Leadership

Howard J. Smith is the Executive Director, Center for Industry Self-Regulation. Howard joined BBB National Programs in 2019 as Deputy Director, Direct Selling Self-Regulatory Council (DSSRC) and for the last year he has led the RMAI Services program. 

Prior to joining DSSRC, Howard was a commercial counselor and litigator in private practice handling complex matters across a broad array of subject matters including false advertising disputes, intellectual property, and bankruptcy matters. Howard has substantial first and second chair trial experience as well as experience counselling a wide variety of commercial clients. Howard’s notable achievements for varied clients include successfully arguing an appeal to the Second Circuit for a Fortune 200 client, winning two breach of contract trials in New York state court, winning a defense verdict in a two-week jury trial in California state court, obtaining dismissal of all claims against his client in a “bet the company” advertising and trademark dispute, and favorably resolving as co-counsel seven litigations arising from real estate investments in excess of $1 billion. Howard also has significant experience in advertising disputes before the National Advertising Division (NAD) of BBB National Programs and with consumer perception surveys in both NAD and Lanham Act matters. 

Howard earned his JD from the St. John's University School of Law.

W. David Hubbard serves as Vice President & Deputy General Counsel for Verizon Communications.  He is located in Basking Ridge, New Jersey and leads Verizon’s Consumer Marketing, Products, Growth and Revenue legal team which provides support for Verizon’s portfolio of Consumer businesses including Verizon Wireless, Verizon Telecom, Verizon Consumer Markets, and Visible, among others. He and his team provide support to Verizon Consumer Group’s Chief Revenue Officer and are responsible for providing legal counsel and guidance for all consumer products, devices and services; business initiatives and national advertising and marketing campaigns targeting consumers in all media; marketing strategy; advertising litigation; regulatory and network compliance; promotions; sweepstakes; external communications; corporate responsibility and compliance with state and federal regulations as well as applicable consumer protection laws. In addition to the above, Mr. Hubbard previously led Verizon’s Intellectual Property and Digital media legal teams and served as the General Counsel for the Verizon Foundation, the philanthropic arm of Verizon which is dedicated to solving critical social issues in the areas of education, healthcare and energy management, particularly in underserved communities. 

Prior to joining Verizon, Mr. Hubbard was an associate with Kelley Drye & Warren LLP (formerly Collier Shannon Scott, LLP) in Washington, DC. He earned his J.D. from the Georgetown University Law Center, and his B.A., cum laude, from the University of Maryland at College Park, where he was a Phi Beta Kappa and Benjamin Banneker Scholar. He currently serves on board of directors for a number of organizations including: BBB National Programs, –which is dedicated to fostering trust, innovation and competition through self-regulation, monitoring, and dispute resolution; the Better Business Bureau of Metropolitan New York -- which fosters honest and responsive relationships between  businesses and consumers; Brightpoint Care -- a leading nonprofit provider of high-quality medical and mental health care as well as social support services to people, families and communities challenged by health disparities; Employment Horizons -- a not-for-profit agency providing comprehensive employment, training and job placement services to people with disabilities and other disadvantages; and the Association of Corporate Council of New Jersey -- which provides legal education, networking, pro bono opportunities and career advancement.  In addition, he and his wife (Tamiko Hubbard)  co-founded Sweet Reads, a literacy-based non-for-profit organization dedicated to inspiring an early love of reading by providing children in underserved communities with books. 

Mr. Hubbard is the Co-chair of Verizon’s Public Policy, Legal, & Security Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Council, and also oversees Verizon’s Legal Internship Program. He is a member of the Maryland Bar Association, District of Columbia Bar Association, National Bar Association, and American Bar Association where he previously served as co-chair of the Section of Litigation Internet & Privacy Committee. He is also a recent recipient of Verizon’s Credo award in July 2020, which honors employees who exemplify Verizon’s core values action and have a positive mark on their teammates, Verizon’s customers and our communities in a significant way. He was also named to the Lawyers of Color “Hot List” in 2014, featured in Modern Counsel Magazine in 2016, highlighted as one of America’s most influential Black Lawyers by Savoy magazine in 2018 ,and one of the Nation’s Best Lawyers of Color in 2019.

Vickie McCormick, CPA, CGMA, is Chief Financial Officer and Chief Operating Officer of BBB National Programs and the Center for Industry Self-Regulaiton. In these roles, she serves as a member of the BBB National Programs executive leadership team and is responsible for all of BBB National Programs’s financial activity, as well as the successful execution of organizational operations. 

Ms. McCormick has served the not-for-profit community for over three decades, during which she has supported organizations ranging in size from $1 million to over $380 million in revenue. With 35 years of experience as a CPA, Ms. McCormick’s areas of expertise include in-house financial management, operations leadership, auditing, and accounting consulting. In addition, she has served on various boards throughout her career, including as chair of N Street Village. She currently serves as a financial consultant to the Board of Trustees of Gordon Research Conferences based in Rhode Island.

Ms. McCormick received her Bachelor of Science degree in accounting, graduating Magna Cum Laude from the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University. She is a member of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants and the Greater Washington Society of Certified Public Accountants.

