Business Digest for May 6, 2015

Corporate Contractors promotes trio

Beloit-based Corporate Contractors has promoted three of its associates.

Terry Miller has been promoted to general superintendent. He is a 22-year construction industry veteran and began his employment at CCI in 2013 as a general trades foremen. In his new role as general superintendent, he serves as a point of coordination between the CCI managers, supervisors and tradesmen.

Terry Russell has been promoted to vice president of Quarry Operations. His industry experience began in 1987 and he joined forces with CCI in 1990. While at CCI he has overseen numerous complex, management-intensive projects. As vice president of Quarry Operations, Russell will manage CCI’s Beloit limestone quarry and Williams Bay sand and gravel pit to ensure efficient, safe and compliant operations.

Kevin Day has been promoted to executive vice president of Construction Services. He joined the CCI team in 2012 as project executive to oversee unique, management-intensive projects. As executive vice president of Construction Services, Day leads all CCI construction-related endeavors, assuring collaboration and consistency in day-to-day activities.

Whiting joins AGC as general counsel

Pat Whiting took over as the AGC’s general counsel on May 2. He is a 2001 graduate of UW-Madison and earned his law degree from the University of Minnesota Law School in 2006.

From 2007 to 2013, he served as an assistant attorney general with the Minnesota Attorney General Office, where he represented the Minnesota Department of Transportation in eminent domain cases for the Central Corridor Light Rail Transit project and the Highway 52 Lafayette Bridge replacement in St. Paul. He also represented MnDOT in contractual matters with contractors.

Since 2013, he has worked for the law firm of Fredrikson & Byron, where he represented the joint initiative of 11 transmission-owning utilities in eminent domain proceedings for the CapX2020 project, which is upgrading and expanding the electric transmission grid in Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wisconsin.

Whiting is admitted to practice in Wisconsin, Minnesota and Iowa. He is from Waunakee, where his parents live, and his wife is from Rhinelander.

Bliffert named hardware industry’s Top Gun

The North American Retail Hardware Association, Hardware Retailing magazine and the National Hardware Show have named Eli Bliffert, of Oak Creek-based Bliffert Lumber & Hardware, as one of this year’s Industry Top Guns. One of four men to receive the national Top Gun honor, Bliffert was chosen as an outstanding independent home improvement retail leader.

The award is considered the highest honor an independent home improvement retailer can receive from the industry. Top Guns are selected based on the success of their retail operations, their contributions to the industry beyond their own businesses and their commitment to innovation at retail.

Petrides joins R.A. Smith as a structural engineer

Paul Petrides

Paul Petrides has joined Brookfield-based R.A. Smith National as a structural engineer in the structural services division.

Petrides has more than seven years of structural design experience as both a designer and project engineer. He began his career designing building facade anchorage for natural stone, precast concrete and metal panels, and has spent the last three years completing low-rise building design projects, underground utility projects, as well as structural inspections for existing structures, while developing his previous employer’s building information modeling standards.

Petrides, who lives in Elm Grove, brings his structural design experience to R.A. Smith’s growing structures practice.