New Selby Gardens CEO sees room to grow

New Marie Selby Botanical Gardens CEO Jennifer Rominiecki is still more than a month away from her official start date, but she’ll be stepping into the role with ambitious goals in mind.

“The Selby Gardens is an extraordinary organization here in Sarasota already, but I think that the organization can be taken to the next level,” Rominiecki said. “I’m excited to bring my experience to this organization and to advance it.”

Selby’s Board of Trustees selected Rominiecki as its next CEO last week, and announced the hire Monday. She’ll be replacing Thomas Buchter, who served as the head of the botanical gardens since 2009 before announcing his retirement earlier this year.

Rominiecki will bring big-city experience to Selby Gardens. She has spent 15 years with the New York Botanical Gardens, most recently as the vice president for institutional advancement and special assistant to the president. There, she helped oversee a roughly $70 million annual budget and plan a rotating series of exhibitions at the garden. She also spearheaded an ongoing seven-year campaign to raise $479 million for the organization.

She’s slated to begin at Selby Feb. 9, and said she’ll begin by listening to staff about the current state of the gardens.

“My first step is to learn from them exactly how the organization currently operates,” Rominiecki said.

For Cathy Layton, chairwoman of the Selby Board of Trustees, Rominiecki was a dream come true — someone with significant experience in a variety of areas of botanical garden administration. Like Rominiecki, she believes the organization is poised to take a big step forward, and she thinks Rominiecki’s hire better equips Selby to take that step.

“She had the type of visionary experience that is the perfect skill set for Selby Gardens going forward,” Layton said.

She said the board would be working closely with Rominiecki over the next year to help finalize a master plan for Selby’s future. As the institution prepares to celebrate its 40th year beginning in July, Layton said those closely tied to the gardens know there’s still room for improvement.

“There’s something innate that says there can be more there,” Layton said. “There isn’t a sense of complacency or the feeling we’re as good as we’re going to get.”

Already, Rominiecki has some ideas about potential areas for improvement. She said botanical gardens are trending toward becoming museums for plants, and that Selby is set up to become more of a museum experience. She believes Selby could benefit from more special exhibitions and events, giving residents more incentive to make repeat visits each year.

“You don’t want someone to go to Selby and to say, ‘It’s gorgeous, but I’ve been there,’” Rominiecki said. “We need to create experiences to have people come back all the time. I think the organization is prime for that.”

A native New Yorker, Rominiecki had never been to the west coast of Florida before the job opportunity arose. Still, she took quickly to the Sarasota area, praising its passion for culture.

“My whole background is in cultural institutions; to find a place that has such a focus on that was really exciting to me,” Rominiecki said. “I would like to help Selby be an even greater leader in this community.”