Meet the community members lending their expertise to the Herald-Leader Editorial Board
As we all know, the COVID-19 pandemic pushed us even more firmly into the physical and philosophical bubbles that we inhabit. Journalists and opinion writers are no different. We need help reaching beyond our bubbles to find out the most important issues and events that are shaping Kentucky, from different geographical, political and philosophical viewpoints.
To that end, the Lexington Herald-Leader Editorial Board is excited to announce the creation of the Community Advisory Board. Three unpaid volunteers will meet with us every other week to talk about what’s happening in their worlds and to tell us about the issues and information they think we need to know as we shape editorials and columns.
The first group of volunteers is a stellar one:
Penny Christian is well-known to Lexington education circles as the most recent president of the 16th District PTA. Christian, originally from New Orleans, first got involved in education when the first of her four daughters entered school and she saw how hard she had to fight to get them enrolled in top classes and programs. She’s served on nearly every board and committee there is in Fayette County, and is also a 2020 graduate of the 2020 Commonwealth Institute for Parent Leadership Fellow, as well as a member of the Prichard Committee for Academic Excellence. She was recently selected to the inaugural cohort of The Education Trust Family Fellowship.
Alan Keck is the mayor of Somerset and a lifelong resident of south-central Kentucky. He is a 2003 graduate of Somerset High School, a 2007 graduate of Western Kentucky University, and a 2014 MBA graduate of the University of the Cumberlands. He is the founder and Principal Agent of Keck Sports Management, a professional baseball agency that represents professional athletes. He serves as a deacon at First Baptist Church, and has been talked about as a rising political star in statewide Republican circles.
Victor Palomino is the station manager for RADIOLEX, also known as Lexington Community Radio, the Spanish/English community radio and media company that tries to amplify underrepresented voices in the Bluegrass. Palomino moved to Kentucky from Asheville, N.C., where he helped to start the first-ever Spanish-segment radio in the state at Mountain Area Information Network (MAIN 103.5). He is also a community advocate and organizer, and an artist and performing musician.
We are extremely grateful that these extremely busy individuals would take time to share their insights. (Part of the draw was the short, six-month board stint, so we will soon be looking for a new set of members. Contact lblackford@herald-leader if you’re interested in serving.)
We hope over time that this board will represent an even broader set of viewpoints, including location, age, race and ethnicity, gender, religious beliefs, occupation and ideological points of views that will be reflected in our Opinion pages. We are excited to get started.
This story was originally published June 3, 2021 at 1:53 PM.
