Candidates Night - June 16th

NOTE:  This was not a regular Town Meeting.  No public annoucement was made regarding the termination of the employement of the general manager.

Candidates Night:
Jim Hannon announced the opening of Candidates Night by introducing the members of the Nominating Committee and each of the Candidates.
            Nominating Committee members:  Jim Hannon, Jeanne Zdzvarski, & Bob Jones
            Board Candidates in order on the ballot:  Byron Efird, Katherine Denow, Rick Noffsinger, Faye Taylor, & JoAnn Rhodes

Byron Efird, Katherine Denow, Rick Noffsinger, Faye Taylor

Ballots will be mailed on July 1^st.  Please have ballots post marked or delivered to the POA office no latter than July 31^st.   Ballots will be counted 7 days prior to the Annual Meeting, which will be held in the Club House at 7:30 pm on August 20.

The Board members going off the Board are Jim Hannon, Mary Pracht, & Terry Shipp.   You have 5 candidates to choose the next 3 Board members.

Each candidate was given 5 minutes to introduce themselves.
 Please click on "Read More" to view the entire article.

Byron Efird introduced himself and his wife, Cendy.  [paraphrased]  We live at 117 Diamondhead Dr... We moved here (Diamondhead) 2 years ago, and we try to do our part for this community…. I work at Teeter Motor Company. I am the Used Car Manager for almost 10 years. I have been in business management most of my life. Starting out as an assistant manager at Andy’s Hamburgers and moving on to Western Sizzlin’, & El Chicos… A lot of my work has been in restaurant management. I was a supervisor of a chemical plant in Little Rock for 10 years. When they closed the plant down, I moved to Teeter’s Chevrolet.
I can answer anyone’s questions. My email address is: Rockarosa@yahoo.com

Anyone is welcome to contact me at any time.  I do not have any hidden agendas, what-so-ever.  I just want the best for the community and try to budget the best we can to take care of the stuff that needs to be taken care of.  You can call me or email me.  Thank you’ll.

Katherine Denow:  [paraphrased]  Most of you know me, because I have been on the board before.   I think we are making a turn-around here in Diamondhead.  I think the Beautification Committee has out done themselves this year.  I like that sign out front that says ‘We have the best golf course in the state of Arkansas’.  Are roads are finally turned around.  Our roads look great!  I had a Republican Women’s Benefit here last Saturday.  The food was stupendous and the service was great.  The ladies who had never been here before were very impressed.

We need to find out what is going on with the Marque out front.  I understand that there is a problem with teenagers.  We have 46 miles in DH to take care of…we need something for the teenagers to do.  I don’t know what, but I want to ask the teenagers and the parents because they will know.  We need a high-speed Internet, a cable company, and a bank. 

Rick Noffsinger:  [paraphrased]  Rick introduced his wife Lynn.  Lynn works for DH as the pool manager.  He let the audience know that he has placed information in the Focus and in “the Blog” (Diamondhead Committee Report), so you will know more about him. 

     Rick wants you to know him as an individual;  Born in Colorado, raised in Alaska – 13 years, moved back to Colorado where he grew up on a ranch / farm life.  Rick was fortunate to obtain scholarships for a good education and ‘happened to fall into one good job after another’.  Most of his experience has been in roads, bridges, land developments, pipe lines, etc.  Rick was in the construction field for many years.  

     “I met my soul mate, Lynn, and decided to get out of the construction field.  We moved to Arkansas to take care of my parents.  I had the opportunity to work for a company called Comact Equipment Company out of Quebec, Canada.  I have been in the saw mill industry for 15 years.  I deal with a lot of adverse conditions.  I am the sole person in my position for this company… I open and close the office.  I basically keep the connection with the South. 

    We have lived in Hot Springs for 22 years, in Diamondhead for 6 years, working on 7.  I am part of the working force of Diamondhead.  The demographics of Diamondhead has changed from a retirement community to a mixture of about 50% retired and 50% working families.   I have been involved with the Social Committee, PR committee, Standards Committee.  I am currently a member of the 4-Seasons golf group.  We try to get involved in the Community because we love it here. 

I am a fisherman and a hunter.  I have ran my own guide service.  I’ve worked for the Los Animas County Sherif’s Department, and the Rocky Mountain Search & Rescue when they needed someone they could depend on, and had a knowledge of the woods.  I would give the same dedication to DH if I am elected. 

     DH is our home and we plan to retire here.  I feel with the current situation in economics, we are going to need someone on the Board with future planning.  The increase in gas prices is going to affect our budget.  It is very important that we get some dedicated members on the Board.  Through out this meeting I hope you have some questions for me.

Faye Taylor:  [paraphrased]  Faye introduced herself as a widow for the past 20 years, living on Arlington Drive
with her 2 dogs.  I found out about DH about 13 years ago from my daughter and son-en law, Chris and Jon Hudon.  I lived in Northern Wisconsin and bought my house here almost 8 years ago.  While in Wisconsin I was part of a team who built a children’s museum.  Prior to that, in Illinois, I was the administrator of school programs.  We taught general engineering to over a thousand children a year, within a 60 mile radius of the museum.  I was asked to be a curator of an historical museum and I said ‘yes’ not realizing it would be a 24 hour a day, 7 days a week job.  But it has been wonderful.  I did a lot of marketing, grant writing, and raising private funds.  I turned around a museum that was operating on 5-6 thousand dollars a year to one that, when I retired after 10 years & remodeling the building, we still had over $250,000 in the bank.  So, it was a fun, but time consuming project.

The reason I decided to run for the DH Board.  I really think that we need a Power Point Program that we can take all around Arkansas, to anyone who will listen, to explain what a wonderful place we have in Diamondhead.  That is the way to bring more people into DH.  I also believe that we qualify for private money in the form of Grants.  I would like to see us bring ‘medical assistance’ [“I’ve fallen and I can’t get up”] to DH.  I think we will bring more retirees to our community.

JoAnn Rhodes had a previous engagement and was not able to attend Candidates Night.  The following statement was read by Jim Hannon and a copy was sent to Diane Porterfield / The Diamondhead Committee Report.

I know by this time you have listened to the other four candidates because I will be the last to talk and last on the ballot.
Hopefully, you aren't asleep yet so I will try to keep this short as possible.
My husband, Michael and I moved to Diamondhead nine years ago. We have loved our time here by being on the golf committee, joining the Lions club, and donating our time and monies to the committees when they asked. My experience in my working career has been office management and accounting. In my years with Blue Cross I have years of training to keep employees and people as happy as I could. I have been retired now for almost two years.
My main focus, on behalf of our residents, will be to strive to make this community one of the strongest it can be. I have seen in the last year, a community that is divided over several issues. These issues need to be solved as soon as possible. We need to see accountability to the residents and we need to stop the unnecessary waste of time our board has to spend on these issues.
I have seen many board members come and go. For the most part, these have been wonderful people devoting their time and energy to keep Diamondhead going through some rough years. I RESPECT THEM SO MUCH for keeping things in line so members like you and me can have this wonderful place to live and work in and be able to enjoy our hobbies right here at home.

The questions for each Candidate will follow - I need a break!

Diane Porterfield

117 Diamondhead Dr

.. We moved here (Diamondhead) 2 years ago, and we try to do our part for this community….  I work at Teeter Motor Company.  I am the Used Car Manager for almost 10 years.  I have been in business management most of my life.  Starting out as an assistant manager at Andy’s Hamburgers and moving on to Western Sizzlin’, & El Chicos… A lot of my work has been in restaurant management.  I was a supervisor of a chemical plant in Little Rock for 10 years.  When they closed the plant down, I moved to Teeter’s Chevrolet.