James May

The Elizabeth Stone House (ESH) of Roxbury recently announced that Milton, Mass., resident James (Jim) May has been promoted to director of development.

The ESH is a family shelter and community support center for families who are survivors of domestic violence, substance abuse, mental health issues and homelessness.

 In his new role, May is responsible for helping the ESH achieve its development goals through various fundraising and relationship building initiatives. This includes managing special events, cultivating individual and corporate donors, foundation sponsors and associations and researching and developing potential and current benefactors.  In addition, he will manage direct mail and annual campaigns, and web and e-mail based fundraising. This includes fundraising for Wilderness Heals, the ESH’s annual pledge hike.

“Jim came to the Elizabeth Stone House out of retirement in 2005 to help with an application for HUD funds to support the transitional housing program,” said Nancy Owens Hess, executive director of the ESH. “His success for that project led to assignment of another, and another, which led us to the obvious decision to appoint him as our director of development.”

Prior to joining the ESH, Jim worked in small businesses most of his life, and was a founding partner in the business in which he retired. May also served for nine years on the board of directors of the Milton Foundation for Education, for which he chaired the grants committee for five years and co-chaired the Celebration for Education, the foundation’s primary annual fundraiser.