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AGRICULTURE • Members of Utah’s 28 county farm bureaus recently met in Layton to select leaders for the Utah Farm Bureau Federation. Convention delegates elected Spanish Fork cattle rancher Rex Larsen to a two-year term as vice president of the organization. Wayne Jarrett, a farmer from Nephi, was elected to the State Board of Directors, filling the remaining year of Larsen’s vacated board seat representing Juab, Utah and Wasatch counties. Flint Richards, a farmer from Erda, was also elected to the State Board of Directors, representing Davis, Salt Lake and Tooele counties. Richards also works on behalf of the Jersey dairy cattle industry. John Ferry, a cattle rancher from Corinne; Joël Hatch, a rancher from Castle Dale; and Craig Laub, a hayfarmer from Beryl, were re-elected to two-year terms on the Utah Farm Bureau Board of Directors. JaNae Titmus of Grantsville was elected to the newly created position of vice chair for the Farm Bureau Women’s Leadership Committee. Titmus and her family are sheep ranchers in Tooele County, and she had been serving on the Women’s Leadership Committee. Filling her remaining year on the committee will be Selma Lehmitz from West Jordan. Others elected to the Farm Bureau Women’s Leadership Committee were Kitty Young of Henefer, Sara Harward of Springville, and Nancy Harris of Richfield. Three new couples were elected to serve on the State Young Farmer & Rancher Committee: Dave and Kalei Robbins of Santaquin, Jed and Nanci Johnson of Aurora, and Kyle and Shelley Wilson of Enterprise. Kenny and Jamilla McFarland of West Weber were re-elected to another term on the committee. Elections also took place for seven districts and chairs for the newly created Agriculture Promotions Committee. In place for a year as an ad-hoc committee, it became permanent this year and required the election of officers. Jamison and Stacy McPherson of Nephi were chosen as chairs for the committee, along with Matt and Lena Leak of Cornish, Daryn Westergard of Ogden, Joel and Becca Ferry of Corinne, Brad and Jenny Osguthorpe of Heber City, Duane and Andrea Schoenfeld of Tridell, Marc and Hollie Henrie of Richfield, and Maria Nye of Delta. CONTESTS • Registration is open until March 1 for the High School Utah Entrepreneur Challenge, open to students in Utah ages 14-18 for a chance to win up to $30,000 in prizes and scholarships. Registration requires students to submit a simple business idea. Twenty-four teams will be chosen to compete for three grand prizes of $5,000 each. Other prizes and scholarships include Best Prototype Award of $1,000, a People’s Choice Award of $1,000, a Rising Star Award of $1,000, a Top Online Vote Award of $500 and $10,000 of in-kind Lassonde Studios housing scholarships. Finalists will be announced March 16, and an awards ceremony takes place April 15 at the University of Utah. Details are at lassonde.utah.edu. DIVIDENDS • Nutraceutical International Corp., Park City, has announced that its board of directors has declared a quarterly cash dividend on the company’s common stock of 12.5 cents per share. The dividend is payable Jan. 5 to stockholders of record Dec. 20. ENTERTAINMENT • The Fountain View Event Venue will open this month at Station Park in Farmington. The 10,000-square-foot event space is on the second floor, above Twigs Bistro & Martini Bar, and can accommodate up to 300 people. The venue features a 4,000-square-foot main hall and two smaller rooms. The venue has an open-vendor policy, meaning that customers can bring in their own vendors, includingthe caterer of their choice. The venue space, which previously sat empty, has large arched windows overlooking Station Park’s Fountain Square and seasonaloutdoor ice skating rink. A grand opening event will take place 11 a.m.-3 p.m. Jan. 21. It is free and open to the public and will feature live music and free food and drinks. Fountain View will be managed by Noah’s EventVenue, based in South Jordan. It operates 30 event venues nationwide, including those in Lindon and South Jordan. ENVIRONMENT • The Utah Governor’s Office of Energy Development (OED), in partnership with Leaders for Clean Air, recently cut the ribbon on a newly installed electric vehicle (EV) charging station at Rowland Hall School. The ceremony marked the completion of nine EV installations at six nonprofit locations across Salt Lake City as part of a $10,000 OED grant awarded to Leaders for Clean Air this past July. Grant funds from the OED were used to facilitate the installation of Level 2 EV charging equipment in partnership with nonprofit entities throughout the Wasatch Front. To qualify for an EV charging station, the nonprofit organization had to employ 10, with at least one of the employees commuting in an EV. Funds covered all costs associated with the EV installation, including the charger and electrical service work. The six nonprofit locations where EV charging stations were installed are Rowland Hall School, Envision Utah, Hogle Zoo, Artspace Commons (which includes tenants Heal Utah, Sierra Club and Tree Utah, among other nonprofit organizations), Wasatch Charter School and Utah Clean Energy. INVESTMENT• Finicity, Salt Lake City, has secured $42 million in new funding. Finicity provides real-time financial data aggregation and insights. Finicity’s Series B round was led by Experian, along with a venture debt facility provided by Bridge Bank and participation from existing investors. Finicity said it will use the capital from its funding to expand its engineering and support teams, accelerating new solution development built upon its data aggregation platform. The funding will focus on growth at Finicity Data Services while also reinforcing operations at sister businesses Mvelopes and Aurora. Thomas Fast, managing director at Ultra Advisors, an independent investment banking division of KEMA Partners, advised Finicity on the transaction.
