Kim Blair has been appointed by City Council to the City of Salem’s seven-person Economic Development Authority. She replaces longtime member Dave Robbins, who stepped down at the end of July. Robbins has been a faithful and valued board member since his appointment on February 11, 2013. Blair will finish the remainder of his current term that runs through March 9, 2028.
Blair currently serves as the Senior Director of Principal Gifts and Strategic Initiatives for the Carilion Clinic Foundation. She and her family have been valuable members of the Salem Community since the early 1990s.
Kim previously served as vice-president for resource development at Roanoke College, her alma mater. Before that, she was the assistant vice president of advancement for the Roanoke area at Virginia Tech, where she led advancement teams tasked with securing private philanthropic funding for the Virginia Tech Carilion-Health, Science & Technology Campus in the Roanoke Innovation Corridor.
Before assuming her expanded role in Roanoke, Blair served as a senior principal gifts officer within the university’s Advancement Division since 2015. In this role she helped secure multimillion dollar gifts supporting the Department of Mechanical Engineering, the Program in Real Estate, the Corps of Cadets, and the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.
Prior to rejoining Virginia Tech in 2015, Kim served as the Vice President of Institutional Advancement at Ferrum College where she launched and completed the most successful campaign in Ferrum’s history while celebrating the 100th anniversary of the institution.
She joined Ferrum after her first stint at Virginia Tech. She was the chief advancement officer for the College of Architecture and Urban Studies, and she helped raise $35 million in her short tenure for the college during the university’s Invent the Future campaign.
Previously at Roanoke College from 1993-2008, Blair held roles as director of development, director of annual giving, and director of alumni, parent relations and annual programs, and a development representative.
Blair is a southwest Virginia native who grew up in Blacksburg. She attended Roanoke College for her undergraduate degree and the University of Lynchburg for her master’s degree. Blair and her husband Tommy reside in Salem with their five children and two grandchildren.