Executive director at The Museum Broken Arrow abruptly resigns

By John Dobberstein, Editor

After only spending a couple of months on the job, The Museum Broken Arrow’s executive director has resigned.

Janna Rogers, an independent scholar and researcher who founded the Oklahoma Native American Network Cross-Cultural Forums, confirmed Thursday she resigned several weeks into the job. She declined to comment further on the decision.

Rogers was hired by the museum’s Board of Directors after a national search for an executive director earlier this year. It’s the third executive director to step down at the museum in the last 3 years. After Julie Brown’s exit in 2022 after serving in the job for several years, Teresa Tucker took over in 2023 but did not continue in that role.

Betty Gerber has been appointed to serve her third stint as interim director of the museum. Gerber said she served as the original executive director when permanent exhibits were added on the museum’s second floor. Gerber said she is serving as a volunteer.

“If it helps the museum, I am available. Our operations are continuing right on track,”

Gerber said, noting that 66 third graders visited the museum earlier in the week for a tour.

In February, announcing Rogers’ hiring, the museum board said Rogers pulled from a wealth of experience and directors felt “fortunate to have Rogers come aboard” due to her “education, experience and especially her enthusiasm.”

Only a couple of months into Rogers’ tenure it appeared there were already tensions between Rogers and at least some of the museum’s Board of Directors. This was reflected in an April 3 email obtained by the Broken Arrow Sentinel from Gary Gerber, president of the Board of Directors, to Rogers.

“I am again directly ordering you to attend a meeting at the museum today April 3 11:00 AM. This is a meeting set up after unanimous approval by the Board of Directors,” Gerber wrote. “If you refuse to attend this meeting at the appointed time, your continued employment at the museum is in jeopardy starting immediately.”

In a reply, Rogers referred Gerber to an email she sent to him the previous evening, apparently stating she had conflicts.

“My inability to attend the impromptu meeting is certainly not a refusal. I am unable to attend due to ongoing and scheduled commitments to the daily operations of the museum including an event that has been planned for fundraising for over a month,” Rogers wrote. “Please feel free to use my office to host your meeting and please send me an agenda and the names of those who you say are attending. I am unable to communicate with them via email to notify them of my current commitments.”

Rogers then asks Gerber to reschedule the meeting for the following week Wednesday. “I look forward to hearing from you and attending the meeting next week so that I have time to receive the agenda, meet participants, and can plan accordingly.”

It’s not clear if the meeting occurred or when Rogers — who said she no longer lives in Oklahoma and has nothing to do with the museum any longer — tendered her resignation.

Gary Gerber, who has played a prominent role in helping the museum grow to its current state, declined to comment on Rogers’ resignation, citing advice from the museum’s legal counsel to not comment on personnel issues.

Broken Arrow At-Large City Councilor Johnnie Parks, who is also a museum board member, acknowledged that Rogers had resigned but declined to comment further.

The museum’s board has also seen a lot of turnover in recent years. There has been tension between the city, which owns the museum building, and the museum and Broken Arrow Historical Society that has lingered into this year. The city strongly pushed to have a city representative on the museum board, which was met with vehement resistance initially.  

In March, Rogers and Gary Gerber, as well as education coordinator Allie Cloud and Judith Jaeger presented an update on its activities and programs to the Broken Arrow City Council. Rogers told city officials that admissions had nearly tripled in February from January’s figures through community outreach efforts and the work of staff.

Rogers said the history museum would be collaborating with the Sherwin Miller Museum of Jewish Art in Tulsa on a collaborative installation of Broken Arrow and Oklahoma pioneers and settlers. 

Cloud said she would be creating programing for Broken Arrow schools, developing walking tours of the Rose District, and hopefully develop tours around Broken Arrow in other historical locations.

Parks said the museum board currently had “great people working together, spending many hours with a project they appreciate and are devoted to, maintaining the history of our city.”

Parks also touched on the museum board’s recent troubled relations with the city. Parks said that during a museum board meeting in February, one of the directors said because the museum was a non-profit, nobody could tell the board what to do.

Rogers told the City Council she did not recall hearing that statement,  but that didn’t mean it wasn’t said.

Rogers said the apparent statement “was not the ethos or ideology of the museum. In fact, behind closed doors, the long history of a cloud hovering over the relationship between the museum and the city, and the importance of moving beyond this cloud, was discussed.”

It was not clear Friday if the museum planned to immediately search for a new permanent executive director. The board’s next scheduled meeting is May 21.