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The Deering Estate Foundation’s executive director, Nina Zanella, and president, Liede DeValdivielso, recently announced the new slate of officers and welcomed four distinguished newly elected directors to the organization’s board of directors at the foundation’s annual meeting in January.
Fellow board members, trustees, community leaders and collaborating partners welcomed the new slate of officers and new members to join the board of directors in fulfilling the foundation’s mission to preserve and protect the Deering Estate’s education and research initiatives, cultural arts programming, environmental conservation efforts, and historic preservation.
The new slate of officers include: Liede DeValdivielso, president; Carole Wright, vice president; Matias Perez, treasurer; Barry Johnson, secretary; Becky Roper Matkov, past president, and Nancy Eggland, president of 100 Ladies of Deering.
The four new members of the 2021-22 board of directors are:
Suzanne Gottlieb Calleja is the associate head of school for Communications and Strategic Partnerships at Palmer Trinity School, an independent college preparatory school in Miami. She began at Palmer Trinity in 2005 as the school’s director of communications and community relations, where she initiated strategic brand building and strengthened relationships within the community as well as with the media.
Active in the community, Gottlieb Calleja is an amateur cellist and has played with the Alhambra Orchestra, a local chamber group. She is a board member of the Palmetto Bay Business Association; was a steering committee member of the 100 Ladies of Deering; is a member of Smith College Club of Miami, and was a board member at Temple Beth Am Religious School. She has also been a commissioner on the Council of Advancement and Support of Education (CASE) Marketing Commission.
Gottlieb Calleja holds a bachelor’s degree from Smith College and a master’s degree in Strategic Communications. She is fluent in French and Spanish. She and her husband, Jose, have one son.
Baldwyn English, is an External Affairs manager for Florida Power & Light in Miami-Dade County. His area of responsibility focuses on South Miami-Dade County from South Miami to Florida City. In this role, he represents FPL and is the primary contact for the company with local city and county elected officials, the business community and the nonprofit sector.
Baldwyn sits on the boards of the Miami-Dade Chamber of Commerce, ChamberSOUTH, South Dade Chamber of Commerce, Economic Development Council of South Miami-Dade, Deering Estate Foundation. In addition to these roles, Baldwyn is chair of the Miami Union Adventist Academy School Board, a local parochial school in North Miami.
Before entering the public sector, Baldwyn worked as an attorney at a leading law firm in Houston, TX. His practice focused on complex business litigation, toxic tort litigation and related oil and gas matters. While in Texas, Baldwyn was successful in both a prosecutorial role as well as defending his clients’ interests and aggressively pursuing judgment recovery. His undergraduate business degree was earned at Florida International University.
Baldwyn is married and has two children. He is happy to be back in South Florida where he grew up.
Jerrod Sharp is originally from Illinois, He now lives in Palmetto Bay with his husband, Geoff, and their son, Josh. As a high school student in the Midwest farm belt, Jerrod first learned of the Deering family and their invaluable contributions to agriculture and its industrialization. Over the years his interests in historical properties and conservation have led him around the world, only to return full-circle to the amalgamation of his Illinois roots with his Florida life by settling just across the street from The Deering Estate.
Jerrod pursued an interest in linguistics which eventually led him to work in the field of interpreting ± serving the Deaf and Hard of Hearing community as an American Sign Language interpreter in the greater Washington, DC, area; North Dakota, and northern Florida. He’s now a stay-at-home parent, spending lots of quality time with his family at Deering. Jerrod also enjoys traveling, collecting artwork, playing the piano, fishing and reading.
Charles Deering’s estate exhibits virtues which demand protection and preservation as hallmarks of south Florida heritage and our nation, as well as promotion to the general public as an historical and ecological gem not to be missed. Jerrod couldn’t be prouder to serve on the board of directors dedicated to this purpose.
Ashley Sodeman is a Realtor and Special Project manager for Grouper Financial Inc. Ashley became an advocate for and fan of the Deering Estate and the Deering Estate Foundation when she joined the foundation staff as an executive assistant in 2005 and remained an integral part of the foundation team until 2012. Ashely remains committed to the mission and vision of the Deering Estate Foundation through her annual volunteer efforts at the main gate of the Deering Seafood Festival, managing volunteers and ticket sales, and selling memberships.
The Deering Estate preserves the 1920s era Miami estate of Charles Deering, Chicago industrialist, early preservationist, environmentalist, art collector, philanthropist and first chairman of the International Harvester Company. The Deering Estate is a 21st Century house museum, cultural and ecological field station, and a national landmark listed on the National Register of Historic Places, owned by the State of Florida and managed by Miami-Dade County Parks, Recreation and Open Spaces Department. The Deering Estate is located at 16701 SW 72 Ave.
