Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, September 29, 1994 TAG: 9409290054
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: LESLIE TAYLOR STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
O'Neil, who has shepherded growth at the YWCA during her four-year tenure, announced her resignation this week at a meeting of the YWCA's 26-member board of directors. The board accepted O'Neil's resignation and appointed Harriet S. Lewis - the YWCA's associate director - to succeed her.
"We always expected that [O'Neil] could be zapped," said Ginny Allison, YWCA board president. "She'd shared with me that she had been contacted about the job.
"We hate to lose her. But when you're high profile and successful, people notice you."
O'Neil's last day with the YWCA will be Oct. 31. The next day, she will become executive director of the Tennessee-Arkansas-Mississippi Girl Scout Council. The council covers the Memphis metropolitan area, four counties in Tennessee, five in Mississippi and one and a half in Arkansas.
O'Neil - a former administrator with the Salem-based Virginia Skyline Girl Scout Council - said the Memphis-based council approached her about a job last winter.
"Opportunity sometimes comes when you least expect it," O'Neil said Wednesday. "I will miss [the YWCA] greatly. What makes me happiest is knowing that [the YWCA] is going full steam ahead. We have too many important programs."
"It was a bittersweet decision," she said of leaving the YWCA and Roanoke. "But I had to spread my wings and see what was on the other side of the mountains."
O'Neil has been credited with spurring service improvements at the YWCA. In her four years at the organization's helm, its downtown Roanoke building has undergone $200,000 in repairs and renovations. Much of it was tied to one of O'Neil's priorities: transitional and emergency housing for women, including pregnant teens and teen mothers.
O'Neil was the force behind the YWCA's "Bogardus Project," a $2.8 million child-care center scheduled to open in September 1996 that will include services for disabled children, provide care for mildly ill children of working parents and be equipped with activities to encourage early-childhood development.
O'Neil completed a three-year term on the city School Board this year, but wasn't reappointed by City Council.
The YWCA board's decision to appoint Lewis to succeed O'Neil was unanimous. Lewis has served as the YWCA's associate director since January. Before that, she was executive director of the Northwest Child Development Center in Roanoke. She also is a member of the Virginia Commission on Child Day Care and Early Childhood Programs.
"We all regret seeing her go," Lewis said of O'Neil. "But we're very much at ease. I hope to continue to stress the same importance that Wendy did on women and their children. I see that kind of thing as a legacy."
by CNB