Lobbying World

• Michael A. Shupp has joined Van Scoyoc Associates. Shupp is a retired Marine colonel and was former chief legislative adviser to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Shupp commanded the main effort in the Battle of Fallujah and also was chief of staff for the program to counter the use of improvised explosive devices in Iraq.

{mosads}• Nicole C. Young has been hired by the Podesta Group as a principal. Young was previously a federal policy adviser for Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm (D). Young served as a liaison for members of Congress and their staff. Young will help Podesta expand its state and local lobbying practice.

• Susan Laver has joined the Washington office of United Technologies Corp. as manager of its space propulsion systems. Laver worked for more than four years at NASA and also was a Capitol Hill aide for six years, serving Reps. Dave Weldon (R-Fla.), Bud Shuster (R-Pa.) and Bill Young (R-Fla.).

• Len Wolfson has joined the Mortgage Bankers Association as its new director of legislative affairs. Wolfson was formerly deputy assistant secretary for congressional and intergovernmental relations at the Department of Housing and Urban Development. Before working at the department, Wolfson was the northwest Pennsylvania field director for President George W. Bush’s reelection bid.

• Lora Ries has been hired by Monument Policy Group as senior counsel. Ries has served as acting director and deputy director of mission operations in the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s US-VISIT program. Lora also was counsel for the House Judiciary Committee’s Immigration subcommittee from 2000 to 2003.

• Jessica Berk Ross will be the new managing director of the Washington office for Ruder Finn Inc. Ross has led her own firm since 2001 and was formerly the director of the public affairs practice at Hill & Knowlton.

• Prism Public Affairs has hired Mary Hanley, Margaret Liu and Caren Wilcox. Hanley, an executive vice president at the firm, most recently spent six years as executive vice president of the National Association for Biomedical Research. Liu, who spent 10 years at Fannie Mae before establishing her own consultancy, will be a senior financial services adviser. Wilcox, a senior counselor at the firm, is a food safety expert who served as deputy undersecretary for food safety at the U.S. Department of Agriculture from 1997 to 2001.