Category: Past Speakers

Biosketch
Edward A. Panacek, MD, MPH, Professor of Emergency Medicine and of Medicine
Dr. Panacek received his undergraduate education (BA) at UCLA, and his MD degree from the University of South Alabama. His postgraduate training was in Emergency Medicine, Internal Medicine and Critical Care Medicine, all performed at UC Davis Medical Center and completed in 1986. From 1986, through 1992, he was an Assistant Professor of Medicine (critical care and emergency medicine) at Case Western Reserve University and University Hospitals of Cleveland. During that time, he served as Director of the Critical Care Medicine Fellowship Training Program, and of the Emergency Medicine Fellowship Program as well as the Associate Medical Director of the AirCare Helicopter Transport Service. He served as the Associate Director, and subsequently as the Acting Director of the Department of Emergency Medicine at University Hospitals of Cleveland.
In 1992, he joined the faculty at the University of California, Davis, as an Associate Professor in the Division of Emergency Medicine and Medical Toxicology and the Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine. He was promoted to a full professor in 1997. He also served as the Emergency Medicine Residency Program Director, from 1992 until 2000. He obtained an MPH in Epidemiology from the School of Public Health, University of California – Berkeley in 2000. From 2000-2014, he served as the Director of the Office of Clinical Trials. In 2015 he moved to the University of South Alabama, in Mobile, as new Professor and Chair of Emergency Medicine. He is the medical director of the Emergency Departments in the USA Health System.
Dr. Panacek has over 300 scientific publications (over 150 original journal articles, over 50 Book Chapters and Invited Manuscripts and over 130 original research abstracts). He has served as an associate editor for two of the major journals in emergency medicine and is on the editorial board of multiple other journals. He has chaired over 12 Committees, Sections or Task forces for national professional societies and was on the Board of Directors of the Council of EM Residency Directors (CORD.) He has also chaired the Executive Committees and served as the overall Academic Principal Investigator for multiple large multi-center national and international clinical trials. He is in frequent demand as a speaker and averages over 75 lecture presentations per year. He won numerous national awards, including the prestigious 2002 “Outstanding contributions in research award” from the American College of Emergency Medicine, the “Hal Jayne Academic Excellence Award” from the Society for Academic Emergency Medicine in 2012, as well as a Lifetime Achievement Award, in 2007, from the University of Maryland, for contributions in EM research.
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Jonathan Porter serves as Vice President of Birmingham Division for Alabama Power Company.
Porter is responsible for the company’s operations, sales, customer service, economic and community development and external affairs activities for more than 430,000 customers across six counties in north central Alabama.
Porter joined Alabama Power in 1991 as a Customer Accounting intern through the INROADS program where he interned four summers with Alabama Power until graduation. He rejoined Alabama Power in 2000 and has held various positions of increasing responsibility to include Sr. Corporate Recruiter, Sr. HR Business Representative, Customer Service Supervisor, Assistant Business Office Manager, Lead HR Business Consultant, Assistant to the Executive Vice President of External Affairs, Birmingham Division Area Manager, Director Customer Service, and Vice President of Human Resources & Ethics.
Prior to joining Alabama Power, Porter worked as an Underwriting Analyst at Protective Life Corporation and as a Manager at INROADS, Inc.
Porter serves as a member of the board of directors for the Jefferson County Education Foundation, Jefferson County Economic and Industrial Development Authority, Birmingham Jefferson Inland Port Authority, United Way of Central Alabama, REV Birmingham Inc., Birmingham Business Alliance, Birmingham Civil Rights Institute, Alabama Power Foundation, Alabama Business Charitable Trust Fund, and A.G. Gaston Boys & Girls Club. Porter is an advisory board member of the Community Foundation of Greater Birmingham’s LGBTQ Fund. Porter is Chairman of the 2021 Birmingham World Games Foundation, serves as a Board Trustee of Tuskegee University and a member of the Newcomen Society of Alabama. Porter is a graduate of Leadership Birmingham, has been featured in Who’s Who in Black Alabama, was recognized as a “Top 40 under 40” by the Birmingham Business Journal, and was recognized as one of “20 leaders for the next 20 years” by Bhm Biz magazine.
Porter graduated cum laude from Tuskegee University with a B.S. degree in Business Administration. While at Tuskegee, Porter was a 4 year letterman in football and was an All-Conference Scholar-Athlete. Porter later received his MBA from The University of Alabama at Birmingham.
A native of Bessemer, Ala., Porter and his wife Kima are the proud parents of daughters Laila and Kailyn.

