A resolution was also passed, by a vote of 469 for and 84 against, to add three equity holder representative positions to the board. An election for these positions will be scheduled shortly.
Mr. Viola, vice chairman of the Exchange from 1993 to 1996, is the founder and sole owner of Pioneer Futures, Inc., which is currently a clearing member of both divisions of the New York Mercantile Exchange, and the New York Board of Trade. Mr. Viola also served on the Exchange board in the at-large category from 1987 to 1990 He is a graduate of the United States Military Academy at West Point and achieved the rank of major in the United States Army Reserves. In 1983, he graduated from New York Law School with a juris doctor degree.
In 1988, Mr. Viola formed the First Bank Group which operates community banks in Dallas and the surrounding Texas area. In 1998, he formed MV Technologies, a developer of fully integrated electronic platforms for trading futures, options, equities, and derivatives.
Mr. Viola co-founded and was chairman of the National Children’s Educational Reform Foundation, which is dedicated to the fundamental reform and improvement of inner-city education with an emphasis on bi-lingual programs in immigrant communities. Mr. Viola has served on the West Point Fund committee, an arm of the board of trustees which supports academy cadet programs. In 1997, Mr. Viola received a man-of-the-year award from the Eden School for Autistic Children. In 1998, Mr. Viola was awarded the Ellis Island Medal of Honor by the National Ethnic Coalition of Organizations. In 2000, he was honored with the community service award from the Futures and Options for Kids charitable organization.
Mr. Rutledge was elected as the board representative in the floor broker category. Mr. Rutledge, who is co-founder and owner of Onyx Brokerage Inc., has been a floor broker on the Exchange since 1981, after working for Merrill Lynch as a newswire editor and technical analyst. Prior to starting Onyx, he also worked for MercOil and J. Tafaro Brokerage. He serves on the membership, technology, arbitration, adjudication, floor broker advisory, and political action committees. Mr. Rutledge has a bachelor of arts cum laude from Harvard University.
Ms. Boyd was elected as the local representative to the board. Ms. Boyd has been the at-large representative to the board for the past three years and a member of the executive committee for the past year. She has traded gasoline for her own account for more than 16 years. She is has been chairman of the NYMEX Charitable Foundation since 1992 and is also co-chairman of the local advisory committee and the petroleum products advisory committee, and a member of the coal advisory committee. She also serves as a director of the Commodity Floor Brokers and Traders Association and Futures and Options for Kids and holds a bachelor of science in business from Fairleigh Dickinson University.
Mr. Rizzi was reelected for the third time as a futures commission merchant (FCM) representative to the board. In addition to serving on the board for the past six years, Mr. Rizzi has served two terms on the executive committee, including the past year. He has been a member of the floor community for 22 years. After working for Dean Witter for a year as a clerk, Mr. Rizzi joined A.G. Edwards and became floor manager in 1982. He has been an officer of the company and a conferring member of the Exchange for 17 years. He is also a member of the COMEX Division and both divisions of the New York Board of Trade. He is the chairman of the membership, FCM advisory, and technology committees and vice chairman of the facilities committee.
J. Robert (Bo) Collins, Jr., ran unopposed to fill the trade slot. Mr. Collins is senior vice president of natural gas trading at El Paso Merchant Energy, a division of El Paso Energy Corporation, the largest pipeline operator and the third largest producer of natural gas in North America. Mr. Collins directs the natural gas derivatives portfolio. Before joining El Paso in 1997, Mr. Collins was a natural gas and crude oil options market-maker with Pioneer Futures on the Exchange trading floor. A graduate of Texas A&M University, his first professional experience was in commercial banking with the Dallas Federal Reserve Bank. Mr. Collins has been a member of the Exchange since 1995 and has served on the options advisory committee since 1996.
Mr. Garland was elected to his first term as the at-large representative to the board. After receiving a masters degree in audiology from Long Island University, Mr. Garland worked as a private and industrial audiologist for eight years. He began trading at the New York Mercantile Exchange for his own account in 1981. In 1982 and 1983, he also acted as a floor broker. Since purchasing his seat in 1983, he has exclusively traded for his own account, concentrating most of his time in the gasoline ring. He is vice chairman of the Exchange floor and settlement committees; panel chairman on the arbitration and adjudication committees; and also serves on the following committees: membership; local advisory; and petroleum product advisory. Mr Garland was also recommended by the Exchange in 1994 to represent it on the National Futures Association membership appeals subcommittee, a position he continues to hold to this day.
Mr. Steele and Mr. Lippman were elected to three-year terms as public directors of the Exchange. Prior to the Exchange’s demutualization in November 2000, the public directors were appointed by the board and served two year terms.
Mr. Steele served as a public director of the Exchange from 1988 to 1994, and was re-appointed to the board in 1999. He is vice chairman of John Ryan Company, an international financial services marketing firm, and is director of the Merlin Retail Financial Center in Stamford, Conn. He previously served as president and chief executive officer of the Norwich (CT) Savings Society from 1975 to 1981, and as president and chief executive officer of Dollar Dry Dock Bank of New York from 1985 to 1990.
Mr. Steele was a U.S. congressman (Second District, Conn) from 1970 to 1974, and was the Republican candidate for governor of Connecticut in 1974. While in Congress , he served on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, was the ranking minority member of the Latin American subcommittee, and chaired or co-chaired Congressional task forces on international drug trafficking and problems of the aging. Following Congress, he was appointed chairman of the Social Security committee of the White House conference on aging. In addition to the Exchange, Mr. Steele serves on the board of directors of SmartServ Online (web and wireless transaction platform services provider), Scan Optics, Inc. (document processing systems and information management solutions), and NLC Insurance Companies. He is also chairman of the board of Moore Medical Corp. He served as a Soviet affairs specialist in the Central Intelligence Agency from 1963 to 1968. He was a visiting lecturer in government at the United States Coast Guard Academy and is the recipient of an honorary doctor of laws degree from Sacred Heart University in Connecticut.
Mr. Lippman is a major contributor to Feed The Children, sponsoring their Christmas event in Harlem in December 2000. He also serves on the advisory board of the Columbia University School of International and Public Affairs. He is a member of the Information Technology Association of America and a former trustee of The Washington Institute. He is also active politically as a fund-raiser for both the Republican and Democratic parties, including hosting fund-raising events at his home.
Last week, Michael Devaney was elected to replace John Moore as chairman of the COMEX governors committee, a two-year term in which he will head the committee which advises the board on matters uniquely pertinent to COMEX Division members. In that capacity he will attend all Exchange board meetings to represent the views of the COMEX Division members.
Mr. Devaney has served as vice chairman of the COMEX governors committee for the past two-and-a-half years; has served on the governors committee since 1994; and has been a member of the Exchange since 1985. He is the owner of Great Lakes, Inc., an independent floor brokerage operation, and has served on the Exchange membership, floor, facilities, business conduct, compliance review, marketing, margin, political action, and rules committees.
