Shawn is a husband, a father, an entrepreneur and an educator, living on Quinpool Road. He was first elected as the Councillor for
District 9 – Halifax West Armdale in October 2016, and re-elected in October 2020.

He is from a family of entrepreneurs and has worked on and advised many start-ups. He is a business professor at Mount Saint Vincent University and has taught courses on entrepreneurship and management at Dalhousie, Saint Mary’s, Acadia, and NSCC.

Before teaching, Shawn was a policy analyst for some prominent political figures in Canada. When Joe Clark was preparing another run for Prime Minister in 1998 and 1999, Shawn managed his research team. Later, Shawn worked as an advisor to Nova Scotia Education Minister, Jane Purves.

Shawn loves big ideas. He organized TEDx conferences every year at Mount Saint Vincent University from 2015 to 2019, putting dynamic speakers on stage ranging from Atlantic Canada’s first Mi’kmaq independent film producer to Halifax’s Chief of Police, a former finance minister, an urban planner, entrepreneurs, leaders in the charitable sector, and others. Shawn was on the Halifax Library Board for three years and helped put the business case together that made our new Central Library a reality.

And Shawn loves Halifax. He walks and bikes to work everyday and tends a big vegetable garden in his front lawn. He loves the lifestyle here in District 9 and wants to protect what’s great and fix what’s broken. He’s a leader who can find solutions and turn them into reality.