The chairman of the stables committee that recommended keeping the stables open used many choice words to describe his feelings about how the Fairfield Glade Community Club Board of Directors responded to the panel’s work.
They were sharp, and they cut deep.
“It’s hard to remember another time in my life when I felt this used, abandoned, taken advantage of, betrayed, ignored and disrespected,” Mark Richie, chairman, said at a committee meeting Nov. 19 at The Center.
“We on this committee volunteered for this work in good faith, and good faith has not been returned to us,” he said.
He was referring to the board’s decision in September to close the stables when the community club’s lease with the operators expires Dec. 31. John and Michelle Cannon have run the amenity along Westchester Dr. under the business name of Wildwood Stables since 2006. They are retiring.
Richie also said the board “so far” has failed “to make good on its expressed desire to meet with this committee and explain their reasoning.”
“I say ‘so far’ because hope springs eternal.”
The board created the committee in March and charged it with proposing a plan or presenting options for the equestrian center’s future. After several months of work, the committee recommended that it remain open, contending it could be a viable amenity.
The board instead decided to close the stables and referred the property to the community club’s Strategic Planning Committee for other development.
Some committee members alleged that the board had no intention of continuing the operation despite President Greg Jones saying otherwise when he announced last December the board would form the advisory committee to help chart the stables’ future.
After the board’s decision, however, Jones said the more the board looked into the finances “the more it didn’t make sense” to keep the stables open because of the costs of needed repairs and improvements and because it served relatively few members of the community and visitors.
John Cannon told the Glade Sun that Wildwood Stables made a profit every year he and his wife operated it.
There was much frustration and resentment expressed during the meeting attended by an audience of 31 people who crowded into the small classroom to show their support for the stables.
“I feel like we’ve been played, we’ve been manipulated, we’ve been misled,” said committee member Patty Vilhaur.
She said the board listed “grossly over-inflated” expenses the community club would incur if it were to take over running the stables. She noted, for example, the board indicated a need for a 40-50-horsepower tractor at a cost of $125,000. She reported that a John Deere dealer in Crossville quoted a price of $48,000 for a more powerful 60-hp tractor.
Vilhaur said the committee had “problems” with nearly all of the expenses the board listed for the stables into 2028. She said the board gave “crazy numbers” to the community.
Jones had previously acknowledged to the Glade Sun there were errors in the spreadsheets for some individual expenses, but he said the total amounts were correct.
Committee member Jennifer Smith said the board never instructed the committee to determine expenses for the stables and did not ask it to review the board’s listed expenses or recommend ways to reduce costs to make the stables more financially attractive.
Another committee member, Deonne Martinez, said it was “strange” the board did not ask the committee to present financials. She said she had headed corporate projects with her accounting background during her professional career and “never was I told not to worry about the bottom line.”
Concerning her time on the committee, she said, “We didn’t know we were playing a game.”
Jones, reached by the Glade Sun, said he would not comment on the committee’s meeting because he was not there to hear the discussion for himself.
Richie pointed out that the board’s liaison to the committee, Treasurer Bruce Horn, did not attend the meeting. Although Horn was not required to be there, Richie said his absence was “incredibly insulting.”
Horn was in another room at The Center attending a daylong board meeting during the time of the committee’s meeting. He told the Glade Sun he could not attend the committee’s meeting because the board’s was previously planned.
Richie told the newspaper he was unaware he had scheduled a meeting concurrent to the board’s meeting.
Richie said the committee had no further action to take other than to “lick our wounds” because it completed its assignment in making its recommendation to the board. He said he expected the board to dissolve the committee in December.
Gerry Miller, an avid supporter of the amenity who was in the audience, said although “the stables is probably a lost cause,” it was high time for more civic engagement among Gladers. He said he had long been waiting for an issue that “excites” the community.
“This may be the one to do it,” he said. “It’s time we rise up.”