Mike is a native Nebraskan raised on a farm in Colfax County near the country church community of Olean. He is the second youngest in a family of seven. Mike received a B.S. in Agriculture Economics from the University of Nebraska- Lincoln in 1977. He is proud of the fact he worked his way through college and graduated after 8 semesters of study. Mike spent his first 12 years after college in management of Agrichemical retail plants in Nebraska.
Since 1989 Mike has been a territorial sales manager for an agricultural equipment company in the four-state high plains area of western Nebraska, Wyoming, Colorado and western Kansas. Mike is well known in the high plains agriculture community as a leading advocate for innovative farming practices that have allowed farmers to maximize limited water supplies and lower their input costs. After eight years of living in Colorado Mike moved his family back to Nebraska in 1997. Shocked by the high increase in the level of local and state taxes since he last lived in Nebraska, Mike decided to help organize the Western Nebraska Taxpayers Association (WNTA) in North Platte. Since its inception, WNTA has been influential in local and state governments’ taxation and spending policies. He is presently Chairman of the WNTA. In 2006 Mike sponsored and successfully helped get a state spending limit Petition question on the November ballot. Although the effort failed, Nebraskans began a debate that continues today on the taxing and spending habits of our state government.
Mike and lifelong spouse Barb have two children. Daughter Rebecca is married to husband Gregg and have given Mike and Barb three grandchildren. Youngest child Jebb is married to his wife Lynn and they are starting their life together. Both children have remained citizens of western Nebraska.
