CT Liberty Forum Speakers and Bios

Jennifer Abel is a Connecticut-based freelance writer who has written for the Bristol Press and Hartford Advocate. She’s a frequent contributor to libertarian blogs and is currently doing research and interviews for The Art of the Possible. Her opinions can also be found at Ravings of a Feral Genius.

Before switching to journalism Jennifer held a variety of lucrative English-major odd jobs: she taught high school, researched and wrote NASCAR collectors’ guides, and did copywriting for an ad agency and copyediting for a defense-industry research firm. She also put in a brief stint as an editor for (what she later discovered was) a spam-writing company. But considering how many spambot links she’s since had to delete from her own blog’s comment threads, she figures she’s more than repaid that particular karmic debt.

Attorney Michael H. Agranoff is a lifelong Connecticut resident. He graduated Hall High School in West Hartford, has a B.A. from the University of Hartford, and a J.D. from the University of Connecticut School of Law. He has been licensed to practice law in Connecticut since 1988.

Mike served three years in the U.S. Army, and was honorably discharged. He was employed as a computer programmer, analyst, and administrator for nearly 20 years before going to law school.

Since 1991, Mike has practiced DCF defense law, representing persons in administrative hearings, investigations, Juvenile Court hearings, and related court and school matters. He has also testified before the State Legislature on various DCF bills and proposed regulations.

His web site contains full DCF defense information, and numerous case summaries. Please see: www.agranofflaw.com.

Mike’s office is located on Crystal Lake in Ellington, CT. He currently employs two associate attorneys and a paralegal. They practice full-service DCF defense law in courts throughout the State. Mike will answer any reasonable legal questions. EMail: AttyMikeA@agranofflaw.com.

Dr. Katherine Albrecht is the director of CASPIAN (Consumers Against Supermarket Privacy Invasion and Numbering), and is also a talk show host of "Uncovering the Truth" every weekday on the We The People Radio Network. Dr. Katherine Albrecht is the director of CASPIAN (Consumers Against Supermarket Privacy Invasion and Numbering), an organization she founded in 1999 to advocate free-market, consumer-based solutions to the problem of retail privacy invasion.

Katherine is widely recognized as one of the world's leading experts on consumer privacy. She regularly speaks on the consumer privacy and civil liberties impacts of new technologies, with an emphasis on RFID and retail issues. She has testified on RFID technology before the Federal Trade Commission, state legislatures, the European Commission, and the Federal Reserve Bank, and she has given over a thousand television, radio and print interviews to news outlets all over the world. Her efforts have been featured on CNN, NPR, the CBS Evening News, Business Week, and the London Times, to name just a few.

Executive Technology Magazine has called Katherine "perhaps the country's single most vocal privacy advocate" and Wired magazine calls her the "Erin Brockovich" of RFID". Her success exposing corporate misdeeds has earned her accolades from Advertising Age and Business Week and caused pundits to label her a PR genius.

Katherine is co-author of "Spychips: How Major Corporations Plan to Track your Every Move with RFID." Two days prior to its release, Spychips flew the top of the Amazon bestseller charts, hitting number one as a "Mover & Shaker," making its way to the top-ten nonfiction bestseller list, and spending weeks as a Current Events bestseller. Within its first four weeks alone, the book sold thousands of copies, and the journalistic and privacy communities called it "brilliantly written," "stunningly powerful," and "scathing." In a nod to the book's focus on freedom, Spychips was awarded the prestigious Lysander Spooner Award for Advancing the Literature of Liberty and named "the best book on liberty" for 2005.

Katherine is a highly sought-after public speaker, informing audiences across Europe and North America with her well-researched, compelling, and often chilling accounts of how retail surveillance technology threatens our privacy. She is a frequent guest on radio programs worldwide, logging over 500 hours of airtime with her proven ability to entertain an audience and generate listener calls.

Katherine graduated magna cum laude with a Bachelor of Science degree in Business Administration with a concentration in International Marketing. She holds a Doctorate in Education from Harvard University with a research focus in consumer education, privacy and psychology.

