Departments People on the Move

People on the Move

PeoplesBank announced the promotions and appointments of nine associates.
• Matthew Bannister has been appointed to Vice President, Corporate Responsibility. He possesses more than 30 years of brand management and corporate social-responsibility experience. He earned a bachelor’s degree in communications from UMass Amherst. His prior experience includes advertising, public relations, and event marketing for top advertising agencies and major nonprofit organizations;
• Paul Hillsburg has been promoted to Vice President, PeoplesFinancial and Insurance Services. With more than three decades of financial, sales, and business-development experience, he first joined the bank in 2008 and previously served as assistant vice president, PeoplesFinancial and Insurance Services. He holds an associate degree in business management from Springfield Technical Community College. He holds Series 7 and Series 66 licenses.
• Kristen Hua has been promoted to Vice President, Secondary Market. She possesses more than a decade of banking experience. She first joined the bank in May 2001 and previously served as assistant vice president, secondary market. She holds an MBA from the Isenberg School of Management at UMass Amherst and a bachelor’s degree from Providence College. She also is a graduate of the New England School for Financial Studies;
• Craig Kaylor has been appointed to Vice President, Compliance. He brings more than a decade of banking and financial experience to his new position, where he will be responsible for overseeing all compliance regulations and policies. He holds a juris doctor degree from the Maurice A. Deane School of Law at Hofstra University and a bachelor’s degree from the University at Albany, SUNY;
• Denise Lamory has been promoted to Vice President, Commercial Loan Administration. She possesses close to four decades of banking experience. She first joined the bank in August 1976 and previously served as assistant vice president, commercial loan administration. She holds several business and financial certificates from the Western Massachusetts Institute of Management Education Inc. and Holyoke Community College;
• Trisha Leary has been promoted to Vice President, Internal Control. She possesses more than a decade of financial experience. She first joined the bank in 2013 and previously served as risk oversight officer. She holds a master’s degree in accounting and a bachelor’s degree in accounting from the Isenberg School of Management at UMass Amherst.
• Karen Sinopoli has been appointed to Vice President, Controller. She brings a decade of banking and audit experience to her new position, where she will be responsible for maintaining and supervising the financial record of the bank in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles. She holds a master’s degree in accounting from the Isenberg School of Management at the UMass Amherst and a bachelor’s degree in accounting from Pennsylvania State University;
• Donna Wiley has been promoted to Vice President, Regional Manager. She possesses close to four decades of banking experience. She first joined the bank in 1979 and previously served as assistant vice president, regional manager. She holds an associate degree in business administration from Holyoke Community College and graduated with honors from the Massachusetts Bankers Assoc. School for Financial Studies; and
• Brian Rheaume has been promoted to assistant vice president, information technology. He possesses more than a decade of information-technology experience. He first joined the bank in 2002 and previously served as information technology officer supervisor. He holds a bachelor’s degree in computer information systems from Westfield State University and is an A+ certified professional IT technician.
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Kathleen McCormick and Peter Mirante have been appointed to the Berkshire Community College board of trustees. McCormick is a partner with McCormick, Murtagh & Marcus, a law firm in Great Barrington. She joined the firm in 2004 and was named partner in 2009. Her focus is on residential and commercial real estate, land use and permitting, construction law, business law, and estate planning. She previously clerked for First Justice David Kopleman in the Norfolk County Probate and Family Court and later served as an associate with the litigation firm Herlihy, Thursby & Herlihy in Boston. She has worked for well-known companies such as the Boston Celtics, the Jane Blalock Co., and Reebok International. McCormick holds a juris doctor degree from Suffolk University Law School and a bachelor’s degree from Boston College. She is a member of the Massachusetts Bar Assoc., the Berkshire County Bar Assoc., and the Real Estate Bar Assoc. of Massachusetts. She is dedicated to enriching the lives of disadvantaged youth and is an active community member serving on boards of numerous charitable organizations. Mirante, who has worked in the banking industry for more than 20 years, is senior vice president of Branch Administration at Greylock Federal Credit Union in Pittsfield. He joined Greylock in 1998 and has served in numerous management positions. Prior to joining Greylock, he worked for Patten Corp. and then Berkshire Bank.
Mirante holds a bachelor’s degree in business administration from the former North Adams State College. He has a long history of community service and currently serves on the boards of the Northern Berkshire United Way, Berkshire Family & Individual Resources, Berkshire Compact for Education, and North Adams Parks & Recreation. Darlene Rodowicz, who was recently reappointed board chair by Gov. Charlie Baker, noted that “the new board members bring a wealth of knowledge from their respective roles in the community. We are happy to have them join the BCC board of trustees as we continue to advance the mission of the college.”
