Lee B. Thomas Jr. helped found the ACLU of Kentucky and marched with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. in Louisville; he died yesterday, according to The Courier-Journal. Thomas and his wife established the Joan and Lee Thomas Foundation; with $19 million in assets, it ranks among the biggest in the city.
Theresa Reno-Weber comes to the United Way’s Louisville area affiliate from Mayor Greg Fischer‘s officer, where her broad portfolio included a 200-person staff responsible for strategy, human resources, IT and other functions. She’s been Fischer’s Chief of Performance and Technology since 2012.
Her appointment as president and CEO is effective Jan. 1, United Way said in a press release today.
Reno-Weber is replacing Joe Tolan, who is retiring in December after 30 years, including the last 15 as chief executive. She was picked by a succession planning committee of current and former members of the board of directors.
Before the mayor’s office, Reno-Weber was a senior consultant for management advisory giant McKinsey & Co. from 2008-2012, according to her LinkedIn profile. She graduated from the Coast Guard Academy in 2000 with a bachelor’s in public policy and international relations. After working six years for the Coast Guard, she earned a master’s in public policy and international security at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government in 2008.
Metro United Way’s budget was $26.6 million in the year ended April 30, 2015, vs. $28.1 million in the prior fiscal year, according to the most recent IRS tax return posted on its website. It had 94 employees, and reported $26.7 million in contributions for the period vs. $27.4 million in the prior fiscal year. Here’s its GuideStar page with previous IRS returns and other information.
The chapter didn’t disclose Reno-Weber’s compensation; we’ve asked for that information, and will update this post if we hear back. Tolan was paid $229,200 in salary plus $50,714 in other benefits in fiscal 2014, according to the IRS return. The other highest-paid employees were Gilbert Betz, chief strategic officer, $131,939 salary and $34,021 in benefits; and CFO Phillip Bond, $123,843 and $67,095. Here’s the staff roster.
United Way focuses on helping kids and families with basic needs such as childcare and after-school activities in seven counties Kentucky and southern Indiana counties: Jefferson, Bullitt, Oldham, Shelby, Clark, Floyd and Harrison. Here’s the list of agencies it funds; read more in its annual report.
The selection committee’s members were board chair Jane C. Morreau; James Abruzzo, J. Barry Barker, Joseph Brown, Mary Gwynne Dougherty, Chris Hermann (chair elect), Mark Kristy, Tim Sanders (UAW and Central Labor Council), Justin M. Suer, and Vincent T. Walker. Here’s the current board of directors.
A news summary, focused on 10 big employers; updated 9:43 a.m.
KFC‘s latest publicity stunt — fried chicken-scented sunscreen — zigged in the U.S. from People magazine, then zagged to the U.K.’s Marie Claire, rolling up untold millions of dollars in free PR over the past 48 hours since its brief Monday launch. And it all involved just 3,000 bottles of a fake product never meant to get into consumer’s hands, according to trade site DigiDay.
Google News counted nearly 100 websites mentioning KFC Extra Crispy Sunscreen. Huffington Post’s story had 3,100 shares. The retro promotional infomercial video got nearly 280,000 views since it was posted on YouTube. And it won 11,000 mentions on social media, said Brandwatch analyst Kellan Terry.
The campaign was by the W+K agency in Portland, Ore., and followed the same formula W+K used for another client: Old Spice. “Its irreverent and unconventional,” Terry said, “and people love to laugh and watch the ad as it unfolds. These types of spots are tailored for multiple platform success.” And it paired perfectly with fake Colonel Harland “Extra Crispy” Sanders, played by actor-turned-pro tanner George Hamilton (photo, top).
The sunblock gimmick followed KFC’s two edible nail varnishes — flavored Original and Hot and Spicy — released in Hong Kong back in May.
TACO BELL is once more in the very unwelcome spotlight after reports employees refused to serve law enforcement officers. The latest incident, involving five Louisville Metro Police officers, comes amid a summer of rising tensions between police and the public.
The one in Louisville happened last week at the Taco Bell at Preston Highway and Phillips Lane, when the officers were taking a work break from duty at the Kentucky State Fair. One employee told co-workers he wouldn’t take the officers’ order, though another worker did eventually take the order, according to Sgt. Dave Mutchler, president of the River City FOP union representing officers.
“However, in the meantime,” Mutchler wrote in an e-mail, “another employee stated to a co-worker ‘I want to mess with them. I want to mess with them. I’m going to mess with them. I’m going to mess with them.'” Seeing no manager, the officers left.
Both Taco Bell and the Louisville franchise owner apologized to Louisville Metro Police and directly to the officers. The franchise owner says police made it clear they didn’t want any of the employees fired, and said he would retrain staff (Courier-Journal and WKYT).
