State Farm® Vice President is New HLDI Board Chairman

Bloomington, IL, January 30, 2008 -- The Highway Loss Data Institute (HLDI) has elected Laurette Stiles as chairman of its board of directors for 2008.

Stiles, vice president of strategic resources at State Farm Insurance, has been a member of the board since 2004. 

"The work HLDI does to understand insurance losses to achieve lower costs for the public is important, and I'm proud to continue working toward this goal," says Stiles.

Stiles joined State Farm in 1983 as a claim representative in Costa Mesa, California. She moved to corporate headquarters in 1989 and later served in operations managerial roles in the Illinois Regional Office and Frederick, Maryland.  After serving as an assistant vice president of human resources in 1995, she was promoted to the Illinois Regional Office as vice president of operations in 1999. She was named vice president of operations for State Farm Fire and Casualty Company in 2001 and vice president of human resources later that year. Stiles was appointed vice president of strategic resources in 2004.

The Highway Loss Data Institute is an affiliate of the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS).   The HLDI gathers, processes, and publishes data on the ways in which insurance losses vary among different kinds of vehicles.  The IIHS and member insurers use that data to help reduce deaths, injuries, and property damage from motor vehicle crashes. http://www.iihs.org/

State Farm® insures more cars and homes than any other insurer in the U.S., the leading insurer of watercraft and is also a leading insurer in Canada. State Farm's 17,000 agents and 68,000 employees serve over 76 million auto, fire, life and health policies in the United States and Canada, and more than 1.7 million bank accounts. State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company is the parent of the State Farm family of companies. State Farm is ranked No. 31 on the Fortune 500 list of largest companies. For more information, please visit statefarm.com® or in Canada statefarm.ca®.