National Board of Directors 2011/2012

Jim Casey has held a number of leadership positions within the MS Society of Canada. He was the vice-chair of the national board and previously served as the chair of the national board's governance committee and chair of the national governance review task force. Jim has served as the chair and vice-chair of the Alberta Division and has been active with direct fundraising with the Alberta Division.

Jim has served on many other boards and is currently a member of the board of the Edmonton chapter of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation. Jim is a lawyer practising in the areas of administrative law, labour and employment and professional regulatory law at Field LLP in Edmonton. Jim acts as the managing partner operating his firm's three offices in Edmonton, Calgary and Yellowknife. Jim also serves as a labour arbitrator and a part-time vice-chair of the Alberta Labour Relations Board.

Bob Decker has been chair of fundraising for the national board for the past six years. He is also chair of the national investment committee, a member of the MS foundation investment committee and participant in various working task forces in the area of fundraising for the MS Society. He was previously a member of the Ontario Division board for the years 2002-2004.

Bob was the founding chairman of the inaugural MS Walk in his hometown of Oakville and has been the top Walk fundraiser nationally for the past seven years. Bob is senior vice-president and founding partner of Aurion Capital Management Inc., a Toronto-based investment management firm that is partially owned by DundeeWealth Inc. He has an MBA from the Schulich School of Business and holds a chartered financial analyst designation from the CFA Institute. He is married with two children and resides with his wife Pat in Oakville, Ontario.

François Coupal is chair of the Quebec Division board.  He has served on the national board for the past seven years, including the last year as secretary, and is a member of the national executive committee. He has been active in various committees and task forces at both the divisional and national levels, most notably serving as a member of the strategic planning task force that culminated in the approval of Momentum 2015. He has also served on the governance review task force and its successor governance committee, which have been providing the leadership to a significant modernization of the MS Society’s governance.

François is a partner in the Montreal office of the global IT services firm Accenture.

David joined the national board in 2007. A long-time donor and fundraiser for the MS Society, he is very involved with the $60 million endMS campaign, serving on the national endMS campaign cabinet and chairing the Ontario Division endMS campaign cabinet.

David recently retired from Brink’s, Inc., where he held several senior executive positions during his career, including chief executive officer of Brink’s Canada Limited, a national sponsor of the MS Society, and managing director of Brink’s Asia Pacific Region. Prior to joining Brink’s, David held numerous corporate finance and executive management positions in the Canadian banking industry, latterly as senior vice-president and head of the Ontario division for National Bank of Canada.

He has also previously served as chair of the Joseph Brant Memorial Hospital Foundation in Burlington, a governor of Joseph Brant Memorial Hospital and a member of the president’s council of the Children’s Aid Society Foundation of Metropolitan Toronto.

A volunteer with the MS Society of Canada, Alberta and Northwest Territories Division, Gayelene is a member of the division board of directors. She is an active fundraiser, directing her efforts to help launch the endMS campaign and build support through her networks for “People Against MS” (PAMS) events, among other initiatives. In addition to her time and expertise, she has made a significant personal gift in support of the endMS Research & Training Network. 

Professionally, Gayelene is the controller of Freemount Resources and was the chief financial officer of Athena Resources for more than a decade.

Chris Bourque is a chair of the Atlantic Division, and acting chair of the client services committee. He also volunteers with the Business Community Anti‐Poverty Initiative and Rotary International.

Professionally, Chris is the president of Foremost Insurance and is one of the very few "fully licensed" (all lines) insurance brokers in Canada. He has developed one of the first nationally recognized risk management programs designed specifically for the not-for-profit sector, and is viewed as a global specialist in mericulture/aquaculture risk management. Chris and his wife and son live in Saint John, New Brunswick.

Valerie is a vice-chair on the Ontario Division board of directors and the Ontario Division representative to the national board of directors. She is chair of the national government relations committee and is also the chair of the governance committee of the Ontario board. Valerie was publisher and later president and chief executive officer of Kids Can Press from 1979 to 2006, having played a leading role in the evolution of the Canadian children’s publishing industry for more than 30 years. Under her direction, Kids Can Press developed an internationally successful publishing program.

She has served on numerous government advisory councils and industry and not-for-profit boards, including the Ontario Media Development Corporation, the Canadian Women’s Foundation, Women’s College Hospital and Tides Canada. Valerie received the Order of Canada for her work in publishing and philanthropy.

