MAY 13 • 2021 | 35

HERE’S TO!

Jim Newman, 
owner and 
managing 
partner of 
Newman 
Consulting 
Group LLC (NCG) in 
Farmington Hills, was 
honored as a Fellow of the 
international ASHRAE 
organization, which 
recognizes members who 
have attained distinction 
and made substantial 
contributions in HVAC&R 
and the built environment 
such as education, 
research, engineering 
design and consultation, 
publications, presentations 
and mentoring. 

Pam Cooper is 
vice president 
of the Escalent 
Energy division, 
based in 
Livonia, and 
serves as the company’s 
Qualtrics partnership 
manager. She is a valued 
adviser to clients in the 
solar energy, electric 
vehicle and energy 
efficiency industries and 
oversees key business 
development activities, for 
electric, gas and water 
utilities in the U.S. 

The firm of 
Howard & 
Howard 
announced that 
attorney Lisa S. 
Gretchko has 
been appointed to serve 
as a judge for the U.S. 
Bankruptcy Court, Eastern 
District of Michigan in 
Detroit. She joined Howard 
& Howard in 2003. 

Dr. Helen 
Edelberg joined 
the Office of 
New Drugs 
(OND)/Center 
for Drug 
Evaluation and Research 
(CDER) at the U.S. Food 
and Drug Administration 
as deputy director for 
safety. This is a new 
position, focused on 
helping the FDA to further 
develop its post-market 
safety efforts. Edelberg, is 
a past member of Temple 
Beth El in Bloomfield 
Township, where her 
parents, Adrian and 
Mynetta Christie, still 
belong. 

The Barbara 
Ann Karmanos 
Cancer Institute 
announced the 
winners of its 
2021 Heroes of 
Cancer Awards. The Geri 
Lester Courage Award 
honors an individual, living 
or deceased, whose battle 
with cancer has been an 
inspiration to family, 
friends and community. 
This year’s honoree is the 
late Jeffrey D. Forman, 
M.D., FACR. He spent his 
life and career helping 
people with cancer, 
working for 35 years as a 
radiation oncologist and 
holding multiple 
professional appointments 
during his 14-year career 
at Karmanos. He loved his 
role as a physician and 
treated every patient with 
kindness, respect, 
understanding and humor. 
After becoming a cancer 
patient and undergoing a 
bone marrow transplant, 
he had a whole new 
outlook on cancer. He 

became a part of the 
Karmanos Cancer 
Institute’s fundraising team 
to help inform community 
members about the 
important lifesaving work 
being done at Karmanos. 
His passion for helping 
patients, informing the 
community and raising 
funds to further cancer 
research was inspiring. 

The Third 
Judicial Circuit 
Court (Wayne 
County)
announced the 
Michigan 
Supreme Court has 
appointed the Hon. David 
A. Groner to the Third 
Circuit Court’s Business 
Court. He will serve as a 
Business Court judge for a 
term expiring April 1, 2025. 
He served in the Criminal 
Division for 14 years; for 
the past four years, he has 
served in the Civil Division, 
where he has handled 
specialty dockets such as 
structured settlements in 
addition to the traditional 
docket. Judge Groner was 
the University of Michigan 
Mentor of the Year 2007 
and received the State of 
Israel Bonds Eleanor 
Roosevelt Humanitarian 
Award in 2006. 

Honigman LLP 
announced 
Richard 
Zuckerman has 
rejoined its 
White-Collar 
Defense and Investigations 
Practice Group as a 
partner in the firm’s Detroit 
office. He most recently 
served as head of the Tax 
Division at the U.S. 
Department of Justice. 

Zuckerman has 
represented executives in 
national and international 
civil and criminal antitrust 
matters involving a variety 
of industries, from 
computer software and 
pharmaceutical to financial 
services, among others.

Frankel Jewish 
Academy 
alumnus (class 
of 2015) Ami 
Zuroff was 
nominated as an 
excellent soldier by the 
president of Israel. 
President Reuven Rivlin 
hosted the annual 
Independence Day 
ceremony at his official 
residence on Yom 
HaAtzmaut to award the 
army’s annual citations for 
distinguished service to 
120 Israel Defense Forces 
soldiers.

Sara Gorman 
Rajan has 
joined the legal 
team as 
associate 
attorney and 
mediator at Transitions 
Legal, a family law firm 
with specialties in 
collaborative divorce, gray 
divorce, and mediation in 
Bloomfield Township. With 
17 years of experience as 
a family law attorney with 
an expertise in litigation, 
Rajan has worked at firms 
throughout Metro Detroit, 
served as a judicial law 
clerk to the Hon. Helene J. 
White at the Michigan 
Court of Appeals and in 
law school, interned with 
the Wayne County 
Prosecutor’s Office under 
Nancy J. Diehl.