Barbara Austen has both a bachelor’s and master’s degree in American history from the University of New Hampshire and the College of William & Mary in Williamsburg, VA respectively.  After working as a museum curator for a number of years, she started a second career by earning her master’s in library and information science with a concentration in archives from Simmons College in Boston. Since receiving that degree, she has worked as an archivist at the Fairfield (Conn.) Historical Society, the Connecticut State Library and the Connecticut Historical Society.  She has given introductory workshops on archives management for the New England Archivists, and frequently gives presentations on preserving family papers, most recently for Connecticut Public Television, and the Connecticut Historical Society.  She has also given presentations for the Connecticut League of History Organizations and for the New England Museum Association. 

Jim Azzola grew up in CT.  He attended high school in Meriden and went to Tufts, Berkeley and MIT, earning a PhD in Mechanical Engineering.  After spending 8 years in the Semiconductor Equipment industry, Jim worked another 8 years in the Oil and Gas Industry and is now a consulting engineer with his own company, Thermal Science, specializing in the design of vacuum insulated tubing.  Jim is a libertarian and an activist championing the cause of freedom.  He worked with the Ron Paul campaign in New Hampshire and subsequently hosted remote phone banks with a national grassroots network during the primaries in many states.  Today Jim is busy building a coalition of liberty minded enthusiasts to further the American Freedom Movement.

Jim Babka is the co-founder and President of the Downsize DC Foundation and DownsizeDC.org, Inc. He is also the host of The Downsize DC Conference Call on the Genesis Communication Network. He has guest-hosted other shows. He has authored several reports including: “How to Persuade Your Friends & Family Guns Save Lives & Reduce Crime,” “How the FDA Helped Kill My Dad,” and “Liberty for citizens, or only for politicians?” Previously, Jim Babka was President of RealCampaignReform.org, which took a lawsuit challenging the campaign finance laws all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. He and his wife Susie are the proud, home-schooling parents of three children

Laurence D. Cohen, a columnist for the Hartford Courant, the Hartford Business Journal and the Waterbury Republican-American, was the former executive director of the Yankee Institute for Public Policy.

He is a former reporter, editor, editorial writer and member of the Editorial Board at The Courant; has held senior speechwriting positions at the Hartford Insurance Group and United Technologies Corporation; and served as Special Assistant to former Connecticut Gov. John Rowland.

He is a former President of the Connecticut Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists and former President of the Connecticut Valley Chapter of the Public Relations Society of America.

He is an adjunct instructor at the University of Hartford and has also taught at the West Hartford and Storrs campuses of the University of Connecticut; Central Connecticut State University; and Albertus Magnus College.

He is president of Cohen Communications, Inc., a public affairs and public policy consulting firm in Glastonbury.  

Tom Durso has a BA in economics from St. Michael's College in Winooski, VT. He was one of a select few non-lawyers accepted into and who completed Harvard Law School’s Mediation/Dispute Resolution program. A former Greater Waterbury Chamber of Commerce vice-president, he was also a CT State Labor Dept. adjudicator, hearings officer and auditor/investigator who now advises national employers on payroll tax issues. He was a member of the Governor's Commission on Unfunded Mandates  which issued its final report  in January 2007  and he served on the Watertown Town Council from 1997 to 1999, the Watertown Police Commission from 2000 to2007 and as its chairman from 2004 to 2006. Tom was chosen by the IRS to serve on its Taxpayers Advocacy Panel (TAP) program for 2007-2010. He is also vice president of the Watertown-Oakville Taxpayers association. One of Tom’s favorite Ronald Reagan quotes is "the closest thing to eternal life on earth is a government program". He and his wife Dora have two daughters, Danielle Ann and Stephanie Jeanne.

