MEDA's board in profile: Dale Beachey, Sarasota, Florida
Day job: Now retired, Dale Beachey spent 34 years as chief financial officer at the Sarasota Memorial Health Care System. He and his wife, Verda, who is also retired, are a MEDA rarity – they’ve both served on its board of directors: Dale for the past three years and Verda for nine.
What he likes about MEDA: Dale is a big fan of MEDA’s agile focus on creating business solutions to poverty. “I like the way MEDA is constantly innovating and coming up with new ways to combat poverty,” he says. “I like the fact that they’re disciplined enough to go in, set something up that’s sustainable, and then leave that in local hands and move on to the next challenge. Not many organizations would have the discipline to do that.”
Most memorable MEDA experience: As a long-time “board couple,” Dale and Verda have enjoyed visiting MEDA’s work in Paraguay, Nicaragua and Tanzania, as well as TourMagination trips that touched on MEDA projects in Romania and Egypt. Dale has also volunteered his financial skills on internal audits of MEDA projects in Nicaragua and Tanzania. “That’s always been a highlight – to get out and see the projects in greater depth and get to meet the people we’re impacting,” he says.
Hobbies: Besides traveling, Dale likes reading and golf (several games a week). In summer he and Verda head north to Elkhart, Indiana, to visit their two daughters and six grandchildren (ages 3 to 16). Like many doting grandparents, they spend much of their summertime sitting in the bleachers watching their grandkids play ball games of all kinds – soccer, baseball and basketball – as well as some wrestling.
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