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Incoming executive director Ryan Newcomb holds a press conference announcing changes.
COURTESY PHOTO
Utah Pride Center announces new leadership, new path forward Utah Pride Center leaders announced a new executive director, a new board, and a new path forward at a press conference November 15. They also announced the continuation of the Utah Pride Festival and Parade. The Utah Pride Center announced in August that it laid off seven of its 19 staff members, and later furloughed the rest of the staff, citing the “instability of our organization.” Leaders temporarily closed the doors of the Center, partially reopening them in October.
producer ERICA GABRIEL is now vice chair. HR professional DYLAN WALKER is the board secretary, and CPA KIRK BRAGDON is the board treasurer. Commercial banker NATHAN CRYER remains on the board. J USTIN ANFINSEN, a director at Valley Behavioral Health, and social workers STACEY FRANCONE and KENNY LEVINE are new to the board. Three out of the eight board members are women and there is lesbian, bi, gay, and transgender representation on the board.
New Board
New Executive Director
Eight people now make up the board of directors for the organization — all of whom joined in 2023. Family law attorney and Just Law LLC cofounder JESSICA COUSER took over as board chair earlier this year. Event
RYAN M. NEWCOMB, who has a 16-year resume as a nonprofit executive and fundraising professional, will take the helm as executive director of the troubled Center. Newcomb told QSaltLake in an interview that his past experience
BY MICHAEL AARON
ISSUE 354 |
December, 2023
of working in nonprofit development and change management, raising over $29 million in those years, are a perfect fit for the Center’s current needs. “People have asked me why I would take this on,” Newcomb said. “I felt like someone who knew what they were doing — someone who had the experience from a nonprofit management point — needed to correct things. Someone to build the right systems, to listen and collaborate and work with anyone and everyone who was calling for change, and to get the organization back on track.” Newcomb spoke in June at the Utah chapter of the Association of Fundraising Professionals biennial conference about important elements of nonprofit leadership. “I made a presentation about pivot-point leadership and taking organizations to the next level. It was not only about fundraising but about board leadership, branding, and organizational narrative with the public and the media,” he said. “I enjoy that. I enjoy the challenges of that. That’s why I decided to do this.” In a press conference Wednesday, Newcomb said his top priority in this role is “to be transparent, restore trust, and build an inclusive center that our queer community deserves.” “The new board leadership and I join public calls for full accountability and take full responsibility for correcting the mistakes of the past. We are charting a new, clearer path with a relaunched organization that will ensure this never happens again,” said Newcomb. “We are pursuing and putting into action aggressive plans that are both timely, quick and fully rectify these debts over the coming months.”
WHO IS NEWCOMB? Newcomb was born and raised in Fort Worth, Texas “Before I came out, I got my start on the ‘wrong side of politics,’” he said. “I was a product of where I grew up, and I was closeted. I was projecting the wrong things and trying to conform to the ‘toxic masculinity,’ as that was what I was supposed to do to come across as straight. I think it was a different time.” “But I learned from that; I grew from