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Local law firm Shatz, Schwartz and Fentin, P.C. announced that attorney Steven Schwartz is the recipient of the Distinguished Advisor in Philanthropy Award. The award is presented annually by the Community Foundation of Western Massachusetts in partnership with the Estate Planning Council of Hampden County and the Pioneer Valley Estate Planning Council. Each year, the award’s recipient may recommend a Hampden, Hampshire, or Franklin county charity of their choice to receive a $1,000 grant. This year, Schwartz has decided to recommend the grant be made to the Children’s Study Home in recognition of its 150 anniversary. Schwartz concentrates his practice in the areas of family-business planning, mergers and acquisitions, corporate law, and estate planning. His practice involves representation of principals in family-business planning (including exit planning for business owners), representation of individuals and corporations in the purchase and sale of business enterprises, strategic planning for the future of clients’ businesses, and providing advice on alternatives in financing through loans and venture capital.
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Pope Francis High School announced that John Goda, Athletic Director for Holyoke Catholic High School, has been appointed to the Athletic Director position for Pope Francis High School. The creation of Pope Francis High School was announced in 2015 when Springfield Bishop Mitchell Rozanski revealed that Cathedral High School and Holyoke Catholic High School would merge into a new school, named in honor of the current Pope. While the official merger will take place to coincide with the next academic year, 2016-17, there has already been a joining together of the athletic programs. Goda, a 1987 graduate of Cathedral, started his career with Holyoke Catholic as a teacher in 1994, and took over as athletic director in 2003. Since the merger of Cathedral and Holyoke Catholic was announced, Goda has worked alongside Cathedral Athletic Director Joe Hegarty to oversee the combined athletic programs for Pope Francis High School. Hegarty recently vacated his position at Cathedral, and Goda will assume the role.
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Holyoke Medical Center (HMC) announced the appointment of Phillip Candito to the position of Vice President of Business Development, where he is leading marketing and development efforts and focused on growing the organization. Candito worked as director of Business Development at the Eastern Connecticut Health Network in Manchester, Conn. for 10 years before coming to HMC. Previously, he served St. Mary’s Hospital in Waterbury, Conn. as director of Rehabilitation Services and Occupational Medicine, and as a physical therapist. Earlier, he earned a degree in psychology from the University of Connecticut; worked in television, video, and stage production for 10 years in Connecticut and New York City; re-enrolled at UConn and earned a degree in physical therapy, which he practiced for 10 years; then attended Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute to earn his graduate degree.
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TD Bank has named Karl Mirke assistant vice president, store manager of the location at 90 Main St. in North Adams. He is responsible for new-business development, consumer and business lending, managing personnel, and overseeing the day-to-day operations at the store, serving customers in Berkshire County, including North Adams, Clarksburg, Adams, Cheshire, Stamford, and Readsboro. Mirke has 11 years of retail banking experience. Prior to joining TD Bank, he served as assistant branch manager at Citizens Bank in Pittsfield. He is a 2003 graduate of Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts in North Adams.
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Aaron Smith, P.C., a certified public accounting firm, announced that certified public accountant Bernard “Buzz” Travers III will assume the role of managing director. In that role, Travers will provide leadership and direction to achieve the goals of the firm. He will oversee day-to-day management and will continue to cultivate the talents of all accountants and staff at Aaron Smith. Travers joined the firm in 1999 as a tax specialist. He is a certified public accountant in both Massachusetts and Connecticut. His areas of expertise include corporate, individual and fiduciary income tax; state and local income and sales and use taxation; federal and state tax audits; mergers and acquisitions; estate and gift taxation; nonprofit taxes; and bankruptcy taxation. In addition, he has assisted numerous business owners in the sale and purchase of businesses. He received a bachelor’s degree in accounting from Bentley University and his juris doctor from Western New England University School of Law. He is past president of the Estate Planning Council of Hampden County Inc., past president of the Field Club of Longmeadow Inc., an officer and director of the Sportsmen’s National Land Trust Inc., and past treasurer of the Longmeadow High School hockey and lacrosse booster clubs.
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Bob Barna has joined Whalley Computer Associates (WCA) as a consulting architect. Barna was employed by VMWare as a senior consultant for the last 16 months and has 19 years of experience in the IT industry. He spent 17 of those years as the senior systems engineer at Competitive Computing. He has earned numerous VMware certifications and has extensive experience in design enablement, developing business requirements and identifying use cases, architecture design, environment build, product pilot, documentations and knowledge transfer, and more. Barna joins a team at WCA that also includes another former VMWare employee, Dan Sullivan, who joined VMWare shortly after it was founded and, in his seven years there, served customers all over New England and New York as a VMware systems engineer, VMware account executive, and partner business manager. Sullivan, who now holds the role of senior solution architect at WCA, is a 39-year veteran of the IT industry, with a background that combines technical expertise and sales skills.
