INUVIK
The Inuvik Community Greenhouse is one "growing concern" and its new executive director wants to make sure it stays that way.

Raygan Solotki is the new executive director of the Inuvik Community Greenhouse. - Shawn Giilck/NNSL photo

Raygan Solotki was hired as the greenhouse's first full-time executive director about two weeks ago and has been on the run since, learning the ropes of her new position.

Solotki, who had just been elected as a member of the board of directors, has only been in town for about three months.

Since being hired as the executive director, she's left that position on the board, as well as her job at Tonimoes Restaurant in the MacKenzie Hotel.

"That was a great experience for me," she said.

"It gave me a chance to meet a lot of people in town."

She left her job as a corporate recruiter in Ontario and came here seeking some adventure and fresh experiences, Solotki said. She said she has found both here.

A chance meeting with one of the owners of Tonimoes in Toronto 18 months ago led to an invitation to eagerly head north.

"It was just a random series of events that led to me waitressing here, which everyone thought was crazy," Solotki said.

"I gave up my corporate job to come be a waitress."

She said her husband wasn't originally in favour of the idea, reminding her that they had made other moves looking to improve their prospects that hadn't worked out.

That wanderlust isn't new for her, since she's previously lived in Japan as well, learning the language in the process.

"He said, 'Let's slow down and look at it.' Two days later he said let's do it. This is the real Canadian adventure, so let's go there for what it has to offer, not just for a job."

Solotki has a bit of a background in horticulture, although she's never really worked in the field before.

"I took college courses in horticulture while studying in an environmental technology program for two years," she said.

"As part of that, we had to get a decent yield out of a plot.

"I've worked in community plots and tried to have my own gardens when I lived in the Okanagan and Japan," Solotki added.

"I'm not really that good at growing things, though."

That's just as well, since she sees her job as a "paper-pusher" more so than as a gardening guru.

"If you look at this job and my resume, it's almost perfect for me," Solotki said.

"It's almost like it's written for me."

"For the last 10 years, I've had a series of different administrative roles," she continued.

"For this job, you have to be the administrative assistant, the marketer. It's everything I've done for the last 10 years, and I've been building these skills. When I found the job, I knew it would be a dream job, and ta-da."

Solotki said the job "would be a lot of work."

The greenhouse has "been run by a lot of volunteers for 17 years, and a great committee of volunteers, who have done some great work.

"My job is to alleviate a lot of that stress on the committee and the co-ordinator, and to get a roof on this building."

Her major challenge so far is hiring staff, learning more about the greenhouse, and acquainting herself with the new partnership between the greenhouse and the Department of Industry, Tourism and Investment.

She's on a one-year contract, after which the position will be evaluated to see if it's been beneficial enough to continue.

Solotki is already confident that will be the case, and said she will spend some of her time over the next year proving that and finding more funding for the facility.

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