THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, September 9, 1994 TAG: 9409090592
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B3 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: HAMPTON LENGTH: Medium: 65 lines
Employees of the Virginia Air and Space Center were asked to sign a petition supporting acting director Jeannette Petrolia after the facility's trustees received a letter criticizing her leadership.
Edwin C. Kilgore, president of the center's board of trustees, said last month's petition originated with the employees. But some staff members said they felt intimidated when asked by department heads to sign the document.
One staffer denounced the petition as ``bogus'' and called it a ``loyalty oath.''
``We were called in and asked to sign a letter saying we were loyal to the center - which I am - and to the acting director - which I am not,'' said the employee, who asked not to be identified. ``I felt as if I would lose my job if I didn't sign. Several other people felt threatened, too.''
The one-page petition endorsed Petrolia's candidacy for the job as permanent executive director.
On Aug. 18, Lynda J. Fairman, coordinator of the center's summer camp-in program, sent a resignation letter to the board complaining about a series of ``incomprehensible staff changes'' carried out on Petrolia's orders.
Fairman said the changes had driven both the center and its education department into disarray. In particular, she cited the July 22 firing of John Mannarino as public programs manager.
The letter also described organizational changes in which Fairman said she and other staff members were forced to give up their offices and told to conduct work without computers, printers, copiers or file cabinets.
``People are going through the motions of work, but creativity and enthusiasm are dead,'' she wrote. ``Everyone is looking over their shoulder wondering where the ax will fall next.''
Kilgore dismissed Fairman's complaints. He said her resignation represented an isolated case of dissatisfaction with Petrolia's tenure.
He also dismissed an anonymous Aug. 12 letter to the board in which the writer compared the working environment at the center to that of a ``concentration camp.''
However, the letters prompted an Aug. 26 staff meeting at which Kilgore assembled the center's employees in a conference room and asked them to share any problems or complaints.
``I was satisfied, when I was through, that morale was quite good, and that everybody was pulling together,'' he said.
But reports from staff members who attended the meeting contradicted that assessment, claiming there was little chance of an honest exchange because Petrolia and her department heads were in the room. ``Nobody's going to stand up in the middle of that and make a protest they might have to pay for,'' one employee said.
Petrolia did not return repeated phone calls.
The turmoil comes less than a year after the board fired former director Richard H. Petersen and several senior members of his staff in a dispute over how to handle lagging attendance and a projected revenue shortfall.
Despite recent growth in visitation and a substantial increase in marketing efforts, the center still ended its 1993-94 fiscal year with only 203,000 visitors, according to marketing director Kimberly Hinson. by CNB