Just as a reminder, tangential to the current case
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It isn’t uncommon for some management types to start their tenure by “firing” everyone nonessential and “rehiring” selectively – make everyone re-apply for the job – and that can include paid employees as well as volunteers.(I’ve seen that happen to friends who are teachers, for example.)
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It is not uncommon to let volunteers go if you really think they’re unneeded.
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It is quite possible, and sometimes absolutely necessary, to “fire” a volunteer who isn’t being productive or who is pulling in a different direction than the organization has decided to go.
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And, yeah, sometimes the new manglement simply doesn’t understand how much of the institution’s knowledge base is between the ears of the volunteers… though arguably that’s a failure of the past manglement, which should have been trying to get them to write it all down for training new staff.
Again, I’m NOT saying any of these apply to this particular case. I’m just saying that the fact that a volunteer has been there for a long time, even if they’re an expert in the topic, is not a guarantee that the volunteer position will continue to exist or that they won’t have to re-justify why they’re the right person to hold it.
