Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, February 8, 1992 TAG: 9202080210
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: SCOTT BLANCHARD SPORTSWRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
TASK AHEAD FOR VOLUNTEERS MIND-BOGGLING
Imagine yourself running a weeklong event with a volunteer staff in the thousands, catering to about 6,000 athletes - all in your spare time, and without getting paid.Essentially, that is how Virginia Amateur Sports says this summer's Commonwealth Games of Virginia must be run. Current and former Commonwealth Games workers say it cannot be done successfully without a paid executive and games staff.
"That's impossible," said Barb Jirka, the Games' gymnastics coordinator who also is director of lodging for the Local Organizing Committee.
"No volunteer is going to know how many T-shirts we need," handball coordinator Andy Hudick said.
Melissa Griggs, director of volunteers for last year's Games, agrees.
"Volunteers just aren't willing to put the time and effort it takes to pull something like this off," she said. "Nobody's got that kind of time. . . . It's going to be wild."
VAS had four paid staff members to run last year's Games: executive director Doug Fonder, games director Bob Hartman, fund-raiser David Tresch and special events director Gina Dunnavant.
Only Dunnavant remains, and VAS chairman of the board Ken King said the organization's financial woes mean Dunnavant's $20,000 salary is being paid "on a week-to-week basis." Tresch resigned in December and Hartman left in January. Fonder was ousted Jan. 31 by the VAS board, which said it no longer could afford to pay him.
Dunnavant has been made interim games director, King said, adding that several "task forces" have been formed by members of the board of directors to take over Fonder's duties. Dunnavant said VAS will advertise to hire a paid games director. She said she has made no long-term commitment to VAS, nor has she decided whether she will remain on staff through the June 23-30 Olympics-style festival.
If Dunnavant leaves, it would shear VAS of the last remaining full-time staff member with experience in running the Games, experience Hartman calls critical. And if the revamped VAS tries to run the 1992 Games with one paid staff person . . .
"That is an impossible task for any human being to do," Jirka said.
It will affect the Games all the way down, tennis coordinator Mel Fiel said.
"Am I going to have to do more work than I've already put forward?" Fiel asked. "With the turmoil at VAS, to put on a quality event, do I have to do more work? [Financially], can I afford to spend more time doing this? When I have to do more, other [volunteers] will be required to do . . . more work. It's a snowball effect."
Hudick is concerned about such things as who will publicize individual sports and who will order equipment and other essentials. With the paid staff last year, he said, "there were still snafus. How are you going to have one paid person and not have snafus?"
The sports coordinators may get some answers today, when they meet for the first time with King at a Roanoke hotel. The meeting was scheduled before the VAS turnover. Some coordinators are busy trying to tell out-of-town volunteers about the VAS shake-up before the meeting, and there is a possibility the board's decision about Fonder and its leadership could be challenged by the coordinators.
King cannot say who will run the games, take over executive and games-related responsibilities, or how the event will maintain what one sports coordinator called the "ambience" of the Commonwealth Games: Opening ceremonies, jackets and T-shirts for athletes and volunteers, medals and so forth.
Especially difficult for the board, Jirka said, will be understanding the day-to-day operation it took to run the Games. In her opinion, Fonder and Dunnavant could have run a successful event because of their experience. Board committees can't do it, Jirka said.
The actual competition may be least affected - if most or all sports coordinators remain on board.
"They know their sports," Hartman said. "They have been the crux of what's happened athletically."
There seems to be little question the Games will be scaled back this summer. Snyder's revised 1992 budget, submitted to the board in January, included a 38 percent cut in program service expenses such as volunteer T-shirts, athlete outfitting, team lodging and meals, printing costs, medals and officials.