CorneliusNews.net is an independent community news and information website serving the town of Cornelius, N.C. It’s part of a network of sites that includes DavidsonNews.net and is owned and operated by Davidson News LLC. We’re a combination of paid staff and volunteers – your neighbors.

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CorneliusNews.net
PO Box 953
231 South St.
Davidson, NC, 28036
704-896-0569.
editor@corneliusnews.net.

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Meet the staff 

David - Photo by Christopher Record

David Boraks, South Street (founder of Davidson News LLC and DavidsonNews.net editor) – David has been interviewing national and local politicians, entertainers and artists, corporate CEOs and regular folks for more than 30 years. His work has appeared in newspapers, magazines and on the radio in the U.S. and abroad. He holds a master of arts degree in liberal studies from Wesleyan University, Middletown, Conn., and a bachelor of arts degree in history from Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y. From 2001 to 2005, he covered the top U.S. banks for the daily American Banker in New York. In 2000, he was a senior correspondent for the online news service LocalBusiness.com. At The Charlotte Observer from 1993 to 2000, his duties included tech columnist, business writer and assistant features editor. Other gigs included editing jobs at The Hartford (Conn.) Courant and The China News in Taipei; Editor-in-chief of The Cambridge (Mass.) Chronicle, and editing and reporting for The Waterbury (Conn.) Republican. David has lived in Davidson since 1993 and, after a 2005-2006 sojourn in Taipei and Shanghai, now works as an independent writer, editor and photographer, and part-time reporter and announcer at Charlotte public radio station WFAE-FM. He is married to Shelley Rigger, the Brown Professor of East Asian Studies at Davidson College, and has two daughters, Emma and Tilly. Web: www.davidboraks.com

Christina

Christina Ritchie Rogers (CorneliusNews.net editor) – A workaholic, a community news junkie and an over-reader, Christina is, above all else, a storyteller. She enjoys using different media, like photographs, videos and graphics, to tell stories completely and creatively.

She holds a B.A. in English from Davidson College and an M.S. in Mass Communications from Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond. While at VCU, she specialized in Multimedia Journalism.

A New Jersey native, college brought this Yankee south. After graduating from Davidson, she lived in Huntersville for two years and taught in Charlotte, and then lived in Baltimore, Rockville, Md. and Charlottesville, Va. before happily returning “home” to N.C. to begin work as a local education reporter last year. Her husband and fellow Davidson alumnus, Nate Rogers, is a painter and teaches art at the college. They live in town with their sweet hound dog and a couple of cats that are, in all likelihood, plotting to take over the world.

Lyndsay

Lyndsay Kibiloski - (Chief Operating Officer) Develops and maintains site, including advertising, design, content posting and editing. Coordinates and creates advertising and all marketing collateral. Maintains ad inventory and oversees sales team – ads@corneliusnews.net. A native of Michigan, Lyndsay attended Central Michigan University, Western Michigan University and the Center for New Media in Kalamazoo. After changing her major more times than should be allowed, she decided Graphic Design was her calling and received her degree in 2007. Shortly after, she fled Michigan’s snows and headed toward Atlanta in search of sun and a job. She never made it there. North Carolina was sunny enough and it is here where she currently resides. Lyndsay joined the company in September 2008. On top of everything already mentioned she also manages the finances, helps plot business strategy and generally keeps David on his toes. Feel free to express your sympathies to her later. If you wish to view her outside work…and you should…please visit her website at www.dontspellmynamewrong.com.

Michelle

Michelle Marckwardt is CorneliusNews.net’s Pets page editor and columnist. She posts pets for adoption, pet and animal news and events, and photos. A native of Novi, Michigan, Michelle is a 1991 graduate of Michigan State University. She moved to North Carolina to get out of the cold and pursue her dream of working in the racing industry, which she has done since 1997. When she’s not traveling to NASCAR races to handle team communications and public relations or sitting in front of the TV watching NFL football, she spends her time cleaning up after and falling in love with the animals at the Cornelius Animal Shelter. Michelle lives in Huntersville with her grumpy cat Taylor.

