President
Tony Tedeschi is the 2010 President of the Greater Warrenton Chamber of Commerce. He and his wife, Holly, own several companies including Piedmont Press & Graphics and they publish the Warrenton Lifestyle Magazine. Tony has served as President or Chairman of several Town and County organizations over the past 23 years including the Town of Warrenton’s Economic Development Committee, the Fauquier County Chamber of Commerce, and the Old Town Warrenton Spring Festival. He currently serves on the Board of the Fauquier Family Shelter and is an active Rotarian. Tony was named Business Person of the Year in 2001 by the FCCC and Alumni of the Year by Lord Fairfax CC in 2009. The Tedeschi family resides in the Town of Warrenton.
Vice President
After graduation from the University of Virginia, he spent a career at AT&T and Verizon, mainly in marketing research, customer service, and strategic planning. He accepted an early retirement offer to form Motion Media, a film and video production company with his cinematographer brother. In three years they had built the company into the 3rd largest video production company in the Washington Metro Area. In 1996, Jim formed Motion Media Marketing and pioneered using video on the web. Later, that year he sold his share of Motion Media in order to form M3Company, a market research, web design, hosting, and search marketing company. Over the years, he has been active with nonprofit groups. He is the President and Founder of ProtectSeniors.Org, a national lobbying and grass roots activist group supporting corporate retirees’ interests in Congress. He is past Chairman of the Association of BellTel Retirees Inc, the largest corporate retiree activist organization in the USA. He has also been active in local nonprofits. He was past president of the Fauquier Technology Alliance, served on the Fauquier Bandwidth Task Force, and founded and supported local networking groups.
Secretary
Growing up in as small a country as Switzerland, I dreamed of seeing the world. After attending the Jesuit College in Austria and attaining a Master’s Degree from Columbia University’s Business School in New York, I enjoyed a career as an international banker living and working in Europe, the Middle East and Asia. I spent five years with Union Bank of Switzerland and close to a quarter century with Citibank, N.A., as a commercial banker and Senior Credit Officer. When my children needed a place to call home and make friends, we decided to settle in beautiful Northern Virginia in the early nineties, and I soon found my passion as a mortgage specialist, financial coach and guest lecturer. Twice a year, I offer free ten-week courses in financial planning to our community. As my professional focus has evolved towards working with seniors who are using reverse mortgages as part of their retirement strategy, I realized that I have found my new calling and I joined Wells Fargo Home Mortgage. As I look ahead, I am excited to continue my work with elderly people taking advantage of the benefits that reverse mortgages can offer and be active in our community through The Greater Warrenton Chamber of Commerce.
Treasurer
I have spent 38 years in the financial services industry. My experience spans retail and commercial banking, consulting with businesses on financial restructuring, and a licensed financial/investment adviser. These working experiences provide me with the realistic insight on the impact of financial decisions and changes, which allows an increased level of financial order and control for both individuals and businesses.
Directors
Angela Smith is one of the founding members of the Greater Warrenton Chamber of Commerce. While she is best known as a local business owner and operator, she has also worked with dozens of businesses and government organizations to affect strategic change within organizations. As the Executive Director of the Fauquier County Chamber of Commerce from 1998 through 2002, she worked with local businesses with common causes to create coalitions that helped all of the individual participants. She has also applied this skill as a private consultant through effective meeting facilitation for groups like The Nature Conservancy, The Humane Society, United Way, NASA and the US Small Business Administration. Angela is the General Manager of the Fauquier Springs Country Club and Legends Catering, now a division of the Springs Club. She is a graduate of JamesMadisonUniversity with a BS in Accounting. She also graduated in 1992 with honors from ATI School of Culinary Arts.
Bernard J.E. van Gils, Esq. is an attorney whose practice focuses on estate, probate and business matters. He assisted the founders of the Chamber with establishing the corporation Warrenton Chamber of Commerce, drafting its bylaws and many other legal documents. Bert has over 20 years of diverse domestic and international experience as a transactional attorney and business consultant. He has practiced in FauquierCounty for ten years. Bert also serves the University of North AmericaUniversity of North America as General Counsel and as a member of the faculty. He has also provided seminars to business owners for the Small Business Development Program at Lord Fairfax College. He has taught in the U.S, Indonesia, China and the CzechRepublic. Bert has previously been a Board member for the Fauquier County Chamber of Commerce, the Fauquier County Community Action Committee, the Partnership for Warrenton, the Warrenton Ballet Company and the Fauquier Regional Technology Association.
