Our Team

Richard Sterner, CEO

Richard Sterner has over 30 years experience in the environmental industry and another 10 years experience in the civil engineering and utility industries. Mr. Sterner has worked primarily as an independent mergers and acquisitions consultant/adviser since selling his own environmental contracting company in 1989 including several exclusive consulting or operational engagements during that period.

After completing military service with Naval Intelligence in the early 1970s, Mr. Sterner has held key management and finance roles within large construction, environmental and engineering service companies, leading to many successful years as a mergers and acquisitions specialist working for his own account or representing small private to large public industry clients.

As a managerial consultant specializing in the hazardous and nuclear waste-by-rail industry, Mr. Sterner was named COO of a leading transportation services firm. He led the company equipment, operations and financial groups through five years of dynamic growth (500% in the period) and through a series of financial transactions with private equity funds and with a large public SBDC funds company.

In a similar consulting capacity, Mr. Sterner represented a large public environmental industry company as its M&A manager, personally completing over $500mm in solid waste and facility acquisitions in the late 1990s.

As principal of Sterner Consulting, Mr. Sterner has represented many large and small public and private businesses representing the Buyer or Seller in a transaction or managing specialty searches for a business or consolidation candidate, funding party or acquirer. He has managed and completed financial documentation and due diligence review projects and maintains a regular practice of business or project valuation or Appraisal services.

Mr. Sterner is a frequent speaker at industry conferences on financial, rail and solid waste matters and frequently acts as an expert on various types of litigation matters. He is a member of IBBA the International Business Brokers Association and represents many niche and specialty businesses in difficult matters of financial documentation, valuation concerns, or estate issues.

Daniel Butturini, Principal

Mr. Butturini has a broad range of experience with mergers and acquisitions in the Environmental Sector. He has provided buy and sell side strategic advice for a number of prominent clients in the private equity, banking, solid waste, liquid-waste, and waste brokerage industries.

He has previously worked for Allied Waste Industries as the Director of Project/Market Development where he managed a large-scale waste development project with $3 to $6 billion revenue anticipated over time. He managed and directed a project team of financial, engineering, operations, legal and public relations experts dedicated to project activities.

Prior to this role he served as the Manager of Business Development for Waste Management, Inc. where he negotiated and closed over 25 acquisitions with first year revenues exceeding $125 million. There he significantly expanded initial market presence, provided strategic integration driving the company to a lowest cost/market leadership position in the New York/New Jersey Metro area. Dan also served as the Director of Financial Planning and Analysis for Waste Management of New York, Inc. where he was involved in the strategic sale of the largest waste processor in the New York Metro area.

Dan has also served as a Manager/Senior Consultant for Deloitte & Touche where he was responsible for developing sophisticated project-financing models, performed economic impact studies and provided comprehensive valuation analysis.

He has also worn the hats of Director/Manager Financial Analysis for McGraw –Hill, Inc. in New York where he was required to perform comprehensive financial analysis/strategic planning support functions for merger and acquisition, divestiture, capital expenditure and special project analyses for the senior management of the McGraw-Hill Information Systems Company.

Dan also served as a Senior Financial Analyst with United Technologies Corporation, Inc. where he provided an integrated financial control function in support of Computer Products and Avionics business units.

Dan has an MBA in finance from New York University and a BS/BA in Finance/Economics from Georgetown University

John Evanko, Partner

John Evanko is an entrepreneur and waste management industry professional. John has been involved in the startup, development and management of several major businesses in the waste management and its related specialty transportation industries. Mr. Evanko started his business career working within his family’s sports equipment marketing business which was the first retail business to offer specialty golf clubs by mail order in the US. He along with two partners started a successful hazardous waste management and waste fuels recycling business, WMMC, Inc. in the late 1980s and sold that business to his partners in 1989 after receiving an offer to join a new public landfill and waste management business, American Waste Services Inc. John quickly moved up to develop and manage its long-haul and LTL waste and commodity transportation business (Dart Transportation Group and Enviroco, Inc.). Seeing the potential for a larger role for railroads in the specialty waste transportation industry John left that position and started what became the largest rail based multimodal hazardous and nuclear waste transportation company in the US (MHF Logistical Solutions, Inc.). John sold his interest in that business in 1986 to private equity and investment funds and has been involved in various private consulting and business projects since that event.

As a pioneer in the early stages of the hazardous waste industry packaging and transportation industry specializing in recycling and reuse of solvents and other waste products, John has a long track record and experience with regulations, waste codes, TSDF sites across the US and with the many packaging issues and requirements to safely and legally transport those materials and products using a diverse series of conveyances and packaging. John understood the advantage of using non-standard types of specialty rail equipment and DOT packaging applications and acquired a company that specialized in unique (soft sided flexible) packaging products and grew that segment of the business tenfold in its revenue and profitability, over a two year period, as a part of the rail transportation business. He developed a network of fixed base and portable rail transload systems and locations across the US to support the rail-based transportation equipment and he pioneered and implemented a seamless approach to managing an incredibly diverse range of hazardous, radioactive and residual waste and commodity projects internationally, managed through a single point of client contact.

Mr. Evanko has spent his entire working career developing and managing specialty waste industry businesses and has a unique set of skills and knowledge base that few experts in the waste industry can equal. He has repeatedly used that set of skills to create well balanced and successful businesses with a blend of creativity and drive that makes John a leading figure in the transportation and management of waste, recycled and reusable products and the businesses that manage them. John is working with Sterner Consulting to apply his unique blend of entrepreneurial and business management skills to assist our client base with their business and growth related needs and requirements.

Chester S. Fossee, ESQ., Principal and General Counsel

Mr. Fossee brings over 30 years of experience as principal of a corporate and business litigation practice. Before coming to Sterner Consulting, he served as general counsel in the waste industry for a company who specialized in waste-by-rail. He holds a BS and JD degree from the University of Pittsburgh. He is admitted to all the courts in Pennsylvania and the Federal District Courts in Pennsylvania, the Third Circuit, the tax Court and the U.S. Supreme Court. He has appeared before numerous State Courts in Pennsylvania as well as the three appellate courts, the three Federal District Courts in Pennsylvania, the Third Circuit Court of Appeals. He has also appeared in federal courts in Connecticut, New Jersey, California, and both the eastern and western district courts of Virginia.

Beth De Maagd, Partner

Beth De Maagd is a seasoned corporate professional with over 15 years of experience in corporate business management, strategic business development, business valuation experience, project management, public relations, sales, marketing, and research analysis. She recently joined Sterner Consulting as a partner in the business brokerage practice.

Beth has valuable experience advising companies on methods to increase profits by utilizing effective marketing tools to highlight business features and aggressively saturate market regions. Her background in mergers and acquisitions, business brokerage, and advising public and private industries will benefit clients when they are evaluating whether to buy or sell a business.

In addition, Beth’s resume includes the position of Vice President of Public Relations for a media firm where she consulted early stage to mature companies in the oil and gas industry on how to successfully market their businesses and brands. Her 20+ year background in education has provided her with an innovative leadership style that has allowed her to foster and maintain unique relationships with professionals in many industries and professions.

Her goal is to maximize a corporation’s return to shareholders by creating a detailed valuation report, efficiently marketing their company to potential qualified buyers, and to provide mergers and acquisitions advisory services, as well as business sales advice, and introduction to the capital markets.