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ASSOCIATIONS
• Darren Jensen has been elected to the Direct Selling Association’s board of directors. Jensen is CEO and president of LifeVantage Corp., Salt Lake City. He is one of six new directors elected to the board. DSA is a national trade association that represents the direct selling industry and advocates on behalf of its 200-plus member companies. The board consists of 22 industry leaders who serve as officers and directors, as nominated and elected by their peers. Jensen will serve a three-year term as a board director through 2021. Jensen has been in the industry for nearly 30 years. He was named president and CEO of LifeVantage in 2015.
• Ronda Landa has been appointed director of the newly formed Women’s Council at the Ivory Boyer Real Estate Center (IBREC) at the David Eccles School of Business at the University of Utah. The council seeks to further the role of women as leaders and active participants in Utah’s real estate community. Landa is a sales director at First American Title Co. She also directs business development efforts on behalf of the firm.
• Salt Lake City has been selected to host the 68th United Nations Department of Public Information NGO Conference in 2019. The annual conference attracts 2,000-4,000 representatives from over 300 non-governmental organizations representing more than 80 countries. Each conference focuses on a different UN topic of interest related to the work of civil society and NGOs. The 2019 conference at the Salt Palace Convention Center will be the first time the event is held in the United States outside of New York.
DIRECT SALES
• Young Living Essential Oils, Lehi, has hired Sarah Bjorgaard as vice president of beauty essentials. Bjorgaard has 25 years of experience in direct sales in the beauty industry, including leadership roles with companies including such as Tastefully Simple, Melaleuca and Plexus Worldwide, where she was most recently the vice president of global sales. She also has a background as a professional cosmetologist and served as an independent executive for Mary Kay Cosmetics for nearly 15 years.
DIVIDENDS
• The board of directors of Extra Space Storage Inc., Salt Lake City, has declared a quarterly dividend of 86 cents per share on the common stock of the company for the third quarter. The dividend is payable Sept. 28 to stockholders of record Sept. 14. The company is a real estate investment trust that owns and/or operates 1,568 self-storage properties.
ECONOMIC INDICATORS
• Utah is ranked second among states in a study focused on how poor credit scores increase car insurance costs. The study from InsuranceQuotes.com indicates that Utahns experience premium increases averaging 223 percent when their credit drops from excellent to poor. Only Michigan, at 229 percent, is higher. Unlike the more commonly known consumer credit score, which lenders use to predict how likely a person is to repay a debt, a credit-based insurance score (CBIS) helps insurers know how likely a person is to file a claim, and therefore how great of a risk the person poses. The higher a CBIS, the less likely a person is to file a claim and the lower that person’s rate. The state with the smallest premium increase resulting from a credit drop is North Carolina, at 75 percent.
EDUCATION/TRAINING
• Weber State University will have a grand opening ceremony Sept. 4 from 2-5 p.m. for the new Health Professions Building, known as the Ezekiel R. Jr. & Katherine W. Dumke Center for Interprofessional Education in Healthcare. The public is invited to tour the building during that time. The Dumke Center’s 15,000-square-foot, two-story building provides a space for health professions students to study and learn from peers. Groundbreaking was May 30, 2017, and construction took just over one year to complete. VCBO Architecture was the architect/designer. The contractor was Spindler Construction. The building has four classrooms, 20 offices, two conference rooms, a student collaboration area and study spaces along the hallways. The facility is also open for local healthcare professionals to lecture, host presentations, stage conferences or conduct research. The first and largest donation for the project came from Ezekiel R. Dumke Jr. and Katherine W. Dumke, for whom the building is named.
EXPANSIONS
• JJUMPP, a Lehi-based online presence management platform for small businesses, has announced its expansion to the Australian market. The company now offers its full suite of small-business marketing tools to customers in Australia and the expansion also includes agency and reseller partnership opportunities for Australian-based companies.
HEALTHCARE
• Opticare of Utah & Opticare Plus Vision have named Camille Williams as national sales director of Opticare of Utah. Williams will be responsible for new group and association product sales, agent/broker relations, quotes and renewals, and new market and general sales oversight. Williams has more than 20 years of experience, including as a director of business development and working in the employee benefits services industry at National Benefit Services, Spectra Management and HealthEquity. She has an associate’s degree in psychology from Salt Lake Community College.
INSURANCE
• NFP Corp., a Lehi-based insurance broker and consultant that provides employee benefits, property and casualty, retirement and individual private client solutions, has hired Michael Ongkiko as a vice president for HR services. Ongkiko will be responsible for overseeing HR services in the West region and promoting those capabilities throughout the market. Ongkiko has more than 20 years of human resource experience in the public and private sector. Prior to NFP, he served as the director of human sesources for Salt Lake County. He also spent over five years advising and working closely with elected leaders.