MANUFACTURING
• Big Agnes Inc., based in Colorado, has announced distribution expansion plans, including opening a second domestic distribution center outside of Salt Lake City.
Howard Peterson has been hired to manage operations at the new distribution center. He is a seasoned outdoor and sporting goods industry executive who has worked in various management capacities, including distribution, manufacturing and logistics roles at brands such as The Coleman Co., Smith Sport Optics and Quality Bicycle Products.
RECOGNITIONS
• Gold Cross Ambulance has received the 2016 Best Quality Improvement Program Award from the American Ambulance Association (AAA). The award was presented to the Utah-based ambulance service provider for significant improvements in documentation and vital sign collection that contributed to improved patient care. Gold Cross Ambulance provides basic life support, paramedic, critical care, neonatal, bariatric and 911 services in Salt Lake City and Utah, Juab, Uintah, Iron and Washington counties.
• Four people have earned Golden Spike Awards, presented by the Utah Valley and Greater Salt Lake chapters of the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA). The awards recognize individual Utah communicators for their exemplary work during the past year. The Communicator of the Year award was presented to Kalani Sitake, in his first year as football head coach at Brigham Young University. The Professional Communicator of the Year award was presented to Chris Thomas, president of Intrepid, a Salt Lake City-based public relations agency. The Mid-Level Professional of the Year award was presented to Bethany Hyatt, a public information officer with the Utah Department of Workforce Services. The Young Professional of the Year award was presented to Allie Jurkatis, a public information officer for the Utah Department of Human Services. The annual event also recognized excellence and best practices in PR and business communication in Utah. An out-of-state judging panel reviewed 75 entries.
RETAIL
• Natural Grocers, based in Colorado, has opened a store at 270 12th St., Ogden. The 18,000-square-foot store is the company’s sixth store in Utah. It plans to open a South Jordan store in early 2017. Natural Grocers by Vitamin Cottage has 128 stores in 19 states.
SERVICES • SCS Engineers has named David Vonasek to manage its Salt Lake City office. Vonasek is a licensed professional engineer with more than 32 years of experience, including knowledge and experience in landfill gas engineering services. He has worked at hundreds of landfills throughout the U.S., Canada, Mexico and Europe. • Vivint Smart Home, Provo, has hired David Porter as chief procurement officer. He will be responsible for sourcing, procurement and supply chain management across the company. Porter has 18 years of supply chain experience, including a variety of executive positions at Cummins Inc. The positions included executive director of supply chain for the Engine Division of Cummins; general manager of global oil and gas; leading the company’s sales and marketing efforts worldwide; and managing engine plants in Jamestown, New York, and Juárez, Mexico. Porter is a former captain in the U.S. Army, where he served as a logistics officer. TECHNOLOGY/LIFE SCIENCES • ARUP Laboratories, Salt Lake City, has appointed Dr. Julio Delgado as chief medical officer, director of laboratories and co-chief of the company’s Clinical Pathology Division. Delgado’s appointment fills a vacancy left by the departure of Dr. Jerry Hussong. Delgado joined ARUP in 2006 as a medical director in the Department of Immunology. He served as co-executive director of the ARUP Institute for Clinical and Experimental Pathology from 2013-2015. Delgado is an associate professor of pathology at the University of Utah School of Medicine. • The Women Tech Council (WTC) recently launched the TechArt Hour of Code, an initiative involving 10,000 girls across Utah to cre- ate a living digital display. The program was part of a national movement around coding during National Computer Science Education Week. The TechArt Hour of Code program teaches students basic coding skills as they create a tile including an image and text. Each individual tile is then combined to create a living digital display showing the collective learning and creations of girls and students across Utah. The first version of the display launched Dec. 6 across local and national platforms. The TechArt Hour of Code is now part of the SheTech curriculum that reaches tens of thousands of girls and activates them into STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) pathways. The TechArt program is in partnership with Dell EMC, Comcast, the Utah Governor’s Office of Economic Development, the Utah STEM Action Center, school CTE directors and the University of Utah Athletics.