After 20 years with Whidbey General Hospital, spokeswoman Trish Rose has left her position to work for Naval Hospital Oak Harbor.

In doing so, Rose is getting involved with the race for hospital commissioner.

“She’s gone back to her roots and taken a position at the Navy base hospital,” said Geri Forbes, CEO for Whidbey General.

Rose, a major general in the United States Air Force Reserves, is currently the highest ranking openly gay service member in the United States military.

Rose announced her departure on her personal Facebook page.

“I leave with a happy heart for those at WGH who continue to care for our community,” she wrote. “This is an exciting time. With the dedication of our competent and caring staff, the energy and wisdom of our new leadership, and a modern inpatient wing on the way, the future is bright.”

When contacted by the Whidbey News-Times for an interview about her new position, Rose declined.

“People move on to new jobs all the time, no big deal, but thanks for asking,” she said.

Rose did say she will be assuming a public relations role at the Naval Hospital, replacing hospital public relations person Sharon McIntyre, who retired this past summer.

“It is a position that I had been hoping would come open for some time now,” Rose said. “I’ve had the honor to support our community hospital for almost 20 years and now I have the honor to support the active duty men and women at NAS Whidbey as well as their families and our military retirees.”

Rose was attending orientation Monday at the base.

Though no longer employed at Whidbey General, Rose wrote in a post being shared on Facebook that she has one more mission to accomplish for her former employer.

“Although I’m no longer employed there, I have embarked on one last mission that I feel is of the utmost importance,” Rose wrote. “We must elect Georgia Gardner in November for the position of hospital commissioner.

“Robert Born would be an absolute disaster were he to be elected.”

Rose said she plans to share her reasoning with her Facebook friends over the coming weeks.

On Tuesday she posted a rebuttal to Born’s recent letter to the editor published in the Whidbey News-Times. In it, he criticized the hospital’s responses to his public records requests.

“During my time at WGH, Born made 39 public record requests and a great number of informational requests,” Rose posted Tuesday. “When I provided the responsive documents, if he didn’t like the answer, he would ask again in a different way, once requesting the same record on a particular subject three times, three different ways.

“The first time I spoke with Born (a phone call in 2011), I was stunned by his rudeness and aggressive behavior.”

Born could not be reached in time for press deadline.