Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, March 9, 1995 TAG: 9503090080
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MATT CHITTUM STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Gendron is leaving her post in April to take up horse farming out West. She said the staff of the museum, as well as several members of the board of directors, have known of her plans for several months.
Gendron said she and a significant other - she wouldn't say if marriage was on the horizon - are looking to buy a ranch in Colorado, Montana, Wyoming or South Dakota. She said she's more sad than relieved about leaving.
``I've got a lot of me invested in the museum,'' she said.
Like just about everything else Gendron has done in recent months, her exit is kicking up a cloud of controversy.
Rumors had circulated for months that Gendron was on her way out, but she had declined to comment on the possibility.
She said Wednesday that she made the decision to leave about nine months ago. Del. Ward Armstrong, D-Martinsville; state Sen. Virgil Goode, D-Rocky Mount; and others have accused Gendron of being a ``lightning rod for controversy.'' They also said she was secretly plotting with state Sen. Brandon Bell, R-Roanoke County, to move the museum out of Martinsville and link it with Explore Park.
Gendron dismissed that as a ``harebrained notion from the beginning.'' But, she said, knowing she was leaving soon anyway gave her some freedom to say what was on her mind with less fear of the consequences.
When she sold her house in October, her critics said it was because she was moving back to Roanoke and wanted to take the museum with her. Gendron said that was just one of the first steps in making her move west.
She even got her daughter enrolled in a Wyoming college in preparation for the move. She said she would have left sooner, but at the request of her boss, state Secretary of Natural Resources Becky Norton Dunlop, she stayed on through the 1995 General Assembly session. Once she helps the museum develop a new long-range strategy, she'll be on her way.
Gendron said she had planned to officially announce her departure in early April, after the next meeting of the board of trustees, but the story leaked out early.
William Shear, chairman of the trustees, said he had been planning to drive to Martinsville today to discuss with Gendron how they would go about announcing her departure to the news media.
``Everyone that really needed to know, knew,'' Gendron said.
In early February, the museum's board of trustees held a meeting during which Chairman William Shear supported Gendron, saying her ``continuance in office is not negotiable.'' Asked if it was awkward to go to such lengths to defend Gendron when he knew she was leaving, Shear said it wasn't.
The whole point of the meeting was to defend Gendron against what the board thought were unjust attacks against her and ``to make it clear that Connie had the complete support of the board,'' whether she was leaving or not.
Shear said Gendron was an outstanding director whom the museum will sorely miss. He pointed to the museum's third consecutive perfect score on an annual state audit of its finances as evidence of Gendron's ability.
No successor has been chosen, but Shear said an interim director likely will be appointed from the museum staff while the trustees search for a permanent replacement.
Armstrong said he regrets that all the controversy around the museum destroyed his friendship with Gendron, and he takes no glee in seeing her leave. He said he looks on the leadership change as chance to make a fresh start with the museum - on the condition that the idea of moving the facility is abandoned.
``We'd love to have [the local delegation's] support,'' Shear said, ``but it's a mystery to me why they haven't been supporting us all along.''
by CNB