NCR board elects new chair

National Catholic Reporter, Nov 28, 2003

The board of directors of the National Catholic Reporter has elected Patrick J. Waide Jr. as its chair, succeeding Joan F. Neal.

Waide, 66, a certified public accountant, was associated with Deloitte Haskins & Sells and its predecessor firms for 28 years and then became chief financial officer of the Bessemer Group of companies. He subsequently served as president and CEO of the Peter F. Drucker Foundation for Nonprofit Management. He is an alumnus of Fairfield University and the Wharton Graduate School.

In addition to his leadership responsibilities at NCR, he also is president of the advisory board for the Jeanne Jugan Residence for the Aged Poor of the Little Sisters of the Poor in New York, treasurer and trustee of the American Federation for Aging Research, trustee of the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation and a director of Mutual of America Institutional Funds.

Neal joined the NCR board in 1998. She was elected chair two years later. A Chicago native, she was associate director of Leadership Greater Chicago, a Chicago-based civic education organization, and president of J. F. Neal & Associates, Inc., a management consulting firm. She is currently the deputy executive director of U.S. operations for Catholic Relief Services.

Speaking on behalf of the NCR board, Waide expressed gratitude for Neal's valuable contributions to the company during her three years as board chair.

During Neal's term as chair, NCR took a number of steps to widen its coverage. The newsweekly opened Rome and Washington bureaus and began extensive health care coverage. The company also entered aggressively into electronic publishing, initiating an electronic version of NCR (ncronline.org).

As his first act as chair, Waide appointed board member Mercy Sr. Theresa Kane to head a newly formed NCR committee to consider board governance matters.