Glenn Johnson, who is a professor emeritus at Washington State University and the mayor of Pullman since 2004, is the new chair of the Community Colleges of Spokane Board of Trustees.
Mike Wilson, who is a retired former president and CEO of Sacred Heart Medical Center and a CCS Board of Trustees member for the last seven years, will serve as vice chair.
Their elections occurred at the November board meeting and are effective immediately. Both will serve for two years.
“CCS is very fortunate to have the caliber of leadership our Trustees provide,” said Christine Johnson, CCS chancellor. “Their expertise and dedication to our students’ success keeps us laser focus on our mission to prepare the region’s workforce at this challenging time and in the future.”
Glenn Johnson succeeds Bridget Piper, former Sterling Savings Bank officer and a Spokane community volunteer, who retired after the October meeting after 10 years on the board. Other board members are Beth Thew, retired secretary-treasurer for the Spokane Regional Labor Council, AFL-CIO, and Steven Yoshihara, senior vice president for Washington Trust.
Johnson was appointed to a four-year term on the CCS board by Gov. Jay Inslee in February 2018 and is proud to say he is a community college graduate, having received an AA degree from Modesto Junior College in California. He went on to earn a BA from Sacramento State University, a master’s degree from UCLA in journalism and a Ph.D. in mass communications from the University of Iowa.
Johnson also is known statewide as the “Voice of the Cougs” and has been the public address announcer for Cougar football and men’s basketball since 1980.
Johnson retired in 2014 from the WSU Edward R. Murrow College of Communication, where he was a professor for 35 years, teaching courses in television news, communications management and others.
Among his many other current and past civic activities, Johnson also serves as legislative co-chair on the board of the Washington Association of College Trustees based in Olympia, chair of the state Transportation Improvement Board and is a past president of the Association of Washington Cities.
Wilson settled in Spokane in 1982 as a vice president – and later president – at Holy Family Hospital after nine years with Veterans Administration Medical Centers in California, Washington and Washington, D.C. He became a vice president at Sacred Heart Medical Center in 1988 and then CEO in 1991. He retired from SHMC in 2009 but returned briefly to serve as CEO while the organization searched for a permanent CEO.
Wilson has been active in the community, and on state and regional boards and committees for more than 25 years, including serving as a member of the CCS Foundation Board of Directors from 2004 to 2008.
Wilson has a bachelor’s degree from Pacific Lutheran University in Tacoma and a master’s degree in business and public administration with a focus on health care from Southeastern University in Washington D.C.
Wilson began his term on the CCS Board of Trustees on October 2013, filling an unexpired term. He was reappointed for a five-year term by Gov. Jay Inslee in October 2014 and re-appointed again to a second five-year term in October 2019.