Who We Are

Steve McElhiney, CPCU – President

Steve McElhiney is the president of both EWI and Tall Pines Insurance Company (VT), a captive insurance company.

His insurance industry experience has spanned over two decades with groups including Fireman’s Fund, TIG, Argonaut Group and Overseas Partners US Reinsurance Company. He has served in the roles of Chief Financial Officer, Corporate Treasurer, Board of Directors member, and Ceded Reinsurance executive.

He has worked extensively in handling insurance company underwriting and financial issues, including credit and counterparty risk, catastrophe management, economic capital, establishing a strategic risk framework, and capital management. He is a frequent speaker and panelist at insurance and capital markets events and has written papers on a variety of topics including commutations; enterprise risk management; and the confluence between insurance companies and capital markets firms.

Steve earned a B.S. (cum laude) and an MBA from the University of Southern California, and attended executive programs at Northwestern Kellogg and the University of Michigan. He also holds a CPCU, Associate in Reinsurance and AIAF certificates.

Steve is the incoming 2011-2012 President & Chairman of the CPCU Society and is the incoming 2011-2012 Chair of the Vermont Captive Insurance Association.

He is an “Ex-Officio” Trustee of The Institutes, a not-for-profit organization that delivers proven knowledge solutions that drive powerful results for the risk-management and property-casualty industry.

Steve is the Treasurer and a board member of North America’s Corridor Coalition (NASCO), an international trade organization.

Brad Lew – Senior Vice President

Brad Lew is a Senior Vice President with EWI, focused on production, placement, and service for treaty reinsurance clients. His insurance industry experience of over 17 years provides knowledge in Personal and Commercial lines covering the breadth of property, casualty, and workers’ compensation products. Brad also has experience with catastrophe management, assisting the A.M. Best SRQ process, captives, weather risk, DFA, and ERM.

As a new addition to EWI, Brad previously was a Vice President at Willis Re for 8 years, involved in production and service, including coordination of extensive analytical services for treaty clients. Prior, he was an Analyst at CSAA (AAA of Northern CA) in ceded reinsurance, where he purchased property catastrophe reinsurance, managed a reinsurance broker selection RFP process, performed captive insurer company analysis, and coordinated ERM initiatives. Brad began his insurance career with Fireman’s Fund Insurance as a Directors & Officers Liability underwriter, advancing to Product Director.

Brad earned a B.S. and M.S. in Finance from Golden Gate University. He has served on the Board of a Risk & Insurance Management Society (RIMS) chapter and has been a member of Professional Liability Underwriting Society (PLUS).

Bonnie Hardesty – Assistant Vice President

As Assistant Vice President at EWI, Bonnie is responsible for primary placements, as well as preparing and marketing treaty proposals, and captive formations.

Prior to joining EWI, Bonnie’s experience includes working for a Managing General Agency that specialized in trucking and transportation insurance placements, and also working for Third Party Administrators where she marketed stop loss insurance placements.

Bonnie currently holds her General Lines Property & Casualty, Life, Accident & Health and Surplus Lines licenses and is able to assist clients in these lines of insurance.

Glenn Peterson, CPCU, CRM, ARM, CIC – Senior Vice President, Risk Management

Glenn serves as Senior Vice President of Risk Management for EWI. He works with client organizations to develop, implement and manage strategies to reduce the frequency and severity of loss.

Prior to joining EWI in 2004, Glenn was Director of Risk Management for DHL Express, the world’s largest express and logistics organization. He was responsible for risk management, loss control, insurance and bonds, claims supervision, and contract issues for North and South America.

Prior engagements include serving in executive risk management for Sunbeam Corporation, Greenhill Petroleum Corporation, and Western Mining Corporation.

Glenn earned his business degree from the University of Texas at Austin. Glenn is a frequent speaker on risk management and insurance topics at local, national and international conferences.

Lynn Sheils, J.D. – Senior Vice President & General Counsel

Lynn Sheils serves as General Counsel to EWI where she has oversight of EWI legal matters. In addition, Lynn is responsible for the administration of client organization’s reinsurance contracts and insurance policies to help advocate for most optimal wordings available. Lynn also has oversight of client claims and can assist in claims reporting, claims collection issues, and can help serve as an advocate in coverage controversies.

