Annual General Meeting Election

We are pleased to report that Maria Candler, Fiona Tower, Ted Smith and Ron Rechenbach were elected to serve on the St. Thomas Vestry this past Sunday. Speakers provided summaries of the life, ministry and finances of the church for 2009 and spoke of the blessings and challenges ahead; copies of the comments and written are being made available on the web page very shortly. Written Annual General Meeting are still available in the Parish Hall.

Ted Smith

My family includes my wife Carolina Lugo, who is our youth minister at St. Thomas', our daughter Lucy, and my son and frequent co-usher Quin. I was born and raised in Richmond and attended a Diocesan school, St. Christopher's, then received my undergraduate degree at the University of the South. I have been a communicant of St. Thomas' for five years since returning to Richmond following graduate school at Wake Forest. We chose St. Thomas' because of its welcoming spirit and mission to include children and youth in all facets of Parish life. I love that Quin and other children are valued participants in so many things, but especially in the ministries in which I participate, ushering on Sundays and setting up for CARITAS. Professionally, I am a finance person. I work in the headquarters business planning and analysis group at Genworth Financial in the west end of Richmond, and prior to getting my MBA I worked on the endowment management staff at the University of Virginia and for an endowment management consulting firm, Cambridge Associates, in Arlington, VA. Should I be chosen to serve on the vestry I hope to concentrate on nurturing the wonderful momentum we've built around the children and youth of St. Thomas' and to contribute my finance and investment experience to the sound stewardship of our parish resources and progress toward our long range planning goals

Ron Rechenbach

I was born and have lived in Richmond, Virginia all of my life, 25 years as a resident of Ginter Park.  I have two grown sons living and working in Arlington, Virginia. I am married to the former Nancy Marston (Miss Nancy) a former St Thomas Day School teacher and resident of the neighborhood for 30 years. I received a BA degree in Psychology from Randolph Macon College in 1969 as well as a Masters degree in Counseling from VCU in 1972. My business career has led me to work as a high school guidance teacher, a high school basketball coach, and as a salesman. In 1989 I started my own company New Dominion Equipment Company, specializing in material handling equipment In 2001 I changed the name of my company to Peaklogix, a company specializing in material handling systems integration. In 2007 I sold my company and am currently retired.  I have served in various capacities over the years such s current member and former board member of the Virginia Counsel of CEO's; a former board member of the National Material Handling Equipment Distributors Association; a current member of the Richmond Chamber of Commerce Business Leaders Roundtable, and a former board member of the Virginia Logistics Association.I grew up attending Ginter Park Methodist Church. Most recently I was a member of Grace & Holy Trinity Episcopal Church for 20 years. While there I served on the Sunday morning breakfast crew and also served as an usher. In 2007 after Nancy and I were married at St Thomas, I transferred my membership to St Thomas. I am currently excited about being considered for the Vestry and look forward to new challenges ahead for the unlimited potential of St Thomas.

Maria Candler

My husband Kirk and I joined St. Thomas in the winter of 2006 while we were expecting our 2nd child, upon the recommendation of Kim Kacani. We always knew that when we started our family we would find a church so that our children might begin to develop their spiritual foundations.  Little did we know how enriched our own lives would be as a result of choosing St. Thomas.  Shortly after joining, our son was born and spent several difficult days in the NICU at Johnston Willis Hospital.  It was there that my real faith journey began.  The overwhelming love and support that we received from our community at St. Thomas (many of whom we had never met) showed me a side of religion I had never experienced in other secular environments.  We knew without question that we had found the right place for our children and ourselves.  This experience led me to become baptized the following summer just before our children were baptized.  We are still learning about all of the wonderful ministries of St. Thomas but have been fortunate to participate in the annual auction, CARITAS, Helping Hands and many programs through the day school where my daughter Sophia, 5, is an alumni and my son Aidan, 3, currently attends. In my professional life, I am an accidental entrepreneur with partnerships in several ventures, most notably James River Grounds Mgmt, a commercial landscape management firm with 6 offices throughout Virginia. I have held several board and committee positions in the largest national landscape association.  I am currently a Junior Achievement volunteer in the Richmond City school district working with children on work readiness, entrepreneurship and financial literacy.  I am excited at the prospect of working in a team to further develop all of the positive things about St. Thomas that drew my family into this community.

Fiona Tower

My family and I started attending St. Thomas after the birth of our first child in 2003.  Both of our children Margaret (now 7) and Ned (3) were baptized at St. Thomas and have attended the Day School.  I have attended a variety of churches throughout my life.  I was born in England with Scottish parents, and I was christened in my parents' parish church (Church of Scotland) and then attended our village church (Church of England) before moving to the U.S. in 1979.  Since our move to the U.S. I have attended non-demoninational, Presbyterian and Baptist churches.  My husband King and I were married in the Episcopal Church.  We came to Richmond in 1995 after graduating from law school, and moved to Ginter Park in 1997.  After 11 years practicing law, mostly in the area of real estate development using historic rehabilitation tax credits, I "retired" to full-time motherhood in 2006.  Since that time I have become more involved in the Church here at St. Thomas'.  I began with volunteer work at the Day School, and I currently serve on the Day School Board and the Altar Guild.  I am also active in the Meals Ministry for both the Church and the Day School.  We have also volunteered to help with CARITAS for the last several years.  We have enjoyed St. Thomas as a place welcoming of our entire family, and our time here has greatly enhanced our sense of community in the Church and the neighborhood.