His job is done now that girls have grown

After 16 years as executive director, Tim Caddell is leaving Girls Inc. Under his tenure, the mentoring agency increased its size, space and budget.

By GREG WILLIAMS

© St. Petersburg Times, published June 4, 2000

PINELLAS PARK -- The executive director of Girls Inc. of Pinellas will step down this summer after 16 years as the top administrator of the program that hopes to inspire girls.

"Part of working in the non-profit social services area is knowing when it's time to let somebody else have the fun," said Tim Caddell, who officially resigns July 7. "We can do things as long as we don't know we can't do them. Once we know we can't do them, then we stop."

Caddell, a Boca Ciega High School graduate and one-time St. Petersburg police officer, began as a volunteer 21 years ago teaching poetry at the Pinellas Park center, 7700 61st St. N. He said his job has given him a perspective on society's changing attitude about preparing girls for womanhood.

"For a long time girls' programs were overlooked," Caddell said. "The underlying feeling was that the boys were going to grow up and marry the girls and take care of them. We really didn't have to develop these programs and teach girls self-sufficiency, which really isn't true."

But old stereotypes die hard. Caddell said he recently met a man who was offended by the club's mission statement to inspire girls to be "strong, smart and bold."

"He was offended by the idea that we were teaching girls to be bold," Caddell said.

Girls Inc. began in the 1960s and serves hundreds of girls ages 5 to 17 each year, most of them from low- or low- to moderate-income families.

When Caddell took the helm of Girls Inc. the agency had one center in Pinellas Park with 48 members, eight staffers and an operating budget of $165,000.

"Girls' programs were kind of underfunded then. Boys' and men's and women's programs got more attention back then," he said.

One of Caddell's first tasks was to raise $750,000 for expansion. During his 16-year stint as executive director, Girls Inc. has grown to an annual membership of 1,100 at three centers countywide with an operating budget of nearly $1-million. The Pinellas Park center, which once had to accommodate girls for its summer program in a circus tent, has grown from 2,000 to 10,000 square feet.

Caddell said he sometimes runs into former Girls Inc. members, now women with children of their own.

"I've gotten as much out of it as I put in, to be able to watch girls grow and develop and reach their own potential and know their own importance," he said.

Caddell, who turned 50 in April, said his health and a desire for a new adventure weighed on his decision to step down.

He said he may write a book, but his immediate plans are to take a motorcycle trip to the Keys.

Caddell already has left Girls Inc. in the hands of acting executive director Alexis-Andrea Sutherland, who said she will return to her job as director of program operations when the board of directors picks Caddell's replacement.

"I wish he didn't go," Sutherland said. "He's just done so much for this community and this agency. I really hate to see him go."

Girls Inc. board president and former Pinellas Park state Rep. Mary Brennan said a new executive director could be chosen by August.

© St. Petersburg Times. All rights reserved.