JOHN McDOUGALL has been appointed chairman of the board of directors of Tristar Homes.

Tristar Homes is the not-for-profit controlled company of Stockton Borough Council. It took over the management and maintenance of most of the council's housing stock.

The 55-year-old was brought up and educated in the Tees Valley and lives at Middleton-upon-Leven, which is between Hilton and Hutton Rudby.

In autumn 2003, Mr McDougall, a chartered engineer who worked for nearly 30 years with Teesside engineering consultants WS Atkins, where he became regional managing director in 1991, was selected as chairman of the North-East Business Support Network Board.

He is also a former chairman of Teesside TEC, deputy chairman of Teesside University, a director of Darlington Building Society and past president of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers.