LACDC reelects officers, adds two new board members

The Los Alamos Commerce and Development Corporation kept its leadership largely steady Monday while adding two new voices to a board that helps steer downtown vitality, business recruitment and small-business support in Los Alamos County. Meeting at the Small Business Center at 190 Central Park Square, the organization re-elected Carol A. Clark as chair, Craig Wehner as vice chair, David Cremer as secretary, Ryan Tatro as treasurer and Denise Derkacs as member at large.

The board also elected Curtis Christensen and George Marsden as new members. Christensen is senior vice president for West Operations at TechSource Inc., while Marsden serves as operations manager for The Family YMCA. Their addition broadens a roster that already includes representatives from UNM-LA, the New Mexico Consortium, a local bistro owner, a magistrate court judge and a Los Alamos National Laboratory representative, reinforcing the cross-sector model behind much of the county’s economic work.

The transition matters because LACDC is more than a boardroom name. Founded in 1983, the private nonprofit says its mission is strengthening the Los Alamos and White Rock business community, with a vision centered on a community that is collaborative, resilient, diverse, financially healthy and economically attractive. Bill Wadt and Karen Easton will step off the board at the end of the month, leaving the organization with a leadership lineup that will shape how aggressively it pursues downtown activity, commercial recruitment and support for local employers over the next year.

That charge runs through LACDC’s main programs. Los Alamos MainStreet and Creative District is a Main Street America accredited program that uses the Four-Point Approach of organization, promotion, design and economic restructuring. LACDC ties that work to downtown events, redevelopment and preservation-based economic development, a particularly important mission in a community whose commercial core grew out of the World War II-era secret city. The corporation also runs the Los Alamos Chamber of Commerce and Discover Los Alamos, while managing the Los Alamos Research Park and projectY cowork Los Alamos.

LACDC’s June 2026 board roster lists 13 members, including Clark, Wehner, Easton, Wadt, Cremer, Melissa Paternoster, John Engen, Tatro, Mike Holtzclaw, Shannon CdeBaca, Elizabeth Allen, Derkacs and Melissa Fox. With Lauren McDaniel serving as executive director, the board now enters a year when local businesses will be watching for measurable results: more downtown foot traffic, stronger support for entrepreneurs, and a broader mix of employers and services feeding the county’s economy.