Ron Stack Elected to Head MSRB

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WASHINGTON - Ronald Stack, managing director and head of public finance at Lehman Brothers, has been elected chairman of the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board for a one-year term beginning Oct. 1, the board announced today.

The board also elected Peter Clarke, the head of municipal underwriting and syndication at JPMorgan, as its new vice chairman.

Though the board's election of Stack, Clarke, and five new members took place at its July 17-18 meeting in Beaver Creek, Colo., their names were not publicly disclosed until this morning.

The new members, who will serve three-year terms, include two securities firm officials, two public representatives, and one bank dealer official. The 15-member board is made of up five securities firm officials, five bank officials, and five members of the public, including a representative of the investor community and a representative of issuers.

Michael Bartolotta, vice chairman of Dallas-based First Southwest Co., and Stanley Grayson, president and chief operating officer of New York City-based M.R. Beal & Co., were elected to the two securities seats.

F. Thomas Howard, executive director of Kentucky's Office of Financial Management, within the Finance and Administration Cabinet, and Kathleen McDonough, a retired executive from Ambac Financial Group, were elected as the two public representatives.

Martin Vogtsberger, managing director and head of institutional brokerage at Columbia, Ohio-based Fifth Third Securities, was elected to the bank dealer seat.

Stack will replace Frank Chin, managing director and manager of the public finance department at Citi in New York, and Clarke will replace Donald O'Brien, the former head of syndication at Morgan Stanley in New York. O'Brien stepped off the board in late July after he left Morgan Stanley. MSRB officials said they do not know why he left and Morgan Stanley would not comment. O'Brien could not be reached.

Chin, along with James A. Posthauer, director of municipal trading and underwriting at SunTrust Robinson Humphrey in Atlanta, will serve an additional year on the board to replace to bank representatives that left last winter - Alan Murphy, formerly of Popular Securities Inc., and Ramiro Albarran, who was previously with Banc of America Securities LLC. Posthauer returned to the board earlier this year after completing a three-year term at the end of last September.

Though Chin was eligible to run for a second year as chairman, he chose not to, board sources have said.

Stack's election marks the second time he's succeeded Chin in an important post in the municipal market. In 2003, he replaced Chin as the new chairman of the municipal executive committee of The Bond Market Association, now the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association. Stack was traveling overseas and could not be reached for comment.

In a 2003 interview with The Bond Buyer following his election to the TBMA post, Stack described himself as a political junkie, in part because of his background: he was speech writer and deputy chief of staff to former New York Gov. Hugh Carey. He also taught political science at two universities.

Stack holds a bachelor's degree from Kings College in Pennsylvania and a master's of philosophy from Columbia University.

Peter Clarke

Clarke, who is in the second year of his three-year term and previously served on the MSRB from 1990-1993, has held various management positions at JPMorgan since joining the firm in 1977 and is a former member of the SIFMA syndicate and trading committee. He received his bachelor's degree from the University of Virginia.At First Southwest, Bartolotta co-manages the firm's Houston public finance practice and serves as chairman of its public finance management committee. He has more than 20 years of experience in public finance serving as either financial advisor of underwriter for a wide variety of clients and issuers. He received his bachelor's of science degree in actuarial science from the University of Illinois.

Grayson joined M.R. Beal in 2002 and has worked for more than 25 years in public finance both as an investment banker and government executive. He worked as a deputy mayor for finance and economic development for the city of New York and as the city's finance commissioner. He received his bachelor's of arts from the College of the Holy Cross and his law degree from the University of Michigan Law School.

At the Kentucky Office of Financial Management, Howard oversees the state's $12 billion investment and appropriation-supported debt programs, as well as all non-appropriation debt issued by Kentucky state agencies. Prior to working for the state, he had a background in banking and investment management. He received his bachelor's of business administration with a concentration in finance from the University of Kentucky.

McDonough has nearly 30 years of experience in public finance and securities law and served as senior managing director at Ambac through 2007, where she led the company's public and project finance unit. Earlier experience included practicing securities and municipal finance law and serving as an enforcement investigator with the New York Stock Exchange. She received her bachelor's of science in accounting from Fordham University and her law degree from Fordham University Law School.

At Fifth Third, Vogtsberger has day-to-day management responsibility for public finance, fixed-income trading, and institutional sales and is a member of the firm's risk management committee and board of directors. He has over 20 years of senior-level experience in public finance and fixed-income trading. He received his bachelor's of arts in political science from Miami University, master of city planning in the school of engineering at Ohio State University and attended the public finance institute at the University of Michigan's graduate school of business administration.

The three members leaving the board at the end of September are: John Hull, financial vice president and chief investment officer at the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation in New York; Michael Imhoff, managing director at Stifel Nicolaus & Co. in Denver; and Milroy Alexander, executive director and chief executive officer of the Colorado Housing and Finance Authority, also in Denver.

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