After three years of skillful juggling with the Island County General Services Administration, Terri Arnold is moving on to greener pastures — and parks.

The GSA assistant director has donned three hats simultaneously during her tenure in Coupeville. Arnold has served as parks superintendent, county property manager and Conservation Futures program coordinator.

“When I was first hired, the job had even more to it,” she said. “I was in charge of the safety committee and defensive driving, and the motor pool.”

Working with GSA Director Betty Kemp, Arnold was able to make her duties more doable. The Greenbank resident then settled into her job, at times feeling like Sisyphus.

“It was an incredibly steep learning curve,” she said. “In fact I’m not even sure I made it through the entire learning curve. It was very, very challenging, but all the things that I was assigned were very interesting. I enjoyed that.”

Friday will be Arnold’s final day with the county, coinciding with the three-year anniversary of her employment. Although the job has been taxing, and at times frustrating, the parting will be bittersweet.

“I’ll miss my fellow employees,” she said. “This has been quite an experience.”

Arnold has accepted a director position with the South Whidbey Parks and Recreation District. She is eager to jump in and immediately help the district fine-tune its master plan.

“Probably the most delightful part of that job is going to be helping finalize that master plan and then develop a strategy for going to the voters for money,” she said. “The district is down the road quite a ways in the master plan process, but I’m coming in right at a critical point.”

While Arnold skillfully carried out her other varied duties with the county, parks and recreation has remained her true passion.

“I came up through the ranks, through grounds maintenance and horticulture, so that part I know really well,” she said. “I know about taking care of parks. I also have recreation background. It’s not as extensive as my grounds maintenance, but this will give me the opportunity to really expand, not only my recreation skills, but the recreation program there.”

Arnold said she is going into the new job armed with innovative ideas to help get the park and recreation district’s fee-based programs financially self-sustainable.

“Really it’s about getting the community to participate in those programs,” she said.

Working for the county and constant networking propelled the affable Arnold toward her new position and likely helped her secure the job.

“Having this job in Island County, through all of its assignments, I probably could not have secured that job without having made the contacts in the community and demonstrated my competencies in this job,” she said. “The connections I’ve made in the county are invaluable to my success.”

Arnold is quick to deflect personal praise and credits her minute but highly-skilled group of park technicians with the impressive amount of work they have accomplished.

“They’re an incredible group of people and I feel like if I leave any kind of imprint, it’s that we have done a lot for the parks that Island County takes care of,” she said. “We have upgraded and improved those. Morale is good. Skill level is higher than it’s ever been in those positions. I feel very proud of what we’ve accomplished.”