Mr. Taggart served as a volunteer Wilderness Ranger for the US Forest Service for 25 years and is the founder and Chair Emeritus of the Forest Service Volunteer Association. He also served as a Fire Commissioner for the Idyllwild (CA) Fire Protection District. He received the President’s Call to Service award for life-long   volunteerism as well as the San Bernardino National Forest Supervisor’s award for visionary leadership in 2004.

Mike studied Communications at UCLA prior to attending Control Data Institute to study Computer Engineering and Programming.  Mike has been involved with leading edge engineering and science research his entire professional career and is currently the Managing Director and CEO of RhizoSystems, LLC and the CEO of Software Science North, LLC.