Susan M.W. Cox has been married 16 years to Bob Cox. Mom and homeschool instructor to their three children (ages 14, 11 and 8 years old). She has been President of Connecticut Homeschool Network, a statewide homeschool organization, since 2006 – CHN is an organization serving Connecticut’s homeschool community through a website and homeschool events since 1995. CHN offers information to enlighten, educate and empower Connecticut homeschooling families.

Michael Cristofaro is the fourth of five Cristofaro children. His father Pasquale emigrated to the U.S. from Italy in the spring of 1962; his mother, Margherita, followed that October. The family settled in New London, Connecticut and Michael was born that December.

The first home the Cristofaro family owned in America was taken by the City of New London in the early 1970s for a sea wall that was never constructed. In 2000, the City again condemned a Cristofaro family home, this time for private economic development. The Cristofaro family and their neighbors, represented by the Institute for Justice, took their fight against eminent domain abuse all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court in what is known as the infamous Kelo vs. New London case.

Michael has a degree in Electrical Engineering from Thames Valley State Technical College and has been employed by Automatic Data Processing since 1988 as a Network Engineer. Michael has been happily married to Anna for nine years.

Jim Gilchrist founded the multi-ethnic Minuteman Project on Oct. 1, 2004, after years of frustrated efforts trying to get a neglectful U.S. government to simply enforce existing immigration laws.

Jim holds a B.A. in newspaper journalism, a B.S. in business administration, and an M.B.A. in taxation. He is a former newspaper reporter and a retired California CPA (Certified Public Accountant).

Jim is a veteran of the U.S. Marine Corps and recipient of the Purple Heart award for wounds sustained while serving with an infantry unit in Vietnam, 1968 - 1969.

Mr. Gilchrist is a passionate defender of the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution and an avid supporter of law enforcement organizations. He has appeared on over 1000 radio and TV news and commentary shows in the past twelve months, and he believes he is only one of millions of 21st century minutemen / women / children who want the U.S. to remain governed by the “rule of law” and who want proactive enforcement of our national security protections and our immigration legal code.

Jim has lived in California since 1976 and currently resides in Aliso Viejo with his wife, Sandy

Susan Kniep is the President of The Federation of Connecticut Taxpayers Organizations, Inc

The Federation is an umbrella organization for taxpayer groups throughout the State, providing networking resources, research, and representation at the State Legislature on issues to include, but not limited to, Taxes, Binding Arbitration, Prevailing Wage, Initiative and Referendum, and Eminent Domain.

Susan is a life long resident of East Hartford, where her family upon their migration from Sweden had founded the one of the first dairy farms in Connecticut, known as the Bergren Dairy. Susan lives in the old family homestead built in the 1840s with her husband, George, of 40 years. George is a retired engineer of an affiliate of Ingersoll Rand. Susan has one daughter, Jennifer, a middle school math teacher and graduate of St. Joseph College.

In addition to Susan’s business background, Susan has the distinction of breaking of many barriers in politics:

· Susan was elected the first woman mayor of East Hartford,

· She is the first Republican to have held the Mayor’s Office within the past 50 years, and

· She is the first and only Independent to have held office in East Hartford.

In business, Susan graduated from Bay Path College, worked for years in the stock and bond brokerage business, owned a floral business, and is now a Real Estate agent with Century 21.

In politics, Susan’s strong roots ultimately led to her successful election to East Hartford’s Town Council in 1983, where she served as Minority Leader until 1989. In 1989, Susan was elected the first woman Mayor of East Hartford where she served until 1993. Under a strong Mayor form of government, Susan instituted many changes, to include developing professional standards for Directors, as well as standards for contracts, bidding and ethics to avoid much of what we are witnessing in State government today. When Susan entered the Mayor’s office she was confronted with a $2 million deficit left by her predecessor. In 1993, Susan left the Town with a surplus unmatched by any of her predecessors, while imposing no tax increase. She again successfully sought the office of Town Council in 1995 as an independent candidate.

Susan practices that what Thomas Jefferson long advocated, which is ETERNAL VIGILANCE IS THE PRICE OF LIBERTY!