Maureen Ohlhausen is a partner in the Washington, D.C., office of Wilson Sonsini, where she advises industry-leading clients on complex antitrust and litigation matters, with a focus on high-profile cases. Sought after for her depth of experience on antitrust and Federal Trade Commission (FTC)-related issues, Maureen is known for her relationships with officials in the U.S. and abroad. 

After finishing law school and clerking at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, Maureen joined the FTC in 1997. She held a series of roles at the agency over the next 12 years, rising to the position of Director of the FTC Office of Policy Planning, where she led the agency’s work on e-commerce and headed the FTC’s Internet Access Task Force, which produced an influential report analyzing competition and consumer protection legal issues in the broadband and internet sectors. She then went into private practice at a leading telecommunications law firm, where she headed the FTC practice group. 

In 2012, Maureen was confirmed by the Senate as a Commissioner of the FTC and was appointed Acting Chairman in January 2017, a role she held until May 2018. As Acting Chairman, Maureen directed all aspects of the agency’s antitrust work, including merger review, conduct enforcement, and all consumer protection enforcement, with an emphasis on privacy and technology issues. Under her leadership, the FTC won several influential merger challenges in court and reached a number of key digital privacy settlements.

To date, Maureen is the only FTC Commissioner to have received the Robert Pitofsky Lifetime Achievement Award in recognition of her contributions to the FTC. 

Following the end of her term at the FTC, and immediately prior to joining Wilson Sonsini, Maureen was chair of the global antitrust and competition practice at Baker Botts, based in that firm’s Washington, D.C., office. 

A recognized thought leader, Maureen is a frequent author and speaker, and is often quoted by leading print and broadcast media on antitrust, FTC, and privacy and data security matters. She has published dozens of articles on antitrust, privacy, intellectual property, regulation, FTC litigation, telecommunications, and international law issues in prestigious publications. During her tenure at the FTC and in private practice, she testified more than two dozen times before Congress, including before the Senate Commerce Committee and the House Energy and Commerce Antitrust Sub-Committee. She also testified before the Antitrust Modernization Commission. 

Eric D. Reicin joined BBB National Programs as President and Chief Executive Officer in 2019 and serves as a member of the organization’s Board of Directors. Eric also serves as President and CEO of BBB National Programs' Charitable Foundation, the Center for Industry Self-Regulation (501(c)(3)).

The home of independent industry self-regulation in the United States, nonprofit BBB National Programs oversees more than twenty national industry self-regulation programs that have been helping enhance consumer trust in business for more than 50 years.

Under Eric’s leadership, BBB National Programs fosters trust, innovation, and competition in the marketplace through the development and delivery of cost-effective third-party self-regulation, dispute resolution, and other programs. BBB National Programs’ industry self-regulation and dispute resolution programs include the National Advertising Division (NAD), National Advertising Review Board (NARB), Data Privacy Framework, BBB AUTO LINE, Children’s Advertising Review Unit (CARU), Children’s Food and Beverage Advertising Initiative (CFBAI), Children’s Confection Advertising Initiative (CCAI), Direct Selling Self-Regulatory Council (DSSRC), Digital Advertising Accountability Program (DAAP), RMAI Services, Class Action Settlement Program, Center for Industry Self-Regulation (CISR) (501(c)(3)) and its Self-Regulation Incubator, CBPR Privacy Programs, VPP Privacy Programs, Teenage Privacy Program (TAPP), and the Coalition for Better Advertising Dispute Resolution Program.

Also under Eric’s leadership, BBB National Programs continues to evolve its work and grow its impact by providing business guidance and fostering best practices in teen-directed marketing, technology, AI, and other emerging areas.

Eric also serves as President and CEO of BBB National Programs' Charitable Foundation, the Center for Industry Self-Regulation (501(c)(3)). In this role, he is leading efforts to incubate new industry self-regulation programs, promote academic research of industry self-regulation, and promote the development of higher education coursework on industry self-regulation. Industry self-regulation is a form of “soft law” that bridges the gap between corporate compliance programs and the “hard law” of government regulation/laws. Under Eric’s leadership, the Center for Industry Self-Regulation is demonstrating how successful industry self-regulation systems create and deploy dynamic industry standards to reflect a market landscape that evolves faster than law and regulation. Eric recently spearheaded an effort with large corporations to incubate an industry self-regulation program focused on Principles for Trustworthy AI in Recruiting and Hiring.

Eric is a senior corporate and legal executive with over 30 years of experience assisting publicly traded and private companies and other organizations grow, manage transformational change, and weather regulatory and public scrutiny. Eric is also a creative business thinker and connector and has founded several national and local executive legal networks to share best practices and improve company and association performance.

Before joining BBB National Programs, Eric served as Vice President, General Counsel, and Corporate Secretary for MorganFranklin Consulting, LLC and MorganFranklin, LLC, a global management consulting firm and government contractor (DOD and civilian). He also led MorganFranklin’s Corporate Investigations & Dispute Solutions consulting practice. Eric’s strategy and execution work in MorganFranklin’s transformation from founder owned to an LLC with minority management ownership to an ESOP led to his recognition as the Association of Corporate Counsel – NCR Outstanding Chief Legal Officer in 2016. Vaco (backed by Olympus Partners) acquired MorganFranklin in July 2019.

