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The law firm of Robinson & Cole LLP has elected Patrick M. Birney and Peter R. Knight as partners. Birney is a member of the firm’s finance group where he concentrates his practice in the areas of bankruptcy and creditors’ rights law. He also serves on the board of the Connecticut Lottery Corp. and is the vice chair of the Wallingford Planning and Zoning Commission. Knight is a member of the firm’s environmental practice group where he focuses on defending clients in litigation matters involving all manner of environmental issues. Robinson & Cole LLP, founded in 1845, has 225 attorneys and 250 professional staff in nine offices.
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TD Bank has named Todd C. Navin as vice president — commercial loan officer in commercial banking in Glastonbury. He is responsible for building and managing a portfolio of commercial loans as well as administrative lending matters, credit administration and risk management, serving clients throughout Greater Hartford. Navin has more than 22 years of experience in banking and financial services. Prior to joining TD Bank, he served as a commercial lender with Liberty Bank in Middletown.
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Meredith G. Diette has been named shareholder in Siegel, O’Connor, O’Donnell and Beck, P.C., a law firm specializing in management-side labor and employment law. Diette serves as the firm’s resident attorney in New London and represents public and private employers. She serves on the Board of Directors for the Rotary Club of New London, the Human Resources Leadership Association of Eastern Connecticut and the Three Rivers Community Foundation and on the Chamber of Commerce of Eastern Connecticut’s Board of Trustees. The firm, which recently celebrated its 50th anniversary, also named Ryan A. O’Donnell as an associate in its Hartford office.
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The University of Phoenix has named Nancy Lynn Pluzdrak as campus director for its Fairfield County campus in Norwalk. In her new role, Pluzdrak leads faculty and staff and oversees all operations at the campus including academic affairs, enrollment, finance and student and alumni services. She is a University of Phoenix graduate and faculty member and brings more than 30 years of management experience to her new position. Pluzdrak was most recently lead faculty and area content chair for the University of Phoenix’s School of Business at the Fairfield County campus. Pluzdrak was selected as the 2010 Faculty of the Year at the Fairfield County Campus. Previously, Pluzdrak held various executive level positions including executive vice president of international operations and executive vice president of global human resources for Daymon Worldwide.
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Chuck Cusson has been named field trainer for Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage in Connecticut and Westchester County, N.Y. Cusson was previously a top-producing sales associate in the Avon office of Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage. He has been a Realtor since 2002. Cusson’s real estate experience started at a young age while working at his family’s real estate development company in Glastonbury.
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Melanie Meile has joined Vanguard Direct as senior account representative in the Rocky Hill office. She had been the owner of PrintWise LLC in Glastonbury. She will be responsible for client relations and new business development for the Connecticut office of the marketing communication service firm.
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Kirk Mikulec has joined Baumer Ltd. as the company’s Industry segment sales manager for the oil and gas industry. In his new position, Mikulec will oversee sales of Baumer motion control and process instrumentation products including sensors and encoders to oil and gas industry customers in Texas, Oklahoma and Louisiana. For the last 10 years he served as regional sales manager for BEI Industrial Encoders where he specialized in the oil and gas market. The Baumer Group, a Swiss firm, is an innovator of precision sensors, motion control, and vision technology for the automation market. Its U.S. division is located in Southington.
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Garth Rivenburgh has been named an associate at CHA’s Rocky Hill office. He is a project manager within CHA’s power & communications market team. He has over 25 years of experience with a wide variety of design and construction projects. CHA is a full service engineering firm with a staff of over 700 in 31 offices from Florida to Maine.
