Museum curator, special forces vet board opponents

Candidates for the MHCC District board Zone 2 seat are James Zordich and Ron Weisdorfer, competing in the May 21 special election. The winner’s four-year term will begin in June.

 

James Zordich 

 

James Zordich wears a badge with the words “Vote” and his information on his chest every day and welcomes the public to strike up a conversation.

He also passes out business cards to those he speaks with so that they remember his name.

“It’s my belief, first and foremost, that when you apply for a position like this, you should have some background with regard to the nature of the institution that you want to join and serve,” Zordich said.

His wife, Garie, is an MHCC administrative assistant with 17 years at the school, during which he has been regularly involved with the campus as a volunteer. Before meeting with The Advocate, he was posting signs on classrooms for teachers absent that day.

“I know too much about this institution,” Zordich joked. He has experience with four MHCC presidents, numerous administrators and a broad collage of students.

“I do feel after all the years of interaction with this college community, I really do want to contribute to the furtherment (sic) and the betterment of this institution,” he said.

He said he hopes to put an end to the “perpetual tuition increase cycle,” and make MHCC affordable while providing an excellent experience.

“Number one, I’m going to be looking at programs from a cost-effective point of view,” he said.

As an example, he cites the parking program that was initiated and scuttled within one year: “It’s issues like that I want focus on. More importantly, I want to try to prevent what I call ‘frivolous expenditures’ in the future.”

Zordich has attended all board sessions and budget sessions this year, as well as the college presidential presentations. “I think I’m quite familiar with what’s going on. I’m also quite familiar with what’s going on with the budget,” he said.

“Anyone who comes into this responsibility needs to be fully grounded and have a fully comprehensive understanding of the institution,” he said. If not, “you’re not going to make fundamentally sound decisions,” he said.

He believes the 2013-14 college budget will not be settled by June and instead will carry into July under the watch of several new MHCC board members. “That is a significant responsibility and one that I think a perspective board member has to be fully prepared for,” he said.

During 30 years as a museum curator at the Los Angeles County Museum of Natural History, Zordich conducted personnel searches, dealt with budget matters, and more. He ran two years ago for an at-large MHCC board position and applied for the at-large seat that member Paul Capell now holds. “If I’m not successful this time, I would have given it three valid tries,” he said.

“I look at this opportunity very seriously and I believe if I’m elected that it will present a great deal of work to understand and further the goals of this institution.”

 

Ron Weisdorfer 

 

Ron Weisdorfer has chosen to go from jumping out of airplanes with the U.S. Army Special Forces to jumping onto the district board.

“I spent 40 years in a classroom, I spent 29 years in the Army learning a bit about leadership, and it was just time to pay back,” the retired middle school teacher said, explaining his motives.

This is Weisdorfer’s first run for public office. “I am not a politician. I will not become one… Don’t expect me to go out and knock on people’s doors or shake babies’ hands. I won’t do that,” he said.

When the MHCC faculty senate that endorsed him offered to set up a phone bank, he instead suggested his teaching colleagues call their friends and family directly.

“I’m kind of a newbie at this game. I don’t know all the questions, yet alone all the answers,” he said.

If elected, he plans to use his experience negotiating contracts for Oregon City schoolteachers to eliminate the “unnecessary contention,” he said. “We’ve got to do something about that.”

When talking to MHCC faculty members, Weisdorfer found they seek someone on the board available for them to talk with. To which he responds, “Well, I’ve got time.”

He also hopes to ensure academic credits are transferable to all Oregon universities, at the least, and to generate more local engagement.

“We need to involve high schools more in community college work,” he said. He plans to press administrators to see if the college can open up communication and get students more involved with the college.

Weisdorfer taught primarily middle-school classes in Oregon City from 1976 until he retired last year. He also taught driver’s education at Clackamas Community College.

He led graduate and post-graduate classes for the Army and spent seven years as an adjunct faculty member reading graduate papers for Kansas State University.

He enlisted in the Army in 1969. He volunteered for the officer program and decided he liked the training, so he volunteered for Special Forces.

“It was an interesting 29 years,” he said. “They paid me to jump out of airplanes. What a deal!”

Weisdorfer remembers when MHCC was just beginning, he said.

He listened when his friend, MHCC auto instructor Jerry Lyons, urged him to run for the board this year.

“It seemed like a good idea, based on, again, ‘I’ve had all this experience with education, Uncle Sam spent God-knows-how-much money making me a leader: Why not give a little back?’ ”