She’s been called a “legend of NBA communication” and now the 1977 Jefferson High School graduate will be honored as the 2023 Bell Tower of Fame Award recipient. The award recognizes a person who has lived in Greene County sometime in their life whose professional or personal accomplishments internationally, nationally or statewide bring great pride to Greene County.
Julie Fie recently concluded a 41-year career in the National Basketball Association. She has seen and helped make changes in the game and the faces that are associated with it. She was a trail blazer in media and public relations policy and practices and a pioneer for women working in the male-dominated league. Fie has the distinction of having a four-decade career that spanned two franchises and three cities and included 21 head coaches (two coaches twice), 12 general managers and more than 350 players. She helped promote three MVP award winners (Charles Barkley 1993, Steve Nash 2005 and 2006) dozens of All Stars, and dozens more All-NBA team members and annual NBA award winners. She has witnessed the continuing number of opportunities for females to grow throughout the NBA and all of professional sports and was an example for others.
Originally joining the NBA in 1981 with the Kansas City Kings, Fie was one of only a handful of females working for an NBA team’s public relations department at the time. Promoted to the Director of Publicity a year later, she served as either a director or vice president, and led an NBA team’s basketball communications /public relations department for the next 39 seasons, making her one of the longest tenured women in the NBA in an executive position. In 1985 with a change of ownership and relocation of the franchise to Sacramento, CA, Fie was one of a handful of KC employees tasked with moving and opening a new franchise in a never tested market. She remained in Sacramento seven seasons.
In 1992 the Phoenix Suns reached out to her to lead their basketball communications department after trading for one of the Olympic Dream Team mega personalities, Charles Barkley.
In that role she served as the club’s primary liaison between the media and the team’s players and management for all basketball communications, responsible for media interviews and requests and the dissemination of information. That included facilitating news conferences, game night press accommodations, credentialing media, the production of the media guides, and press information. The only female member of the team’s traveling party for decades, she coordinated media schedules and worked on a day-to-day basis with some of the game’s biggest personalities. Over her career that included former league Hall of Famers Bill Russell, Charles Barkley, Jason Kidd, Steve Nash, Shaquille O’Neal, Grant Hill, Mitch Richmond, Ralph Sampson, Jerry Colangelo, Rick Welts, Cotton Fitzsimmons, Annie Meyers Drysdale and broadcaster and fellow Iowan Al McCoy.
Perhaps basketball was Julie’s destiny. Her late father, Larry Fie, was captain of the Iowa State University basketball team and her mother Sue was observing in the stands when she went into labor. Julie was born the next morning. Raised primarily in Jefferson, Julie graduated from Jefferson Community High School in 1977 and from Iowa State University in Ames in 1981. While an undergraduate she was mentored and worked in the Sports Information Department from 1979-1981 and was part of one of the first Sports Information internships there. Fie, too, has mentored many over the years and at minimum a dozen of her assistants have gone on to significant roles in the NBA, other professional sports leagues and college athletic departments ranging from president to directors.
She and her 2007 staff were the inaugural winners of the Outstanding Public Relations Staff of the NBA and were among the top nominees on many occasions thereafter. Over the years she served on numerous PR Advisory Boards in the NBA as well as boards in the community. Julie was a trail blazer and continues to be a mentor and a friend to many.
She will be honored at opening ceremonies of the 2023 Bell Tower Festival Friday, June 9, at 7 pm on the Bell Tower Plaza in downtown Jefferson. A public reception for her will be held in the Greene County courthouse rotunda following the ceremonies until 8:30 pm.