Lee

Lee Dorsey, Marketing and ad sales. Lee is a Davidson College undergraduate, seeking a bachelor of arts degree in English, with an International Studies concentration. He was a founding member and director of marketing and community development at the national, non-profit organization Project Tomorrow in his hometown of Louisville, Kentucky. At Davidson College, he co-founded the Patterson Court Sustainability Council, a sustainability coalition composed of, and for, the Greek organizations on campus. Lee developed, marketed, and initiated a compostable cup project, effectively replacing all non-recyclable, non-compostable cups used at parties and events with a compostable option. He is currently the Patterson Court Sustainability Chair, the Sports Marketing Association Assistant Director of Marketing, and an active Chidsey Leadership Fellow at Davidson College. He joins the team with a strong belief in community involvement and will seek to strengthen the greater Davidson community within his new position.

Candy

Candy Gipe, Sales Team. Having started her sales career many years ago at the advent of technology (nothing was digital back in 1979! and there were few women in any sales jobs!) Candy’s selling experience has tracked along the growth of technology (she has sold products–phones: faxes, computers, wireless; software: vertical market applications, call accounting, sales force automation; and services: training, consulting, application development, call center applications, cloud computing applications). Throughout her long tenure of commissioned sales and sales management, she has kept a keen eye on the practical side of innovation. Technology is only good if it can help her clients achieve their goals: more customers, better workplace efficiencies, increased sales, increased profitability, increased customer satisfaction. She is proud to continue that sense of service and creativity in helping Corneliusnews.net advertisers achieve their goals, and move into the field of online, digital, daily advertising. In her free time, Candy enjoys sailing on Lake Norman or kayaking on beautiful Lake Davidson.

Kerry

Kerry Rasenberger, Sales Team. After graduating from Penn State, Kerry started her career as an assistant buyer for Saks 5th Avenue in NYC. Eventually, she found her true passion in business….Sales and Sales Management. She continued her career with Spring Industries as an acct exec and was recruited over to Moygashel to run their USA sales office. There she developed new Account Executives with a strong monitored training plan; includes product training and specifications, sales techniques, internal order process, customer satisfaction ( internal & external), and communication skills. When Kerry moved out of NYC, she continued her career with a Steelcase dealership in Sales Management. Kerry is excited about being part of the Corneliusnews.net team. She can’t wait to start building her clientele and developing strong relationship with them.

Carol

Carol Wilber Bradfield, Sales Team. Carol Wilber Bradfield is thrilled silly to be part of the advertising sales team for Corneliusnews.net. Raised on Lake Norman and a graduate of North Meck High, she has been allowed to live in Davidson since 1986 even though she has absolutely nothing to do with the college. After graduating from the University of South Carolina where she studied Journalism, Advertising and Marketing, Carol spent years selling and designing ads for The Weekly Newspapers and The Charlotte Observer’s Rock Hill and Hickory editions. Carol has also served as advertising manager for the Fort Mill Times and worked in radio in Atlanta. While raising her sons, Christopher and Jesse, she worked as Marketing Director for Wilber Associates architects in Cornelius. Now that the kids are grown, Carol enjoys paddling with the dragon boat team “Healing Dragons” on Lake Norman.

Thomas

Thomas Christy, Reporter. Thomas Christy is a recent graduate of Davidson College, where he received a B.A. in Russian Studies through the Center for Interdisciplinary Studies. A native of Concord, Thomas attended the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics for high school and has been an active member of the Davidson Fire Department for over three years. Thomas spent the summer of 2010 interning at the New York City Office of Emergency Management before deciding on a one-year deferment from a graduate program at The George Washington University. In the meantime, Thomas is attending paramedic school and serving as a captain on the Davidson Fire Department.

