As a lawyer Dave has also devoted countless pro bono hours to criminal justice issues.
Working with groups like the ACLU and the Pennsylvania Innocence Project, Dave has sought to improve our jail, our justice system and to free innocent people convicted of crimes they did not commit.
Dave has deep experience in County government. As a 2-term at-large member of the Allegheny County Council, he was instrumental in:
- consolidating the row offices;
- implementing the smoking ban;
- tightening pollution standards; and
- serving as the Chair of Elections
Importantly, he spearheaded major economic development initiatives, including one to create a Countywide Riverfront Park.
This new county park that would be transformative for our region…
a continuous riverfront linear park with bikeways that would run along one side or the other of every one of our 4 major rivers, with bridge connections and amenities all along the way, from county line to county line. When constructed, it will be the greatest linear park in the world and will allow us as a region to commute by bicycle, lessen our carbon footprint and breathe new life into all of our many riverfront towns and adjacent communities.
Dave is a lifelong Pittsburgher. Dave and his wife Kathy together have five children and live in Oakmont.
Dave grew up in Shaler, graduated from Carnegie Mellon University and the University of Pittsburgh School of Law. His professional career began as a public school teacher before eventually becoming an attorney, first at Buchanan Ingersoll and now at Reed Smith.
Dave’s family on his father’s side were originally from Central Pennsylvania and began their American Dream as coal miners and farmers. On his mother’s side of the family were also farmers. Eventually that side of the family became small business owners with his maternal grandfather starting the first Ford dealership in Pittsburgh. It was this American Dream story that in part inspired Dave to become the first official to endorse Barack Obama for President in Pennsylvania.
In addition to spending time with their 5 kids and now his 3 grandchildren, Dave is an avid outdoorsman.
He loves to hike, bike and camp. He played sports growing up and most enjoyed and excelled at basketball and baseball.
He always loves having a good book on hand – well anything really – novels, short stories, non-fiction, newspapers, magazines especially The New Yorker and The Atlantic. His favorite local author is novelist Stewart O’Nan.
Thank you for visiting our site to learn more about the campaign.
Dave and Kathy like dining out, especially in small, locally-owned restaurants that serve up dishes made with locally-sourced ingredients.
During Covid Dave learned to mill flour and bake bread from scratch! And at the encouragement of his then future wife, he took up salsa dancing as a condition for future dates and well…the rest is history!
