I'm a child of the eastside of Baltimore County and have lived here most of my life — first in Middle River then in Perry Hall, where I graduated from high school.  I now live in Towson.

I'm a county history junkie and have a fondness for all the places that make my "hometown" special. You'll frequently find me hiking around Oregon Ridge with my dog or grabbing a slice at Pizza Johns in Middle River.

Over the years I've worked for a number of area publications including The Times in Perry Hall, The Avenue and The Journal Northeast as well as writing for Reuters news service.

For much of the last decade I was a reporter for Patuxent Publishing Co.'s community papers in Baltimore County as it's senior politics and government reporter.

I've won numerous state, regional and national awards for coverage of stories such as the Joseph Palczynski spree killings and hostage standoff in 2000, coverage of Hurricane Katrina, as well as state and local government coverage.

I've also been honored for my investigative work which includes stories involving the Community College of Baltimore County, the hiring of a health officer who was not licensed to practice medicine in Maryland and an investigation that led to the indictment of a sitting county councilman for theft from his campaign finance account.

While at Patuxent, my political blog was honored as the best in the Maryland-Delaware-DC region. I continue to blog about politics for Patch.

I appear each Thursday morning in the 7 o'clock hour where I talk about local politics on WBAL 1090 AM. I've appeared regularly on a number of that station's programs and have made guest appearances on Midday with Dan Rodricks on WYPR 88.1 FM.

I also co-hosted the "All Politics is Local" radio show on WCBM 680 AM.

You can find me on Facebook and on Twitter.