Delmar (“Del”) K. Banner           

 

Del’s practice centers on agriculture, structuring and operation of agribusiness and farmer cooperative organizations and the lenders who provide their financing.  He has served as general counsel (both inside and out) to small businesses, cooperative and agribusiness and not-for-profit boards of directors and management in issues of governance, regulatory compliance, employment, merger, consolidation and acquisition transactions and operations.   Del has structured and documented financing and work-outs into the mid-9 figure range.  He was a principal co-author of the Illinois Amendments to Article Nine of the UCC and a principal contributor to the Illinois Grain Code.   He handles farm real estate transactions, exchanges, partitions and carries on an active estate and business and transition planning practice for farm and non-farm estates.  Del has written and/or presented testimony before Committees of Congress and state legislatures on more than 50 occasions. He’s lectured on secured lending, farm and business estate and financial planning to lawyers, bankers, and farmers in some 17 states. 

 

For nearly 20 years, Del was Adjunct Professor of Ag Law and Finance at the University of Illinois College of ACES and Extension Specialist in Ag Law and Finance with teaching responsibilities in Ag Law, Environmental Law and Policy, and Veterinary Jurisprudence.  He served as Vice Chair of the Center for Farm and Rural Business Finance at the UI.  Del was the architect and founding President and CEO of The Farm Credit Council, the Washington-based trade association of Farm Credit Banks and Associations and their federated District Farm Credit Councils, nationwide.  In that role he was chief legislative affairs manager and principal spokesman for Farm Credit in Washington D.C. through the difficult period of the mid-1980s.  Prior to that, as Senior Vice President and General Counsel of the Federal Intermediate Credit Bank of St. Louis, he served as special counsel to the Farm Credit Administration to write the Farm Credit Act Amendments of 1980.   He completed USAID assignments to author statutes for the chartering of agricultural cooperatives in Kazakhstan and chartering of ag finance cooperatives in the Republic of Georgia.

 

Del and his wife, K., live on and operate the farm where he was raised.  When not in the office, he’s likely on a tractor, a mower, in the shed, playing lead trumpet in a brass group, organizing a mission trip or enjoying his grandchildren.

 

Del is a graduate of the UI College of ACES and the College of Law.  He is admitted to practice in Illinois and the Federal District Court for the Central District of Illinois and before the United States Supreme Court. He is a past member of the Board of the American Agricultural Law Association.