Posted: June 18, 2010

Hospitality

Gold Key/PHR made the following annoucements:

Robert M. Howard, formerly CFO, has been named chief investment officer for the company. Howard will be responsible for evaluating and managing the company's various assets. He joined Gold Key/PHR as controller in 1990 after several years in public accounting with Ernst & Whinney. He was promoted to executive vice president of finance and accounting in 1994 and CFO in 2000. He is a graduate of Washington & Jefferson College with a concentration in accounting. He is a certified public accountant, certified financial manager and certified management accountant.

D. Brian Carson has been named CFO after several years in public accounting. He comes to Gold Key/PHR from Goodman & Co., where he specialized in corporate financial audits, financial reporting, income tax reporting and financial forecasting. Carson holds a bachelor's degree in accounting from Virginia Tech and is a certified public accountant.

Law

Jeffrey S. Bergren has joined the law offices of Vandeventer Black as director of marketing. Bergren will oversee the marketing and public relations efforts in the firm's four Virginia and North Carolina offices and will be based in Norfolk. He began his career in the insurance industry working as an associate director for the Large Corporate Markets division of Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Co. before joining the law firm of Pullman & Comley in Connecticut. Bergren was a sports broadcaster and play-by-play announcer for WBNZ Radio in Traverse City, Mich., while also serving as the executive editor of the Citizen Journal, covering breaking news and sports. Prior to that, he covered Marshall University Football for West Virginia MetroNews Radio.Bergren earned a BS from Southern Connecticut State University, where he majored in journalism and public relations.

Awards & honors

Ames Herbert, a Virginia Tech extension specialist in Suffolk, has been awarded the Virginia Agribusiness Council's 2010 Extension Specialist Service Award for his service and contributions to the agribusiness industry.

Herbert is a professor, extension entomologist and Integrated Pest Management specialist at the Tidewater Agricultural Research and Extension Center in Suffolk. After coming to Virginia Tech in 1988 as the IPM specialist for soybeans and small grains, he expanded his work to peanuts and cotton. In 1997, he was appointed Virginia's IPM coordinator, managing federal funds for carrying out IPM programs.

In addition to farmers, Herbert has worked with homeowners and school systems to provide education about the values of IPM. In 2006, he received the Virginia Tech Alumni Award for Excellence in Extension.

Boards, commissions & associations

Giovanni Donatelli, founder and managing partner of The Language Group, a multilingual services firm in Virginia Beach, has been elected to the Association of Language Companies board of directors. The ALC is a national trade association representing businesses that provide translation, interpretation, localization and language training services.

John T. Midgett has been elected president of the Hampton Roads Estate Planning Council for 2010-2011.

He was president of the Hampton Roads Gift Planning Council from 2004 to 2006; chairman of the Trusts & Estates Section of the Virginia State Bar from 2008 to 2009; president of IAFP (now the Financial Planning Association) from 1995 to 1997; and is current president of the Mariner's Mark Condominium Association. In 2010, Midgett joined the board of directors of the Norfolk - Tidewater Chapter of the Society of Financial Service Professionals. He is a Legal Elite, Super Lawyer and in "Best Lawyers in America." He is a fellow in the American College of Trusts & Estate Counsel.

Midgett received his bachelor's degree from the University of Virginia and is a graduate of the T.C. Williams Law School at the University of Richmond, where he was a member of the Law Review.

He is founding partner of Midgett & Preti in Virginia Bech.

Melinda C. Davis CPA, partner in the Norfolk office of Goodman & Co. LLP, has been appointed to the board and named treasurer of The Greater Hampton Roads Chapter of Women In Defense.

A graduate of Old Dominion University, Davis has been with Goodman since 1994 and provides accounting and tax services for a variety of small, medium and large businesses. She is a firm resource for multistate tax preparation and is responsible for the preparation and review of returns with filing requirements in as many as 26 states. She also specializes in a variety of tax credit programs including the Virginia Enterprise Zone program.

Davis is a member of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants, the Virginia Society of Certified Public Accountants and the Southeastern Virginia Chapter of the National Association of Women Business Owners.

Clark Nexsen has announced the following shareholders:

Peter Skaredoff PE LEED AP is a professional mechanical engineer with more than 10 years of experience in the design and management of public and private residential, commercial and industrial projects.

Ben Hatcher AIA is a registered architect and project manager who has been practicing architecture for more than 30 years including a significant amount of experience with educational, federal and municipal clients

Diane McCann CID IIDA LEED AP is a certified interior designer in Virginia, and holds the National Certification for Interior Design Qualification designation. With more than 10 years of experience, she specializes in space planning, move management and project management for corporate, municipal, state and federal government clients.