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EMA Dental announced that Dr. Colleen Chambers has joined the practice as its newest associate. Chambers completed her undergraduate degree in biological sciences at the University of Connecticut and went on to earn her DMD at the University of Connecticut School of Dental Medicine. She was awarded the School of Dental Medicine Alumni Research Fellowship for her research with alveolar bone and implant integration using rh-PDGF-BB. She completed an Advanced Education in General Dentistry program at Virginia Commonwealth University, where she focused on esthetics, general dentistry, and complex implant dental treatment. Chambers is proud to have had the opportunity to provide dental care to underserved communities at the CT Mission of Mercy, Remote Area Medical Services in Wise County, Va., and as part of a dental service trip to Honduras. She is a member of the American Dental Assoc., the Massachusetts Dental Society, and the Valley District Society.
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Caroline Gear has been named executive director of the International Language Institute (ILI) of Massachusetts, located in Northampton. Gear joined ILI in 1986 as a Spanish and ESOL instructor, and in 1989, she became the school’s director of programs. In that capacity, she has been ILI’s primary coordinator with numerous partners, including area businesses, partner colleges and universities, the U.S. State Department, the Fulbright Scholars program, and the U.S. Commercial Service. She has written several articles on assessment and evaluation and regularly presents on teacher training and supervision, both regionally and nationally. Gear earned her bachelor’s degree in Spanish from State University of New York at Potsdam and her masters’ degree in Spanish literature from Michigan State University. In addition to her years at ILI, she has worked in Peru, Mexico, and Spain.
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Lee Bank announced that Wendy Healey has been named to the position of Senior Vice President, Community Banking, and David Harrington has been named to the position of Vice President, Commercial Lending. Healey joins Lee Bank with experience in both the retail-banking and financial-technology sectors. She most recently served as senior vice president in charge of retail, sales, and marketing at Torrington Savings Bank. Prior to that, she was an independent financial services consultant while pursuing an MBA, and has held senior management roles at COCC Inc., a lead provider in core technology to the financial industry; Sovereign/Santander Bank; and People’s United Bank in Connecticut. As senior vice president in charge of community banking, Healey’s focus will be on existing and new customer relationships, as well as the design and fulfillment of new products and packages of services to meet customer needs. She will oversee policies, future business planning, and long-range strategic goals for her department and is responsible for the overall administration of compliance, including policy and procedures, monitoring, review, training, and board reporting. Harrington brings more than 18 years of experience in product and operations management. He most recently served as multi-life new business operations manager at Guardian Life Insurance Co. in Pittsfield. Prior to that, he was employed as product and project manager, U.S. Insurance Group, MassMutual Financial Group, and senior product line manager, disability and long-term-care insurance at Berkshire Life Insurance Co. As vice president of commercial lending, Harrington is responsible for developing and maintaining Lee Bank’s commercial-lending activities and expanding existing customer relationships in conjunction with the bank’s strategic goals.
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Springfield Technical Community College (STCC) recently welcomed three new members to its board of trustees: Steven Grande, Franklin Quigley, and Macarthur Starks Jr. Grande is president of Meridian Industrial Group, LLC in Holyoke and Springfield. He also serves on the Holyoke Taxpayers Assoc. is vice chair of the advisory committee at Smith Vocational and Agricultural High School, chairs the Mayor’s Industrial Development Advisory Council, serves on board of directors for the Greater Holyoke Chamber of Commerce and Associated Industries of Massachusetts, is a member of the advisory board for William J. Dean Technical High School; and is president of the board of directors for the Western Massachusetts National Tooling and Machining Assoc. Grande holds a bachelor’s degree in political science and criminal justice from American International College. Quigley, an STCC alumnus, serves on the STCC foundation board and is a member of the presidential search committee. He is the president of FD Quigley and Associates, an organization specializing in providing project-management services to commercial retail developers; is a member of the state board of directors for Special Olympics; and is a retired referee of the American Hockey League. Starks, a senior finance and leadership professional, is an assistant vice president/change agent at MassMutual Way Center of Excellence, at MassMutual Life Insurance Company. Starks also serves as board chair and treasurer of FutureWorks Career Center in Springfield. A graduate of STCC (‘88), Starks received a master’s in management information systems and a bachelor of arts in accounting from Western New England University.