Prior to joining EWI in 2005, Lynn was a litigator in private practice in Texas. Most recently, she was a shareholder in the Dallas office of Cooper & Scully, P.C. At Cooper & Scully she analyzed and handled complex insurance coverage matters, representing both insurers and insureds, and was of among a relatively small number of attorneys with the ability to represent reinsurers. Aside from her insurance and reinsurance coverage work, Lynn has litigation experience representing insurance companies, claims managers and self-insured companies.

Lynn earned a Doctor of Jurisprudence from Southern Methodist University, School of Law and a Bachelor of Science, cum laude, from Texas Tech University. Lynn is admitted to practice as a member of the Texas State Bar and the United States District Court for the Northern, Southern, Eastern and Western Districts of Texas. In 2009, Lynn completed the Associate in Reinsurance (ARe) Program and was presented with the 2010 Distinguished Graduate Award for having the highest cumulative grade average on the examination.

Michael C. McKee, ARM, ASP, CFPS - Vice President, Loss Control

Michael serves as Vice President of Loss Control for EWI Inc. He assists our clients in identifying, managing and mitigating risk exposures using creative and real-life approaches to Loss Control.

Before joining EWI in 2006, Michael worked for the Insurance Services Office as a field All-Risk and HPR Loss Control Representative and worked as a Senior Fire Prevention Officer for the Dallas Fire Department specializing in hazardous materials.

Additionally, Michael is registered as an insurance loss control representative with the Texas Department of Insurance, a Field Safety Representative with the Texas Workers Compensation Commission, and is certified as a Radiation Worker Level II and Hazardous Waste Operations and Emergency Response (HazWoper) Technician.

Scott Uhl – Senior Vice President, Specialty Casualty

Scott Uhl is a Senior Vice-President with EWI Risk Services. The specialty casualty practice provides blended wholesale and co-brokerage insurance intermediary and risk consulting capabilities.

Scott was formerly with Quorum Risk as the director of the D&O and Governance Risk Management Group and Technology E&O practice. Prior to forming Quorum Risk, Scott was a Vice-President and national technology practice leader with Lockton Financial Services.

Prior to Lockton, Scott was the Underwriting Manager for Liberty International, underwriting D&O, EPLI, Fiduciary and Professional Liability for publicly traded high-technology, bio-technology, energy and marine issuers and privately held middle market, commercial and financial institution firms.

Earlier assignments included that of Branch Manager and lead-IPO management liability underwriter at AIG and the Contractors Labor Pool.

Scott has a B.A. from California State University, Chico. He is on the advisory board of the North Texas chapter of the National Association of Corporate Directors, is a member of PLUS, and also serves on the Evaluators Board of the North Texas Regional Center for Innovation and Commercialization.

Nicholas P. Roberto – Senior Vice President

Nick Roberto is a Senior Vice President at EWI specializing in the production and broking of treaty and facultative reinsurance. Nick has enjoyed a career in the reinsurance industry that spans over 30 years. These years of experience, exclusively in the field of reinsurance, has given him significant experience and an indispensible knowledge base that he brings to bear in assisting clients with the structuring of reinsurance programs and in broking those programs.

Nick graduated with a Bachelor degree in Economics from Ramapo College in 1978. He began his reinsurance career in 1978 as a Treaty Underwriter at Continental Reinsurance Co. in New York. Thereafter, Nick expanded his reinsurance experience at reinsurance intermediaries located in New York, Dallas, and Overland Park, Kansas, including serving as an assistant vice president at Intere Intermediaries, Inc. and Bell Nicholson Henderson, and as a vice president at Bates Turner/Employers Re. Most recently, Nick joins EWI, after a 9-year career at Aon Benfield, where he was responsible for the opening of the Benfield office in Dallas.

Toni Green – Vice President - Claims

As Vice President of Claims, Toni is responsible for the supervision of the workers compensation and medical TPA adjusters on the handling of claims with the ultimate goal of maximizing production and reducing the cost of risk throughout the company. In addition, Toni performs annual audits on six TPA’s in an effort to provide ongoing oversight and management of claims with the intent of focusing heavily upon claims with high severity potential and those claims where large losses have become evident.

Toni served as Risk Analyst for the Contran Group (NL Industries - Houston) where she began her career in the insurance industry in 1991. Toni relocated with the company and joined EWI in Dallas, Texas in January 2004.

Toni is a graduate of Prairie View A&M University where she obtained a bachelors degree in business administration. She is also a licensed Workers Compensation Claims Adjuster for the State of Texas.