Dr Lee Smee chair university programs and senior marine scientist II Dauphin Island Sea Lab associate professor of marine science university south Alabama
Native of Georgia Flowery Branch
Undergraduate Piedmont College 96
Masters Georgia Southern university 98
Taught community college for 3 years
Returned to grad school for PhD at Georgia tech in 2001 earning doctorate in 2006
Faculty position at Texas a and m Corpus Christi 2006-2018 before joining Dauphin island
Married to sandy Smee 21 years, two children Joseph 14 and Lily 8. Eagle Scout and Assistant scoutmaster troop 292 in Mobile. Rotary member downtown Corpus Christi club 2011-2018 Paul Harris Fellow

Meg McCrummen Fowler is director of the History Museum of Mobile. She is also a doctoral candidate at Tulane University, completing a PhD in Art History & Society. Meg came to the Museum from the University of South Alabama, where she served as a Visiting Scholar in the Center for the Study of War and Memory and as an instructor in Department of Art and Art History. She holds a BA in History and French from The University of Alabama and an MA in History of Art from Tulane University. Her museum experience includes a fellowship in 2018 at the Musée d’Orsay in Paris. Meg grew up in Mobile and now lives in midtown with her husband, James.

Mayor William “Sandy” Stimpson Biography
Sandy’s mission is for Mobile to become the safest, most business and family friendly City in America by 2020. His visionary goal to unite the City, known as One Mobile, has empowered every Mobilian to have a voice. He was first elected in 2013. During his first term, he worked hard to address issues of public safety, fiscal responsibility, downtown revitalization, and blight eradication. He was reelected by a landslide in 2017.
Sandy’s civic and business endeavors, both locally and statewide, have been numerous and varied. He has served on the boards of the Boys & Girls Club of Southwest Alabama; the Mobile Area Chamber of Commerce; the Alabama Policy Institute; and the Business Council of Alabama; the University of Alabama President’s Cabinet; and the University of South Alabama’s Board of Trustees. Sandy graduated from the University of Alabama in 1975 with a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering. He spent nearly forty years in the lumber manufacturing business. Sandy and his wife Jean have been married since 1975 and have four grown, married children and twelve grandchildren. They are longtime, active members of Ashland Place United Methodist Church.

Tonie Ann Coumanis Torrans
Tonie Ann served in the United States Peace Corps in Kingston, Jamaica where she helped set up a Social Work Department in the Bustamante Hospital for Children (the only children-specific hospital in the Caribbean)- 1989-1991
Tonie Ann worked as a Medical Social Worker for nearly 15 years at Providence Hospital before coming to Penelope House in March 2007
Tonie Ann received her Masters in Social Work at the University of Southern Mississippi and her undergraduate degree in Sociology with a Social Work Emphasis at the University of Southern Mississippi where she played Varsity Volleyball for four years and was a member of the Delta Delta Delta Sorority
Currently, Tonie Ann is the Executive Director of Penelope House, attends the Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church, and is a member of the Junior League of Mobile and NASW (National Association of Social Workers)
Tonie Ann is the proud mother of two sons: ages 15 and 13

Special Agent Steve Sorrells currently serves as the Senior Team Leader on the FBI’s Evidence Response Team in the Mobile Office. SA Sorrells has served as an agent for 20 years in New York and Mobile. SA Sorrells currently is a member of the FBI’s Adjunct Faculty teaching crime scene courses to local and state officers, other FBI agents, and police officers in foreign countries.
Rachel Byrd Bio – Rachel Byrd currently serves as the Assistant Special Agent in Charge (ASAC) for the FBI Office in Mobile. She has been with the FBI for 15 years. After initially being assigned to the Honolulu Division, she served in the FBI Laboratory before moving to serve as a Supervisory Special Resident Agent in the Jackson Division. ASAC Byrd returned to Mobile (her hometown) in October of 2017