Jake Peters, a member of The Community School's board of directors and founder of Leroy's Ice Cream, will be Ketchum's representative on a recently created marketing board, now formally called Sun Valley Resort Area Marketing Inc.
The board is being created to take over marketing of the resort area from the Sun Valley-Ketchum Chamber & Visitors Bureau. The Ketchum City Council unanimously approved, with no debate, Mayor Randy Hall's nomination of Peters at a special meeting Tuesday. Councilwoman Nina Jonas abstained from voting since she hadn't seen Peters' résumé due to her e-mail not working.
Hall said former Councilman Charles Conn recommended Peters. Peters earned a bachelor's degree in finance from the University of Washington in 1984 and a master's in business from the International Institute for Management Development in Lausanne, Switzerland, in 1989.
His career started as an investment banker from 1990 to 2000. He was at Credit Suisse First Boston until 1996, working as a capital-markets officer focused on technology, health care and utilities. He then went to Deutsche Bank, acting as managing director and head of East Coast technology-investment banking until 1998. Peters then returned to Credit Suisse in an identical position.
After 2000, Peters founded Swoop Technology, securing $20 million in funding for a public transportation concept to be used on Interstate 805 in San Diego County, Calif. The concept involves a narrow shoulder lane dedicated to transit buses outfitted with lane-keeping sensors. Peters said he worked extensively with government officials to promote the idea.
The marketing board is to be comprised of five members, each posting a résumé boasting resort and tourism marketing experience. Each city now has its representative. Sun Valley's is Jim Knight, and Sun Valley Resort General Manager Tim Silva is the third member, leaving two open positions.
Knight said at Tuesday's meeting that the plan for those two seats is to have the Ketchum business community offer a list of nominations. The board would then choose the fourth member. The fifth would be chosen at-large from the area.
The completed marketing board will hire and oversee a chief marketing officer in charge of two separate things: marketing operations and the visitors bureau. The bureau would still plan community events and handle visitor and customer services.
Trevon Milliard: tmilliard@mtexpress.com
Jake Peters
