MW District Staff


Rev. Marla E. Brown	Rev. Kathy Brown	Rev. Kenneth Ladd	Beth Brice	Casey Smith
M. W. District Superintendant	Assistant to the District Superintendant	Assistant to the District Superintendant	Receptionist/Financial Administrative Assistant	Communications & Resource Development
Email	Email	Email	Email	Email

Rev. Marla Brown

On Monday, January 7^th, 2008, Rev. Marla Elifritz Brown was introduced to the Leadership Team as the new district superintendent beginning July 1, 2008. Rev. Brown served the Grace United Methodist Church in Dayton, Ohio. She comes to us with much experience in pastoral and district ministry.

Rev. Brown has served mostly in the Dayton area. Her appointments include ministry as a student associate in Englewood UMC while attending United Theological Seminary, associate pastor at Fairview UMC, the director of Church and Community Ministry for the Miami Valley Mission Society, lead pastor at Faith UMC and as previously stated, she is currently the senior pastor at Grace UMC. She has experience both as a staff member and the leader of a staff, and experience in smaller struggling congregations as well as strategic ministry in changing demographics in an urban church.

Rev. Brown’s Conference experience includes having served as a member of the Conference Board of Ordained Ministry, training as an Intentional Interim pastor, involvement in the Conference Urban Ministries Network and she currently serves on the Conference nominations committee and is the chairperson of the Hispanic Task Force for the Annual Conference.

Along with all of her vocational and professional experience, Rev. Brown is a very relational minister, has gifts in team building, and understands a variety of cultural contexts, including life in our rural areas.

Rev. Brown was raised on a farm south of Fletcher, Ohio. She is married to Len and she and her husband have six children, Tami, Stephen, David, Matthew, Alisha and Phillip and seven grandchildren, Robert, Hannah, Haley, Braden, Jenna, Evan and Tate. While she has spent her ministry in and around the Dayton area, her husband Len is a native of Toledo. Len’s family was one of the founding families of Church of the Cross UMC on Cass Avenue. He remembers fondly the caravan from Broadway to the Cass Avenue site many years ago.

We welcome Rev. Marla Brown and her husband, Len to the Maumee Watershed District and give thanks for her ministry among us.

In ministry with you,

Bishop Bruce R. Ough

Rev. Rae Lynn Schleif

Education:

BA in Political Science from Wright State University

Masters in Business Administration from Wright State University

Masters of Divinity from United Theological Seminary

Ordained Elder in the United Methodist Church, West Ohio Conference

Previous Appointment:

Englewood United Methodist Church, June, 1984- June, 1986

Fairview United Methodist Church, June, 1986- Dec., 1994

Director of Church and Community Ministries, Miami Valley United Methodist Mission Society, Dayton North and Dayton South Districts, Jan., 1995 – June, 2004

Senior Pastor, Grace United Methodist Church, Dayton, OH, July, 2004 - July, 2008

Rev. Kathy M. Brown

On Sunday, February 27, 2011, Bishop Ough's appointment of Rev. Kathleen M. Brown as the Assistant to the Superintendent, Rev. Marla E. Brown, was announced. This appointment is effective July 1, 2011. Rev. Kathy Brown has served as the Senior Pastor of Belmont United Methodist Church in Dayton since July 1, 2006. Kathy holds a BA degree from Otterbein University and a M.Div from The Methodist Theological School in Ohio. A native of Columbus, Kathy was ordained elder in the West Ohio Conference, in 1995. She has also served as an Associate Pastor of Reynoldsburg UMC from 1993-2000 and Senior Pastor of Concord UMC, Englewood from 2000-2006.

Each pastoral context has afforded Kathy the opportunity to use her administrative, pastoral and community ministry skills. Kathy also comes to the serve the district with a specific experience and gifts in leadership development as a teacher and trainer. She has served on the West Ohio Conference Board of Ministry for several years; serving as the Chair of the Board of Ministry since 2008. Kathy and her husband, Charlie, are the parents of three growth children, Sherri, Amy (an ordained elder of the West Ohio Conference), and David. They are also the grandparents of Chase, Joshua, David, Mary and Lucy. Kathy and Charlie will be moving to the Maumee Watershed District in late June.

Words of welcome and congratulations can be offered to Kathy at kbrown@bumcdayton.org