DeKalb Park District approves new interim executive director

DeKALB – DeKalb Park District officials are taking the first steps towards a new permanent executive director, starting with naming an interim executive director to handle day to day tasks in the meantime, after the district’s last executive director recently resigned.

Phil Young, who is president for the DeKalb Park District Board of Commissioners, said Ray Ochromowicz is scheduled to start back at the park district as interim executive director on Monday. He said Ochromowicz previously served as the park district’s interim executive director about seven years ago.

“He did a very good job back then,” Young said. “And so we looked at his credentials and [we thought] he was a great candidate again.”

Ochromowicz will be paid $6,000 a month for working up to 20 hours per week until the board can hire a permanent executive director, according to park district documents provided to Daily Chronicle.

The park board voted, 5-0, to approve the new agreement for interim executive director services with Ochromowicz during the board’s meeting Thursday. The board also voted, 5-0, on Thursday to approve the executive director job description, following discussion during the board’s Jan. 7 meeting.

Proposed changes to the executive director job description, as discussed during the Jan. 7 meeting, included further clarification on chain of command and job delegation. There was no additional discussion amongst commissioners about the job description following the vote to approve it on Thursday.

After the Jan. 7 meeting, Young said re-evaluating job descriptions for positions when looking for a new person to fill them is per park district policy and procedure. He has said the description needed to be updated before the job posting for the now-vacant director role goes live.

“Every time there’s a vacancy ... by default the board has to assess the job position and do an update as required,” Young said. " ... Sometimes there’s a lot of changes, sometimes there’s a few.”

Young said after the Thursday meeting next steps in the coming months will include setting a salary for the executive director position, posting the job with the new description and reviewing applicants for the position.

The update comes after Gail Krmenec, secretary for the DeKalb Park District Board of Commissioners, confirmed via email in December that former DeKalb Park District Executive Director Amy Doll resigned and district officials would soon begin looking for a new temporary executive director to fill the role in the meantime.

In responses to Illinois Freedom of Information Act requests filed by the Daily Chronicle, park board officials wrote that no severance or non-disclosure agreements, documents or records exist between Doll and the park district.

Jeff Dobie, who is one of the candidates running for park district commissioner in the April 6 consolidated election, said he wanted to run for the position because he was not happy with the leadership over there and he believes the park district has been poorly run. He said he has coached baseball within the park district and he lives on the River Heights golf course, which he believes has never been busier than it has been in the past year.

“I don’t believe they have [filled the golf superintendent position] and they lost a lot of good people who could’ve done the job properly but were fed up with the way things were being run,” Dobie said. “And there’s nothing worse than losing good employees. They’re hard to find. You lose one and you’re going to spend the next year or two and tens of thousands of dollars to replace them.”

Doll did not return multiple requests for comment from Daily Chronicle, and park board officials have declined multiple requests for further details.

According to the park district’s website, Doll was hired by the district in September 2014 as the recreation superintendent. She was appointed as the park district’s executive director in May 2016.