Who I Am
I grew up the hill in Chateauneuf. My family has been in Orléans for generations. According to SFOPHO, my maternal grandmother’s family arrived in 1864. I grew up hearing stories about Orléans before the developers arrived. I have experienced being a child, a teenager, and an adult in this community.
Growing up, I was involved in several institutions in our area, including the Scouts du District D’Ottawa, and Lu’s Taekwon-do Dojang/Edge Taekwon-do Academy, which was present in our community until COVID. I have always volunteered in my community, and my involvement in the community association continues that.
I hold a bachelor’s degree with honours in geology from the University of Ottawa and have worked in mineral exploration for 6 years. That short career allowed me to live in various cities like Perth, Western Australia, and Rouyn-Noranda. I have also experienced several camps of different sizes, from a 10-person camp in Northwestern Ontario to the Musselwhite Mine camp. It also allowed me to travel extensively through Europe (high wage + travel bug + time off) and experience a variety of cities. Between the surprisingly good urbanism of Australia, the shockingly vibrant music scene of Rouyn-Noranda, and the built-in communities that are mine and exploration camps, I have a lot to draw on regarding what makes a city and community work.
When gold fell in 2013 and I lost my job, I returned to university for a Master of Business Administration. Since 2016, I have been involved in various transformation projects across different departments. I have become an expert on transforming organizations from their current state to their desired future state. I hope to use these skills to help our community transition from our current state to the desired state outlined in the Orléans Secondary Corridor Plan, and help the city transition to the desired state outlined in the Official Plan and master plans, since my research indicates that the policy goals are in line with what should be done for a prosperous and healthy city.
I am also a father of two little girls. I hope I can enable enough change to let them grow up in a better Orléans than the one where I grew up.
Why I am Here
I decided to get involved in the community association after the last municipal election. During that election cycle, I did some research and fell down the urbanist YouTube rabbit hole. The points brought up in some of the videos, notably Not Just Bike’s Strong Towns series. It struck me how much our city was deteriorating and how isolated I felt as a child growing up in the suburbs. The financial aspects also really tickled the muscles I acquired during my MBA. I am a sucker for challenging transformation projects.
I am the type of person who, when presented with new information, does my best to take action based on that information. I took my father’s old commuter bike out of the shed, plopped my old saddle bag, which I bought to do bike commutes in Australia, and started running errands using my bike to see how feasible it was. Just doing short trips, I quickly saw an improvement in my mood and lost a non-trivial amount of weight. I realized how deteriorated our roads are, and how difficult it has become to run some trips on a bike compared to when I was a kid, because of the increasing traffic volume, and vehicle sizes (looking at you, trucks and SUVs). It also allowed me to see and talk to various people in my community (I am the annoying extrovert who stops talking to people when walking or cycling). This experience confirmed what was presented in the videos. I decided that it was time to leverage my expertise to tackle the transformation project that is the Orléans Corridor Secondary Plan.
Other Community Work
I am also a member of the Federation of Citizen Associations ‘ Planning and Zoning Committee. I also got involved with Strong Towns Ottawa for a bit (I admittedly encouraged them to ramp up, then got busy with an acting assignment and recruited other directors for the CA, so…oops!).
If someone from Edge Taekwon-do Academy opens a school within walking or biking distance, I would return as an assistant instructor in a heartbeat. I am also likely to resume my involvement with the Scout movement when my kids are old enough.