Robert A. Levy is senior fellow in constitutional studies and a member of the board of directors at the Cato Institute, which he joined in 1997 after 25 years in business. He also sits on boards of the Institute for Justice, the Federalist Society, and the George Mason University School of Law. He founded CDA Investment Technologies, a major provider of financial information and software, and was its CEO until 1991. Levy clerked for Judge Royce C. Lamberth on the U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., and for Judge Douglas H. Ginsburg on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. From 1997 until 2004, Levy was an adjunct professor of law at Georgetown University. He has written numerous articles on investments, law, and public policy. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, USA Today, Washington Post, National Review, and many other publications. Levy has also discussed public policy on national radio and TV programs, including ABC’s Nightline, CNN’s Crossfire, Fox’s The O’Reilly Factor, MSNBC’s Hardball, and NBC’s Today Show. His next book, co-authored with William Mellor and scheduled for Spring 2008 release, is The Dirty Dozen: How Twelve Supreme Court Cases Radically Expanded Government and Eroded Freedom. Levy received his Ph.D. in business from the American University and his J.D. degree from the George Mason University School of Law.

Martin B. Margulies is a professor at Quinnipiac College School of Law in Hamden, Connecticut, and holds degrees from Columbia College, Harvard University and New York University. He has served on the boards of the American and Connecticut Civil Liberties Unions. He writes frequently about First Amendment issues and has provided legal counsel in many free speech cases and speaks often on various aspects of the First Amendment.

State Representative Arthur J. O’Neill of Southbury was first elected to the state House of Representatives in 1988, winning a special election to represent the 69th District of Southbury, Bridgewater, Roxbury, and New Milford. Due to redistricting in 1992, Representative O’Neill now represents the towns of Southbury, Bridgewater, Roxbury, and Washington. He was most recently re-elected on November 7th, 2006.

For this legislative session, Representative O’Neill will serve as Ranking Member of the General Assembly's Judiciary Committee.

During previous terms, Representative O’Neill has served on the Legislative Management, the Energy and Technology, and the Government Administration and Elections Committees, the Finance Revenue and Bonding Committee, and has served as Chairman of the Regulations Review Committee, and Ranking member on the budget-writing Appropriations Committee.

Representative O’Neill also served as Chairman of the Shepaug River Task Force. The Task Force, which was created by an act of the General Assembly, was charged with studying the effects of the diversion of water on the Shepaug River and whether the 1921 contract between Waterbury and the Town of Washington was properly implemented.

Representative O’Neill was a member of the Task Force for Redistricting and was Chairman of the Southbury Training School Task Force in 1993-94, which studied Governor Weicker’s proposal to close the Southbury Training School.

In January of 2004, Representative O'Neill was chosen by House Speaker Moira Lyons and House Minority Leader Robert Ward to serve as the Republican co-chairman of the bi-partisan ten-member Select Committee of Inquiry. The Committee investigated former Governor John G. Rowland's acceptance of expensive gifts from state employees and contractors doing business with the state, in an attempt to determine if the events warranted his impeachment.

Active in the community, Representative O’Neill is a member of the East Hill Woods Corporation Board of Directors, a continuing care facility located in Southbury. He was a member of the Southbury Republican Town Committee from 1980-88, served as Chairman in 1987 and as secretary from 1981-87. He was also a member of the Southbury Charter Revision Commission from 1985-86 and served as secretary of the Pomperaug Valley Water Authority. He is a former member of both the Tribury Jaycees and the Tribury Rotary Club.

Born April 27, 1952, Representative O’Neill is a graduate of Southbury public schools. He is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of the University of Connecticut and earned a Juris Doctor

Brett Powell is the Director of Marketing for the Free State Project and is involved in numerous liberty oriented organizations in New Hampshire. Originally from a small town south of Kansas City, Brett graduated with a bachelor’s degree in Business Administration from the University of Kansas in 2004 and worked as a Regional Coordinator for the Leadership Institute’s Campus Leadership Program from 2004 to 2005. After obtaining an MBA from the University of Missouri in 2006, Brett moved to New Hampshire as part of the Free State Project and currently works as a consultant specializing in merger and integration management. Brett is responsible for planning and coordinating marketing campaigns designed to promote the mission of the Free State Project and to grow membership.

