After more than an hour behind closed doors today in Lubbock, the State Bar of Texas board of directors voted 42-to-1, with one abstention, to name Trey Apffel, the bar's president in 2014-2015, as the next executive director.

Apffel, founder of and a principal in the Apffel Law Firm in League City, will assume his duties as executive director Dec. 1, according to Lowell Brown, communications division director for the bar. Apffel replaces Michelle Hunter, the bar's executive director since 2008, who retired effective Aug. 31.

The board set Apffel's base salary at $271,000 after agreeing to an increase in the salary range of $200,000-$250,000 originally authorized. Tom Vick, the bar's president, noted in a Sept. 11 email to the bar's evaluation subcommittee members that Apffel had indicated that $271,000 is the lowest compensation he could accept. Vick noted in the email, that even with the adjustment, Apffel would be making less than the $289,380 base salary that Hunter was being paid when she retired.