Marilyn Lenzen is chair of British Columbia and Yukon Division. She was introduced to the MS Society in 2003 and soon began volunteering to plan an MS Walk. She continues to be involved in event planning and fundraising. She finds her involvement with the MS Society rewarding, as it provides her with an opportunity to help people with MS while still using her professional skills.

In 2008, Marilyn was recognized for her five-year contribution to the MS Society. She is also the founder of the SUCCESS MS self-help group. The self-help group is a dynamic and supportive resource to those with MS living on the North Shore of Metro Vancouver. The group also forms an energetic MS Walk fundraising team that achieves top fundraising status each year as a friends and family TeamMS.

Brian Lerner is past chair of the Manitoba Division. He has served on the division board and as a member of the national board of directors since2008. He also sits on the national audit and governance committees.

Brian is a partner with Aikins, MacAulay & Thorvaldson LLP, and is also the co-chair of the Aikins Business Law department. He specializes in mergers, acquisitions and corporate finance law. Brian became a bencher of the Law Society of Manitoba in 2009. He currently sits on the complaints investigation committee, the practice and ethics committee and as chair of the investment committee for the Law Society.

Among his other community activities, Brian is particularly proud of his past involvement with Boys and Girls Clubs of Winnipeg, including a term as its president. Brian also currently sits on the board of the Manitoba Moose Yearling Foundation, the charitable arm of the American Hockey League’s Manitoba Moose hockey team.

Dr. Samuel Ludwin is a professor emeritus in the Department of Pathology and Molecular Medicine at Queens University, where he also served a term as associate dean in the Faculty of Health Sciences, and vice-president of research at the Kingston Hospitals.

In addition to his clinical work as a neuropathologist, he has been a researcher in multiple sclerosis for the last 35 years. He has published extensively on studies of the pathology of clinical multiple sclerosis, and his experimental studies have mainly focused on the mechanisms of demyelination and the capacity for remyelination (repair) in animal and tissue culture models of multiple sclerosis. He has served on the editorial boards of numerous scholarly journals, and has held numerous administrative academic positions. Currently, he is the chair of the Federal Panel in Research Ethics of the three federal granting agencies.

Linda Lumsden was chair of the national board of directors from November 2009 until June 2011 and now holds the position of past chair (ex-officio). She has held numerous leadership positions within the MS Society since becoming a volunteer with the Ottawa Chapter, where she served as vice-chair and then chair. She was then elected to the Ontario Division board of directors, becoming first vice-chair and then chair in 2007.

Linda Lumsden lives in Brockville, Ontario. She retired from Bell Canada after 31 years of service. Her career spanned a variety of executive management positions, including customer service, labour negotiations, budget management and strategic planning. When she retired she was a vice-president specializing in government relations. She has provided leadership to a number of community boards of directors, including serving as chair of the George Brown College board in Toronto and as president of the Bell Pensioners Group in Ontario and Quebec.

James Orr is chair of the Alberta and Northwest Territories Division board  and chair of national client services. He joined the MS Society Alberta Division in 2006 as a member of the government relations committee.

He has been a civil servant with the Government of Alberta for 10 years and is currently director of Safety Codes & Standards, which includes responsibility for accessibility under the Alberta Building Code.

Eugene Paquin’s career in education includes that of a teacher, principal, superintendent, assistant director and director of education, regional consultant with the Saskatchewan Ministry of Education, and program supervisor and consultant with the Prince Albert Grand Council.  As well, his background includes work as a realtor, customs officer and chief excutive officer of a non-profit organization.  Mr. Paquin continues his involvement in human resources activities by consulting in the areas of recruiting, organizational development/assessment and behaviour, strategic planning and board development. 

Mr. Paquin is active in his parish through various ministries and as a member of the Knights of Columbus.  Eugene volunteers in his community through numerous charities and activities on boards including the MS Society of Canada, the Saskatchewan College of Respiratory Therapists, Saskatchewan Youth Heritage Fairs, City of Saskatoon Board of Revision and provincial and national constituency boards.

Mark Whitmore has been on the national board of directors since November 2007. He is currently on the audit committee and the liaison to the medical advisory committee.

Mark is the managing partner for Deloitte in Toronto. He has 25 years of experience in the consulting industry, primarily focused on financial services. He has held a number of senior positions in the firm, both in market-facing and operations. In addition to the MS Society, Mark provides leadership to a number of other community organizations, including Ivey (alumni association board member) and Sick Kids (leadership campaign cabinet member).