Dennis Taylor is the Chief Operating Officer of Paradigm Solutions, a certified small, woman-owned Business & Management Consulting firm located in Catlett, VA. Paradigm Solutions was founded in September 2002. Before launching Paradigm Solutions, Dennis was employed for 17 years by Intertek Technical Services where he served in various management capacities including: Director, Operations; Director, International Business Operations; Chief Operating Officer; and he then concluded the last 7 years of his career with Intertek as their President and Chief Operating Officer. Intertek is an international supply chain improvement and quality assurance consulting firm serving the aerospace and commercial manufacturing markets. In his current role Dennis is responsible for relationship development and interfacing with Paradigm Solutions’ customers who are primarily small to medium sized commercial firms. In addition Dennis also supports consulting service delivery to the company’s municipal customers which include Fauquier County Government and Public Schools, Culpeper County and The City of Roanoke, VA. When not working in the business Dennis volunteers his time in support of local organizations including the Greater Warrenton Chamber of Commerce (GWCC), the Balanced Growth Alliance (BGA), the Warrenton Economic Development Advisory Committee, Fauquier County Government’s Business Advisory Committee (BAC), The Partnership for Warrenton, the Southern Fauquier Business Owners Association (SFBOA), the Academic Advisory Council of the University of North America, and VDOT’s Adopt-A-Highway Program. Dennis and his wife/boss/best friend Jean reside in Catlett, VA where they enjoy gardening, music, photography, cooking, travelling, and creating custom designed gifts and gift baskets.
John Stewart has over 15 years of investment and research experience in the fields of finance and economics. John holds an M.S. degree in economics, having graduated cum laude and received the award for excellence in economics research for his studies in labor and macroeconomics. John and his wife moved to Catlett, VA in the summer of 2000. In 2007 John founded Vantage Economics, an economic consulting and research firm, and since then has been heavily involved with growth and development issues in Warrenton and FauquierCounty.
Les Nichols is the business development director for Carson, Ashley & Associates, LLC. Carson, Ashley & Associates is a third generationLand Planning, Land Surveying & Civil Engineering Company headquartered in FauquierCounty. Les has worked in Warrenton since 1992 and is very active in the community. He currently serves on the board of the Southern Fauquier Business Owners Association and the leadership council of the Northern Virginia Builders Industry Association.
Linda Voelpel is the Owner and Director of Ballet Academy of Warrenton; and the Executive Director of The Warrenton Ballet Company, a community-wide non-profit 501(c)(3) pre-professional dance company. Past volunteer activities include leadership roles in Girl Scouts and Boy Scouts of America-Oklahoma and Texas(1974–88); Chair, Certificate Program for High School Seniors-Phi Beta Kappa Association of Oklahoma City, (1987–90); Episcopal Diocese of Oklahoma-Parish Delegate State Diocesan Convention, Founding Committee, Saint Francis of Assisi Parish (1984-86); Precinct Co-Chair, County Delegate, Presidential Delegate-Oklahoma Democratic Party (1984–91); Dance and Drama Director-Advent Lutheran Church, Charleston, SC (1970–73). Ms. Voelpel earned the Bachelor of Fine Arts degree, Phi Beta Kappa, Summa Cum Laude with Departmental Honors and the Master of Science degree, both from Texas Christian University. She also earned a post-graduate, ABA-approved certificate in the Paralegal Program at Georgetown University. In addition to her teaching and performing background in dance, Ms. Voelpel has a diversified employment background in the corporate, non-profit association, and legal fields.
Operating her businesses in Fauquier County for over 25 years, Sunny Reynolds is an award-winning photographer and adventure travel operator based in historic Old Town Warrenton. She has incorporated the passion for photography and travel into Biotrek Tours (biotrektours.com), which organizes and leads adventure travel for small groups into 10 countries worldwide. Her travel encounters provide unique insight and knowledge as to the ways and workings of the land, the people, the culture and the environment.Sunny served as an elected member of the Warrenton Town Council where she sought support for business and the arts in the town of Warrenton. Sunny was voted Woman of the Year for the Arts in 2003 and was voted, for the last four years, Best Artist in Warrenton by Warrenton Lifestyles magazine readers poll. Ms. Reynolds is a member of the American Red Cross and works in their disaster relief program, spending several weeks in Mississippi as a shelter manager during the aftermath of hurricane Katrina.