WILMINGTON — The executive director of a non-partisan legal nonprofit that advocates for businesses in federal and state litigation has been named as the next leader of the New Hanover Community Endowment.
READ MORE: ‘We can’t build our way out of this’: NHC Endowment addresses affordable housing, other questions
Endowment chair Bill Cameron announced to commissioners Monday morning Dan Winslow will be the organization’s next CEO and president. Unrelated to the endowment vice chair Shannon Winslow, the new organization’s president comes from Massachusetts and has worked in all three branches of government, as well as in the business and nonprofit sectors. His brothers have lived in Wilmington, Southport and Wrightsville Beach for 30 years, one of whom works for Novant.
Winslow will start his role with New Hanover Community Endowment on Oct. 1.
Since 2021, Winslow has led the New England Legal Foundation (NELF) in Boston, founded in 1977. Its efforts are focused on a six-county region, championing “individual economic liberties, traditional property rights, properly limited government, and inclusive economic growth,” according to NELF’s website.
The nonprofit advocates industry perspectives in federal and state litigation and has filed briefs in Supreme Court cases, such as Sackett v. EPA — which redefined “Waters of the United States” and removed federal jurisdiction of isolated wetlands. State cases include Avila v. Boston Public Health Commission, which challenged the validity of Massachusetts’ Covid-era eviction moratorium.
Last year, NELF senior attorney Ben Robbins told Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly that Winslow’s leadership helped NELF raise over $1 million in 2022, a first in the nonprofit’s nearly 50-year history.
Winslow prided his fundraising efforts Monday.
“I have served as the head of a nonprofit organization in Boston that has nearly tripled in reach and revenue in the last three years,” he said.
NELF’s financial supporters include multinational law firms, such as Nelson Mullins and Kirkland & Ellis, defense contractor Raytheon Technologies and accounting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers, which serves as Novant Health’s auditor.
Commercial real estate firm Cummings Properties is another donor to NELF. The nonprofit supported the company in a case to recoup 56 months of rent payment after a tenant’s default.
In 2022, NELF received $135,000 from the Sarah Scaife Foundation, a prominent conservative foundation that donated $1.5 million to the Heritage Foundation the same year — the leading nonprofit behind the controversial Project 2025 initiative.
Winslow’s swan song for the nonprofit comes in the founding of NELF’s Equalizer Institute, to launch in 2025. It’s centered on providing free corporate legal clinics to underrepresented business entrepreneurs, such as minorities and veterans. The honorary chair of the institute’s advisory committee is Dr. Bernice A. King, CEO of the Martin Luther King, Jr. Center For Nonviolent Social Change (The King Center).
The 66-year-old said his accomplishments have brought diverse change to everyday people and their representatives in the legislature.
“My first work as a lawyer was advocating Federal Voting rights in federal court, which resulted in the creation of the first ever Latino majority House District in Massachusetts, which resulted in the first ever Latino elected to the Massachusetts House, and also which resulted in the first ever Black majority congressional district, which resulted in the first ever woman, Black woman who now serves in Congress from Boston,” he said. “In winning those cases, I needed to prove by preponderance of the evidence to federal judges that there is disparity based on race by any measure, whether in Massachusetts or New Hanover County, there continue to be disparities based on race and income, wealth, home ownership, infant mortality, diabetes, cancer, the list goes on. These are areas where the endowment can support measurable and significant improvement.”
Yet, he also has had a sense of humor about his approach. The former legislator received national attention a decade ago for stacking marshmallow fluff outside the gubernatorial budget director’s office to compel him to make cuts in spending. Each jar, stacked in a pyramid, had a holiday card attached, suggesting a part of the budget — or excess “fluff” — to cut, CBS reports.
Cameron boasted to commissioners at its Monday morning meeting that Winslow was energetic, innovative, effective and a “consensus-builder.”
“We believe we have the right person for this job,” he said, echoing similar sentiments at a press conference Monday afternoon.
Cameron officially introduced Winslow to the community, noting board members compiled a list of qualities they sought in a new CEO: “He met almost every damn one of them.”
Winslow is a former district court judge, was a Massachusetts House representative from 2011 to 2013, and served as chief legal counsel for Governor Mitt Romney from 2002 to 2005. He oversaw drafting of all of the governor’s legislative initiatives and reduced outside legal spending by allowing public lawyers to work across state agencies rather than individual departments.
From 2013 to 2021, Winslow worked as legal counsel and eventually served as executive vice president for Las Vegas-based Rimini Street, a software solutions company, where he built a staff of 70 lawyers. As a private sector attorney, Winslow cites experience representing an alleged polluter in the Acushnet River Superfund settlement and winning a favorable plea deal for a white-collar defendant accused of fraud, money laundering, and hiding stolen loan payments in St. Kitts, a Caribbean tax haven.
