Tennessee Valley Authority headquarters and TVA logoNASHVILLE - President Barack Obama has nominated a Memphis accountant to serve on the Tennessee Valley Authority's nine-member governing board, which requires U.S. Senate approval, Rep. Steve Cohen, D-Tenn., announced Friday.
D.V. Lynn Evans, a certified public accountant, will fill the position held by Bishop William Graves of Memphis.
"I recommended V. Lynn Evans to President Obama because she is a superb accountant with extensive public and private sector experience," Cohen said in a statement. "She is intelligent, well respected and admired throughout Memphis and Tennessee for her dedication to public service and her skills as an accountant."
Obama said Evans "will greatly serve the American people" while at TVA, a federal utility that serves some 8.5 million customers in almost all of Tennessee and parts of Kentucky, Alabama, Mississippi, Kentucky, North Carolina, and Virginia.
The board sets broad strategies, goals, and objectives, long-range plans, and policies of TVA and oversees the TVA staff led by a chief executive officer.
Evans is the owner of V. Lynn Evans, CPA, a certified public accounting and consulting firm established in 1983. She has served on the Board of Commissioners of Memphis Light, Gas, and Water Division since 2004 and served as chairman from 2008 to 2009.
She also has served on the board of First Alliance Bank in Memphis.
U.S. Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., complained in August after TVA Chief Executive Tom Kilgore announced he was stepping down that too many TVA directors have no corporate experience or the financial skills to oversee a complex entity like TVA.
Just six of TVA's nine seats are currently filled. Unless Congress moves quickly, the board could shrink to just four members, leaving TVA with no quorum by the end of the year.
TVA receives no taxpayer money and provides flood control, navigation and land management for the Tennessee River system as well as assisting utilities and state and local governments with economic development.