Dallas, TX -- Belo Corp. (NYSE: BLC) announced today that its Board of Directors has elected M. Anne Szostak a director of the Company effective October 1, 2004. Her election increases the size of the Board to 14 directors.
Szostak, 54, of Providence, Rhode Island, retired in June 2004 after a distinguished 31-year career with FleetBoston Financial, the seventh-largest bank in the United States. From February 1998 until her retirement, she served as the company's executive vice president and corporate director of human resources and diversity. In this role, she directed a staff supporting 50,000 employees and managed a $3.9 billion salary and benefits budget. Szostak also served on Fleet's Executive Management Committee and, from 2001 to 2003, as chair and chief executive officer of Fleet Bank-Rhode Island.
"Under Anne's leadership, Fleet has been widely recognized for its commitment to employees, talent development, and a diverse workforce," said J. McDonald Williams, Belo's Lead Director and chairman of the Board's Executive Committee. "Belo shares this commitment and we will benefit from Anne's insights in this and all areas of Belo's business."
As a Class I director, Szostak's term will expire at Belo's Annual Meeting of Shareholders on May 10, 2005, when she will be eligible for reelection by shareholders. Stephen Hamblett, former chairman, publisher and chief executive officer of The Providence Journal Company, will retire from the Belo Board at that meeting.
Szostak is a governor and chair-elect of the Boys & Girls Clubs of America; a trustee of Women & Infants Hospital and the Institute for Contemporary Art in Providence, Rhode Island; a member of the Rhode Island Board of Governors for Higher Education; and has served on the President's Glass Ceiling Commission. She is trustee emeritus of Colby College in Waterville, Maine, where she earned a bachelor of arts in sociology in 1972. Szostak lives in Providence with her husband, Michael, and two daughters.
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