The Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association has announced a successor to current president Mark Baker, who is set to retire at year’s end. In his place comes Darren Pleasance. The association notes that this is only the sixth president in its history, dating back to 1939. Baker has been on the job for more than 11 years. Somebody buy that man a beer!
AOPA notes that Pleasance has more than 8000 hours in 50 different types and currently owns three airplanes: A Piper Meridian, a Van’s RV-6 and a Progressive Aerodyne SeaRey.
“I’m honored with the opportunity I’m being given to help steward AOPA forward into the future, and I’m inspired by the role AOPA will continue to play in protecting our freedom to fly,” says Pleasance. “I’m grateful for the privilege I’m being given to lead this incredible organization that has had such a positive impact on my life and the lives of all of us who love aviation.”
Pleasance joins AOPA at a time when there are pressures across the spectrum, from finding a leaded-fuel replacement to rapidly rising aircraft-ownership costs. But there are opportunities, too, such as with the MOSAIC program expected to become a reality sometime in 2025.
For his part, outgoing president Baker says, “I’m confident that Darren is the right person to lead AOPA into its next chapter. He is a pilot’s pilot with a genuine passion for flying. He combines that excitement about aviation with leadership experience at some of this country’s top consulting and tech firms, giving him the right balance of business skills and kinship with our members.”
I also quit AOPA after having been a member for a number of years. GA in general has become unreachable to a majority of aviation enthusiasts . I have in my professional career overseen several million dollar companies and have never forgotten that the main path to success is not just revenue generation but most importantly the quality of service given to the customer. My feeling is that AOPA has forgotten this and like most corporations only interested in the well being and renumeration of their corporate management.
Mark Baker worked to protect leaded avgas from even the approved G100 replacement and vilified california for trying to get rid of leaded fuel. That’s just an impressive error in judgment. You could say FAA is foremost guilty of not getting rid of 100LL but to the extent AOPA could affect the outcome, Mark Baker worked against reason, not only useless but actively detrimental.
We can hope new guy is better
About time, let him pay his own flying expenses. Dropped my membership because of him and his actions. BTW while at OSH heard AOPA bought another Big dollar airplane, did MB checkout in that one too?
It would be wonderful if the new guy put emphasis back on the ga part of ga and tried to make flying affordable for the individual pilots. It seems the organization gave up on that and shifted focus to the big guys instead. Cost is the reason I’m out of the game now. Over my career and with a decent salary rise I’ve the years, aviation prices far out outpaced my raises. As so, it remains a rich man’s game.