Patrick Gallagher AIA LEED AP is a registered architect with more than 14 years of experience with various Department of Defense projects from schematic design through construction administration.

Daniel J. Rusnack PE LC LEED AP BD+C is a professional electrical engineer and is Lighting Certified by the NCQLP with more than six years of experience with government, military, university and commercial facilities. His work experience includes interior and exterior power distribution, lighting and telecommunication design.

Mike Tippin PE is a professional engineer with a broad range of experience in the civil engineering field, which includes site development, roadway design, design and analysis of storm water management facilities, hydrologic and hydraulic modeling of watersheds and flood analysis.

Terry Riley PE is a senior civil engineer with more than 39 years of experience in the design, construction and management of naval and other military facility projects.

Kim Humphrey, executive director of the Virginia Conflict Resolution Center, has been selected to be an examiner for the Baldrige National Quality Award. Humphrey serves on the Virginia Senate Productivity and Quality Award Board and has been an examiner at the state level for seven years.

Marina Liacouras Phillips of Kaufman & Canoles PC was appointed to the Department of Environmental Quality's Offshore Wind Regulatory Advisory Panel, which develops regulations for wind projects in Virginia's offshore and coastal settings. Phillips is a partner in the Norfolk office and practices in the areas of environmental law, real estate, and mergers and acquisitions.

Martin A. Einhorn of Wall, Einhorn & Chernitzer PC has been named an at-large board member of the Virginia Society of Certified Public Accountants Educational Foundation. The foundation supports students and educators in Virginia through scholarships, grants and award programs.

Banking & finance

Monarch Bank made the following annoucements:

Joe Dreps has been named executive vice president of Monarch Bank Real Estate & Finance Group. Dreps has more than 35 years of experience in the financial industry. Before joining Monarch, Dreps worked as senior vice president and corporate banker for BB&T. Dreps will be located in the Virginia Beach headquarters in the Town Center area.

David Ropp has been named senior vice president, business banker. Most recently, Ropp was a senior vice president with Fulton Bank. He has more than 25 years of experience in the financial industry. Ropp will be based at the Greenbrier office.

Terri Ruby has been named vice president, cash management services. Ruby will oversee the delivery of Monarch's business banking and cash management services. Most recently, Ruby was a deposit relationship manager for Fulton Bank. Before that, she was with Chartway Federal Credit Union where she held several positions including credit officer, director of retail sales and sales manager.

Leslie Doyle has been promoted to senior vice president at U.S. Trust, Bank of America Private Wealth Management. Doyle is a private client adviser in Norfolk and has been with U.S. Trust for eight years. She provides customized solutions and services to help wealthy individuals and families address their wealth management objectives.

Hampton Roads Bankshares, the holding company for Bank of Hampton Roads and Shore Bank, made the following announcements:

Sarah B. Stedfast has joined the company's Gateway Bank Mortgage Inc. subsidiary as senior vice president - Virginia production manager. Stedfast has more than 20 years of mortgage banking experience with regional and national mortgage lenders. She most recently was branch manager/vice president at Bank of America Home Loans in Norfolk, where she was a member of the local Bank of America Leadership Team. Stedfast will be responsible for overseeing the expansion of the mortgage banking business throughout the bank's Hampton Roads, Eastern Shore, Richmond, Charlottesville and Emporia markets. Stedfast will be located in Gateway Bank Mortgage's Virginia Beach office. Stedfast earned a degree in finance from Virginia Tech.

Lisa M. Lentz has been appointed senior vice president, Corporate Business Risk Management. Lentz will be responsible for identifying and evaluating emerging risks across all lines of business within the organization. She will also continue to manage credit policy implementation for Bank of Hampton Roads and Shore Bank. Lentz joined Shore Bank in 2002 and served for five years as vice president in the bank's Credit Administration area. In 2007, she assumed the leadership of Shore's Internet Banking area and held that position until she moved to the company's Credit Administration area in Norfolk in June 2009, where she has been vice president - Credit Business Process Management. Lentz holds a BBA degree from the College of William and Mary, an MBA from the University of South Carolina, and has graduated from the Graduate School of Banking at Louisiana State University, the ABA's Commercial Lending School, and the Virginia Bankers School of Bank Management.

CommonWealth Planning, a general agency of The Guardian Life Insurance Co. of America, New York, N.Y., made the following annoucements:

Aaron T. Otto, Greg G. Buenviaje, John J. Reichart, Matthew G. Flauter, Keri A. Bateman and C. Edward Drescher have joined the agency as financial representatives.

