James "Jim" Bowen has declared his candidacy for the Wood County Central Hospital Board. Bowen was raised in Post in the West Texas Panhandle and has been a Wood County resident since 2003. He was educated at Dallas Baptist University and served a tour in the United States Navy aboard the U.S.S. Springfield, the sixth fleet flagship in the Mediterranean and Middle East.

Bowen has 45 years experience in business management for multi-national insurance companies in Dallas. After retiring to Wood County, Bowen and his wife, Golda, were part of a group which organized and created the Forever Young Activity Center (FYAC). He was the first vicepresident of and assisted in the acquisition of the old Radio Shack and the 10-acre tract west of the Wood County Justice Center which was gifted to FYAC for future development.

Currently, Bowen serves as an adult Sunday school teacher, deacon chairman and volunteer worship leader at Faith Baptist Church in Quitman. He has been a substitute teacher at Quitman Junior High and Quitman High School since 2009.

"If elected, my desire is to increase and encourage more young people in health career fields and entice them to seek careers in Wood County," Bowen said.

Bowen has served on various boards and commissions during his business career in Dallas. He was on the Dallas ISD Tri-Ethnic Commit- tee, which was made up of community leaders and established to assist the troubled Dallas schools in finding solutions to the race issues in the district. The committee developed partnerships between local businesses in the neighborhoods of the district.

He served on the North Dallas Chamber of Commerce Board and was the president of the Lions Sight and Tissue Foundation which started the tissue transplant center at Parkland Hospital and furnished 1,500 pairs of eyeglasses a year to disadvantaged children and adults in the Dallas County area.