Catholic Relief Services president stepping down
The president of Catholic Relief Services is stepping down at the beginning of 2012, the Baltimore-based humanitarian agency announced Wednesday.
Ken Hackett, 63, has headed CRS since 1993, leading the agency through Hurricane Mitch in Central America, multiple famines in Africa, the Indian Ocean tsunami in 2004 and the Haiti earthquake earlier this year.
Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan of New York, the chairman of the CRS board of directors, said a board committee would conduct a nationwide search for a successor to Hackett with a goal of installing the next president by January 2012.
Hackett has agreed to continue serving as president for six months beyond the expiration of his current five-year term in June 2011, and to continue on as a consultant until July 2012 to assist in the transition.
“Over two years ago, Ken Hackett, our esteemed president, challenged the Board to become robustly intentional in our strategy for future leadership transition, including his own office as CEO,” Dolan wrote in a note to CRS staff.
“Ken’s challenge to the board was characteristic of his nearly four decades of devotion to CRS—he only wants to be a servant to Jesus Christ, His Church, His poor,” Dolan wrote. “We took him seriously. The good news is that we can do this patiently and carefully, because we are able to approach any leadership changes from a position of strength, success and stability.”
Hackett joined CRS in 1972 following Peace Corps service in Ghana, according to the agency. He served CRS in posts throughout Africa and Asia and in a variety of positions at CRS headquarters in Baltimore. During his tenure as president, the agency’s operating budget grew from about $300 million to more than $800 million today.
In a release, CRS credied Hackett with shepherding a major initiative to provide lifesaving medication to people with AIDS in the developing world. Under Hackett, CRS incorporated a justice-centered focus in all its programming, using Catholic social teaching as a guide.
Catholic Relief Services is the international humanitarian agency of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. Dolan wrote of the bishops’ and the board’s “immense gratitude” to Hackett.
“It is only because of his extraordinary leadership these past 17 years that we are in such a secure position that we can approach this transition calmly and carefully; and only because of his selfless ‘calling the question’ that we are now commencing this realistic planning for the future of this agency we all so love,” Dolan wrote.
