Brian J. Davis, U.S. District Court judge for the Middle District of Florida, will lead The Community Foundation for Northeast Florida as chair of the board of trustees for the next two years.
Davis has been a trustee since 2014 and has volunteered with Leadership Jacksonville, NCCJ, Urban League, NAACP, Omega Psi Phi Fraternity, Jacksonville Community Council, Hubbard House, Help Center, PACE Center for Girls, OneJax and the Jaguars Foundation.
He also chaired the Mayor’s Domestic Violence Task Force in 1999. Most recently, he chaired the Jacksonville Public Education Fund and is an advisory board member of the North Florida Council, Boy Scouts of America.
Davis succeeds Martha Frye Baker, whose two-year term as chair ended in 2021.
Also, two community leaders have joined the board for an initial three-year term: Lauren Rueger and R. Halsey Wise, replacing trustees Ryan A. Schwartz and Dori Walton, who rotated off the board at the end of 2021 after 10 and nine years of service, respectively.
Rueger is a communications consultant and an alumna of the foundation’s Weaver Philanthropic Initiative.
She has also been a community member of the foundation’s Program and Initiatives Committee. She is a member of the Baptist Health Foundation Board of Directors, co-chairs the Communications Subcommittee of the Wolfson Children’s Hospital Advisory Council and is an active member of the Parents’ Association at The Bolles School.
She will remain on the foundation’s Program and Initiatives Committee.
Wise is the founder, chairman and CEO of AfterNext HealthTech and founder and CEO of Lime Barrel Advisors, a private investment and advisory services firm.
He served on the board of directors of the Jefferson Scholars Foundation at the University of Virginia and continues to chair the UVA Jefferson Scholarship Selection Committee for North Florida.
Wise also served on the board of trustees of the Episcopal High School in Alexandria, Virginia, and The Fessenden School in West Newton, Massachusetts. He is the founder of the Garden of Hope at the Huntsville, Alabama, Botanical Garden.
He will join foundation’s Investment Committee.
