Gary G. Ely, a 34-year-veteran of Spokane, WA-based Avista Corp., was elected chairman of the board, and will retain his titles of president and CEO. He succeeds Larry A. Stanley as chairman, who retired after serving on the board since 1991 and as non-executive chairman since last November. Ely, 53, was named president and CEO in November 2000 after briefly serving as acting president and CEO. He had held the position of executive vice president of Avista before that. In recent months, Ely has been credited with helping Avista Utilities regain its financial strength and with developing a long-term strategy on power issues.

Tulsa-based Unit Corp. announced that its co-founder, chairman and CEO, King Kirchner, will retire from his position as CEO at the end of June 2001. John Nikkel, Unit’s president, has been elected to the vacated position. The company said Kirchner will continue to serve in his capacity as chairman. Unit explores for oil and natural gas and contracts for the drilling of oil and natural gas wells. Its drilling rig fleet now consists of 52 rigs and it owns an interest in 2,950 oil and gas wells. Unit’s operations are located from South Texas through Montana and into Canada.

Houston-based Nuevo Energy Co. has accepted the resignation of Doug Foshee as chairman, president and CEO. Foshee intends to pursue other interests. With Foshee’s resignation, the board of directors appointed Isaac Arnold, an outside Nuevo director since 1990, as chairman. The board also announced that Phillip Gobe, currently Nuevo’s COO, has been appointed interim president and CEO. Nuevo has initiated a search for a new president and CEO, and Gobe will be considered as part of the search. “Phillip Gobe and the rest of Nuevo’s senior management team have the full support of our board of directors,” said Arnold.

Dan C. Tutcher has been appointed president of Duluth, MN-based Lakehead Pipe Line Co. Inc., the general partner of Lakehead Pipe Line Partners LP. He succeeds J. Richard Bird, who has become group vice president, Transportation Group North, for Enbridge Inc. based in Calgary, which is also the parent company of Lakehead Pipe Line Partners LP. Through subsidiary companies, Enbridge operates the upstream Canadian pipeline system which is integrated with the Lakehead system and provides field operation and business services to Lakehead through service agreements. Enbridge announced a segmentation of its Energy Transportation Group and appointed Tutcher the group vice president, Transportation Group South. Bird will remain on the board of directors of the general partner and will continue to have operational and development responsibility for the existing assets of the Partnership. Lakehead Pipe Line Partners LP plans to adopt the Enbridge brand and will rename the Lakehead Partnership later this year.

Prima Energy Corp. reported that Neil L. Stenbuck has joined the company as executive vice president and CFO, effective May 16. Stenbuck will fill a newly created position at Prima, where the company’s president and CEO, Richard H. Lewis, has also served as Prima’s CFO since the company was founded in 1980. Stenbuck held the position of vice president and CFO at Basin Exploration. from 1995 until earlier this year, when that company was merged with Stone Energy Corp.

The Georgia Power board of directors announced that it has elected Judy M. Anderson as senior vice president of the company and president of the Georgia Power Foundation Inc. Anderson, 52, also was elected on Wednesday as president of the Southern Company Charitable Foundation Inc. Formerly Georgia Power’s vice president and corporate secretary, Anderson will be responsible for setting the strategic direction for Georgia Power’s and Southern Company’s charitable giving programs. Her appointment will be effective June 1. Georgia Power is the largest subsidiary of Southern Co.

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