Photo by Wyatt Kostygan: Kevin Cooper

Long-time business leader Kevin Cooper just jumped into the race for Hospital Board. The former Greater Sarasota Chamber of Commerce president and current Mote Marine Laboratory vice president will run for Seat 2.

Cooper is the first candidate to file for the board this year. His entry comes at a time when the hospital board has become the subject of much greater political debate in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. He said he felt a call to bring a business perspective to the board.

“It’s about ensuring the highest quality care for Sarasota County residents,” Cooper said. “Health care is extremely personal and we simply cannot do enough to recruit the best and brightest medical professionals in the country to help those in our community who find themselves in need of our services.”

His campaign stressed his military background, which included being deployed to the Al Anbar province in Iraq during the peak of the war there. Locally, he’s best known for leadership at a number of major business groups. Before serving as president and CEO of the Sarasota Chamber, he also served as executive director of the Siesta Key Chamber of Commerce and as investment director at the Gulf Coast Community Foundation. He served now on the Lakewood Ranch Business Alliance’s board. He also sat on the Sarasota County Planning Commission.

The hospital, he said, is personal as that’s where his two children were born.

“Sarasota County has been an absolute blessing for me in so many ways. It is the best place in Florida, and the country, to live and raise a family and I will continue to do everything I can to preserve that for current and future generations,” he said.

Photo by Wyatt Kostygan: Kevin Cooper