February 12,2004

Grassley Announces Finance Committee Tax Staff Change

WASHINGTON -- Sen. Chuck Grassley, chairman of the Committee on Finance, todayannounced a change of his committee tax staff. Diann Howland, pension policy advisor, is leavingthe committee to join the American Benefits Council as vice president, retirement policy.

Howland has worked for Grassley on the Finance Committee since he became chairman inJanuary 2001. Before that, she served as his retirement policy advisor when he was chairman of theSenate Special Committee on Aging. She has other extensive experience in the Senate, and also inthe House of Representatives, working on committees with jurisdiction over both the tax and laboraspects of employee benefits policy. She also served during the first Bush administration in the U.S.Department of Labor’s Office of Policy.

Succeeding Howland as pension and tax counsel is John O’Neill. O’Neill joins thecommittee from the law firm Davis & Harman LLP in Washington, D.C., where he spent severalyears counseling employers, financial institutions, and trade associations on retirement, health, andeducation tax policy and tax and Employee Retirement Income Security Act matters related toemployer-sponsored retirement plans, health insurance plans and products, life insurance and annuityproducts, long-term care insurance, education savings vehicles, and employee benefit plans.O’Neill received his law degree from Georgetown University Law Center in Washington,D.C., and is a graduate of Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs, N.Y.

“I wish Diann well in her new position,” Grassley said. “She works hard, and she’s dedicatedher career to improving retirement policy and Americans’ ability to have more secure retirementincome. I look forward to working with John as he puts his experience to work toward the samegoals.”

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