Brandt Miller practices what he preaches.
The newly-elected board chair of the Hardin County Chamber and Business Alliance, says it is all about giving back to the community.
He assumed the role as board chair during the annual meeting of the organization held in McIntosh Center in February.
Miller, vice president commercial lender at Liberty National Bank, started listing his involvement in his various communities (including Ada, Allen East and Hardin County), and the Icon could hardly write a quickly as Miller talked.
Here is just some of that involvement:
• works the scoreboard at Allen East football games (for the past 8 or 9 years)
• coaches soccer in the Allen East Youth Sports Association
• coaches softball and is president of the Tri-County Coach-Pitch Softball League (serving Hardin, Allen and Auglaize counties)
• from 2005 to 2012 was treasurer of the Lima Farmers Club
• past advisory board member of the Walter C. Potts Entrepreneurial Center, Lima
• vice-president of the Ada Community Improvement Corp. (CIC)
• fiscal officer of Jackson Township, Allen County
From this list it is easy to see why he believes being involved includes “giving back to your community.”
“Being involved in the community should be an expectation,” he said, explaining his multi-faceted interests, adding that “it’s great to represent Ada and Hardin County.”
Stepping into the chamber and business alliance role, he will help that board look ahead to the next five years.
“The chamber and business alliance’s role is to give value to its members,” he said. “It’s also to promote economic development, help promote member businesses and to put Hardin County in a positive light.”
Miller became a member of the chamber and business alliance board in 2015, finishing a term of someone who stepped off the board. With a limit of two three-year terms, Miller is in the final year of his board membership.
He said that the board meets every-other-month. During the “off” months the executive board meets.
Miller is a 1999 graduate of Allen East High School. He grew up on a wheat-soybeans-corn family farm and was for a time a member of the Allen East Ewes and Rams 4-H Club.
After high school he graduated as an accounting major from ONU. His banking experience includes positions at Citizens National Bank, and Superior Federal Credit Union, before joining Liberty National Bank in 2012.
Miller also graduated from Ag Lending School at Purdue University, School of Commercial Lending with the Ohio Bankers League and completed the Graduate School of Banking at the University of Wisconsin in Madison.
He is also a 2006 graduate of the Allen-Lima Leadership program and has helped facilitate the Allen-Lima Youth Leadership program.
His wife, Melissa, also an Allen East graduate, is a physical therapy assistant at Lima Memorial Hospital. The Millers have two daughters, a fourth grader and second grader. They live just outside Lafayette.
