Christian, husband, father, technologist, musician, author, speaker – I hope to use my eclectic skill-set and unorthodox thinking and methodology – to serve the people of Chester County. This is my promise.
Until moving to Chester, SC – David never really considered any location his permanent home. He was raised through-out the U.S because his father was a 26-year sailor in the US Navy. He often reminisces:
“We moved so much in the early years of my life, that I lived in Charleston, SC, San-Diego, CA, and Mississippi in 3rd grade alone!”
Those early “Navy-brat” years helped him to learn to make friends fast – and to be at ease with the changes and lumps that can come in life. After growing up in Northern California for 13 years (the Fairfield, Vacaville and Suisun area) – his family moved to Newport News, Virginia. It was in the the South, where his guitar playing career took-off!
Moving from California to Virginia had people talking about a “new, hot-shot guitarist from Cali” – the buzz helped him land title of “the ‘workinest’ guitar player in the Tidewater area”. It was not unusual for David to play shows all day at Busch Gardens (Williamsburg) – then perform til 1 A.M. in honky-tonks – and then wrap up his day performing guitar on studio recordings until sunrise.
During his career as a professional guitar player in Virginia He earned a B.A. in Music Business and minor in Composition from Old Dominion University and began to study and use a new technology called MIDI: Musical Instrument Digital Interface. His knack for working with computer tech in recording studios, would later become the basis for a new career. David has performed guitar on Country music records by Hank Williams Jr and Crash Craddock of “Take This Job and Shove it” fame back in the early 1980s and has performed with Grammy Award winning musicians the likes of Victor Wooten (Bela Fleck and the Flecktones) Norm Frigault (the drummer for T. Graham Brown, and the Music Director for Winona Judd, Pianist – Harry Sharpe. His career focus changed when he had his first of four children – Not wishing to be a musician on the road any longer, He went into a career in a then fledgling technology of personal computing and a new technology called the Internet, in the 1990s.
An early adopter of Internet based technologies – He put his resume on the internet in a time when there was no such thing as “job sites.” It was then on one fateful day that he received a phone call from an IT Manager at Goddard Space Flight Center, where he was invited to lunch and offered a job at NASA! David worked for a 12-year tenure at NASA, where his innate knowledge and eclectic skills-set took him to the literal ends-of-the-earth in support of NASA field science initiatives. He was even able to combine his musical talents into a NASA Educational Initiative called: “Explorer Schools” in 2005
Behind David are two bullet ridden helicopters from the Russian – Afghanistan war era.
He has served as technical lead on projects at the North Pole, the Amazon basin (Bolivia) to study a supposed meteor impact (The Iturralde Crater expedition – https://tinyurl.com/5axkaaa9 ) He spent weeks in Antarctica – where he engineered and installed a polar-orbiting spacecraft ground station (McMurdo Ground Station – https://tinyurl.com/yp7rt74d ) and has supported multiple spacecraft launch events at Vandenburg Airforce base and Cape Canaveral. He has worked with and supported world-class, published scientists and even a Nobel Prize winner, John C Mather – for his work with the Cosmic Radiation Background studies.
NASA was where he met his wife of 19 years, Amy. She also worked at NASA, Goddard Space Flight Center – as a Resource Analyst.
David, who is also an ordained minister, his wife, and their youngest daughter, moved to Chester, SC 16 years ago – on a literal prompting by Holy Spirit. He and his wife were led to leave everything and everyone that they knew – to move to “some town called Chester” –
He has worked for the State of South Carolina since living in Chester and has also served as IT Administrator for the City of Chester for 8 years – under both Mayor Foster and Mayor Stringfellow. He has served on several committees for Chester improvement and events planning and provides technology support services to different ministries in the community at little or no cost, because he genuinely believes that “to those whom much is given – much more is required.”
He also has three additional adult children who each have their own successful careers:
Michael is a Director for performing Arts productions in the mid-west, Katie is a Micro-Biologist at Johns Hopkins University, and David is a professional Firefighter and EMT for the State of Maryland.
David is also running for Public Office in his county government. His campaign focuses on the same ideals as his father: Liberty and Independence. You can see his campaign website at http://dorchesterindependent.org
David serves in the capacity of Pastor in an international ministry called “Jesusfreak computergeek” – and produces a live broadcast called “The Gathering” – in reference to Matthew 18:20 “where two or more are gathered in My name, I am in the midst also”.
where he serves in music ministry as a guitarist, bass and at times, keyboard player.
He has also written numerous columns and Opinion Pieces for the Chester News and Reporter – since 2006 on subjects as diverse as “the Dangers of Common Core” to “Quantum Computing” to “Transhumanism” – You can view PDFs of several iterations of those columns: http://chesteratlarge.org/columns
During his tenure as Division Director for a SC state agency – David led a team of twenty personnel who managed a state-wide microwave communications system used for closed-circuit Educational Television and Emergency Management Division – on a budget of $1,600,000.00 (1.6 million Dollars). He acquired $1,900,000.00 from Clearwire corporation in 2007 – that purchased hardware and software for Educational Media retrieval systems that were installed in every school district in South Carolina. He was also able to acquire an additional ARRA grant of $1,400,000.00 to finalize the project(s). Having expertise in multiple disciplines of technology, allowed him to reduce the cost of each system by basing these systems on his own design. The first COREMedia system was engineered and built in his own garage as proof-of-concept.
He also led the transition of microwave technologies in the state – enabling the state of South Carolina to finalize a “spectrum lease” of state-owned assets – adding $145,000,000.00 dollar lease revenue into the state coffers. (Announcement of the spectrum lease offering in 2009 )
You may be wondering – “What does any of this have to do with serving as Chester County Council?”
It is my desire to bring my ability to process complex issues and complex systems, as demonstrated by my experiences and varied skills – into serving the people, as Chester County Councilman at-large.
Over the past 15 years – I’ve watched the people of Chester County have their hearts broken and lose some of their hope – when we watched the Mills close, buildings fall-over, crime rise to new heights and some local leaders, sadly – fail in their high-calling, bringing public shame on the entire county. Recently, many businesses have shut down, to never recover as a result of leaders lacking “situational awareness” and having a lack of vision. “When the leaders lack vision – the people perish” Proverbs 29:18
As a skilled problem solver and someone who “sees what others might miss” I want to bring those skills and experience into serving the people of Chester County as we move into the future. The world has changed drastically – particularly in the last few years. We need someone who is grounded in the ideals of our Republic – ideals of Individual Liberties and Private Property Rights – and the changes to our way of life that are coming to our nation’s doors and will come to our local governments if we do not remain vigilant. We need leaders who understand those changes and how we can position ourselves to prosper in a time when so many are in fear of great loss.”