As you read on the front page, the Gazette has reached a cross road; this issue, Winter 2021, will be my last issue as this publication’s General Manager.
After 11 years and 48 issues, it is time for me to retire from what has been a wonderful experience. It was not an easy decision! My fear has been that if I stopped, the Gazette would stop, and that is a very real possibility.
For many years I have enjoyed the camaraderie and teamwork of a dedicated group of committee members who attended meetings four times a year, helped think of articles that would fill the Gazette’s pages, wrote those articles, took pictures, expressed strong and welcome opinions when touchy issues confronted us, and tackled a number of important tasks that kept the whole enterprise running. The fact is, however, that the tasks that underpin the Gazette’s very existence (described on the right) were all done by me. And now it’s time for me to stop. My sincere thanks to the community of Gardiner for giving me this opportunity to serve. I have loved it for all 11 years.
It is my fervent hope that you will not make me regret this!! Please step up. Perhaps no one wants to take on quite as much as I carried, but if you have QuickBooks skills you might take on the accounting; if you have Adobe InDesign skills you might handle the layout; if, like me, you can organize the heck out of anything, you might oversee the whole operation and keep everyone on target. Four times a year for about five or six weeks you will be quite busy. Then you can take a nap until the next issue.
I look forward to sitting in my living room reading copies of the Gazette that I did not produce. Thank you all.
What We Need
The Gardiner Gazette is in need of a volunteer General Manager to handle a variety of roles. Specific skills are QuickBooks and Adobe InDesign, however, the General Manager’s primary role is coordination, even if some aspects of production are handled by other volunteers.
The GM will ensure that four meetings (physical or virtual) take place each year; that enough articles are identified and assigned at each meeting to fill the next issue; and that articles are received on time.
The GM also coordinates with the Advertising Manager; makes sure all ads and articles are placed in the layout; and coordinates review and proofreading. Finally, the GM makes sure the Gazette gets to the printer on time.
Templates exist for almost everything (meeting agendas; production emails to the printer; QuickBooks invoices and reports; an Adobe InDesign template for layout; a scheduling spreadsheet for meetings and submission deadlines, etc.), and three existing Committee Members are already on board to assist.
If you would like to see the Gardiner Gazette continue and you have one of these skills, or all three, please contact L.A. McMahon (Lillian) at 845 514-5509 or vividdesignhv@gmail.com.