Jennifer Winfree is the new Chairman of the DeKalb County Republican Party.
She succeeds Kennith Vanatta, who has served as Chairman for the last six years.
Members of the local GOP met Saturday morning at the courthouse to reorganize.
Winfree says she looks forward to serving the party as chairman for the next two years. “I am very grateful to the people of DeKalb County for electing me to this position. I’ve got some big shoes to fill. Kennith has been a wonderful chairman these last six years. I just hope that I’ll be able to live up to everyone’s expectations. I want to continue to keep DeKalb County Red. I also want to continue to try to get more women into our women’s club. I’m very proud of them. We’ve done a lot of work in the last six years and I want to expand on that. We eventually want to try and start a young republicans club here. I just want to get as many people involved as I can and adhere to the principles of the Republican party. I have been President of the DeKalb County Republican Women’s Club for the past two years and I will step down next month in order to take on the party chairman position. Pat Zorno will probably be our next (women’s club) president.”
Vanatta thanked the party for the privilege of having served as chairman. “I’d like to say how much I have appreciated your confidence over the past six years that I have had of being chairman. It’s been a real joy to me. We’ve had some hard spots but we’ve had some happy ones too. I’ve gotten to do a lot of things because of being chairman in this county that probably I wouldn’t have gotten to have done if I hadn’t been chairman. So for that purpose I’d like to say thank you so much. I promised that we would do all that we could, with your help, to pull this county together and we have realized a great deal of that. I promised to you that we would see more people that would be in our courthouse (Republican elected officials) and we have. I think at that time (six years ago) we had one county wide elected official. Now you can look around and see quite a few. So all in all, it’s been good. I guess we’ve done well.”
Other officers selected by the party are Vice Chairman- Jerry Childress, Secretary- Barbara Vandergriff, Treasurer-Dennis Stanley, Vice Treasurer- Bertha McBride, and Laura Chandler, Representative of the DeKalb County Republican Women’s Club.
George LeFevre was presented a plaque for his long time support and devotion to the party. The plaque, presented by former party chairman Vanatta, reads “In Honor of his years of commitment to the cause, the DeKalb County Republican Party presents George LeFevre with a Lifetime Achievement Award.”
Another Lifetime Achievement Award will be presented to Mary Oaks at the Lincoln Day Dinner in April. She was unable to attend Saturday’s meeting.
(Top Picture- Jennifer Winfree)
Middle Picture- left to right: Bertha McBride, Laura Chandler, Jennifer Winfree, Jerry Childress, Barbara Vandergriff, and Dennis Stanley)
Bottom Picture- George LeFevre and Kennith Vanatta)