Board of Directors News

Board of Directors News

Dear Co-op Members,

One of the most important current events at La Montanita is that we've hired a new General Manager.

As you may already know, hiring and supervising the General Manager is one of the board of director's main functions.

After a lengthy, nationwide search, we are fortunate to have found Tom Nolan from Fairfield, California.

Tom has been in the retail grocery industry practically his entire adult life and brings an excellent set of skills in management, marketing, budgeting, and problem solving.

After exhausting the possibilities of hiring from within the cooperative industry, the board made a conscious decision to look for a General Manager from the progressive end of the mainstream grocery spectrum.

The Board believes this was an important step in making La Montanita competitive with the major corporate chains that carry organic products and natural foods in our neighborhood.

Our challenge now is to stay true to our mission and cooperative principles while distinguishing ourselves from our competitors and regaining our historic financial strength.

The Board is confident Tom can continue the financial recovery from our recent expansion and help us adapt to the competitive climate in the coming years.

I should mention that our financial recovery is going well as a result of the hard work of our Interim Management Team and the staff and volunteers that have sacrificed so much to keep the Co-op strong in the aftermath of our expansion to Rio Grande and Matthew.

The entire Board appreciates the effort everybody has shown over the past year, and we are grateful for it.

Now I'd like to touch on a few other major issues as a way of introducing some of the topics the Board will be grappling with in the coming months. Governance by Policy (also known as Policy Governance, POGO, or the Policy Manual):

A few months ago, the Board adopted a set of policies to use in the governance of our cooperative.

What was surprising to me as a relatively new board member is that we never had such a thing before.

The policies were conceived by a variety of board members, both past and present, over the last two to three years with help from other cooperatives around the country and a consultant from Cooperative Development Services.

Basically, the Policy Manual is a document the board uses for guidance in the way it makes decisions.

The policy manual does not replace the bylaws or the mission statement. It builds on them. Think of it as a constitution-of-sorts that can be updated, amended and changed to meet the changing concerns of the board and membership.

Many boards of directors of natural foods co-ops around the country are now using this form of governance.

The board believes Policy Governance is an essential tool for our Co-op because it removes the board from management of the day-to-day operation of the stores, so it can focus on its main task: visioning and planning for the future.

Member Linkage Committee:
In addition to hiring and supervising the General Manager, one of the Board's main functions is to represent the membership of the Co-op.

As I write this, the Board is working on the charter for the Member Linkage Committee.

While I can't speak for the committee or foresee exactly how it will manifest itself, I expect it will address the members' concerns about how we fulfill our mission in the store and in the community.

Perhaps it will become a place where the members can learn more about the cooperative principles and participate more in decision-making that affects La Montanita. Whatever form it may take, I hope the creation of this standing committee will go a long way to answering ongoing member concerns.

Policy Development Committee:
Our Policy Manual calls for the creation of a committee to continually evaluate and update the policies we use to govern the Co-op.

The Policy Development Committee is also working on its charter and it should be adopted and begin functioning in an upcoming board meeting.

Look for updates from these two committees and other important standing committees as they are created in the coming months.

Board Elections:
I'll write more about this next month, but the elections for new board members will take place this fall.

At this time, it looks like there will be four vacancies.

If you are interested in becoming a Board member, please attend at least one of our next few meetings.

I'm hopeful that we'll see some great candidates.

Also coming up next month… prospects for a patronage dividend.