By Sam Richards

Staff writer

Friday, March 15 (3:00 p.m.): It’s not unusual for people either within the gates or from the world outside to view Rossmoor as a city within a city, given its population, its own elected government and departmental structure much like that of a city. And all that makes Kelsey Clyma feel right at home.

“The makeup of the community is so similar to how a city runs,” said Clyma, who started her new job as Rossmoor’s senior manager of resident services in late February. “That’s my background, so that’s a very comforting feeling.”

Clyma will oversee Counseling Services, Custodial, Transportation, Fitness and Aquatics. She succeeds Kelly Berto, who left in December after 22 years at Rossmoor, the last eight months of that as Rossmoor’s first senior manager of resident services, a position newly created in 2023.

“Working in the public sector for so long, I understand there’s always room for improvement, and a need to keep up with the times,” Clyma added. “I want to make sure our services are keeping pace with what the residents want, and what the needs are.”

Clyma comes to Rossmoor from the city of Vacaville, where she had been that city’s recreation supervisor, overseeing the city’s park rangers and community centers. Before that, Clyma had worked as recreation services coordinator for the city of San Bruno. She also has similar experience in the cities of Napa and West Sacramento.

She stresses her experience with public facilities – she said she’s managed eight of them.

One thing Clyma, a Vacaville native now living in South San Francisco, hopes to make progress on soon is the process for clubs and other organizations to rent rooms within Rossmoor for meetings and other events. New room reservations have been placed on hold, largely owing to turnover both among GRF Recreation staff and among club leaders, and much remains to be sorted out.

Ann Mottola, GRF’s director of community services, said Clyma is highly skilled in technology-based process improvements. That, Mottola said, is key to the current review of the reservation management program and related processes.

“Kelsey has done similar work with two prior (employers) by addressing both technology improvement and process improvement,” said Mottola, adding that Clyma’s expertise also should help the replacement of Jenark software that manages accounting for GRF and Rossmoor’s Mutuals, and MOD operations, by integrating new NetSuite software with several other types of software used throughout Resident Services.

“She is the right person to lead this effort for Community Services,” Mottola said.

Clyma acknowledged that’s something she’s done in other places and can do again now. “We already have a network and guidelines for (facility) rentals; we want to make sure it’s easy to understand, and that should shorten wait timer for residents and for staff.”

Mottola also praised Clyma’s collaborative work style, saying she hopes Clyma can help better connect Resident Services’ various divisions and thus help improve overall service.

Beyond that, Clyma said she doesn’t come to Rossmoor with any grand mandates or plans to make substantial changes, though she does want to hear from Rossmoor residents about how she, and her charges, can better serve them.

“I’ve always been passionate about providing tools for staff to give the best service they can,” she said. “I come with a lot of experience doing that.”