Meet the President and CEO
About Us | Meet the President and CEO| Meet the Board of Directors | Donors | Links
Ralph S. "Buddy" Palmer
Buddy Palmer joined the Cultural Alliance of Greater Birmingham as President and CEO on September 2, 2008. Previously, Palmer served as the executive director of the Acadiana Arts Council in Lafayette, Louisiana, from January 1995 to January 2008. In that capacity, he was responsible for budget and financial administration, personnel, community relations, long-range organizational planning, program development, grant writing, board development and oversight of program implementation. Over the course of his thirteen year tenure, Palmer increased the Council budget from $240,000 to $1.2 million and grew staff size from three to eleven employees. Acadiana Arts Council services to its eight-parish region include grant programs, arts-in-education for grades k-12, management of a community arts center, an artists-in-parks summer program, a research and development partnership with the Lafayette Economic Development Authority, public art projects, and numerous partnerships with human service agencies providing programs to underserved populations.
Palmer went to Lafayette from his hometown of Selma, Alabama, where he served for four years as the executive director of the Selma/Dallas County Arts Council. Among the programs he designed during his tenure in Selma were a community performance series, children’s theatre series, summer arts camp, an award-winning festival and numerous arts-in-education projects. In 1994, a community project created by Palmer received national recognition and was the subject of an Alabama Public Television documentary.
Palmer has served as a consultant to arts and community-based organizations for the Louisiana Division of the Arts, Mississippi Arts Commission and Alabama State Arts Council. He has presented at conferences throughout the southeast on topics such as arts and tourism partnerships, cultural planning, arts and racial healing, and artist-community partnerships.
As a community volunteer, Palmer has served Downtown Lafayette Unlimited, the Junior League of Lafayette and Leadership Lafayette. Palmer is a graduate of Tulane University and has received post-graduate training at the Southeastern Institute for Education in the Arts.