Jeff Rowes serves as a staff attorney at the Institute for Justice. His practice focuses on private property rights, free speech, and economic liberty.

Jeff currently represents the Community Youth Athletic Center, a boxing and mentoring program for at-risk youth in National City, California near San Diego. National City, which declared the gym and hundreds of other properties “blighted,” approved a plan to seize the gym and transfer its land to a private developer so he can build luxury condos for the wealthy. He also represents the elderly and working-class families of the beachfront MTOTSA neighborhood in Long Branch, N.J. who are facing condemnation for the same reason.

In his First Amendment practice, Jeff successfully represented Chris Pagan before the en banc U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit in Pagan’s First Amendment suit against Glendale, Ohio for banning automobile "for sale" signs from parked cars. The U.S. Supreme Court denied Glendale request to review this decision.

With respect to economic liberty, Jeff represents Maryland entrepreneurs who want to own funeral homes, a Massachusetts entrepreneur who is trying to open an amphibious vehicle sightseeing company, and a non-denominational summer camp in Pennsylvania trying to secure access to a river for whitewater rafting.

Jeff regularly publishes opinion pieces on constitutional law, including a recent essay in Legal Times about the state of property law in America following the U.S. Supreme Court’s disastrous 2005 ruling in Kelo v. City of New London.

Jeff graduated with honors from Harvard Law School in 2002 where he was extensively involved in law and economics. He also holds a Master’s Degree from the University of Chicago in law and philosophy.

Before coming to the Institute, Jeff clerked for Judge Will Garwood of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and Chief Judge Patricia Fawsett of the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida.

Alan Schaeffer, is the Executive Director of Separation of School and State.

For 14 years, the Alliance has promoted the idea that the government is the wrong organization to run schools.

Now, building on the work of Marshall Fritz (founder of both the Alliance and the Advocates for Self Government) Alan is taking the Alliance through a new phase focusing on empowering the right organization to control education THE FAMILY. The culture of freedom must be built on the firm foundation of convictions so strong that the children are the first to experience its benefits - not the last.

This idea is the very bedrock of freedom. In fact, the future of freedom depends on it!

Robert “Bob” Schulz is the founder and chairman of We The People Foundation for Constitutional Education, Inc., and We The People Congress, Inc.

Bob was born in 1939 in New York City. Bob and Judith, his wife of 45 years, live on the east side of Lake George, in the foothills of the Adirondack Mountains in upstate New York, where they raised four children: Bob, Nancy, John and Mark.

Bob has an engineering degree from the United States Merchant Marine Academy in Kings Point, New York (1963), and a Masters Degree in Business Administration from Xavier University in Cincinnati, Ohio (1969). He completed most of the course work for a Ph.D. in Public Administration from the Graduate School of Public Affairs, State University of New York at Albany.

Bob has held significant positions in industry (Westinghouse and General Electric), in government (Director of a State Office in Connecticut and a State Office in New York, and full time advisor to the Administrator of the United States Environmental Protection Agency), on Wall Street (Prudential-Bache Securities), in business (founder and CEO of a consulting firm), and on the radio as a talk-show host (WROW-Albany).

However, this work and these assignments are not Bob’s principal reason for being.

Although he is not an attorney, Bob is not unskilled in the law. Since 1979, Bob has been occupied with an abiding concern about wrongful governmental behavior. He has been carefully scrutinizing Government’s behavior, comparing that behavior with the requirements of the State and Federal Constitutions and unhesitatingly confronting improprieties and conflicts, in the courts, professionally, intelligently and rationally. Bob has performed the research, prepared the briefs and argued cases in the highest state and federal courts. Over one hundred fourteen (155) decisions have been published in cases he has brought against unconstitutional and illegal behavior by those wielding governmental power.

