Rutgers Board of Trustees Elect 2017-2018 Officers

NEW BRUNSWICK, N.J. – William E. Best, a senior vice president at PNC Bank, has been elected to a second one-year term as chair of the Rutgers University Board of Trustees. The Belle Mead, N.J., resident’s term as a charter trustee runs through 2023.

Mary I. DiMartino, executive director of J.P. Morgan Securities, LLC, will serve as co-vice chair for a second term. A Lawrenceville, N.J., resident and Douglass College alumna, her term as a charter trustee runs through 2019. DiMartino has served on the Trustees’ executive committee, was chair of the Trustees’ task force on assessment and served on the Board of Governors’ audit committee.

James F. Dougherty, co-owner of Metropolitan Veterinary Associates, is the other Board of Trustees co-vice chair. A veterinary internist from Collegeville, PA., he is an alumnus trustee through 2018. He is vice chair of the Camden Board of Directors of Rutgers, a member of the Board of Overseers and has served as chair of the Board of the Trustees’ nominating committee and ad hoc committee on diversity.

Best, who also has served as vice chair, has been a member of the Board of Trustees’ executive committee, the Board of Governors’ audit committee and the Board of Governors’ alumni and university relations committee.

Best is past chair of the International Economic Development Council. He is a board member of both New Jersey Future and the Newark Regional Business Partnership, and a member of the New Jersey Regional Plan Association. He has received numerous awards and recognitions, including from the New Jersey Redevelopment Authority (2007), the African-American Chamber of Commerce (2006), and the New Jersey state Senate and Assembly (2005).

The appointments take effect July 1, 2017, and run through June 30, 2018.

Historically, the Board of Trustees was the governing body of the university from the time of its founding as Queen’s College in 1766 until the university was reorganized under state law in 1956. The board acts in an advisory capacity to the Board of Governors and comprises

41 voting members: 20 charter members, 16 alumni members and five public members appointed by the governor of the state with confirmation by the New Jersey state Senate. Of the 20 charter seats, three are reserved for students with full voting rights.