APA Election Season Begins With Announcement of Candidates

The slate of psychiatrists chosen to compete for APA Board of Trustees positions provides members with the opportunity to choose among experienced psychiatrists from a broad range of specialties, practice settings, and geographic areas who have made their mark in the field.

Heading the list are Frank Brown, M.D., of Stone Mountain, Ga., and Anita Everett, M.D., of Glenwood, Md., who are seeking to become the next president-elect of APA.

Brown noted that he has been involved with APA since 1989, serving on 21 committees, councils, and the Board of Trustees, including being APA treasurer, chair of the Finance and Budget Committee for four years, and chair of the Board Work Group on Real Estate. His involvement has been primarily in the areas of finance, aging, minority affairs, and telepsychiatry.

Everett indicated that she is division director of community psychiatry and faculty at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and School of Public Health. She leads health care transformation and clinical program development. She is active in APA leadership on the Board of Trustees, councils, and Assembly. She is a Maryland Psychiatric Society past president and member of the Maryland Psychiatric Foundation.

The treasurer’s position, which is for a three-year term, is also up for election this cycle. Vying for that post are Bruce Schwartz, M.D., of the Bronx, N.Y., and Linda Worley, M.D., of Fayetteville, Ark.

The Board’s trustee-at-large election is a three-way race for 2016, with Rebecca Brendel, M.D., J.D., of Boston, Geetha Jayaram, M.D., of Baltimore, and Richard Summers, M.D., of Philadelphia facing off. This position is also for a three-year term.

Two of APA’s seven geographic Areas will vote for a trustee in this cycle. In elections for Area trustee, the Area Council rather than the APA Nominating Committee chooses the candidates.

Competing in Area 3 are Steven Daviss, M.D., of Baltimore and Roger Peele, M.D., of Rockville, Md. Area 3 encompasses the district branches of New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, and the District of Columbia.

In Area 6, which includes the five district branches in California, the candidates are Robert Cabaj, M.D., of San Francisco and Melinda Young, M.D., of Lafayette, Calif.

Resident-fellow members (RFMs) will also have three of their colleagues from whom to choose as they vote for the Board position of resident-fellow member trustee-elect. The candidates are Adrian Jacques Ambrose, M.D., a resident at Dartmouth-Hitchcock in Lebanon, N.H., Uchenna Okoye, M.D., M.P.H., a resident at the UCLA Semel Institute in Los Angeles, and Matt Salmon, D.O., a resident at Maricopa Integrated Health System in Phoenix.

APA announced the slate of candidates for the 2016 election in late October, and while it is considered public, it is not official until the Board of Trustees approves it at its meeting next month. All of the winning candidates will take office at the close of the 2016 APA annual meeting in May in Atlanta.

All members for whom APA has a valid email address on file will receive an electronic ballot. Other members will receive a paper ballot along with instructions on how to vote online if they choose to do so. All candidates as well as their supporters are strongly urged to review APA’s recently updated Election Guidelines.

Voting will begin on January 4, 2016, at 5 a.m. (EST) and end on February 1, 2016, at 11:59 p.m. ■