Most Recent Lifetime Achievement Award Winner
Gerald Gallimore
General Manager
Citizens Telephone Cooperative
Floyd, Va.
Gerald Gallimore, general manager of Citizens Telephone Cooperative in Floyd, Va., is the recipient of the 2007 OPASTCO Lifetime Achievement Award.
Gerald’s career with Citizens began in 1973, where he put his electrical engineering education to practical use in the cooperative’s plant department. In 1976, he moved into management, being promoted to general manager in 2001. Today, Citizens serves 22,000 accounts through the cooperative or one of its subsidiaries: SelecTec, Inc., Citizens Communications Corporation, Inc. and Citizens Cablevision, Inc.
For more than 30 years, Gerald has played an active role in state, regional and national telecommunications associations, providing an important voice for the rural telecommunications industry. He is a current board member and a past president of the Virginia Telecommunications Industry Association, and he is an active member of the Business and Technology Committee of the National Telecommunications Cooperative Association (NTCA). Citizens is also affiliated with Associated Network Partners, Inc. (ANPI), of which Gerald is a past member of the ANPI Board of Directors and has played an active role in developing ANPI’s vision for the future.
Gerald’s commitment to Citizens’ service area extends to his participation on the Board of Trustees for the Old Church Gallery, an arts and history organization based in Floyd. He also was the president of Gallimore Electronics, which owned and operated a local broadcast radio station in the town.