Carol Cole returning as chamber executive

The former longtime executive director of the Springfield Chamber of Commerce is returning to Vermont to resume her old job.

http://www.rutlandherald.com/article/20110325/NEWS02/703259877

Published March 25, 2011 in the Rutland Herald

Cole returning to Springfield as chamber executive

By SUSAN SMALLHEER

SPRINGFIELD — The former longtime executive director of the Springfield Chamber of Commerce is returning to Vermont to resume her old job.

Carol Cole, who served the chamber for 13 years from 1985 to 1998, has been living and working in Kentucky and she said Thursday she was terribly homesick for her hometown.

Cole was packing and getting ready to show her home in downtown Lexington, Ky., Thursday. She said she expected to leave Kentucky next week, move her belongings to Springfield, and start her new-old job on April 4.

Cole said she had moved to Lexington more than three years ago to be closer to her daughter and her family. She said she had been working for the dean of the School of Agriculture at the University of Kentucky.

“My heart’s been yearning to go back home and I had put the word out that if somebody was looking for someone,” said Cole, who worked as a real estate agent before moving to Kentucky.

She said Lexington was a beautiful city with a lot to offer, but it wasn’t Vermont.

“I’m a Vermonter at heart, I miss home and I miss being involved and feeling like you’re accomplishing something,” she said, adding that working in academia had been a big change.

“I feel I can contribute,” she said.

Cole said she left the chamber in 1998 in large part because of the death of her younger brother, whom she had raised.

“I probably should have just taken a leave of absence,” she said. “There were days after I left I wished I hadn’t. I enjoyed the work and the diversity of the business community.”

Cole said that the business leaders in Springfield are “a unique group of people who have phenomenal ideas.”

Lexington is in full flower of spring right now, she said, with cherry trees in full bloom. Lexington had a record 27 inches of snow this winter, she said, making her even more homesick.

She said she knows there’s still plenty of snow in Vermont, but she said she has hopes by the time she gets back to Springfield the weather might have eased up.

“I’m dreading mud season,” she said.

Cole will be replacing Patty Chaffee, whose contract was not renewed by the chamber in January.

Jeffrey Matulonis, chairman of the chamber’s board, declined to talk about Chaffee’s nonrenewal other to say that the board of directors was concerned about declining membership.

“There are some challenges, but I’m not sure what they are going to be,” said Cole.

She said her first assignment back in Springfield would be to meet with board members individually, and then start meeting with members individually.

“I think it’s important to have a good public face on the chamber to be positive and professional. The chamber’s there to work,” she said.