Winslow describes himself as socially moderate and fiscally conservative. He filed a brief to the Federal Election Commission in 2013 to treat campaign donations from married gay couples the same manner as straight couples; he also criticized the prosecution of prominent activist and hacker Aaron Swartz during a 2013 debate:
“We have to look at the exercise of unfettered discretion by federal prosecutorial authorities, whether it’s decisions not to prosecute in the case of banks that are perceived as too big to fail or in the case of Aaron Swartz, somebody who was prosecuted with no criminal record, with no intention of making personal profit.”
The endowment embarked on a search for its new leader after its inaugural hire, William Buster, parted ways with the organization in February. The endowment board, consisting of 13 members, have remained mum on Buster’s reasoning to exit; WHQR has reported the CEO was pushed out.
NHCE hired North Carolina firm moss + ross to lead a nationwide search in April, with a committee headed by board vice chair Shannon Winslow, along with Cameron and endowment board members Woody White (former commissioner who helped steer the endowment’s founding), Cedric Dickerson, and David Sprunt.
“We were looking at his proven, demonstrated success,” Winslow told Port City Daily about the new CEO. “And he had just that.”
During his time in the state judiciary, Winslow won a national award from the Foundation for the Improvement of Justice for implementing a “smart calendar” system that increased court docket efficiency. It is something that impressed the endowment’s vice chair.
She told Port City Daily it wasn’t necessarily the fact that the new CEO worked in law or served in government and judicial branches that were driving factors in the board’s decision. It was what he implemented during his career and how he devised new ideas.
“It’s not the law part that impressed us most,” the vice chair said. “I’ve heard some of the small chatter about that — but that’s not the piece. It’s what he did within law, which was solving complex issues at the courthouse and being proximate with people, from janitors to high elected officials. … We were not looking for a legal background. He happened to have one. But what he was able to exemplify were specific skill sets within there that we were looking for: communication skills, being a visionary leader.”
The candidate search
The endowment search garnered 150 applicants. NHCE vice chair Winslow said it was one of the most competitive searches moss + ross has conducted to date. Though she couldn’t comment how many applications were local, she said candidates’ credentials and track records were more important than location.
“I’m a native Wilmingtonian, but people can ingrain themselves, they can learn the people,” she said. “Jack Barto is a great example. He was not from Wilmington, and he was considered one of the most successful leaders of our hospital.”
Barto is the former president and CEO of NHRMC and was recently appointed to the endowment board. He moved to the region in the early aughts to take the job and oversee the hospital’s growth from 2005 to 2017.
The endowment was created by the controversial New Hanover Regional Medical Center sale to Novant Health in 2020, as voted on by the then-commissioners, dissented by Rob Zapple. Its makeup includes the county commissioners choosing five of the endowment’s board members and Novant oversees six. Attorney General Josh Stein’s approval of the 2020 deal included requiring two additional endowment-appointed board members to promote diversity and professional expertise.
Former Senator Harper Peterson was against the hospital sale and helped formed the group Save Our Hospital, which transformed in the last few months into local nonprofit Heal Our People’s Endowment. It calls for greater oversight of the endowment and is concerned with organizational mismanagement, leadership changes, and lack of transparency.
Heal Our People petitioned Stein to ensure the endowment fulfills its charitable purpose, addressing inadequate transparency and diversity, the influence of nonprofit hospital Novant Health over the endowment’s board, leadership turnover, and insufficient strategic planning.
Stein’s office has not responded to Heal Our People’s Endowment petition but has sent a letter to county commissioners and Novant reminding them of the diversity of board members it elects. It comes after a shuffling of board members in recent months that has led to its current makeup of nine males and four females, the majority of whom are white.
The AG’s office did not have a comment on the new CEO appointment Monday. Peterson, however, said he wanted to see other applications that were submitted to the board.
“It’s another example of why they shouldn’t have made this a closed meeting, closed process endeavor,” Peterson told Port City Daily.
While he complimented CEO Winslow’s legal experience, Peterson cast doubt on his ability to direct long-term action addressing the county’s systemic issues and raised broader concerns with the board’s decision-making process.
“It’s like a puzzle,” Peterson said. “The pieces have to fit a bigger dream or idea. And we’re not seeing that. I mean, who is he answering to? Is he going to be independent of the board or is he going to be a ‘yes’ man? We know there is internal division on the board of directors. I think that’s apparent to everybody.”
Peterson said he learned about Winslow’s hiring through a “national connection” and announced the new CEO on Heal Our People’s social media Sunday evening.
He wrote: “The good old boy network running the board has selected Daniel B Winslow, a Massachusetts Republican lawyer, former politician, and ‘free market’ ideologue. With no significant experience in philanthropy, this is a slap in the face to both our local nonprofits and the very people for whom this Endowment was created.”
