two entities was discussed by park board members.
The results of a recent community survey on recreation programs indicated a strong interest among residents in a possible merger of the two programs. Asked about their support for the park district and community center “working more closely together” 61 percent of respondents were very supportive, and 15 percent somewhat supportive. Only 2 percent opposed the idea; 22 percent were “not sure.”
Consultant Ronald A. Vine of Leisure Vision, Inc., which conducted the survey for the park district, called the percentages of those supporting a merger “huge numbers.”
“That’s a mandate for these organizations to work together,” he told the park board in June.
Several park board commissioners expressed keen interest Monday in doing just that, specifically mentioning the term “merger.” Others, however, including park board President Tom Lamm and board Treasurer Dale Jones, as well as Chappel, advised going slow on the issue.
Lamm noted he and Commissioner Molly Hague have already met twice with Community Center staff and board members and would be attending the Community Center’s July 22 board meeting.
“We’re looking at all possible ways of working to save resources,” said Lamm. An earlier July meeting, he noted, was spent reviewing with the Community Center staff the 8-10 questions on the park survey related to the center.
Several park commissioners urged the park board to explore a possible merger as soon as possible. Park board Vice President Ron Steele said, “I’d like to avoid taking three or four months deciding who’s going to be on the committee.”
While supporting the idea in principle, Jones suggested any decision-making process should include the village’s residents.
“While I appreciate your sense of urgency, I also think there’s a desire on the part of the community to be involved,” he said. “It would be beneficial if we had a committee of community members and one or two members of each board,” he said, noting he wanted to assure that all aspects of any possible venture with the two entities were fully understood before committing to any agreement.
“We need to look at what would that merged entity look like,” he said. What are the specifics? What are the benefits? What would be the disadvantages?”
Cargie, who supported Steele’s desire to proceed with the dialogue, also agreed with Jones, saying he wanted to be sure the Community Center was, in fact, interested.
“If it’s [not OK] with the community center, let’s not waste our energy,” Cargie said.
The Community Center’s Thomas said something as involved as a merger is not something “people can just jump into. This is a process. We need to learn each other’s cultures.”
Chappel stressed that the cooperative process is in the very early stages.
“We talked about more cooperative programs,” said Chappel. “If that leads to something additional, then so be it.”
“Right now merger is pretty far down the road, in all honesty,” Chappel said.