Former Board member profile: Sarah Matala

—by Anne Holzman

[Sarah served on the board through 2009]

In her work as an affordable housing consultant, Sarah Matala examines buildings and figures out what needs to be done to prepare them for their new use. She works with an architect and a contractor to develop a “work scope.” Then she and her team determine how to finance the project.

She also loves the dried fruits and nuts and enjoys stocking shelves and being part of the community at Hampden Park Co-op.

What a happy coincidence, then, that just as she applied for a spot on the board of directors, HPC was expanding and getting set to buy the building it has rented for many years. She agreed to fill out the term of a departing member, which expires in November 2009.

Sarah Pearson grew up in Pasadena, California, the daughter of two Midwesterners who encouraged her to return to the region for college. At Gustavus Adolphus, she met Brad Matala, her future husband and a Minnesotan. She graduated in 1994, then served a year in Lutheran Volunteer Corps, placed at Second Harvest in Maplewood. During that year she got acquainted with HPC.

She continued as an active, volunteering HPC member for the next few years while employed first by a Twin Cities food bank network and then as the community organizer for the Lexington- Hamline District Council in St. Paul. “I had always wanted to do community organizing,” she said. “It’s quite fun to have that as part of my history.”

But Brad had established himself in Northfield, where he ran a music performance venue and related ventures. Sarah moved to be with him, and they married in 2000. She said she drifted away from volunteering at HPC because “it wasn’t quite pm the way" any more.

In 2006, the pair traded the music nightlife for the more predictable hours of running a studio. They bought a house in Southeast Como and set up Essential Sessions at 1583 Hamline Ave., below Coffee Grounds café. Sarah’s employer, J.L. Pope Associates, worked out of a University Avenue office in Prospect Park, placing HPC in her path once again. She got herself re-trained for volunteer shifts and was soon stocking shelves with employee and board member Matt Hass. It wasn’t long before he began talking to her about joining the board.

She had already applied for the imminent board opening, she said, when she heard that the building was up for sale. “I was excited,” she said. She recalls having recommended, in the application process, “position the co-op for expansion”—not having any idea how quickly that might be happening.

She joined the finance committee and met weekly with them for much of the summer and fall, as well as twice monthly with the full board. As the annual meeting approached, she sounded a bit weary but still game to find financing for the building’s purchase. The worldwide financial crisis was making shopping for credit more difficult than usual, she said. For the co-op, “it could not be happening at a worse time.” Nevertheless, she had another meeting that week with a banker who, she hoped, might have a workable offer.

Matala said she’s been advocating separation of the co-op’s property ownership from its store operation, a distinction she sees often in her work and thinks might help HPC run more smoothly. But she said she hasn’t heard of models for such a separation among co-op grocery stores.

She has another suggestion, which is that the board begin to draw more members who are not board members onto its various committees. The structure allows for this, she said, but the co-op isn’t taking full advantage of folks who might be willing to serve on a committee without taking on full board responsibility.

Matala said she might run for re-election to the board next year. Either way, she hopes to continue applying her real estate expertise to the long-term care of the building, assuming the purchase goes through.

And in any case, she’ll always be happy with the occasional shift stocking shelves. “Something about that systematic bringing-things-forward is really soothing,” she said.

Anne Holzman is a freelance writer and HPC member. She is grateful for the hours that so many have dedicated to planning the co-op’s expansion.