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HomeBoard of Directors

The League of Women Voters of Wake County
2025 - 2026 Board of Directors


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Gaye Williams
President

Gaye Williams (she/her) is a child of the South. Originally from South Carolina, she grew up in South Florida, attended college and graduate school in Louisiana and Texas, and had a long career in Atlanta with a brief stint in Fort Worth before landing in North Carolina where she has deep family ties. Moving to Apex in 2013, Gaye joined LWV-Wake in 2020, looking for an opportunity for deeper community involvement. She has been a Voter Services volunteer and part of the LWV-Wake Vote411.org team. A self-described Redistricting geek, in 2024, Gaye began serving as the Redistricting Liaison for LWVNC. She also served as co-lead for the League's statewide Citizen Initiative Study Team, whose work resulted in a new position on Citizen Initiative being adopted in 2025 by the LWVNC.

Gaye’s graduate education and professional career was anchored in Human Resources, primarily for high tech and professional services companies. Before retiring from Cisco Systems, Inc in 2023, she led the People & Communities (HR) team focused on global mergers & acquisitions for Cisco Systems, Inc.

In addition to volunteering with the LWV, Gaye’s community involvement includes working as an Election Official, serving on the Multimodal Transportation Advisory Board for the town of Apex, and deploying in October 2024 as a Red Cross volunteer to assist with the support of Western North Carolina communities impacted by Hurricane Helene.

Sandra Birckhead

Treasurer/Finance

Sandra Birckhead is an Organizational Change Coach specializing in enabling leaders to transform their business through process improvement and culture change.

Sandra is an expert in lean management systems, in team effectiveness and in the change-management process. She has led transformation projects in manufacturing, laboratory environments, and sales and marketing.

She is an experienced facilitator and trainer, preparing organizations to implement lean six sigma and other change initiatives.  Sandra’s work experience spans a broad range including strategic planning, supply chain, project management, and process improvement implementation.

Sandra has also worked with non-profits facilitating strategic plans, conducting focus groups, and training leaders. She is currently assessing and mentoring new workshop moderators for Braver Angels.

Sandra has BA from UNC-Greensboro and an MBA from the University of North Carolina. She is certified by the American Society for Quality as a Lean Six Sigma Black Belt and by the International Coach Federation as an executive coach.
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Kristen Howard

Secretary


Kristen studied History of Science and Biology in college, and she returned to those roots last year by completing the Wake County Extension Master Gardener program. 


After college she became a COBOL programmer in New York with Equitable Life and when PCs came out, she switched over and became a financial analyst. While there she completed her MBA in Finance at NYU in the evenings. After 12 years, she left Equitable Life to raise her three children and teach computers at her local colleges in CT. 


During that time, Kristin started her own computer training service, Granite Micro, specializing in private one-hour lessons, and supported TCI, a consulting company doing benchmarking studies in the life insurance industry. When TCI sold their company, Kristen tagged along and became an employee of Deloitte Consulting.


For the last 14 years of her career, she benchmarked back-office expenses across industries and managed a data analytics team based in Atlanta and Hyderabad. There were other side ventures along the way like writing an Heirloom Gardening newsletter, becoming an Associate Professor at Norwalk Community Technical College, and owning a metaphysical bookstore.


During the pandemic she joined the Wake County League of Women Voters and started studying art via zoom.


Family, the league, art, and gardening are now her primary concerns.

Suzanne Botts
Development Chair

Suzanne originally joined the League of Women Voters in Auburn, Alabama in 1970. Born and raised in Troy, Alabama, she attended Auburn University earning a B.S. in Zoology, M.S. in Wildlife Biology and Game Management. Suzanne taught science and biology in middle and high school and worked in Fisheries at Auburn University as a Research Associate before returning to study to be a veterinarian (D.V.M.) This education path continued in a Pathology Residency, followed by a PhD in Veterinary Pathology and Virology at Cornell University. She is also diplomate of the American College of Veterinary Pathology.

Suzanne's long career began as a Veterinary Pathologist at Experimental Pathology Laboratories, Inc. She led peer review for studies conducted for the National Toxicology Program and its Archive, and comparative pathology for studies with the Department of Defense. She also approved medical devices at Becton-Dickinson, led drug safety development and evaluation of human and animal medicines at Pfizer, human medicine at GlaxoSmithKline, Hoffman LaRoche, and served as Head of Pathology at Vertex Pharmaceuticals.

Retiring in 2015, Suzanne returned to Raleigh and became active in her church, RotaryClub, joined the Wake County League of Women Voters in 2017 and Wake Master Gardeners (2018). Suzanne is a strong advocate of the non-partisan work of the League and is currently serving as our Development Chair for Wake County. 

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Liz Simon

At-Large Board Member and Co-Chair Affordable Housing Committee
Liz joined the League of Women Voters of Wake County in March 2022. She co-chairs the Affordable Housing Committee and has served the League by volunteering with the Women’s Equality Day events and registering voters at USCIS’ swearing-in ceremonies.
She retired in 2020 after 32 years working in the Graphics Division at SAS Institute, Inc. in Cary. In addition to her Computer Science profession, Liz is a certified ESL (English as a Second Language) and teaches ESL classes through Wake Tech.

For many years, Liz was very active with the Toastmasters International organization, where she achieved the DTM (Distinguished Toastmaster) award and served in various leadership roles from the Club to State levels. Liz has volunteered extensively with the International Focus organization and various Student International Exchange programs.

Liz is married to Gary Bryant and between them have 3 daughters, 1 son, and 9 grandchildren. Liz enjoys family events, reading, traveling, and fun times with her book club. We're excited that Liz is now serving as a member of the LWV-Wake Board of Directors.

Johanne Christensen
Co-Chair Voter Services 

Johanne joined LWV-Wake in 2021. She is currently a co-chair (2024-2026) of the Voter Services Committee where she works on the League's outreach efforts to voters in Wake County.

Johanne has a BA in English/Creative Writing from the University of Houston and received her PhD in Computer Science from NC State. She brings her user experience background to her passion for voter's rights advocacy.

Outside of the League, she enjoys writing and fiber arts.

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Robin Hammond

At-Large Member and Affordable Housing Committee Co-Chair


Robin Hammond is a North Carolina native, born and raised in Wilson. She has been a Raleigh/Wake County resident since 1983. She attended the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, and is a graduate of East Carolina University and the School of Law at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Robin is retired from the practice of law where she worked in state government and private practice as a judicial clerk at the NC Court of Appeals, in mortgage banking, administrative law, residential and commercial real estate, zoning and land use, natural resource protection, local government law and public finance. She holds a certificate in municipal administration from the UNC School of Government.

We're thrilled to have Robin's experience added to the Board of Directors for LWV-Wake.