The following is excerpted from my remarks to the delegates at the Annual Business Meeting on May 5, 2026. The theme of the meeting was Our Journey. …

  First, I want to thank the interview committee and the Board that hired me back in 2017. They got me started on my MRSPA Journey. I was pleased to be selected, and I am still honored to hold the position. I thank Fay, Lorraine, Ann Marie, Charlie, George, Debbie, Carla, Nancy, Betty, and Tillie for your leadership and for your patience with me. I thank the other George for his help with parliamentary questions and for his wonderfully dry sense of humor, Steve and Alicia for your help with everything monetary, and Janet, Nancy, and Sharyn for your excellent meeting minutes and tolerance of my picky attention to detail.

I thank all the area directors, committee chairs, committee members, newsletter editors, pension system trustees, and our Legislative Aide over the last 9 years for all you have done, do, and will continue to do for MRSPA, our members, me and for the new director when the time comes. I thank all our local presidents and your Boards and committees for keeping this ship afloat. In short, I thank each and every one of you who said yes. I learned decades ago in my previous association life that if I was going to be successful in my leadership, I needed a whole lot of yes people. Differing and opposing ideas are important for proper decision making but our organization would only succeed with the yes people to support me and my ideas. Yes people to help carry out our goals. Yes people to step up when asked. Yes people who have your back. And yes people who listen when times get tough, and who understand and honor traditions while they move ahead with changes that are needed to drive the association forward. And the same is true at MRSPA. I thank each of you who said yes when I asked you to do something – especially when you didn’t really want to – when someone in your local asked you to step into a leadership role or even if you simply said yes when they asked if you wanted to come to the ABM today. I am grateful to all of you who said yes and who will continue to say yes to MRSPA and to your local associations. Your yes equals our collective success. As I take my leave from MRSPA, there are a few things I/we did not get done that perhaps someone with fresh eyes and ideas may consider. One is purchasing the software (and learning how to use it) that will enable our Legislative Committee and members to quickly contact legislators via email about legislation. Another is to consider a new association management system – or a new database. This may not be necessary, but it doesn’t hurt to investigate it. A third item is investigating communicating with members via text message like most other companies do now. And lastly, I am hopeful that we will turn the page toward positive membership growth. I know how hard we have been working on this for 9 years! I feel strongly that the actions built into the Strategic Plan, along with the advertising campaign and other initiatives we are already pursuing - will help us move in the right direction. I wish the new director, Board, and local associations much success moving forward. The membership growth journey must always be a top priority. As I end my remarks, I again want to thank all of you for your patience listening to me today. I sincerely thank you for the opportunity to serve as your executive director. It truly has been interesting, educational, rewarding, exhausting, and mostly fun – and it has been an honor to represent you and your interests. I wish you and MRSPA nothing but success as Our Journey continues. Thank you.