Fry to retire as NOIA president; Luthi named as successor

Nick Snow
OGJ Washington Editor

WASHINGTON, DC, Oct. 14 -- Tom Fry, who has been president of the National Ocean Industries Association since 2000, announced that he will retire in early 2010. NOIA directors have named former US Minerals Management Service Director Randall B. Luthi as his successor.

Fry also formerly led MMS, starting in 1993, as well as the US Bureau of Lands Management, where he became director in October 1999. He came to the US Department of the Interior from American Natural Resources Inc. in Dallas, a natural gas process and transmission company where he was vice-president during 1984-93. He also worked for the US Department of Energy as its regional counsel in Dallas and in its Economic Regulatory Administration.

Luthi was MMS director during July 2007-January 2009. Prior to that appointment, he was deputy director of DOI’s Fish and Wildlife Service and, in the late 1980s and early 1990s, an attorney in DOI’s solicitor’s office and at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. A Wyoming native, Luthi served several terms in the state’s House and was its speaker in 2005 and 2006.

NOIA directors named Luthi as the organization’s new president on Oct. 9 during its fall meeting in Colorado Springs. Fry said that he probably will turn the job over to Luthi in March.

Contact Nick Snow at [email protected].