This month we are spotlighting an employee who has been with the SRDA for over 36 years – our Executive Secretary, Virginia Patterson. Through the many changes of SRDA over the years - bosses, locations, coworkers have all come and gone but our one constant has been Virginia.
She started with SRDA after moving to Colorado from Wyoming and trying her hand at a few other types of positions – she worked for a Pueblo funeral home for a short time but didn’t care for it. Virginia attended Midwest Business College and earned her Associates degree after working for the State of Wyoming in the Oil & Gas Commissions office. To show her lifelong sense of responsibility, she accepted a job as a teenager in a nursing home, where she enjoyed helping residents with their daily routines. Her much older coworkers would often ask her why someone her age would want to work there. She had her favorite clients while working at the nursing home and that attitude stuck with her. Now she enjoys working with our senior community. She likes the daily interaction and answering their questions when they call for help. She remembers one time hearing a coworker tell a new employee being shown around the building that “Virginia knows everything!” Well, with her humble nature she doesn’t necessarily agree with that statement but does accept that she has learned many things over the past 3 ½ decades.
In fact, back in the “old days” she had to convince Steve & Gene to purchase a computer to make her job easier. She is very proud to say that her computer knowledge is self-taught and never took computer classes (this was in the days before Google made it easy for everyone to know everything). She says that she likes to play the Wheel of Fortune game on her home computer. She spends time with her husband of 46 years, Ken and her 14-year-old deaf and blind rescue dog, Bob. She also has a 39-year-old son that is the apple of her life, no grandkids yet, but she is still hoping.
Virginia says she thinks that this is a great place to work. Everyone is friendly, not much drama and the organization’s Board of Directors and executive staff go out of their way to provide a lot of help for the employees. As the assistant to Executive Director, she thinks he is an easy boss to work for and goes out of his way to extend a helping hand. She considers him a friend.
We are accepting volunteer drivers to deliver meals to homebound older adults. Through meal delivery, our drivers serve as a friendly face to our often socially isolated homebound clients. All drivers are background checked and reimbursed for mileage costs.
To find out more about our nutrition programs, call 719-543-0100. 