LAW
• The Utah Judicial Performance Evaluation Commission (JPEC) has added four commissioners: Aden Batar, Christine M. Durham, Blair Hodson and Bridget K. Romano. They join the independent, 13-member JPEC, established by the Utah Legislature in 2008. It collects and disseminates information about the performance of all judges in Utah. Batar is director of immigration and refugee resettlement at Catholic Community Services of Utah. His appointment is by the Utah Senate. Durham is a retired Supreme Court justice. She was the first woman appointed to Utah’s Supreme Court, where she served as a justice for more than 30 years, including service as chief justice, before retiring in 2017. Her appointment is by the Utah Supreme Court. Hodson is executive director of the Rocky Mountain Innocence Center. He has over 10 years of nonprofit experience in operations and development and has a particular interest in the establishment of mutually beneficial partnerships between the private and nonprofit sectors. Mr. Hodson's appointment is by the Utah Supreme Court. Romano is assistant division administrator in the Salt Lake County District Attorney’s Civil Division, where her focus is civil litigation. Prior to joining the Salt Lake County District Attorney’s Office, she served as chief civil deputy and solicitor general in the Utah Attorney General’s Office. Her appointment is by Gov. Gary R. Herbert.
• Holland & Hart has hired Chris Mack and Peter Smyth for its Salt Lake City office. Mack joins as an associate in the firm’s commercial litigation practice group. He represents clients on commercial and appellate litigation matters. In addition to a pair of judicial clerkships, he was a judicial intern to Judge Evelyn J. Furse of the U.S. District Court in Utah, clerked with the U.S. Attorney’s Office, and worked in Washington, D.C., as a law clerk on U.S. Sen. Orrin Hatch’s Senate Judiciary Committee. He earned his law degree from the University of Utah S.J. Quinney College of Law and his bachelor’s degree from Utah Valley University. Smyth has joined as an associate in the firm’s tax practice group. He practices in the areas of estate and wealth transfer planning, federal taxation, trust and estate litigation, and Utah state and local taxes. He also works with the trust and estate litigation group to assist clients in litigating trust and estate disputes. His education includes a bachelor’s degree from the University of Utah.
OUTDOOR PRODUCTS/RECREATION/SPORTS
• Solitude Mountain Resort and Brighton Resort have been added as resorts available to Ikon Pass holders. Pass holders now will have access to nearly 10,000 acres of terrain in Utah at Deer Valley Resort, Alta, Snowbird, Solitude Mountain Resort and Brighton Resort — the most terrain offered in Utah on any season pass. The Ikon Pass can be used at 29 destinations in nine states, four Canadian provinces and two continents, offering 66,000 skiable acres.
REAL ESTATE
• Mountain West Commercial Real Estate has opened an office at 2314 Washington Blvd., Ogden. Mountain West shareholder Mike Medina will be the office director. Mountain West has four offices in three states. The company said the new office gives it the opportunity to enhance and increase its service platform to better serve Weber/Davis County clients.
• Rosegate Draper, a 277-unit age-restricted multifamily property in Draper, has been sold for $51.35 million to Kennedy Wilson, a California-based real estate investment company. Marcus & Millichap made the sale announcement. Marcus & Millichap’s Shin and Brock Zylstra represented the seller, a local developer and owner, and procured the buyer. Built in 2015, Rosegate Draper is at 14075 S. Bangerter Parkway. The five-story community features one- and two-bedroom units. Kennedy Wilson’s portfolio currently includes six multifamily properties in Utah and over $16 billion in total assets.
• The 11.62-acre Gateway West Shopping Center property at 5600 West and 3300 South has been sold by Sears Holding Corp. to APM LLC. Financial terms were not disclosed. Mountain West Commercial Real Estate agents Michelle and Tracy Doong represented the buyer, will belisting the property and will be representing the new landlord to do the leasing. Family-owned APM has been in the shopping center industry for more than 40 years and owns commercial property in five states.
RECOGNITIONS
• Patricia W. Christensen will be awarded the YWCA’s 2018 Outstanding Achievement Award in Law honor at the 30th annual Leader Luncheon, set for Sept. 7 at the Grand America Hotel in Salt Lake City. The YWCA presents the award to women who have demonstrated their commitment to advancing the well-being of Utah women and girls, and whose work and achievement exemplify the YWCA’s mission of eliminating racism; empowering women; and promoting peace, justice, freedom and dignity for all. Christensen is an attorney at Parr Brown Gee & Loveless, Salt Lake City. She is a founding member, past president and current board member of Women Lawyers of Utah; a mentor with the Utah State Bar’s New Lawyer Training Program; founded and leads a mentoring group for women lawyers; serves or has served as an officer and director of numerous other professional, civic and charitable organizations; has been a lifelong social justice advocate, and is an active member of the Utah Citizens’ Council focusing on the impact of economic inequality on society, especially as it affects minorities and women.
• England Logistics, a Salt Lake City-based freight brokerage firm, has been ranked on the “50 Best Companies to Sell For” list, compiled by Selling Power. It is the England Logistics’ second year on the list. To determine rankings, the Selling Power research team evaluated applications that focused on three broad categories: compensation and benefits; hiring, sales training and sales, enablement; and customer retention.
SERVICES
• U-Haul Company of Utah Inc. has announced that Quality Building Stone Inc. has signed on as a U-Haul neighborhood dealer to serve the Bluffdale community. Quality Building Stone, 993 W. 14730 S., will offer U-Haul trucks, trailers, towing equipment and moving supplies.
TECHNOLOGY/LIFE SCIENCES
• BlytzPay, a Salt Lake City-based financial technology payment company, has named Darrell Gamble as chief revenue officer. Gamble as 25 year of experience in building and empowering SaaS sales teams, most recently serving as the senior vice president of sales at MX.