Thank You Stephen for Exemplary Service

Publish Date: Tuesday April 15, 2025

Fife Coast and Countryside Trust have welcomed a new Chair, Jill Miller OBE.

Outgoing Chair, Stephen Carter OBE, formally resigned at our Board meeting on 21st March. His resignation followed 12 years of exemplary service leading the organisation’s governing body. This is the maximum term that can be served without a break by any Director of FCCT, as laid out in our Articles of Association.

Stephen had been involved with FCCT since the organisation was founded in 2002. His involvement included providing a short period of cover as the Chief Executive.

Leadership

Our CEO, Jeremy Harris, says: “Stephen’s leadership of the Board of Directors provided high-integrity oversight at a time when FCCT has undergone some significant shifts in our strategic direction. We have so much to thank him for.

“While Stephen has stepped down from the Board of Directors, we know he will remain active in all things countryside and Fife. We look forward to keeping regularly in touch – albeit outside of the boardroom.”

Among farewell gifts for Stephen was a poem that speaks to his contribution over the years.

If love for Fife were given a name
Care for beaches, paths, toilets would be called the same
And if there were a label for setting a tone
To grow organisations where no-one’s alone

What would interest in all staff be typically called
Or listening through full meetings while remaining enthralled
That high-value integrity, a diplomat’s trait
Of hearing all views with the patience to wait

If the instinct to listen and gather those views
Had got attached to it some name we could use
Some term we could call on to serve to describe
Small things that are noticed and not brushed aside

What is the word for giving up time
Consistently being there come rain or come shine?
At this moment he leaves us and goes from our midst
While this cannot be any full kind of list

I move we make sure we include in our charter
A section that names all above…. John Stephen Carter

Stephen is pictured (right) with Jeremy and Jill.