Eric previously served as Senior Vice President and Deputy General Counsel at Sallie Mae, then a Fortune 500 diversified financial services company (NASDAQ: SLM). He spent 14 years working closely with the Board of Directors and senior executive management during times of transformational change, senior executive turnover, negative press, government investigations and class action litigation, financial uncertainty, and regulatory scrutiny. He also successfully led a large team of attorneys, compliance personnel, and professionals based in six cities. Several of Eric’s former deputies at Sallie Mae now serve as general counsel at publicly traded and private companies.

Eric is known in the marketplace for developing talent and building coalitions. His successes include identifying, cultivating, and sponsoring individuals along the journey to CEO, general counsel, and other senior executive positions. He also advises senior executives and general counsels as they work through complex crisis situations and transformational changes.

Eric served a six-year term on the global board of the Association of Corporate Counsel, which has a presence in 85 countries. Eric previously served as president of the Association of Corporate Counsel - NCR, the largest regional in-house bar association. Eric served as the 2016-2019 co-chair of the D.C. General Counsels Club. He recently served on the advisory board of the Georgetown University Law Center CCI and is an emeritus member of the Board of Directors of the American Employment Law Council (AELC). Eric also served from 2019-2023 as Chair of the Cosmos Club Retirement and Employee Benefits Committee in Washington DC.  Eric is a Fellow of The College of Labor and Employment Lawyers. In 2019, Legal 500 named Eric to the General Counsel Powerlist – United States. Throughout his career, Reicin has written and spoken on the intersection of technology and the workplace, and more recently in the use of artificial intelligence (AI).

Eric served as the chair of the Executive Leadership Team for the 27th and 28th Lawyers Have Heart 10K/5K benefiting the American Heart Association and serves on its Executive Leadership Team.

Eric is a member of the CNBC CEO Council, Forbes Nonprofit Council, the Economic Club of DC, and The Cosmos Club (DC)

Michele M. Totonis is the Director of Legal Affairs / Legal Business Partner for Intellectual Property (IP); Product & Marketing Development; Licensing & Entertainment; and Corporate Communications for the LEGO Group of companies. Michele leads the company’s engagement on IP development, strategy, litigation, protection and enforcement and helps to formulate and execute the company’s marketing and entertainment related strategic initiatives. Michele negotiates the legal and business aspects of the company’s mission-critical, high-visibility IP licensing and entertainment deals, and is responsible for the legal relationship management for all major partners and licensors such as Disney (including Marvel and Lucasfilm), Warner Bros., DC, Universal, SONY, Netflix, and various premium car brands. Michele also handles other complex transactions for product and asset development for live action and animated television and theatrical motion picture development, including content creation, broadcast, distribution, licensing, merchandising, music rights, digital gaming and publishing. Michele drafted and implemented the global IP Strategy for the company; oversees IP related litigation; handles the legal review of general marketing, marketing to children, digital and brand marketing content reviews; and is responsible for the oversight and management of the global IP portfolio, as well as the policing efforts for the IP assets in all realms, such as online commercial and social networking sites. Michele developed and delivers training sessions for internal personnel regarding IP matters such as proper trademark and copyright use and patentability of new subject matter; as well as programs relating to children’s advertising rules and guidelines (CARU), COPPA legislation, GDPR, global packaging requirements, product testing requirements (CPSIA regulations), and marketing strategies and compliance. 

Michele has been a participating member of the CARU Supporters Council since 2008, is an active member of the International Trademark Association, the American Bar Association, the Connecticut Bar Association and is a frequent speaker at legal and business conferences and seminars on various subjects including intellectual property law, digital gaming, marketing to children, entertainment law, licensing, merchandising and brand protection. Michele began her career with the boutique intellectual property firm of Hosmer & Reiter in 1993, where she gained valuable experience in trademark, patent and copyright prosecution and licensing agreements for a variety of entertainment, merchandising and commercial clients via the firm’s relationship with LIMA (Licensing Industry Merchandisers Association) where Mr. Hosmer served as General Counsel. Michele then moved on to the Ahlstrom Corporation and from 2002-2008, served as its Chief IP Counsel where she managed Ahlstrom’s global IP portfolio.  Michele joined the LEGO Group in 2008. 

Michele earned her B.A. Summa Cum Laude from Columbia University, her B.S. Summa Cum Laude from Western Connecticut State University, and her J.D. Magna Cum Laude from the Quinnipiac University School of Law. She is admitted to the Bar in Connecticut. 

Prior to her legal career, Michele performed as a dancer in a variety of Broadway and off-broadway productions.  In her spare time, Michele and her husband enjoy spending time with their two sons attending various sporting activities the kids engage in, listening to their sons play in a musical concert, playing golf together as a family, spending time at amusement parks enjoying the thrill rides, especially the rollercoasters, listening to music, or gardening. As you might imagine, Michele has a vast array of LEGO® models on display throughout her home and office, many sets to play with and build, as well as hours of LEGO® animated programs to enjoy!