Charles M Brown, was appointed Director of Libraries - The Public Library of Charlotte and Mecklenburg County (PLCMC) in February 2004.  Prior to joining PLCMC, he spent ten years as Director of the Hennepin County Library in Minnesota and eight years as Director of Libraries in Arlington County , Virginia .  Mr Brown has extensive experience in library leadership from across the country, having also worked in public libraries in California , Missouri , Washington , D.C. , New Jersey and Ohio .

Mr Brown is a native of St. Louis , MO and a product of that city's parochial and public school systems.  As an undergraduate, he attended Lincoln University ( Oxford , PA ), the nation's oldest historically black college, Washington University ( St. Louis ), and completed his undergraduate studies at Rutgers University ( New Jersey ).  His Master's degree in Library Science is from Columbia University in New York City , and he has completed post-graduate courses of study at both the University of Virginia and the John F Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University .

Mr Brown has been active in professional organisations in every state where he has worked and is a past President of the Public Library Association (PLA) and a past member of both the Council and Executive Board of the American Library Association.  He also is a past President of the North Carolina Public Library Directors Association (ALA).  He currently serves on the board of SOLINET, a not-for-profit organisation serving libraries in the Southeastern United States, and is an active member of the Urban Libraries Council.  Locally, he also serves on the board of the United Way of Central Carolinas, Inc., based in Charlotte , North Carolina .