{"id":114558,"date":"2026-01-12T01:18:19","date_gmt":"2026-01-12T01:18:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/114558\/"},"modified":"2026-01-12T01:18:19","modified_gmt":"2026-01-12T01:18:19","slug":"gov-desantis-names-an-appointment-and-reappointment-to-the-uwf-board-of-trustees","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/114558\/","title":{"rendered":"Gov. DeSantis names an appointment and reappointment to the UWF Board of Trustees"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The appointment, Kevin Mason, is an alumnus of University of West Florida.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The University of West Florida (<a href=\"https:\/\/uwf.edu\/\" data-wpel-link=\"external\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"external noopener noreferrer nofollow\">UWF<\/a>) Board of Trustees is welcoming a new member and returning another to the panel for continued service.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Gov. Ron DeSantis announced this month that he\u2019s appointed Kevin Mason to the panel that oversees policy for UWF. DeSantis also reappointed Paul Bailey to the <a href=\"https:\/\/uwf.edu\/offices\/board-of-trustees\/board-of-trustees\/the-trustees\/\" data-wpel-link=\"external\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"external noopener noreferrer nofollow\">Board of Trustees<\/a> for the campus located in Florida\u2019s Panhandle.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Mason is an alumnus of UWF, where he earned his bachelor\u2019s degree in business administration and management. Mason is also steeped in business.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Mason is the CEO and Co-Founder of <a href=\"https:\/\/acentria.com\/\" data-wpel-link=\"external\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"external noopener noreferrer nofollow\">Acentria Insurance<\/a>, based in Destin. The company now has offices and services throughout the Southeast United States and has grown to about 50 locations. Mason was also a Producer and Managing Partner of the North Florida Operations for the Insurance Office of America.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Bailey will return to the Board following the reappointment. Bailey is a lawyer for <a href=\"https:\/\/www.weltonlawfirm.com\/\" data-wpel-link=\"external\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"external noopener noreferrer nofollow\">Welton Law Firm<\/a>. Welton is based in Crestview and provides a range of legal services.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.mhdfirm.com\/\" data-wpel-link=\"external\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"external noopener noreferrer nofollow\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/20-MHD-Florida-Politics-V1_1-728x90-1.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"728\" height=\"90\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-316235\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Bailey is also a registered firearms instructor with the <a href=\"https:\/\/home.nra.org\/\" data-wpel-link=\"external\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"external noopener noreferrer nofollow\">National Rifle Association<\/a>. He\u2019s also an Adjunct Professor at <a href=\"https:\/\/www.pcci.edu\/\" data-wpel-link=\"external\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"external noopener noreferrer nofollow\">Pensacola Christian College<\/a>. Bailey earned his pre-law bachelor\u2019s degree from that school and later earned his law degree from Regent University.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The UWF Board of Trustees comprises 13 members. The Board is the governing body for the institution. Florida\u2019s Governor appoints six of those members while the Board itself votes on appointments for the other five members.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The President of the Faculty Senate occupies one of those seats, while the President of the Student Government Association holds another.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The UWF campus had nearly 16,000 students enrolled as of the Fall Semester.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The appointments and reappointments named by DeSantis still require final approval from the Florida Senate.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/states.aarp.org\/florida\/looking-for-a-volunteer-gig-check-us-out\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener external noreferrer nofollow\" data-wpel-link=\"external\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-772854 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/2291001_Vol_FL_Recruitment_DigitalAds_728x90.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"728\" height=\"90\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The appointment, Kevin Mason, is an alumnus of University of West Florida. The University of West Florida (UWF)&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":114559,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[58003,6876,28,30,29,58004,10952,58005,58006,412,2564,58007,58008],"class_list":["post-114558","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-acentria-insurance","tag-board-of-trustees","tag-florida","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-news","tag-kevin-mason","tag-national-rifle-association","tag-paul-bailey","tag-pensacola-christian-college","tag-ron-desantis","tag-university-of-west-florida","tag-uwf","tag-welton-law-firm"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114558","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=114558"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114558\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/114559"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=114558"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=114558"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=114558"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}