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Contender for Dranesville District seat touts real-world experience

David Fiske is one of two seeking nomination in June 20 primary
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David Fiske, a physicist who long has been active in McLean community activities, is seeking the Democratic nomination in the 2023 race for Dranesville District supervisor.

Entering the fray on filing-deadline day, David Fiske embarked on a bid for the Democratic nomination in the race for Dranesville District supervisor.

“I felt I had something to offer,” Fiske said. “I’ve got some real-world experience. A lot of what the county does, they want to be data-driven. You don’t want to be entirely staff-dependent.”

Fiske will go up against lawyer James “Jimmy” Bierman in the June 20 Democratic primary, and the chosen nominee will face Republican candidate Puneet Ahluwalia in the Nov. 7 election.

The winner will succeed veteran Supervisor John Foust, a Democrat who opted not to seek re-election.

Fiske is focusing his campaign on:

• Fully funding Fairfax County Public Schools, increasing teacher pay and revamping joint planning processes used by county officials and the school system to “ensure land-use approvals for new residential development are properly synchronized with capital-improvement plans.”

Downtown McLean and the west end of Falls Church are being redeveloped simultaneously and it is essential that Fairfax County and Falls Church planning officials communicate with each other and use similar criteria when projecting future school enrollment, Fiske said.

• Maintaining residential neighborhoods’ character by revising the county’s zoning ordinance regarding accessory-dwelling units, home-based businesses and freestanding accessory-storage structures. He also favors placing new development in Community Business Centers, revitalization areas and near transit stations, provided they enhance and do not detract from existing uses surrounding them.

• Encouraging more people – including county-government employees – to work from home. He also would like to introduce an on-demand element for public transportation in less densely developed areas where providing full-sized buses would not be practical or efficient. This service would connect with trains or fixed-route bus services.

• Improving stormwater-management systems and phasing in green-energy elements, including electric vehicles and renewable-energy sources. He also favors having county officials consider the overall tree canopy when doing land-use comprehensive planning and taking into account connectedness of natural areas so as to facilitate wildlife migration.

• Returning the Fairfax County Police Department to full staffing levels and increasing police pay, especially for mid-career officers who often mentor the department’s younger members. The department now is “chronically understaffed” and this “has the potential to build on itself in a negative way,” Fiske said.

He also supports tracking the police department’s use-of-force incidents, emphasizing de-escalation training for officers and having independent investigations by the independent police auditor and Office of the Commonwealth’s Attorney in cases of alleged police misconduct.

Fiske is a former McLean Citizens Association board member and served with the group’s Planning & Zoning Committee. He also belongs to the Greater McLean Chamber of Commerce, is a Cub Scout pack leader, a PTA member at Franklin Sherman and Haycock elementary schools, and a former president of the Brookhaven-Forest Villa Civic Association.

Fiske is involved with local youth athletics, coaching multiple girls’ and boys’ sports teams and serving as a board member and vice president for baseball with McLean Little League. He would like to see each community in Dranesville District have its own synthetic-turf athletic field.

A former Arlington resident, Fiske holds bachelor’s degrees in physics and mathematics from Ohio State University and master’s and doctoral degrees in physics from the University of Maryland, College Park. The day before defending his dissertation, Fiske experienced physics firsthand in a serious bicycle accident and woke up in a hospital with no memory of the incident.

After earning his doctorate, he worked at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center on a National Research Council Post-Doctoral Fellowship. He also has held temporary posts at the University of California-Irvine, Carnegie Mellon University, the University of Pittsburgh and Penn State University.

In 2005, Fiske began working for DECISIVE ANALYTICS Corp. and in 2014 founded his own consulting firm, FiskeTech LLC, where he still works.

Fiske moved to McLean in 2011 and was a co-founder of Right Size McLean (aka McLean Citizens for Right Size Development), which pushed for neighborhood protections when Fairfax County was revamping its comprehensive plan for McLean’s Community Business Center in 2021.

During his off hours, Fiske watches baseball, reads mysteries, dabbles in robotics and 3-D printing, and enjoys traveling, especially to countries in Eastern Europe.

One of Fiske’s backers is longtime McLean activist Adrienne Whyte.

“I’m supporting David Fiske because he has a long history of civic activity in Dranesville – particularly McLean – in land use, right-sizing of development, public safety (and support of our first responders), school excellence and environmental protection,” she said in an e-mail to the GazetteLeader. “I expect our next supervisor to be an experienced activist and proven leader in those subjects, and David is the only candidate who is.”

Jennifer Jones, who knows Fiske through his various community endeavors, described him as “tenacious, caring, bright, hardworking and methodical.” Fiske is willing to go against the pack when he thinks he is right and makes decisions grounded in reason and factual evidence, she said.

“He truly cares about safeguarding stellar schools for our children, building and maintaining a thriving, safe community for families and businesses, and ensuring adequate and available roads and parking in McLean,” Jones said.