LION Publishers elects officers, thanks departing directors

At the 2015 LION Summit, the Board of Directors re-elected officers and thanked three founding directors for their service. The slate was approved by members at the annual meeting.

The current Board of Local Independent Online News Publishers is:

• Dylan Smith, Chairman, TucsonSentinel.com
• Charlotte Anne Lucas, Secretary (chair, Membership Committee), NowcastSA.org
• Doug Hardy, Treasurer, CTNewsJunkie.com
• Jay Allred, Richland Source
• Steve Beatty, TheLensNOLA.org
• Scott Brodbeck (chair, Member Benefits Committee), ARLnow.com
• Kelly Gilfillan, BrentwoodHomePage.com
• Suzanne McBride, AustinTalks.org
• Traven Rice, The Lo-Down
• Brian Wheeler, Charlottesville Tomorrow

At meetings held during the conference, I and C-A and Scott were re-elected, having reached the end of our three-year terms as founding members of the Board. The three officers of the organization — chairman (me), secretary (C-A) and treasurer (Doug) — were re-elected to those posts.

The slate was presented to the membership at the annual meeting, held Friday, Oct. 2, and met with unanimous approval.

It's with great thanks, along with some sadness and pride, that we thanked three of our original directors for their service to LION Publishers. Ned Berke (SheepsheadBites.com), Howard Owens (theBatavian.com) and Jesus Sanchez (theEastsiderLA.com) were with us from the beginning, and played huge roles in founding and growing our group. In a big way, it's their responsibility we banded together to help make local news a better, more sustainable, more effective proposition. All three served out their initial terms, and each contributed so much.

We'll always be indebted to them, but we should also recognize that it's a sign that we're a healthy organization when we have great new directors who want to share their ideas and energy by serving on the Board. 

Every time we have new directors, they add to our capabilities. Having recently added Jay, Traven and Brian to our leadership has already paid off in the skills and commitment they brought to making our 2015 conference such a success.