Bob’s current focus is on the historical context and purpose of the last ten words of the First Amendment, what Bob refers to as the accountability clause.

Ralph Sherman is an attorney in solo practice in New Britain. He is known throughout Connecticut for his representation of firearms owners and is the chairman of Gunsafe, a statewide, Web-based, gun-rights organization. He has helped more individuals obtain Connecticut handgun permits than any other attorney. Thousands of Connecticut high-school students have attended his live, classroom presentations on the Second Amendment. A lifelong resident of Connecticut, Sherman is a member of the First Co. Governor's Foot Guard Band, based in Hartford.

He also served for three years as conductor of the Second Co. Governor's Foot Guard Band in New Haven. In his spare time he enjoys motorcycling and studying Connecticut history. He and his wife, Molly, homeschool their three children. His law firm is featured here www.ralphdsherman.com .

Dr. Robban A. Sica received her MD from the Medical College of Ohio. Dr Sica has been practicing integrative medicine for over 20 years and founded an integrative multi-specialty private practice of natural and alternative medicine, The Center for the Healing Arts, PC in Orange, CT Dr. Sica’s integrative approach is a successful new model for patients with chronic health conditions as well as those wishing to prevent illness, utilizing natural alternatives to medication. Dr. Sica sits on the Board of Directors for the American Board of Clinical Metal Toxicology, the International College of Integrative Medicine, and the American Association for Health Freedom. Her brave battle against Connecticut state officials was successful in protecting freedom of access to chelation therapy in the state. Since then, protecting health freedom has become a passion for Dr. Sica. and helped to found the Connecticut Health Freedom Coalition, our state chapter for AAHF, to further health freedom efforts here.

You can learn more about Dr. Sica and her practice at www.centerhealingarts.org.

Florence Stahl has a long history of political activism. She was the first woman elected to Avon's Board of Selectmen and then served on its Board of Finance and Water Pollution Control Authority...altogether over 20 years of public involvement.

Twelve years ago, she founded the Avon Taxpayers Association and has been its president ever since, racking up significant accomplishments along the way. Most notably were the establishment of an automatic referendum on the budget, increased transparency of personnel contracts, publication of an Avon Employee Compensation booklet, several high profile budget defeats, and a general consciousness-raising among taxpayers concerning fiscal responsibility.

She is the owner and manager of Avon Resume which will celebrate its 25th year in 2009 and has resided in Avon since 1967.

Michael Telesca is a native of Waterbury, CT where he was elected to the Board of Alderman in November 2007 for a term of 2 years. He served in the US Army from 1971 to 1974. After his military service he owned and operated several retail shops in FL and returned to CT in 1985. A former Realtor, he is currently the owner and manager of several residential properties in Waterbury today.

He has been in many volunteer and civic involvements including being a Member of “WOW-NRZ” since 1995, serving as the Housing Committee Chairman 1996 to present; Member of Waterbury Neighborhood Council 1996- 2003; Member of “The Property Owners Association of Greater Waterbury” since 1996 serving on the Board of Directors as Treasurer 1997 to 1999 and as President 1999 to 2003. He is also a current member of ELKS lodge

# 265 in Waterbury, CT

Co-founded and served as President of NRZ Property Rescuers Inc 1997 to 2000, a non-profit group that provided jobs in the inner city that cleaned vacant lots, boarded up abandoned buildings and helped elderly residents with yard work and small repairs on their homes. Board member of “Neighborhood Housing Services” 2004 to 2007. Served on the “ Mayor’s Blue Ribbon Commission on Housing” in 2005. Formerly served as Board President of “Naugatuck Valley Projects” Housing Committee in Waterbury 2006-2007.

He also Co-founded and serves as Chairman of The Waterbury “ Independent Party since 2003; a minor political party that has seven elected members to the Board of Aldermen and School Board in Waterbury.

