By Morgan Pilz, Staff Writer

Photo courtesy John Viola and the Board of Directors. This updated organizational chart displays the new responsibilities of each department.

(May 2, 2019) Ocean Pines interim General Manager John Viola announced Friday that he and the OPA board of directors have disbanded the transition management team put in place following the departure of General Manager John Bailey in February.

The group, comprised of the board of directors and Viola, was created to assist in overseeing the management of the community as the board looked to fill the leadership position.

“Because there was no general manager in place, the board put this temporary management team into place to work with the department heads to help Ocean Pines,” Viola said. “When they filled the position with me on the temporary basis, we decided to leave the temporary management team in place until I could evaluate further on what was needed.”

For roughly a month after taking on the responsibilities as interim general manager, Viola appointed Recreation Director Colby Phillips operations manager and oversaw the advisory committees. Finance Director Steve Phillips continued to oversee the business side of the association.

That combination worked well enough quickly enough to prompt Viola to recommend the team’s dissolution.

“I spoke to Doug Parks and the board, made a recommendation and the board agreed to disband the transition management team because we had a lot of success over the last month and we felt that it was not needed,” Viola said. There was a lot of participation, a lot of communication on the way I handled the advisory teams and other meetings.”

President Doug Parks released a statement on Friday to make the end of the management team official.

“With John Viola in the role of interim general manager for the past several weeks, he and his team have done an extremely effective job in managing the operations of OPA,” Parks said in the release. “Given the current conditions and based on John’s recommendation that the transition management team is no longer required, the transition management team will be officially disbanded as of Friday, April 26. We congratulate John and the OPA staff for their efforts during this time and look forward to their continued success in the daily management of the Association.”

Viola also has released an updated organizational chart that shows the structure of the association and the relationships, functions and relative ranks of its departments. The chart has been reviewed and approved by Viola, Finance Director Steve Phillips and Operations Director Colby Phillips.

The chart can be viewed at www.oceanpines.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/Ocean_Pines_Association_Organizational_Chart_2019.pdf.