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Jane Sessler
Written by Greg Hankins, Editor   
Thursday, 04 February 2010
    Jane Sessler is a doctor of dentistry who managed her own practice for 26 years, taught at the Columbia School of Dental and Oral Surgery, and currently works with FirstHealth's Children's Dental Centers.
Image    From the Sports Club to CERT, Sessler has been very involved with the various volunteer organizations that make Seven Lakes West tick. And now, she told The Times, it might be time to “get with the big kids.”
    “There’s a lot of work in this community that needs to be done by volunteers,” Sessler said, “and I think it’s important for me to step up to work. I have some ideas, I have the enthusiasm, and I certainly have some time right now . . . I have done a lot of behind the scenes work. . . and I am absolutely amazed at what people do around here, and I want to be more of a part of that.”
    “There was a need for Board candidates, and I had some people come to me and I said say ‘Would you run?’ and I said “No!” And eventually I said, ‘Well, maybe I do have something to offer.’’”
    Sessler described volunteerism as the heart and soul of the community. “There’s a need, and all of these people come out of the woodwork. That spirit of volunteerism has to continue. We have to reach out to some different folk to get them to do that. I’d like to widen the net a little bit.”
    
Community Priorities
    Asked what three or four big things the Board needs to be working on, Sessler told The Times those were “some of the things the Board is already working on” — for example, evaluating the quality of the community’s infrastructure.
    Alluding to Infrastructure Director John Goodmans’ recent discovery that many of the corrugated steel pipes that carry water under Longleaf Drive have rusted through and could ultimately threaten the integrity of the roadway, Sessler said, “John Goodman is looking under things and finding all these nasty things and he’s got to be the bad guy and come and tell us all those things. Mary Anne Fewkes and her crew had to come and tell us that the dam was leaking.  . . . and everybody was angry, because they had to take action.Those are the kind of things I am so used to doing: telling people they’ve got a problem.”
    Hearkening back to her dental practice, Sessler added “The most awful thing to have to tell a patient is ‘You have a problem,” and they don’t have any clue that they had a problem.”
    “We don’t want this community to have pain,” Sessler said, “We don’t want something to cave in, we don’t want something to be completely destroyed, so that we are stuck building it tomorrow — we can’t have the time to plan, we can’t have the time to send out bids, it’s an emergency. We do not want that to happen.”
    The Board has a plan for dealing with the need for road repaving — and it should, Sessler said. “Roads are coming up — maybe not tomorrow — but if we don’t plan to do it it won’t get done. My experience: If I don’t plan for something, it’s not going to happen.”
    Another challenge on the horizon is the competition for homebuyers posed by new, nearby subdivisions in the works — and the impact of that competition on property values.
    “You’re going to have so many new communities in this area,” Sessler told The Times, “that are going to be bigger, better, newer, probably better planned. If we don’t keep our side clean, neat, and attractive, it’s not going to be anything that anybody is going to want to move into. Yes we have a lake, and they won’t, but we really have to protect that lake.
    
Role on the Board
    Asked which of the various positions on the Board best suited her talents, Sessler said, “I think I’m not equipped to do the Treasurers’ position, I am not going to kid anyone and say that I am. I would probably like to get involved with the Secretary position and the communications part of that.”
    Sessler said there has been talk of creating a volunteer coordinating position on the Board. “I would love to get that organized and coordinated and reach out to different groups of volunteers for different projects. Some of them would be recreational, some of them could be working on other things with the men and women who are heading up the major committees — making it more public so that people understand that they can come on board. That’s one of the things that I could see.”
    “There are always things that come up at those meetings that they need someone to take,” Sessler added, “and, if I’m equipped to do that, I’ll step up . . . My expertise is coordination, communication, sending out information.”
    
Budget and Dues
    “I think the dues increase is necessary,” Sessler told The Times, when asked whether she supported SLWLA’s proposed budget and dues increase.
    “I think if you look at what it should have been anyway, if it had been on that steady five percent all these years, it would  be exactly where it is. In fact, it would have been a little bit more. You’re talking about all those years of Boards whose hands were tied behind their backs. They really couldn’t have increases until there was parity among all the groups.”
    “Yes it hurts to say it has to be a lump sum right now, but that’s it.”
    
Recruiting candidates?
    Asked why the Westside Board has such a hard time scaring up prospective Board members, Sessler said the tenor of community debate can be a problem.
    “It does become a bit of a lynch mob mentality when hard decisions have to be made,” she told The Times. “I was very happy being behind the scenes doing things, getting to know the community, and lending a hand. It’s very hard to put your name and your face out there. People get angry and they start to take it out on Board members.”
    “Nobody wants to have an adversarial situation with their neighbors. That’s a problem.”
    “There are so many extremely intelligent and talented people on both sides of each issue,” Sessler added. “Instead of coming to the Board with a complaint, it would so much nicer of them to come with a suggestion and an idea and the willingness to join in on a committee to get there . . . That would be a nice way to do things.”
    
Other thoughts
    Asked what other issues or concerns she had about Seven Lakes West, Sessler mentioned boat safety, the need to involve younger residents, and implementing the long range plan.
    On boat safety, Sessler told The Times, “there are a lot of people who just don’t want to acknowledge the rules. And again, they have to remember that It’s their neighbors and friends patrolling and asking them to cooperate. Because it’s our lake, our responsibility, our liability if something happens.”
    Noting the growing number of young families making their home on the West Side, Sessler, a younger retiree, said it would be nice to find a way to reach out to those families, and, despite their busy schedules, offer them a greater opportunity to become involved in the life and governance of the community.
    “I would like to be able to see that Long Range Planning committee’s work be used,” Sessler said,” but we haven’t been able to use any of it because we have just been trying to patch things. We need to implement it.”
    “We have to build that into the board’s work. The LRP has been out there for years, and years, and years coming up with this great idea, but if we don’t give them the opportunity to implement that, then this community is never going to get anywhere. We need to be able to take a five-year range of their work and put it into the Board’s work.”
 
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