For 80 years, Rowe Camp and Conference Center has been an intimate country “home” for thousands of young campers and conferees, with its rustic cabins full of laughter, the ancient stone chapel quiet in meditation, the woods and fields inspiring in their natural beauty. Mother Nature displays her wondrous ways beautifully here, but She also takes a toll on our buildings and grounds. The effects of northeast winters together with age and use by a few hundred teenagers each year is hard on our buildings. Repairs and restorations need to be made in a timely fashion, so our valuable experiences can continue.
One of the challenges of our recent growth has been to care for, maintain, and provide stewardship for the resources we have, while at the same time building and growing. The goal of the Stewardship Project is to ensure that all our buildings are in good repair and that we continue to enhance our property. We must increase our maintenance budget and staff so we can care properly for our buildings and grounds. Over the next five years, all buildings will get needed improvements, and a schedule will be developed to continue an optimum level of care.
In order to meet these goals, we created a new Stewardship Committee. Long-time work week volunteer Guy Thompson, has just joined the board and has agreed to chair the committee. Guy developed a maintenance database that will keep track of all the maintenance needs and work done on each building. In addition, it will provide us with reports that will streamline the process for creating work lists. With Guy on board and willing to take the leadership, this project is moving forward.
Several volunteers were recruited to become ombudspersons for a building. The first committee meeting was in October, 2005. Each volunteer agreed to the following plan:
Assessment Phase:
1. Complete a full assessment on the building, using the assessment tool provided.
2. Make a list of the things in need of repair.
3. Make a list of routine maintenance that needs to be done for the building and when it should be done each year.
Committee Phase:
1. Attend the Annual Fall Stewardship meeting where the group will make recommendations for how the year’s capital funds will be used.
Work Week Phase:
1. Provide a list of maintenance repairs that could be done during work week to the facilities department three weeks before work week
2. If possible, attend work week and enlist help in getting the maintenance repairs done.
Annually:
1. Update inventory and work lists.
2. Attend Stewardship weekend.
We believe that keeping track of all of the buildings at Rowe and also being the maintenance person is way too much work for one person. We believe that having a group of knowledgeable and dedicated people keeping a watchful eye on one piece of the puzzle will move us forward on our goal to get all of the buildings and grounds up to good repair in the next 5 years.
While Rowe has grown extensively over the last decade, the maintenance department has not. A gift to the Stewardship Project will help to finance a new maintenance position, so that all the work being identified by the committee can be completed.
Our goal this year is to raise $20,000 to fund this position. Won’t you help?
You can donate online by using the online donation form, by calling us at 413-339-4954 or by mail to us at Rowe Camp and Conference Center, Kings Highway Road, PO Box 273, Rowe, MA 01367.