The doors were wide open on the sixth floor of the First National Bank building in Hermitage Tuesday evening as the staff and board members of the county's domestic violence agency welcomed their new executive director.

Lizette Olsen of Sharon, who moved back to her hometown recently from Baltimore, will take over the reigns of AW/ARE Inc. She replaces the Rev. Larry Haynes of Hermitage, who stepped in as interim executive director in September.

"This event is the culmination of the phoenix rising out of the ashes," said board President Ray Slovesko of Hermitage, referring to internal problems the crisis agency had last year. In August most of the staffers walked off their jobs, complaining of problems with management, and board members were accused by some of trying to hide a meeting by telling the public they would convene in one place while they actually met behind closed doors at the bank building in Hermitage.

"Things happen for a reason," Slovesko said.

Ms. Olsen, a founding member of the agency in the mid-'70s, agreed, saying, "It's my karma."

The wheel of fate began to turn last summer when Ms. Olsen was visiting her mother and saw AW/ARE's problems story begin to unfold in the newspaper.

"I wasn't accustomed to seeing AW/ARE above the flap on the front page of The Herald," she said with a laugh.

Friends in the area urged her to get involved as the search for a new executive director began in earnest in November.

She applied for the post, knowing her three-year commitment as vice president of Education and Training of Planned Parenthood of Maryland would be coming to a close in February.

Ms. Olsen said she remembers that AW/ARE was "similarly challenged" when she served on its board for a year in the early '80s.

"My view of the needed services in the county is that they weren't able to flourish," she said. "Maybe part of what I was supposed to do (during her time away) was develop the skills, the tolerance and the patience to serve the agency now."

She lauded the staff for having the strength and determination to keep things going during AW/ARE's recent turmoil.

"The people who needed services didn't know about boards, funding, etc. What they wanted to know was: 'Is someone going to answer the phone when I need them?' " Ms. Olsen said. "The staff just clung to that."

She said she plans to engage the public more with communitywide programs aimed at reducing domestic violence. Also on the horizon is a name change to better reflect how the agency serves the needs of everyone in the county, she said.

"The bottom line is, initially the community is going to sit back and watch and see what we do," Ms. Olsen said. "But violence issues impact all races, all genders, all ethnicities. It impacts everybody in the community."

"We need to promote a healthy-values concept of individuals. AW/ARE is a reflection of our community. We want to continue to build on what we've created so far," she said.

Also Tuesday night, new board members Dick Steinlechner and Harriet Guido, both of Hermitage, Joyce Blanke of Brookfield, and Susan Franklin of Greenville, joined current board members Slovesko, Marcia L. Gregory of Farrell and Jane Csonka, Kim Landfried, Erla Maxwell, all of Greenville. Haynes will eventually join the board to help oversee the transition to a new director.

Haynes, who also directs the Sharon-based Shenango Valley Foundation, called the changes provident, and agency supervisor and assistant executive director Candace Blake agreed.

"If you have something you believe in strongly enough and you're convicted and it's a good thing, then it will happen, it will really happen," Ms. Blake said.

For more information about getting involved with AW/ARE, call (724) 662-1870.

You can e-mail Herald Staff Writer Sherris Moreira-Byers at

sbyers@sharon-herald.com