“The job description was almost literally the same thing I did in Blue Ash, and there are more hours in the day to complete my tasks here,” she said of moving from a part-time to full-time position.
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Theilman is the second Blue Ash parks employee to be hired by Fairfield. Fairfield Parks and Recreation Director Tiphanie Howard, who headed Blue Ash’s recreation, golf and event operations, started in September. But when she saw that Theilman was one of the 72 applicants for the job, she made sure her team was more involved in the selection.
“I didn’t want it to appear that because I did have that personal experience that I was hand-picking her. It was an overwhelming decision for the whole team to take Brittany on as our newest team member,” Howard said. “I kept hearing over and over again that Brittany is what we need for this position.”
Howard said she was looking for a person with “well-rounded experience” to fill the community events coordinator position.
Fairfield has a reputation of employees working for the city for several years, and many have been in the parks department for a decade or longer. That’s inspiring for Theilman, she said.
“Whenever I hear others say, ‘I’ve been here for 30 years,’ … That’s the number I want to get up to,” she said.
Theilman started March 4 and has worked the upcoming summer concert series, including creating contracts and new sponsorship packages, but she won’t make any changes until she first sees how they operate.
“I’m basically trying to run as it has in the past, and see it with my own eyes,” she said. Then she’ll assess what features need to be added, like food trucks, or if aspects need to be altered.
And any changes would come only after research, something Theilman said she did while working for Blue Ash.
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“I did a lot of research there from surrounding communities, to see what people are doing,” she said.
That research likely would include expanding the city’s demographic reach to attract young professionals to the concert series and events.
“That’s one of my goals, to promote toward the young professionals in the area to come hang out at our summer concerts,” she said.
Though she’s been tasked with bringing in more young professionals to city events, she will work to appeal to all demographics by working to bring in different genre bands — from big band and folk to dance party bands and bands that perform original songs.
While it’s been about three years since the previous community events coordinator left the city, Theilman said she believes it’s a benefit to herself the job has been vacant.
“I can come in and create my own way, and my different expectations,” she said.
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