Through the years,
because The Woods finances was running in the black, we kept avoiding a major
capital campaign by using monies earned from fees from facility use and offering
programs. We added a new kitchen, enclosed the kitchen
porch in the back for staff use and storage. We
expanded the pool deck, built cabins near the pool, built the homestead,
boxcar, infirmary, staff meadow cabins, enclosed the shop, upgraded bathrooms
and cabins including bunks and mattresses, as well as built a house and put in
four manufactured homes.
By the time we
retired, we did ask Presbytery to take out a loan on the property to help
balance the budget and make up for some of the development costs. Our attitude was since we had put in millions
of dollars for upgrading and building new facilities through the twenty years
we were there, ending with a loan less than 25% of what we spent was
reasonable.
We knew we had to move
forward with the development of the grounds and facilities as the demand for
use was increasing. We turned over
several million dollars for materials alone through the years, primarily using
our staff and volunteers for development projects, without any major fund raising. We were able to accomplish this because of
the increase use of the facility and because of the success of the programs we
offered.
There
was a contractor from one of the churches who helped us with the construction
of buildings. When we were remodeling
and adding on to the kitchen, he rallied about forty men to come and “lift” the
frame in one weekend for the expansion of the kitchen. It was amazing and wonderful. He helped The Woods a great deal with his
expertise. We appreciated his help a
lot.
I’ll never forget,
however, when they were about ready to put the windows up in the kitchen. In the design I had included a pass through
window from inside the kitchen to the outside. When we had BBQ’s and outdoor events, we
could serve from inside the kitchen directly to the outside and receive dirty
dishes without having to go through the kitchen passage way. We also ran a high school leadership program
(STEP) all summer and they ate outside and they, too, would not have to go
through the main doors and interrupt the regular ongoing camps in the dining
room to get their meals, etc.
I needed a wider (than
a window sill) flat pass through shelf at the bottom of the window. The Contractor wanted to put the pass
through on a short shelf above the level of the counters. I really did not want that to happen. I needed a flat shelf low enough for junior
and senior high young people to use for passing dishes and food items
safely. I went to Richard and I said,
“do something about this, we won’t change it after it is in.” Richard went to him and told him I wanted it the
other way. The contractor became very
upset and yelled at Richard and said something like, “You go to your Presbytery
meetings and leave the building to me.”
He did eventually
install it the way I wanted. However,
it was too bad. He became so angry he
did not help us with any other projects.
That was one of those times I was very happy that Richard was a strong
person. That window was used a lot
through the years. Sometimes it was a
challenge to meet program needs over easier construction.
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