A Greenville man with more than 14 years of experience in senior living management has been selected as president of South Carolina Baptist Ministries for the Aging.
Tom Turner, right, newly elected president of SCBMA, receives congratulations from board chairman Herbert Adams, left, a member of First Baptist Church in Laurens, and acting president Kirby Winstead.Tom Turner, who for nearly two years has served in a multi-site role as an associate area manager for Sunrise Senior Living Services in Greenville, received a unanimous endorsement at a called meeting of SCBMA’s board of trustees on March 20 at South Carolina Baptist Convention Center in Columbia.
Turner will succeed Richard McLawhorn, who held the position for three years before accepting the pastorate of Garden City Baptist Church in Murrells Inlet. He is expected to assume his new duties by May 1.
Kirby Winstead, a former associational director of missions and chairman of trustees, has served for the past eight months as acting president of Ministries for the Aging, which operates the Bethea Retirement Center in Darlington and the Martha Franks Retirement Community in Laurens with a total of approximately 350 residents.
Mike Mills, pastor of Calvary Baptist Church in Florence, chaired the presidential search committee for the 25-member SCBMA board.
Turner, in a statement submitted to the presidential search committee prior to his election, said he is “passionate about health care” and that “quality of care is of the utmost priority.”
He spoke of his “desire to serve Christ and glorify him” and added, “Although I have never been in the ministry, I have always lived my life with the knowledge that my talents are to be used for his gain” whether in “a secular or ministry position.”
His pastor, Frank Page of First Baptist Church in Taylors, recommended the new SCBMA president by saying that “his faith is vibrant and his competency in the field of ministry to the aging is solid.”
Turner is a 1992 graduate of Winthrop University, where he earned a bachelor of science degree in business administration with a concentration in health administration.
The Turner familyIn his current position, he has been in charge of operation oversight for seven senior living communities in South Carolina. Previously, he was an executive director and administrator in three “skilled nursing neighborhoods” and two “assisted living with Alzheimer’s care centers.”
Turner’s wife, Mary Anise, is the daughter of International Mission Board missionaries who were assigned to Korea, where she grew up. The Turners have two children, Kate Elisee, 5, and Paul, 2.