The end of 2024 and the beginning of the new year brought significant events for the South Coastal Village Volunteers. At its December 3 meeting, the Steering Committee honored the outgoing chair, Chris Powers, and the former chair, Ron Kerchner, thanking them for their leadership of the organization. Both Powers and Kerchner were founding members of SCVV and were instrumental in getting the village operational. Kerchner served as chair of the Steering Committee from the inception of SCVV in 2020 until January 2023, when Powers, who had been serving as vice chair, took over that position.
The two were presented with commemorative gavels by the incoming chair, Claudia Thayne, who thanked them for their dedication and efforts. “You are the heart and soul of our village. Without your leadership, we would not be where we are today,” said Thayne. The committee celebrated with a cake to recognize the honorees. Both Kerchner and Powers will continue as members of the SCVV Steering Committee, which is responsible for the day-to-day tasks of operating the organization.
SCVV’s annual meeting was held on January 7, 2025, by Zoom because of the weather, with new leadership taking the positions of chair and vice chair. Chair Claudia Thayne, who has been active with SCVV since 2020, served as vice chair for most of 2024. In that role, Claudia was involved in all aspects of SCVV’s operations, working closely with the Village Volunteers. She has served as the designer of the quarterly SCVV newsletter since 2021 and has been involved in the design and production of all the Village’s documents. Claudia has also worked with SCVV members, performing a variety of services. “I’m honored to take over the leadership of this wonderful organization,” said Thayne. “It will be hard to fill the shoes of Ron and Chris, but I hope to follow their example and help to continue to make our organization grow.”
Donald Sheridan, who joined the Steering Committee at the beginning of 2024, has taken over as vice chair. Sheridan, who settled in Ocean View in 2022 with his wife, Kathy, became active as a volunteer for the South Coastal Village Volunteers to get involved with his new community. “In retirement, we wanted to make friends here and give back to the community,” Don notes. “SCVV appealed to both me and Kathy.” Not only did he provide member services, Don also used his computer expertise to immediately become an indispensable part of the office staff. He is now working on improving the computer system that SCVV uses for service requests. Don’s experience with data has made it possible for SCVV to compile valuable statistics to track our progress and plan for the future.
As the South Coastal Village Volunteers begins its fifth year of operations in the Bethany Beach area and its fourth year of providing services to members, we are grateful to our initial leaders Ron Kerchner and Chris Powers and now to Claudia Thayne and Donald Sheridan. Their willingness to offer new leadership will allow our village to continue to be a valuable asset to the community.
