Our Leadership

W. Howie Walz

Mid-America Division Vice President

W. Howie Walz joined the American Red Cross in 2002 after a successful 20-year career leading non-Red Cross blood and biological organizations. He held the position of chief executive officer of the Red Cross Lewis and Clark Blood Services Region for three years prior to becoming the vice president of the Mid-America Blood Services Division in 2005. As vice president, Walz is responsible for management and oversight of the Divisions’ eight Red Cross Blood Services Regions, which span the central United States from Texas to Minnesota. The Division collects more than 1 million red cell and 200,000 platelet donations annually, and serves more than 500 hospitals and transfusion centers.

Greg Novinska

Chief Executive Officer

Greg Novinska has been with the American Red Cross Badger-Hawkeye Blood Services Region for more than 10 years, the majority of that time spent in the primarily donor-focused areas of Collections and Donor Recruitment. Novinska acted as interim CEO from October 2008 until being named CEO in April 2009. As interim CEO, he worked to develop solid relationships with our hospital partners, Red Cross chapters, our board members and blood drive sponsors.

Novinska’s experience in healthcare prior to the Red Cross, as a member of the surgical staff in area hospitals, gives him a unique perspective on how important the work of the Red Cross is to our hospitals and patients they serve.

David C. Mair, M.D.

Chief Medical Officer

Dr. Mair provides medical and scientific oversight to the Reference and Neutrophil Laboratories in the North Central Region and serves as an assistant medical director of the transfusion service and the therapeutic apheresis departments at the University of Minnesota Medical Center-Fairview in Minneapolis and the Minneapolis Veteran’s Hospital. Dr. Mair is a published transfusion-medicine expert and serves as an ad hoc reviewer for Immunohematology, Journal of Clinical Apheresis, Transfusion, and Archives of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine publications.

John Weiss, M.D., Ph.D.

Medical Director

Dr. Weiss has an M.D. and a Ph.D. in Oncology and is board certified in Anatomic and Clinical Pathology. He has more than 30 years of experience in blood banking and pathology. He serves as medical director of the Region, providing medical oversight of the Region’s component and the reference labs, as well as medical management of donor health issues. In addition, Dr. Weiss is the associate medical director of Transfusion Service at the University of Wisconsin Hospital and Clinics. He is an assistant clinical professor in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health. Dr. Weiss has also published a number of papers on blood banking and pathology topics.