Deborah Stevenson, mother of two children, Samantha and Cassandra, realized that homeschooling is what all parents do from the time children are born, and that it was a natural thing to continue to do so.  So she did.

Deborah became involved in legal work as a result of homeschooling her children.  She became involved in protecting her right to homeschool as a parent before she began attending law school.  She homeschooled, as well as drove her children to college, where they took courses during the day, and went to law school at night.  She currently practices Education law and Appellate law privately in addition to working as Executive Director of NHELD, LLC.

Ms. Stevenson formed Connecticut Citizens to Uphold the Right to Educate (C.U.R.E.) in 1989 in order to assist all parents in the state to retain their right to instruct their children at home without government interference.  Because she believed in the tenth amendment's provision that all powers not specifically granted to the federal government belong to the states and to the people, C.U.R.E. remained a state organization protecting the rights of citizens in the state.  It was not until 2003, when Deborah realized that there was a continuing effort by another organization to actively promote the adoption of federal regulation of homeschooling, that she decided to form National Home Education Legal Defense.  A national organization was necessary in order to inform and assist parents in all states in halting federal regulation and retaining authority in the states to instruct their children in freedom.

Deborah has no background in public education.  She does have an extensive background in home education, having taught both her children since birth at home.

Ms. Stevenson also has an extensive background as a public speaker.  She spent ten years as a reporter interviewing all sorts of interesting people from parents to Presidents.  She also hosted many radio programs on a variety of topics throughout her ten year career.  As a parent and an advocate, Deborah has been the guest on many radio and television programs throughout Connecticut and the country.  She has also conducted many workshops on homeschooling and the law.

You can find articles that Ms. Stevenson has published in Home Education Magazine, Family Times, and on NHELD, LLC's website, www.NHELD, LLC.com, to name a few.

Luther Weeks is the Executive Director of CTVotersCount.org and the Executive Director of the Connecticut Citizen Election Audit Coalition.  Luther is a retired software engineer, and computer scientist with masters degrees in computer science and management. He has been active for several years in voting integrity issues and citizen-lobbying the Connecticut Legislature.  Mr. Weeks efforts contributed to the passage of the paper record law in 2005 and the selection of optical-scan over DRE (touch screen) voting equipment in 2006, in Connecticut.  Last year, he organized a coalition of citizens to observe Connecticut’s post-election audits showing that they are insufficient, unreliable, and ineffective, resulting in five public legislative hearings across the state.

Peter Wolfgang, President, FIC Action and Executive Director, Family Institute of Connecticut

Peter has led FIC since July, 2007 and had been its director of public policy since 2004 and the chief architect of FIC’s statewide defense of marriage petition drive in 2002. In that time he helped to grow FIC from a small organization representing a few hundred supporters to one of the largest statewide pro-family organizations in the Northeast. FIC now counts over 50,000 Connecticut families as supporters of its work. FIC has grown to three organizations thanks in part to his leadership: Family Institute of Connecticut Action, our lobbying arm, Family Institute of Connecticut Action Committee, our political action arm, and the Family Institute of Connecticut, our non-profit educational arm. Peter holds a Juris Doctorate from UConn School of Law and is a member of the Connecticut Bar. He also has a Bachelors Degree in International Studies from The American University in Washington, D.C.

Peter was born and raised in Manchester, CT. He and his wife, Leslie, live in Waterbury with their four children: Elizabeth, 7, Katharine, 5, Isaac, 3, and Rose, 1. In 2006 they were named “Family of the Year” by the Connecticut State Council of the Knights of Columbus.

Robert Young is seasoned and experienced in the areas of government and private accounting, financial analysis and system conversions. He has lived in Wethersfield, CT, for the past 25 years and he joined the Wethersfield Taxpayer’s Association (WTXA) in 2001. At that time he became WTXA Treasurer and has maintained that position since 2001. . He continues to address the Wethersfield Town Council and Board of Education on issues of taxes and quality of life issues. Mr. Young is currently serving as Secretary for the Federation of Connecticut Taxpayers Organizations (FCTO).