Three Candidates Vie to Become APA’s Next President-Elect

APA members will be able to choose among three president-elect candidates in the upcoming APA election who specialize in different areas of psychiatry but share extensive involvement in APA—Renȳe Binder, M.D., James Nininger, M.D., and Mark Rapaport, M.D.

Binder is professor and director of the Psychiatry and the Law Program at the University of California, San Francisco, and associate dean for academic affairs for the School of Medicine and former interim chair of psychiatry. She is chair of the APA Committee on Advocacy and Litigation Funding and a former trustee at large and Area 6 representative.

Nininger is a clinical associate professor of psychiatry at Weill/Cornell Medical College and in private practice with a subspecialty in geriatrics. He is APA’s Area 2 Trustee, on the American Psychiatric Foundation Board, vice-chair of the APA Steering Committee on Practice Guidelines, a past speaker of the Assembly, and served on the DSM-5 Clinical and Public Health Committee.

Rapaport is the Reunette W. Harris Chair of Psychiatry and the Behavioral Sciences at Emory University School of Medicine and chief of psychiatric services for Emory Healthcare System. He is the founding co-editor in chief of the APA journal Focus: The Journal of Lifelong Learning in Psychiatry and a member of the Council on Medical Education and Lifelong Learning.

The treasurer’s post, which is for a three-year term, is also up for election, and in that race Frank Brown, M.D., of Atlanta will face James Greene, M.D., of Memphis.

One of the Board’s trustee-at-large positions will also be contested in this election cycle, with Anita Everett, M.D., vying with Stephen McLeod-Bryant, M.D. Everett is from Glenwood, Md., and McLeod-Bryant is from Old Hickory, Tenn. At-large trustees also serve three-year terms.

Two of APA’s seven Areas will vote for trustees in the next election. In elections for Area trustee, the Area Council rather than the APA Nominating Committee chooses the candidates.

Facing off for Area 2 trustee are Jack Drescher, M.D., and Vivian Pender, M.D. Area 2 includes all of the district branches in New York state.

Area 5—which includes the Southern states, Puerto Rico, and the military district branch—will also be electing a trustee. The candidates in that race are R. Scott Benson, M.D., of Pensacola, Fla., and Gary Weinstein, M.D., of Louisville, Ky.

Members-in-training (MITs) will also have three candidates from whom to choose as they vote for the Board position of member-in-training trustee-elect. Competing for that position are Vittoria DeLucia, M.D., a resident at the University of Maryland/Sheppard Pratt Program; Heather Liebherr, D.O., a resident at the University of Pittsburgh Western Psychiatric Institute and Clinic; and Ravi Shah, M.D., a resident at Columbia University - New York State Psychiatric Institute.

APA announced the slate of candidates November 1, and while it is considered public, it is not official until the Board approves it at its meeting this month.

All members for whom APA has a valid e-mail address on file will receive an electronic ballot. Other members will receive a paper ballot along with instructions on how to vote online if they so choose. All candidates and their supporters should review APA’s updated Election Guidelines. ■