People

Independent Insurance Agents of North Carolina named Kelley L. Erstine chief executive officer.

Erstine assumed the association’s CEO responsibilities Oct. 15 and replaces Bob Bird upon his retirement after 25 years of service to IIANC.

Erstine served as executive vice president of the Independent Insurance Agents of Arkansas for eight years where his duties included managing the affairs of the association and directing the organization’s governmental affairs division. He also served as a member of the Independent Insurance Agents & Brokers of America’s (Big “I”) National Governmental Affairs and State Governmental Affairs board.

Prior to being named IIANC’s new CEO, Erstine was the vice president of Institutional Advancement and Development at the University of Central Arkansas, a state institution of approximately 13,000 students located in Conway, Ark.

The partners of Raleigh, N.C.-based TriSure, an independently owned insurance brokerage and consulting firm, appointed Kurt Sokolowski to their leadership team.

A client executive at TriSure since 2004, Sokolowski has managed commercial property and casualty accounts (including general liability and workers’ compensation) and oversaw account representatives responsible for day-to-day operations. Sokolowski’s appointment as partner comes in the wake of significant growth for TriSure. Since 2005, the firms says its revenues have increased 45 percent and its staff has increased 36 percent.

American International Group Inc. has named two executives to lead its restructuring.

AIG said that Paula Rosput Reynolds, a former chief executive of Seattle-based insurer Safeco, would become chief restructuring officer, overseeing divestiture of assets and serving as AIG’s main liaison with the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, which provided AIG with an $85 billion loan. The company has since received an additional line of credit.

Richard Booth, AIG’s chief administrative officer, is now also to be in charge of transition planning. Booth will oversee the separation of companies that AIG sells off.

Reynolds and Booth will report to Edward Liddy, who was named AIG CEO in conjunction with the government’s bailout.

Separately, AIG told Reuters it hired New York public relations firm Burson-Marsteller to help it respond to the “huge volume of requests for information we are receiving from customers, employees and the media.”

Markel Corp. named John K. Latham president of its newly formed Southeast region. In addition to his new role, Latham will continue to head the Office of Business Development.

As president of the Southeast region, Latham will organize the management team that will focus on marketing and underwriting all of Markel’s products. The region will serve the wholesale distribution community in nine southeastern states and Puerto Rico.

The southeast region is one of five regions in the new structure of Markel’s excess and surplus lines operations. Plans for the new structure will be fully implemented in early 2009.

Latham has worked with Markel for six years and has held several roles including president of Markel Re and chief information officer. In addition, he created the Office of Business Development for Markel and headed that department since 2007.

National Insurance Crime Bureau has named James K. Schweitzer senior vice president and chief operating officer.

As former director of the South Carolina Department of Public Safety, Schweitzer led 1,500 employees charged with enforcing traffic, motor vehicle and motor carrier laws, providing security for public officials and state properties, and administering highway safety and criminal justice grant programs.

Prior to becoming director of Public Safety, Schweitzer served over 33 years with the Federal Bureau of Investigation. He began his FBI career in Tampa, Fla., and served in a variety of assignments in the field and at FBI Headquarters in Washington, D.C. As chief of New Agent’s Training at the FBI Academy, Schweitzer supervised all instructors and was responsible for the FBI’s National Academy Program. In 2002, Schweitzer was appointed special agent in charge of the Columbia, South Carolina, FBI office where he oversaw the creation of a Joint Terrorism Task Force and the opening of a Computer Crime Center.

Wausau, Wis.-based Wausau Signature Agency has appointed two vice presidents to lead sales, service and marketing in the southern and northern regions of the U.S. Mark Miller has been promoted to vice president-South Zone. Millerjoined WSA in 2003 as director of sales in the Overland Park, Kansas office. He began his insurance career with Wausau Insurance as a field claim adjuster in 1981 in Overland Park. He held a series of claim positions of increasing responsibility including claims supervisor, claim unit manager, team manager and claims manager in the Overland Park office.

Mike Kern has assumed the position of WSA vice president-North Zone, after having served several years as head of WSA’s South Zone. Prior to his experience with WSA, Kern held various sales and underwriting positions within the Liberty Mutual Group. He joined the organization in 1988 as an account representative in Portland, Ore.

WSA is a national agency that offers access to group, property and casualty products from a variety of carriers.

Topics Agencies AIG