WASHINGTON (ABP) — The Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty has recently acquired two new professional staffers.
The BJC has hired Stephen Reeves as staff attorney and Emilee Simmons as associate director of communications.
Reeves served last fall as a legal intern for the Washington-based agency, which advocates for religious freedom and church-state separation. A Texas native, he previously worked in Austin as a legislative and legal intern for the Christian Life Commission of the Baptist General Convention of Texas.
Reeves, who grew up near Austin, is a graduate of the University of Texas in Austin and Texas Tech University Law School in Lubbock. Two Texas churches in which he had been actively involved — Second Baptist in Lubbock and First Baptist in Austin — provided financial support for his internship.
Reeves' position is new. He performs some of the duties that had been fulfilled by Andrew Daugherty, who left as assistant to BJC General Counsel Holly Hollman in 2004 to become a pastoral resident at Wilshire Baptist Church in Dallas.
Hollman said Reeves “is poised to make a great contribution to the work of the BJC,” adding, “His experience in Texas on church-state issues and his legal training will prove invaluable.”
Simmons previously was an administrator and communications specialist for the American Health Lawyers Association in Washington. A Boone, N.C., native, she is a graduate of Wake Forest University and has worked in communications, event planning and Website development for several non-profit organizations. Simmons interned for BJC during her undergraduate years.
Both Reeves and Simmons attend Washington's First Baptist Church.
— Photos of Reeves and Simmons are available from the Baptist Joint Committee.