Debbie Barteldt

Debbie Barteldt, chief financial officer – Originally from South Florida and a graduate of Florida State University, Debbie has 20 years of accounting experience. She started her career in public accounting and over the course of her career has worked for a variety of industries including mortgage banking, clinical research, local government and architecture. Debbie lives in Davidson with her husband Bruce and their children, Elizabeth and Bruce III.

Liz Weindruch

Liz Weindruch, food columnist – Hailing from Little Rock, Arkansas, Liz Fleming Weindruch is a financial analyst by day and adventurous home cook by night. After realizing that ramen wouldn’t cut it when she graduated from Davidson College, she began experimenting in the kitchen ten years ago and hasn’t looked back. A true liberal arts graduate, she has spent her career working in politics, consulting, and most recently, financial services.

Jaletta Albright Desmond

Jaletta Albright Desmond has been writing a weekly column about faith, family, and cultural issues since 2002. It appears in various daily and weekly newspapers in OH, WV, KY and now DavidsonNews.net and CorneliusNews.net (on Fridays, under the title Life Happens). Desmond, a Cal State Fullerton grad, is a former broadcast journalist who left her native state of California for her career but stayed in the southeast for love. She and her husband, Boston native and Audiologist Alan Desmond, met in Bluefield, WV (didn’t everyone meet their mate there before eHarmony and Match.com?). They moved to Davidson more than four years ago with their daughters, Jocelyn and Julia. This “Modern Family” was made complete by the adoption of their resilient and beloved shelter dog, Luke, who substitutes as the goofy, adorable young son from the family’s favorite TV show.

Nick Hughes

Nick Hughes, a native of Australia, has achieved black belt status in multiple martial arts, taught unarmed combat in the French Foreign Legion, boxed professionally and now teaches Krav Maga, the unarmed combat system of the Israeli Defense Forces. He also owns Sinners and Saints Tattoos in Cornelius.

Over the last 40 years, has worked as a bouncer, a military police officer in the French Foreign Legion, and a bodyguard to the world’s rich and famous. He has written multiple articles on practical martial arts and recently published the book, How to be Your Own Bodyguard.

Chip Dawson

Chip Dawson – Antiquity resident Chip Dawson has worked in the safety industry for more than 60 years, serving for 20 years as a Navy Surface Warfare Officer and Commander, and later working as a safety engineer at Kodak Park in Rochester, N.Y. Before retiring in 1992, he managed the 125-person career fire department, the site security force, the 9-1-1 center and the safety staff, and was the site emergency manager. He continues to consult on workplace safety and emergency management for the regional chamber of commerce in Rochester.

It was snow that brought Chip and wife Shirley to Cornelius for the winter. Their home in Antiquity sees little of the 100 plus inches common in the Western New York snow belts. He writes for regional and national safety publications, and recently joined the CorneliusNews.net team as a columnist. Chip will write about all things safety—public safety, occupational safety, fire protection, disaster management, home safety, recreational safety—as well community planning and other topics of interest to him and our readers.

Bill Giduz, Hillside Drive – Davidson’s unofficial town photographer and head juggler, Bill contributes occasional photographs to CorneliusNews.net. He is also the director of college communications at Davidson College.

Other contributors: Michele Miller-Houck, Alex Gregor, Shelley Rigger, Rodney Graham, Gordon Clark.

CorneliusNews.net in the news

Nov. 8, 2011, CJR.org, Columbia Journalism Review, “Have You Seen Fido? Community news sites reunite pets with their owners.”

May 19, 2011, CorneliusNews.net, “Chamber names small business of the year, honors 2 others” – Davidson News LLC – parent of DavidsonNews.net and CorneliusNews.net, received one of two Honorable Mentions in the Lake Norman Chamber 2011 Small Business of the Year Awards.

May 6, 2011, CorneliusNews.net, “Partnership links Cornelius, Davidson sites with WFAE-FM.”

March 15, 2011, WFAE-FM, “Local news site expands, reflects national trend.”

March 14, 2011, DavidsonNews.net, “Announcing CorneliusNews.net”

(See also news and research mentioning DavidsonNews.net on our DavidsonNews.net “About” page.)