I'm a conservation scientist, a PTA dad, and a nonprofit leader. I've spent a lifetime building the skills, connections, and insights to help make Lake Forest Park a happy and thriving city.
Decades of nonprofit leadership give me essential skills for our city council. I've balanced and stretched tight budgets, finding grants and donations to start bold new programs, and finding creative ways to balance competing demands on limited resources. Just as a city council stewards the tax dollars of a community, a nonprofit stewards the precious donations of our members, and it's essential to make sure we get the most from every cent.
As a nonprofit advocate, I've spoken on behalf of values we all share. I've been a voice for students, parents, and teachers who wanted to see climate change presented truthfully in classrooms, and stood up for evolution education against efforts to replace it with religious indoctrination. I pushed candidates nationwide to speak about science on the campaign trail. And at conservation nonprofits, I've been a voice for wilderness and our beloved salmon, orcas, and cougars.
My successes rest on skills in communication and
In 2016, my wife visited her sister in Lake Forest Park. She told me about walking along tree-lined streets to the farmers market and Third Place Commons. About relaxing by the lake. She told me it was the perfect place to raise our family.
She was right!
We moved here early in 2017, enrolling our two kids first in Whizz Kids Academy and then LFP Elementary. Our eldest is now at Kellogg, and our new daughter will start at Whizz Kids this fall.
My parents-in-law moved to town not long after, and now our family has three households, across three generation!, in Lake Forest Park.
I was recruited into leadership in LFP PTA at our bus stop, serving first as communications chair, and then for several years as advocacy chair. Those roles built on my professional experience, and gave me new chances to connect with the community and the policies that affect us all.
Serving in the PTA has been a constant reminder that so much that we value in our community come because of enthusiastic volunteers. Everything from back-to-school barbecues to science fairs and field trips — key ways our schools bring together a community and create lifelong memories — happen because someone steps forward to lead.
The same is true for our city's parks. On the city's Parks and Recreation Advisory Board, I've taken part in work parties clearing ivy out of parks that community volunteers have worked tirelessly to protected