Board members
Cathajane Rieger serves as president of the board of directors and serves on the board’s Building Committee and Tenant Relations Committee. Growing up in St. Louis, she has been involved with Cornerstone Corporation since an early age. In elementary school she helped with rehabbing a Cornerstone building. After graduating from the University of Missouri-Columbia with a degree in plant science, she returned to St. Louis and excitedly joined the Cornerstone board of directors in 1999. She also was a tenant of Cornerstone from 2000 to 2003. From 2006 to the present she has served faithfully as the president of the board of directors. Currently she is a homeschooling stay-at-home mom with 2 children, freelance landscaper, and church janitor.
Phyllis Wheeler has been a member of the board since 1999. She is a member of the Communications Committee and the Governance Committee, and also serves as the board’s webmaster. Phyllis is a pre-published fiction writer and a writer-publisher of homeschool curriculum, as well as a deacon at her church, Grace and Peace Fellowship. She has an English bachelor’s degree from Smith College and a mechanical engineering bachelor’s degree from Washington University, and worked as both a newspaper reporter and a mechanical engineer. She belongs to the board because she is interested in mercy ministry.
Dana M. Malkus, J.D., has served on the board since 2002 and chairs the Building Committee and the Governance Committee. She is an attorney and assistant clinical professor at St. Louis University School of Law where her duties include supervising students in the Community & Economic Development Clinic and teaching a transactional drafting course. Prior to her current position, she was an associate at Lewis, Rice & Fingersh in St. Louis where she focused her practice in the areas of commercial real estate and general business law. Before beginning her private practice at Lewis Rice, she served as a law clerk for the Honorable E. Richard Webber in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri. She serves at Cornerstone because she believes a safe and affordable place to live is foundational to most other aspects of life. And, we all are responsible for caring for our neighbors. Cornerstone is one way she does that.
Jon Easterling is the treasurer for Cornerstone Corporation and has served on the board since 2004. Jon is a loan review specialist with Cummings, Ristau & Associates P.C., graduated from Wheaton College with a B.A. in business/economics, and is a deacon and member of South City Church PCA. Jon joined the board to use his finance and business skills to help Cornerstone in its goal of helping meet the physical needs of the working poor, specifically in providing safe and affordable housing.
Beth Dodson, Ph.D., has served on the board of directors of Cornerstone Corporation since 2005. She belongs to the Communications Committee of the board. She is research assistant professor of public health at Washington University in St. Louis where she conducts research about obesity and cancer prevention. Dr. Dodson received her PhD and MPH from Saint Louis University School of Public Health, where she focused her studies on behavioral science and epidemiology. Prior to beginning her public health training, she pursued a graduate certificate in counseling. She is passionate about renewing and reviving the City of St. Louis and enjoys being a part of Cornerstone because of its commitment to care for the tenants it serves.
Jim Lowe, Ph.D., has served since 2010. He serves as board secretary and is also the editor of Cornerstone’s quarterly newsletter, serving on the board’s Communications Committee. Jim is a member at Old Orchard Church, which has long supported the ministry. For more than 20 years, Jim has been on faculty at John Burroughs School, a college prep private high school. He holds the Johnston Endowed Chair of Classics and acts as a college counselor. He has both an M.A. and Ph.D. in classical languages and literature from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, as well as a B.A. in classics-English and classics-philosophy from Colby College in Maine. Jim joined the board because Cornerstone seemed to be a worthy enterprise in which he hopes his own skill set will prove useful.
Executive Director Josh Dodson joined Cornerstone in 2010. He lives in the community within which Cornerstone Corporation operates. He holds a B.A. in history from Oklahoma State University and an M.A. in Religion and Culture from Covenant Theological Seminary. Josh is a member of New City Fellowship and a deacon in training. Josh joined Cornerstone because of his interest in Cornerstone’s vision to “repair broken walls and restore streets with dwellings,” alongside Cornerstone’s desire to care for those we serve and help provide for those in a difficult time.
