Blog

I'm very excited to now be consulting for the fabulous change-making organization Living Cities, managing the implementation of a grant from MacArthur Foundation to deploy civic tech projects in three cities in the US. It's a great opportunity to build on my experiences both as an entrepreneur and systems scaler with a small business and my time in office as mayor of South Orange. There's tremendous potential for creating innovation, especially in city governments, and I'm excited for how this will integrate with my continued interest in understanding how to create sustainable change in systems of governance in the US and abroad. Look out for more soon!

In 2010 I filed incorporation papers for “Veracity Media,” a name I had been using since middle/high school to describe crazy media related ventures to make politics more “honest” that I was trying to work on. In 2011 I had the pleasure of meeting Aaron Straus Garcia, who not only helped me become one of the youngest mayors in the country in my beloved hometown of South Orange, but shared my passion for getting more (young) people into our civic ecosystem. Six months later, after an insane few months in office for me, and a political campaign in Spain for him, we met in the Pirate’s Cove at Seton Hall to talk about how we can get more young people elected and really shake up government. We quickly realized we each had no real paying job, and so we deferred Rethink Leadership (to be launched about a year later) and we went in on Veracity Media together and started our hustle around Jersey and NYC. We brought Ryan Morgan on a year later, and our first company employees in January of 2014. Since then, Veracity has grown to be one of the best NationBuilder experts, and political and digital consulting...

Originally posted on Facebook Warning, the following may not be super popular at first glance, but it might be worth a read... Personally, I am not amused by the circus that has become the democratic process used to select the person to serve in one of the most singularly powerful positions of leadership and authority and influence currently existing in human civilization. It’s 2015, there are a million ways to be amused, and I enjoy partaking in those as much as the next person (maybe more). There is endless entertainment. But this is not one of them. This is supposed to be where ideas on solving problem related to little things like poverty, poor economic mobility, lack of access to healthcare, education and jobs, crippling student debt and economic indebtedness, major growing problems with our environment, wasted tax dollars because of biased, corrupt or inept management and spending, lives ruined because of a misappropriated criminal justice system, overly prohibitive government regulations in some areas, and under regulation in others, a huge lack of global leadership contributing to poverty, corruption, hunger, disease and conflict around the world are supposed to be discussed and figured. Those are actually the things at stake,...

Last week I spoke about local government innovation as part of a civic innovation series for Emergency Local Government Leaders. Check it out below!  

I sat down with NJTV to look back on some lessons learned and challenges from the last four years, as well as look ahead at what's next! Check it out below:  

It was my distinct honor and pleasure on Monday night to swear-in Sheena Collum, South Orange's first female Village President - and second youngest. Her service on the Board and as a volunteer in town has been considerable, is the reason I supported her two years for trustee and again this time around for Village President.       More: http://villagegreennj.com/towns/government/torpey-era-ends-south-orange/ http://villagegreennj.com/towns/government/collum-sworn-49th-first-woman-south-orange-village-president/  

It was my distinct honor and pleasure on Monday night to swear-in Sheena Collum, South Orange's first female Village President - and second youngest. Her service on the Board and as a volunteer in town has been considerable, is the reason I supported her two years for trustee and again this time around for Village President.       More: http://villagegreennj.com/towns/government/torpey-era-ends-south-orange/ http://villagegreennj.com/towns/government/collum-sworn-49th-first-woman-south-orange-village-president/  

Yesterday, South Orange elected its first female Village President ever (And second youngest!).  I was proud to support Sheena Collum for Trustee in 2013 along with Steve Schnall and Walter Clarke and again for Village President in 2015. It's not every day you get to vote for the person who will be assuming your elected position, but in this case, I couldn't have been happier to do it! South Orange will be lucky to have her in the position of Village President, and it's just one more example of the South Orange community being open-minded and coming out to the polls to vote for who they think will genuinely lead the town in the best direction. We've made an enormous amount of progress in South Orange, and it will surely continue under her leadership. http://villagegreennj.com/towns/government/collum-elected-first-female-south-orange-village-president/