Eldon Ralph, the general manager of Greenbelt Homes, Inc., (GHI), will retire at the end of July with over 26 years of service to Greenbelt Homes – 11 years in his current position, almost 16 years on the GHI staff and after a career of more than 30 years in engineering and facilities management. James Claggett Jr., who has been selected as the new general manager, will start on July 10.
“We all have a part in the governance of GHI,” Ralph told the News Review. Alongside GHI’s board of directors and staff, he led GHI’s $24.5 million Homes Improvement Program, asbestos remediation efforts and the cooperative’s negotiation of a Neighborhood Conservation Overlay Zone with the City of Greenbelt and the Prince George’s County government.
As a cooperative, GHI blends characteristics of self-government and private enterprise.
Ralph moved from a private company to managing a community that residents collectively own. Before joining GHI’s staff in 1997, Ralph worked for the maintenance management firm ServiceMaster as director of physical plant operations on the company’s account with D.C. public schools. Born in Guyana, he emigrated to the U.S. from Britain in 1988.
For Ralph, succeeding in his work has been rooted in service and attentiveness to the needs of staff and GHI members alike. “You’ve got to serve the customers really well,” he said. “And that’s not only the external customers, but your internal customers as well.” Ralph said that staff, as internal customers, are key to meeting the needs of members as external customers. “You have got to get the best out of your employees in order to serve the external customers really, really well.”
Ralph advocated for staff, said Joseph Perry, Jr., GHI’s director of finance. “If there were any concerns by staff, he would raise them to the board so they were fully aware,” Perry said. “Transparency is an excellent word to describe Eldon.”
Ralph said he has led by empathy in his interactions with members and the board of directors.
“You’ve always got to realize, ‘Okay, let me put myself in their shoes to see whether it is they have a point,’” Ralph said. “In 90 percent of the time since I’ve been here, I think they have a point. They’ve got a good point, and you have to hear them.”
GHI President Stefan Brodd counted Ralph’s leadership of GHI through the Covid-19 pandemic and multiple staff transitions among his greatest achievements. Brodd and Perry commented on Ralph’s commitment to GHI’s strategic planning process. Every summer, the board of directors and interested members meet with the guidance of an external facilitator to set a 12-month action plan and longer-term goals.
“That strategic plan, which is a very detailed document,” Brodd said, “really turns into a set of assignments that the board is asking our staff to complete within those given timeframes.”
GHI’s cooperative ethos has opened opportunities for GHI to contribute to national energy-efficient building efforts and, alongside the City of Greenbelt, preserve the New Deal characteristics of Old Greenbelt.
GHI’s Homes Improvement Program upgraded GHI homes’ energy efficiency by replacing windows, entry doors and baseboard heaters in almost all of the 1,600 units between 2016 and 2021. Prior to the rollout, with support from the U.S. Department of Energy, GHI partnered with the National Association of Home Builders Research Center on a multi-year pilot program assessing the performance of proposed improvements in 28 of the cooperative’s brick, frame and cinderblock homes.
After years of negotiations between the city, GHI and the Prince George’s County Council, a Neighborhood Conservation Overlay Zone limiting residential density will take effect in April.
What’s Next?
Ralph said that he will help ensure a “smooth and seamless transition” to his successor. What will he do then? “For the first three months?” Ralph said, “Sleep.” Then, he plans to invest time in hobbies, spend time with his grandchildren and work with volunteer organizations.
Ralph emphasized that GHI’s achievements resulted from teamwork. “The great sports organizations, they’re sound all the way through, and I think it’s the same with GHI,” Ralph said. “What I mean is this: my success that I’ve had here, if things have happened during the time that I’ve been here, they cannot solely be attributed to me. The board takes credit and so do all the employees who I have worked with.”
Perry said Ralph is “extremely, extremely dedicated to doing his absolute best.” Brodd described Ralph’s “flawless integrity.”
“He’s an extraordinary person,” Brodd said. “We’re really going to miss him.”