Fourteen years ago, I saw a notice from Outpost looking for owners interested in running for the Board of Directors. I was intrigued. And then I did what I suspect a lot of people do when they encounter an invitation like that: I set it aside.

At the time, I was working in food and hunger advocacy. I care deeply about the role food plays in building healthy people and communities, and I had recently become an Outpost owner. Like many of you, I enjoy shopping at Outpost and having access to locally grown food, but I hadn't spent much time thinking about what it meant to actually be an owner of it.

I saw a few more signs, got a few more emails and eventually decided to run. I couldn't have known then how much that decision would shape me.

Serving on the board introduced me to people who would become professional colleagues and lifelong friends. It taught me about governance and finance, listening and consensus and the sometimes-complicated work of balancing mission and values with the realities of running a grocery business. More than anything, it taught me what it means to help steward a community institution.

Those lessons have followed me through nearly every leadership role I've held since, including my current role as President & General Manager of WUWM 89.7 FM - Milwaukee's NPR.

Last year at WUWM, we launched a civic awareness campaign called “Yours. Truly.” built around a simple idea: nobody owns WUWM, but the community that supports it.

I've been thinking about that idea ever since, and it has made me think about Outpost and my decision to return to the board last year.

We live in a world where so much of what shapes our lives can feel far away from us. The news we consume is often distributed through enormous national platforms. The food on our tables moves through long and complex supply chains. Many of the stores, media companies and institutions we rely on are ultimately shaped by decisions made somewhere else, by people we will never meet.

Outpost is different.

More than 24,000 of us collectively own this place; This gives us something increasingly unusual: a real voice in the future of an institution that serves our community.

That is what cooperative ownership means to me. It is not simply where you shop. It is the opportunity to help sustain something local, accountable and rooted in the people it serves.

Outpost’s Board of Directors is one of the places where that ownership becomes real. We help set the long-term direction of the cooperative, represent our fellow owners, support and oversee the CEO and help make sure Outpost remains both true to its values and strong enough to serve the next generation.

You don't need to be a governance expert or a grocery-industry veteran. I certainly wasn't when I first ran. We need thoughtful, curious people who are willing to listen, learn, ask good questions and take responsibility for something we hold in common.

Local institutions don't remain local, strong or accountable by accident. They remain that way because people decide they are worth participating in and sustaining.

If that idea means something to you, I hope you'll consider helping us steward what we own together.

You can learn more and apply to run for the Outpost Board of Directors here.

David Lee

Board Director & Nominations Committee Chair