LAKE PLACID — The Lake Placid Institute has recently elected Macie Huwiler and Emily Kilburn Politi to its board of directors.

“I am honored to welcome these two ladies to our board,” said board Chair Catherine McGraw. “They bring fresh ideas, enthusiasm and invaluable skills to our organization.”

Politi has had a career in the field of public administration. In recent years, she has served as citizen participation specialist at the state Department of Environmental Conservation, promoting sustainable outdoor recreation on state land. She has also served as housing trust administrator for the Adirondack Community Housing Trust, where she developed the first community land trust organization in the Adirondack Park and administered the New York Main Street Revitalization Grant for the AuSable Forks Main Street Program. She was recently elected to the North Elba Town Council and is a board member and vice chair of the Town of North Elba/Village of Lake Placid Joint Review Board. She is a Short-Term Rental Sub-Committee member of the North Elba/Lake Placid Community Development Commission, for which she has drafted suggested legislation for the regulation of short-term rental units. She also sits on the boards of the Housing Assistance Program of Essex County and the Adirondack Housing Development Corporation, a newly formed organization with a mission to provide affordable housing.

Huwiler comes to the Institute with 30 years of sales and nonprofit executive experience. For the past five years, she has served as development director for Lake Placid Center for the Arts, where she cultivated corporate sponsorships and individual donors. She sat on the board of directors of the American Theater Company for 18 years, including five terms as president. She is currently a board member of AdBookOnLine, a website designed to help nonprofits streamline the process of ad book fundraising. In 2010, she founded the Gala Consortium, a group of leaders from the city of Chicago who chair high-level fundraising events. Macie was also an account executive at CNN, where she sold multi-platform deals and TV-digital sponsorships. She had a 14-year career at CBS television network, where she moved up the ranks from manager of sales forecasting to account executive of network sales.

The Lake Placid Institute for the Arts & Humanities is a platform for artists and thinkers to present their work and share their ideas while providing residents, visitors and students the opportunity for cultural and intellectual enrichment. Programs include poetry, photography, and film competitions for students living or studying in the Adirondack region; the John C. Bogle Adirondack Roundtable lecture series; an annual chamber music seminar; and an art book group that meets monthly at the Lake Placid Public Library throughout the winter and spring.