This sentiment was addressed to Winslow by media, out of the gate Monday. Upon being asked if a leader of a $1.3-billion endowment should have more of a philanthropic background, Winslow defended his experience. He added he’s been on the nonprofit side of leadership and the receiving side of funds.
“So that perspective has allowed me to have visibility into a lot of different philanthropies, and a lot of different ways that philanthropies do or don’t do well — the process of giving and applications and the like,” he said. “And I hope to take from that experience some ideas and some learning about proportionate application processes. For example, the process of the $250 Boy Scout grant or Eagle Scout grant to paint benches being different from, say, a $10 million, $20 million grant for impact or social impact investing.”
Winslow called the endowment staff dedicated and having done heavy lifting that set groundwork to help guide him. He added he’s “a quick step,” dedicated to listening, and that good leaders always learn from those with whom they surround themselves. Winslow said the interim director and vice president Lakesha McDay is “an unbelievable hero and a star”; she had led the organization during the CEO search.
“She is adored by her staff,” Winslow said. “They respect her because she deserves their respect, and it’s mutual.”
At an endowment community meeting in June, at least one attendee questioned why McDay wasn’t being considered for the CEO position; an answer wasn’t provided by the endowment at the time, citing it’s a personnel issue.
Port City Daily asked McDay Monday if she applied, to which she said no; she also wasn’t part of the hiring process, the endowment confirmed. When asked if she had initial thoughts on the new hire and what she hoped to accomplish under his leadership, an answer wasn’t provided.
Winslow said he hoped to build out staff as needed and create “maximum efficiency, maximum impact … running with all cylinders firing.” In doing so, he also intends to hone “transparency, collaboration, honesty, innovation, accountability and results” at the endowment. But it would come without preconceived notions regarding what needed improvement.
“I plead ignorance,” he said when asked if there were problem areas he had researched and would address first.
Instead, Winslow said he would focus on executing due diligence, speaking with the community to garner feedback on its needs first and foremost. He also leaned on the fact he brought a fresh perspective, without alliances or allegiances.
“I’m a complete blank canvas in terms of what’s gone on before me,” he said. “I know that some folks have been unhappy. I hope to learn from those people. I hope to learn from any kind of constructive criticism. You don’t just learn from people that agree with you. Sometimes you can really learn from people that don’t agree with you, and they might have a good point of view.”
Winslow also will take a page from other community foundations, he said, and expand involvement with organizations. He cited the endowment’s membership with a North Carolina grant makers association as an example.
“We’re still a startup,” Winslow added, “still growing and learning and going through the growing pains that are ordinary in any kind of a relatively new organization with a big mission. And I think that we need to look at other good practices, best practices for how it’s been done elsewhere in the country.”
Aside from familiarizing himself with the community at large and the area nonprofits, he also said he will meet with the endowment’s community advisory board within his first days on the job. The CAC has gone on the record and expressed dissatisfaction with being heard by endowment board members.
More so, Winslow said he wants to team-build and meet people where they are to team-build potential solutions on the four pillars of the endowment: education, public safety, healthcare and community development.
“I will meet neighbors in their living rooms,” he said, “and after I have learned and listened to these different perspectives, I will then work with the team and with the board to ensure that the New Hanover Community Endowment takes its place as a civic leader in this community to set an agenda for transformative and meaningful change.”
To date the endowment has doled out $68.8 million in total, which Cameron told commissioners it’s on schedule to give $50 million or more this year as well. Winslow said his goal is to get to a point where the endowment is spending “not just $48 million a year, but $100 million, $200 million.” He envisions the $1.3 billion as an “initial deposit,” with which he wants to multiply its county value by leveraging partnerships with other endowments, foundations, corporate sponsors, “perhaps the private sector partnering with us.”
The IRS will require the endowment to spend 5% of its asset value annually by the year 2028.
Earlier in the spring, the endowment committed $19 million to the affordable housing crisis, something Winslow said he was experience in already. He referred to a white paper recently released by NELF. It advocates a “Free Market Affordable Rent” plan to create municipal zones that cap rent at 30% of annual median income and reduce local regulations to incentivize housing construction.
“Essentially that’s putting affordable rents within reach of middle class people who have so often been forgotten in a lot of this debate,” Winslow said. “We have a lot of work to do as well for poverty housing and housing for the poor, but the folks at the next level of income, that’s the average the median income earners have been completely forgotten, and I think we need to make sure that we have housing solutions across the panoply of the community.”
Spokesperson Kevin Maurer said the endowment expects to have an update on its housing affordability plan soon, as the team has been working with partners and the board to finalize the first group of completed grants.
Commissioner Zapple said after the press conference Monday he is looking forward to seeing Winslow’s output.
“Let’s go, Dan,” he said with an enthusiastic smile. “Go dole out some money.”
Commissioner LeAnn Pierce appreciated the new CEO’s confidence and energy, adding: “Now, let’s see the results.”
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