Our Board of Directors

Meet the Board of Directors

2010 Directors:

Lee Miller, Director

Retired Biology Professor and Editor

Lee grew up in Illinois, where he worked in factories as a Time Study Engineer, and subsequently managed a retail jewelry business. At age 29 he returned to school to earn an MF at Yale University and a PhD at Duke University. Starting in 1966 he taught and did research in plant ecology and plant physiology at Cornell. From 1978 until his retirement in 1996 he was both Editor-in-Chief and Managing Editor of international scientific publications for the Ecological Society of America. While serving as an officer of the Council of Biology Editors, he developed education programs for new editors, and created a web site for the organization.

In Ithaca, Lee served on the Board of Trustees of the Tompkins County Public Library from 1998-2006, and was president of that board for two years. Lee joined the board of Better Housing in December 2006. He was one of three “producers” for a play-reading group at Lifelong in 2009.

In addition to volunteer work, his passions are music, art, foreign travel and languages. Lee and his wife Sylvia have traveled independently on every continent except Australia.

Julee Johnson, Chair

Manager, Historic Urban Plans, Inc.

Julee served as Executive Director of the Southern Hills Preservation Corporation, a non-profit affordable housing organization in Tully, NY for almost 20 years (until 2005), which offered programs similar to those at Better Housing – first time home buyer grants and counseling, home repair and rehabilitation grants, and constructing and managing subsidized apartments for senior citizens.

Since October of 2005, Julee has managed the catalog and internet-based business Historic Urban Plans, Inc., which sells reproductions of antique world maps and city plans (www.historicurbanplans.com). When not busy filling orders, she attends trade shows and produces new catalogs and other marketing material for the business.

Julee received her M.A. in Historic Preservation Planning from Cornell University in 1985 and B.A. in Social Ecology from the University of California, Irvine in 1981.

Carol DiSanto, Secretary

GRI, CRB, Carol DiSanto Real Estate & Appraisals

2007 President- New York State Society of Real Estate Appraisers

Jon Minikes, Treasurer

Investor

After receiving his law degree from Cornell in 1962, Jon was a practicing attorney specializing in international law and real estate. From 1968 to 1972, he was Vice President of Uris Buildings Corporation, investment builders. Jon later served as Managing Director of Jones Lang Wootton, where he specialized in real estate investments in the United States on behalf of Europeans and Far Eastern institutions, and most recently served as President and CEO of Milstein Brothers Realty Investors, a real estate investment and consulting firm. Jon moved to Ithaca in 2002, where he’s served as a member of the Cornell University Council and assisted students of the Program in Real Estate.

Karen Allen, Ex-Officio

Program Manager, Intertek

Tristram Coffin, Director

CEO, Alternatives Federal Credit Union

Tristram Coffin is the Chief Executive Officer of Alternatives Federal Credit Union, a Community Development Financial Institution (CDFI) in Ithaca, New York. Before coming to Alternatives in 2007, he had served for more than five years as the CEO of a credit union subsidiary (CUSO), offering mortgage loans, investment services and lower cost payday loan alternatives in thirty credit unions throughout the Pacific Northwest. In that role he also helped form a new CDFI for low income people in Eastern Washington, served as Regional Director of a national broker-dealer offering investments in over 300 financial institutions, and was selected as one of the “40 Under 40” outstanding business leaders in the Seattle metropolitan area. Prior to that, he spent five years as CEO of CUSERVE, a subsidiary of Hudson Valley Federal Credit Union, during which time the organization was recognized nationally as the CUSO of the Year.

Tristram currently serves on the Board of the CDFI Coalition, and is a member of the State of New York’s Small Business Task Force. He is Chairman of the Board of Directors of BALANCE, a consumer credit and financial counseling service. Locally, Tristram serves on the Board of organizations that provide free meals and housing assistance.

Anthony Hopson, Director

Asst. Vice President for Community & Government Relations, Ithaca College

Prior to coming to Ithaca College in 2009, Anthony was the associate dean on the Worcester campus of the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences. Hopson had previously served at the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences as associate and assistant dean of students, as assistant dean of students at Clark University, and as assistant director of minority affairs/outreach programs at Worcester Polytechnic Institute. He holds a bachelor’s degree in general studies and a master’s degree in higher education administration from the University of Connecticut.

Bruce John, Director Emeritus

Retired

Suzanne Motheral, Director

Outreach Worker, Tompkins County Office for the Aging

Before joining the Office for the Aging in 2008, Suzanne was a mediator and facilitator for the Community Dispute Resolution Center in Ithaca from 2003-2007. Prior to that time, she was Director of the Fellows Program in Public Affairs at the Coro Center for Civic Leadership in Pittsburgh. Suzanne has a B.A. from Pennsylvania State University and M.A. from the Goddard-Cambridge Graduate Program.

Ro Rukavena, Director

Realtor, Warren Real Estate

2010 President-Elect, Ithaca Board of Realtors

Rosemary (Ro) Rukavena is an Associate Broker and Accredited Buyer Representative at Warren Real Estate. Prior to her real estate career, she was the Business and HR Manager for EMF Corporation in Ithaca. Ro has served on the Board of Director’s of Better Housing for Tompkins County since January 2008.

Ro is currently the 2010 President Elect for the Ithaca Board of Realtors and for the last 8 years has served on numerous committees.

Ro is a 1980 SUNY graduate and has lived with her husband Peter in Ellis Hollow since 1997. Ro spends her free time working in her greenhouse, gardening, making wine with her husband, baking and playing with her two rescued dogs.

Ro is a huge advocate of Better Housing for Tompkins County and supports their mission and vision for the future.

Ken Schlather, Director

Executive Director, Cornell Cooperative Extension of Tompkins County

Ken served in the Peace Corp for 8 years in Asia before attending graduate school at Cornell. He did research in Central America, studying soil science, receiving his Ph.D in 1998. Ken has been the Executive Director of Tompkins County Cooperative Extension since 2003.

Gary Stewart, Director

Vice President of Government & Community Relations, Cornell University

Opinion and senior editor at The Ithaca Journal since 1993, Stewart joined the Community Relations staff at Cornell in 2002. Before coming to the Journal, Stewart was managing editor of The Moscow Times, helping launch and produce the first English-language daily paper in the former Soviet Union.