05/04/2019
I’m planning to use this page to periodically publish information that I hope will be helpful for readers, such as information about starting a business, wills, trusts, and other legal issues and current events. But I thought as a start, I should share a little information about myself.
Even though I was born in Utah while my parents were attending college, I consider myself a third generation North Idahoan, having spent most of my life here in Bonner County. My grandfather on my dad’s side was a dairyman in the Kootenai area and my grandfather on my mom’s side was a postal clerk in the main post office building in Sandpoint. He had served in the Navy on the USS Tennessee prior to moving to Sandpoint. My dad had his own insurance agency with Farm Bureau Insurance here for 38 years prior to his retirement in 2015. My mom is a member of the American Organist Guild and is well known for her accompaniment for community recitals, including The Messiah. She still teaches piano and organ to this day. It’s important to me to carry on the great legacy left by my parents and grandparents.
I attended elementary school at Washington and Farmin schools, and after a short move to Idaho Falls finished my high school years at Sandpoint High School. These were wonderful years of my life where I was involved in student government serving as student body vice president, football where I was awarded the Jerry Kramer award for outstanding lineman, choir, business machines where I had the fastest typing time in the school, and learned shorthand, which came in handy for my college classes (before the days of laptops). I also worked at McDonald’s during my spare time and earned my Eagle award as a scout and served as boatswain in our Sea Explorer Post. I even picked huckleberries for cash one summer.
Perhaps the two jobs I had which most gave me my motivation to continue seeking higher education were the summer jobs of roofing and logging. I have such admiration for those who are skilled in those occupations, but am ever grateful the jobs gave me the impetus (and money) to go to college.
Because of these activities and graduating as one of five valedictorians in the Sandpoint Class of '87, Brigham Young University awarded me their “president’s scholarship” which I gratefully accepted. When I arrived in Provo, Utah, I realized I had been a big fish in a small pond and now was a little fish in a big pond. Couldn’t make the football team, barely got into the Mormon Youth Chorus, and didn’t even consider running for a student government office. Upon this realization, though, I did feel as Popeye the Sailor, “I am what I am and I am what I am,” so I went to work on a degree in Political Science. During my college career, after my Freshman year, I did fulfil a commitment I had made to myself that I would serve my church on a two-year mission. I was called to serve in the France Paris Mission. Upon returning I finished my political science major with a minor in French, graduating with high honors.
Upon finishing my degree, I was awarded a scholarship to attend the J. Reuben Clark Law School at Brigham Young University. While in law school, I served on the BYU Law Review as Lead Articles Editor and interned with the Elsaesser and Jarzabek law firm which I joined in 1997 upon graduation. While there, I was the outside assistant general counsel for Coldwater Creek, overseeing the legal side of their nationwide roll-out of 450 retail stores and represented many local business clients such as Bonner General Hospital, Unicep Packaging, Panhandle State Bank, Ink Well, and many others. This experience gave me incredible exposure to laws relating to leases, bankruptcies, and contracts across the nation. It also helped me strike out on my own in 2010 to act as general counsel for three start-up businesses (two were successes and one was a terrible failure) and to accept a position (eventually becoming an of-counsel partner) in 2014 with the Kunzler Law Group of Salt Lake City, specializing in commercial transactions, software licensing, and privacy law for clients all over the country.
I also discovered that with somewhere around 80% of businesses being privately owned there was an urgent need for someone to become familiar with contracts, leases, wills, insurance and trusts locally. This group of people have urgent need for assistance in those areas but don’t have the resources to deal with them in-house. With my background and experiences, I can give good legal counsel to those people and their businesses.
As I have experienced assistance from some who have gone before me, I have felt it a duty to give in return. Consequently, I served on the Bonner County Planning and Zoning Commission from 2012 to 2015, co-founded the Panhandle Alliance for Education, served on the legal team representing a citizens group formed to bring litigation against the Corps of Engineers to keep the level of Lake Pend Oreille up to protect spawning beds for Kokanee, served as Scoutmaster in two Boy Scout troops, worked as bishop over a local congregation for my church and now as a counselor in the stake presidency for an area of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints covering eastern Washington, North Idaho, and Western Montana.
I love reading and attempting to write my own stories. These interests are matched only with my interest in camping and kayaking.
My greatest accomplishment, however, is convincing my wife Sharon to marry me and working with her to raise our three sons, Spencer and twins Gregory and Justin. I’m grateful for the flexibility of my profession that allows me to work so much of the time from my home, where if I need a break I can just walk down to the water’s edge, jump in my kayak, and be in another world in 10 seconds flat. If you try to reach me and can’t, just drive out on the bridge and look to the east. That kayaker out in the lake you see might just be me.
Well, enough horn tooting!! I’ll soon be posting on actual legal matters that will be of interest to you, so come back again😊. (And if you have any specific legal questions regarding wills, trusts, or business issues, let me know, and I'll try to address them.)