William L. Dudley III has joined the agency as a career development supervisor.

Health care

Bryan Fox MD has joined the physician orthopaedic team at Sports Medicine & Orthopaedic Center. An expert in minimally invasive spine surgery techniques, Fox is a graduate of Ohio State University. He completed his orthopaedic surgery residency at the Naval Medical Center Portsmouth and completed his fellowship in adult spine surgery at Duke University. He served in the U.S. Navy for 25 years, 17 as a physician and eight as a naval aviator. Most recently, Fox was a chief of Orthopaedic Spine Surgery, Naval Medical Center Portsmouth.

Bon Secours Health System made the following annoucements:

Amy Iveson has joined Bon Secours Hampton Roads as the director of Service Excellence for Extended Care. Previously Iveson was employed by Knowledge Factor, a startup educational software company, serving as the regional director for its health care clients. She will lead the service excellence initiative in patient engagement, employee engagement and physician engagement. Iveson, a registered nurse, is a graduate of Riverside Hospital School of Nursing and Christopher Newport University. She worked with LifeNet, an organ procurement organization in Virginia, for 10 years, beginning as a procurement coordinator and advancing to senior manager of donation services. Iveson was then recruited by Donor Alliance, the organ procurement organization in Colorado, as the vice president of organ procurement operations.

Eugene Y. Chang MD FACS, a board-certified surgeon, has joined Tidewater Surgical Specialists. He is certified by the National Board of Medical Examiners and the American Board of Surgery. Previously, Chang was employed by Delta Surgical Oncology/Breast Care Center in Portsmouth, where he served as surgical director of surgical oncology. Chang holds a bachelor's degree in industrial engineering and operations research from Columbia University School of Engineering and Applied Sciences in New York. He earned his medical degree from the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey at the New Jersey Medical School in Newark. He completed an internship in surgery at Temple University Hospital in Philadelphia, where he also served a residency in surgery. Chang is a fellow of immunotherapy, as well as a fellow of surgical oncology with the National Institutes of Health, National Cancer Institute, Surgery Branch, in Bethesda, Md. In addition, he is a diplomate of the National Board of Medical Examiners and the American Board of Surgery. He also is a fellow with the American College of Surgeons and is a member of the American Society of Breast Surgeons.

Architecture & engineering

J. Dudley Parrish RA LEED AP has joined DJG Inc. in its Architectural Group. Parrish earned an associate's degree in drafting design and technology from Virginia Commonwealth University and has more than 25 years' experience designing a wide range of building types, both in the public and private sector. Parrish is currently assisting with the design of projects for the Hampton Redevelopment and Housing Authority, Christopher Newport University, and the College of William and Mary.

Academics

David Buckingham as has been named vice president of Student Affairs and dean of Enrollment Services at Virginia Wesleyan College. Buckingham has led the college's division of student affairs since 1982, overseeing campus departments such as athletics, residence life and security. He will now also supervise enrollment at the college. He holds a BA in social science from Campbell College and a MA in history from Old Dominion University.

Technology

John M. Wasson COO has been named president of ICF International, which is headquartered in Fairfax. Wasson will continue to run the day-to-day operations of the company. Over the course of his 23-year career at ICF, Wasson has been a consultant on environment and energy issues, headed a regional office, and led the company's business development efforts. Wasson joined ICF in 1987 as an associate. In 1989, he was promoted to senior associate. In 1991, he became project manager and was named vice president in 1994. He was promoted to senior vice president in 1998 and executive vice president in 2001. He was named COO in 2003.

Certifications & designations

Stephanie L. Kalantarians AIA at Guernsey Tingle Architects, has passed the Architectural Registration Exam and is licensed to practice as an architect in the commonwealth of Virginia. Since joining Guernsey Tingle Architects in 2005, Kalantarians has worked on the renovation of the Henrico Theatre, which received a Design Excellence for Preservation Award from the American Institute of Architects Hampton Roads in 2009. She has also worked on Eaglescliffe Condominiums in Ford's Colony, which received an award of Merit for Best Multi-Family Project from the Hampton Roads Association for Commercial Real Estate, also in 2009. She is currently working on a 33,000-square-foot psychiatric facility for Williamsburg Place in Williamsburg. Kalantarians holds a bachelor in architecture degree from Virginia Tech.

Joe Gopi, the manufacturing engineering manager at Sumitomo Machinery Corp. of America, has become certified as a project management professional. Gopi is a member of the Project Management Institute. He holds a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering from TKM College of Engineering in India. He joined Sumitomo in 2006, and has more than six years of mechanical engineering experience.