Nominating Committee
The Committee’s charge (as defined in the bylaws) is to nominate candidates to become Officers and Trustees of the Fellowship and present the slate in the notice of the Annual Business Meeting, which takes place each May. At the same meeting, the Fellowship votes on two new Board-nominated candidates to assume the three-year terms being vacated by the longest-serving members. The Fellowship’s Past President also serves on and votes with the committee (assuming that the Past President still resides in this area).
These are the current members of the Nominating Committee
Dee Walters
Rett Paparella
Ron Gould
Kristen Mitchell (pending Congregation approval)
Beth Robison
Sue Wood
Biographies of Members of the Nominating Committee
Dee Walters
Term Expires 2008
Dee Walters grew up in a large Catholic family on a farm in rural Minnesota. After retiring from a property & casualty insurance business career, she and her husband Barry Copeland moved from Illinois to Erie, CO in 2000. They have three grown daughters and one fabulous new granddaughter.
Looking for a spiritual home was one of their first retirement goals. They consulted the Yellow Pages and decided to investigate the two Unitarian Universalist congregations in Boulder. One visit to BVUUF was all it took to get hooked on Unitarian Universalism and especially this Fellowship.
Dee has been co-chair of the Auction Committee (3 years) and an active participant on the Members & Newcomers Committee (4 years) and the Canvass Committee (2 years). In 2005 she spearheaded a project to acquire Church Windows, a database management program designed especially for churches. She was elected to the Nominating Committee in 2005 and takes very seriously this committee’s responsibility to nominate candidates for the Board of Officers and Trustees of this wonderful Fellowship.
Loretta (Rett) Paparella
Term Expires 2008
Rett Paparella was born in Brooklyn, NY, and raised as a Catholic. She became interested in Humanism and Unitarian Universalist philosophy about five years ago and has been a member of the Fellowship for the last four years. Rett is as Registered Nurse with a BS degree, and she has been working in nursing for 38 years, primarily in nephrology nursing, in which she is certified.
Although she and husband Al have lived in Broomfield, CO for the past 34 years, she notes that she “has not lost my ‘Brooklyn’ accent!” Rett is presently working part time at a dialysis outpatient clinic, and she is looking forward to retirement in 2007. Rett tells us that she “loves to read books … sing … play my guitar and piano … music all types — although I favor blues, folk, and classical — politics … cooking and baking. I ski … watch movies … and walk my dog, Eliza (a 14 years young Bearded Collie and my best friend, after my husband, Al, and our son, Luke!).” Rett is a BVUUF Singer and has been our volunteer recruiter. She also helps arrange the Adult RE film series.
Ron Gould
Term Expires 2009
Ron Gould joined the Fellowship in early 2002. He has served the congregation as Treasurer and has been a member of the Finance Committee, the Investment Committee, the Building Acquisition Committee (that resulted in our current location), and the Membership and Visitors Committee. He also has been the coordinator of the Men’s Group. Currently, Ron is on the Social Concerns Committee. He also co-chairs of the Welcoming Congregation Implementation Group and is one of the BVUUF’s representatives to the Interfaith AIDS Coalition.
Ron grew up in Paonia and Grand Junction, CO, and attended college in Wooster, OH, and graduate school at CU-Boulder in the 1960s, where he earned an MSEE. Professionally, Ron was most recently the Associate Director for Administration at the Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Laboratory. He retired from Stanford in early 1998. Ron and his wife, Jennifer, arrived in Boulder County in time for the BVUUF’s 2001-2002 New Year’s Eve party at Jane White’s. They joined the BVUUF shortly thereafter and are both exceptionally happy (spiritually and otherwise) in this Fellowship.
Kristen Mitchell (pending Congregation Approval – see Announcement of Congregational Meeting
Term Expires 2009
Kristen was born and raised near Ann Arbor, Michigan. After a relatively secular childhood, she discovered the Unitarian Universalist faith while in veterinary school at Michigan State University. She says:
“Feeling stressed and isolated during a grueling academic program, I took the advice of a long-time friend and visited the UU Church of Greater Lansing, where I soon felt a strong kinship. As I moved around in the coming years, I visited UU churches wherever I happened to be on any given Sunday.
When I relocated to Colorado in 2005 due to my husband’s career, I soon started attending the First Unitarian Society of Denver near Capitol Hill. Although I loved this church, the commute became diffi cult when my husband and I bought our first home in Erie and I began working as a small animal veterinarian in Brighton. That’s when I started attending the BVUUF, and I soon felt at home in this congregation.
I’ve enjoyed participating in the Adult RE Film Series, a Small Group Ministry, Circle Suppers, and Second Friday Discussions. The timing was right to form a Young Adults Group at the Fellowship, and I’ve made many close friends in this group. I’ve also found great pleasure in joining UUs from our Fellowship to prepare and serve meals at the Boulder Shelter for the Homeless. The Fellowship has become an important part of my life, being a source of close friends and also always reminding me to slow down, appreciate all of the blessings in my life, and take the time to leave my small mark on the world, hopefully making it a better place in some small way.”
Beth Robison
Term Expires 2010
Beth Robison has been a member of the Fellowship since 1999. She came to UU’ism at the UU Church of Little Rock where she and her family were members from 1994-1997.
Beth is serving as Chair of the BVUUF Children and Youth Religious Education (CYRE) Committee.
Beth grew up in Bartlesville, OK. She has a degree in Music Education from the University of Northern Colorado and is a violist with the Fort Collins Symphony Orchestra. She has played with many regional orchestras over the years and served as personnel manager for the Arkansas Symphony Orchestra.
She taught public school orchestra in Pine Bluff, AK and has also taught private Suzuki string instruction.
Beth lives in Longmont and is studying broadcast captioning/court reporting, as well as raising her 3 children — Kate, Will, and Ben — with her husband, Rusty.
Sue Wood
Term Expires 2010
Sue Wood joined the Fellowship in September 2000 as part of her healing, spiritual journey after cancer treatment.
She joined the choir and is now Chair of the Music Committee — a major joy in her life. Other activities seem to involve food. Sue can often be found making coffee on Sunday mornings and has been a member of many Auction sub-committees with food service or bake sale responsibilities. She co-chaired the farewell celebration for Catharine Harris, co-chaired food service for 8 visiting UU choirs who performed a concert at the Fellowship three years ago, and is currently co-chairing the committee to produce the first-ever Fellowship Cookbook. In addition, Sue serves food at the homeless shelter each year.
Sue was raised a Methodist, and with her family joined the Boulder UU Church in 1971. With 2 children in RE, she organized and taught the pre-school classes for 2 years. In her pre-retirement years, Sue taught and chaired the RN program at Arapahoe Community College in Littleton, followed by part-time employment with the Colorado Board of Nursing where she reviewed all the Certified Nursing Assistant programs in the state.
Grandmothering two 3-and-a-half-year-old girls is a current passion.