JPA to discuss options in a closed-door meeting with legal counsel
By Miriam Raftery
Photo, left: Dr. Michael Hager, President, Friends of the Water Conservation Garden, and Lauren Magnuson, Interim Director of the Garden
January 30, 2024 (El Cajon) – Friends of the Water Conservation Garden and the garden’s new interim director, Lauren Magnuson, made impassioned pleas at a January 23 meeting, asking the Joint Powers Authority (JPA) to allocate additional funds through June to help alleviate a financial crisis.
The Water Conservation Garden is celebrating its 25th anniversary this year. Magnuson. said, “We supported the community during the pandemic. Now we are hoping that the community will support us.”
The Garden has over $1 million in financial obligations, including large loans taken out during the pandemic and some smaller grant funds slated to be returned. Questions have been raised by the JPA over years of inaccurate record-keeping practices and borrowing by Friends to cover the Garden’s operating expenses, among other concerns.
“The Garden has significantly cut our monthly budget by more than half,” Magnuson told ECM in an interview earlier this month. “We unfortunately had to furlough a good portion of our staff and lean on current staff to absorb those furloughed positions.” She has pledged full transparency and open communication with staff and volunteers, scrambling to pull together financial records and options to help the garden grow and thrive in the future—though the task is daunting.
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