The incident echoed one last month in Phenix City, Ala., where a Taco Bell clerk wouldn’t serve two sheriff’s deputies after another customer complained about the officers being there. The employee was fired and the chain apologized to the deputies and to the sheriff’s office. But there have been others involving cops:
UPS: In Richmond, Va., the shipper says it plans to lay off 160 workers from its UPS Freight unit there within the next 12 months in a cost-cutting move. News reports didn’t give a total headcount there, however (Times-Dispatch).
For some 40 years, producers of liquor, wine and beer have been helped by the notion, enshrined in the dietary advice of a number of governments, that a little alcohol can provide modest coronary and other health benefits. But now, according to a new Wall Street Journal story today, that advice is shifting rapidly, as health-policy officials around the world scrutinize previous advice amid new research pointing to possible cancer risks.
“The change is pressuring the alcohol industry in some of its biggest markets, including the U.S., the U.K. and Russia,” the front-page story says. “Its response is as expensive and sprawling as the threat it perceives, including attacking anti-alcohol advocates’ research and working with governments to formulate policy. Alcohol companies are also funding their own research, including a plan by four companies to contribute tens of millions dollars toward the cost of a rigorous study.”
In Louisville, Brown-Forman could be swept up in the shifting regulatory tides. The nearly 150-year-old companies sells its flagship Jack Daniel’s and nearly 20 other brands in about 160 nations around the globe.
A review of its regulatory filings shows the company has grown increasingly concerned about changes in public views about alcohol consumption, including moderate drinking. In its 2015 annual report to the Securities and Exchange Commission, for example, it added a new passage to the business risks section that highlighted the possibility of “significant additional labeling or warning” requirements.
“Our products already raise health and safety concerns for some regulators,” the company warned investors, “and heightened requirements could be imposed. If additional or more severe requirements of this type become applicable to one or more of our major products under current or future health, environmental, or other laws or regulations, they could inhibit sales of such products.”
But Brown-Forman’s rising concerns date to at least 2012, when it flagged the possible consequences of any new health research that could lead to heightened government scrutiny and controls. Its risk warning in that year’s report said: “If future research indicated more widespread serious health risks associated with alcohol consumption, and particularly with moderate consumption, or if for any reason the social acceptability of beverage alcohol were to decline significantly, sales of our products could decrease materially. Our sales could also suffer if governments banned or restricted advertising or promotional activities, limited hours or places of sale or consumption, or took other actions that discouraged alcohol purchase or consumption.”
That advisory appears to have been prudent, given the shifting views on moderate consumption disclosed in today’s Wall Street Journal.
Photo, inset: Brown-Forman added the BenRiach brand when it bought the BenRiach Distillery Co. in June for $405 million; it just launched 15 new whiskies. In photo, top: the company’s Sonoma-Cutrer wines.
The Muhammad Ali Center said today it would honor leaders from the worlds of philanthropy, entertainment, and business at the fourth annual Muhammad Ali Humanitarian Awards, Sept. 17 in Louisville.
This year’s will be the first since the Louisville native, prize fighter and globally famous humanitarian Muhammad Ali died, in June in Phoenix, after a decades-long battle against Parkinson’s disease. He was buried a week later at Cave Hill Cemetery during a funeral that drew luminaries from government, politics and entertainment across the world.
He and his wife Lonnie co-founded the Ali Center, which opened in November 2005, and attended each of the previous year’s Muhammad Ali Humanitarian Awards. She will speak at this year’s ceremony, and present several of the awards. The honorees:
Here are the detailed biographies of the honorees provided by the Ali Center: Continue reading “Ali Center to salute McCain, Gossett, three others at annual awards ceremony”
A news summary focused on 10 big employers; updated at 8:24 a.m.
PAPA JOHN’S: The owner of three Papa John’s restaurants in New York City has agreed to pay $500,000 in back wages to more than 200 workers under a deal with state Attorney General Eric Schneiderman and the U.S. Labor Department; it’s the eighth case brought against Papa John’s franchisees by the state’s top law enforcer in the past two years. In addition to paying $500,000, franchisee Sultan Ali Lakhani must add procedures to handle employee complaints, post a statement of employees’ rights, and designate a compliance officer to submit quarterly reports to Schneiderman’s office (New York Daily News).
KINDRED is closing another hospital in Houston, the second such closing the Louisville-based hospital and nursing giant has announced there this month as it consolidates operations in the city. The Kindred Holcombe facility near Texas Medical Center will shutter in October and all 204 jobs will be eliminated; local news accounts did not say how many beds the hospital has. With the earlier planned closing of 37-bed Kindred Hospital Baytown, the company will still operate nine hospitals in the Houston area (Houston Chronicle).
Boulevard 