David Esrati is a first generation American, born in Celina Ohio, raised in Cleveland Heights.
He graduated from Cleveland Heights High School in 1980, entered the US Army in 1981 and served with 7th Special Forces Group at Ft. Bragg and then the 11th Special Forces Group in Jamestown Ohio as a reservist.
A Wright State University graduate, he has a BSB in Marketing.
He has lived in the South Park Historic district since Jan 28, 1986 (the day the Space Shuttle Challenger exploded) in a 2 story frame home that he bought for $14,500 while a sophomore in college. His first introduction to politics was when the city cited him for putting up the wrong kind of garage door and took him to court. The lack of support from elected officials inspired him to run for Mayor against Clay Dixon in 1993. That was the year another political neophyte, Mike Turner also ran for mayor. Often getting confused for each other on the campaign trail, Esrati was the one who financed his own campaign with $1000 and eschewed donations.
He came in a respectable 4th in the 6 way primary, and then jumped in to run for the commission seat vacated by Mark Henry in the fall. He split out the vote between two well know wives of politicians and helped Dean Lovelace finally reach the commission on his fourth run.
He has run for Commission, or attempted to run (running into well documented issues with the Montgomery County Board of (S)Elections and petitions many times.
He has run for the Democratic nomination to Congress 3 times.
He runs an influential and well read political blog www.esrati.com that he has been publishing since 2005.
Along the way:
- Started the first for profit neighborhood development corporation South Park Social Capital
- Served as President for 2 terms of Historic South Park Inc.
- Named one of Dayton’s 40 under 40 by the Dayton Business Journal
- Served as an unofficial big brother from 1988 to present to an inner city youth
- Founded the Raider Hockey club as a freshman at WSU. Coached youth hockey throughout college, was also involved in Student Government and InterClub Council
- Co-Founded www.vobOhio.org– (formerly VOB108) the leading organization for Veteran Owned Businesses in SW Ohio. His last position was as the transitional CO (Commanding officer after serving as the XO for 6 years)
- Won beautification awards for his home and his office in the South Park Historic District
- Worked with AAF Dayton to help bring national caliber speakers to Dayton, and has served as an organizer for the Summitup conference since being part of the founding committee.
- Was named one of the Top 25 Twitter Dayton-centric Accounts to follow by the Dayton Business Journal in 2015
- Hangs green basketball nets on backboards across the city of Dayton for free as part of an effort to show kids that someone cares- and that we should take pride in our community. He’s hung over 500 free nets, and the city finally was guilted into spending over a million dollars to fix basketball courts across the city.
- Started in-depth citizen journalism on the side to cover the Dayton Public Schools starting in 2016 because of their position as worst or 2nd worst in the state. They are now the worst in the state and facing state takeover.
- Elected precinct captain, with competition in every election, 3 terms
- Has filed multiple lawsuits to try to encourage public officials to abide by the Ohio Sunshine Laws.
- Founded the non-profit Reconstructing Dayton as a 501(c)(4) to make local government more efficient, more transparent and responsive.
- Founded the non-profit The Modern Policy Institute as a 501(c)(3) to craft comprehensive policies and programs for open transparent representative political systems, supported by open source tools all in the hopes of taking the money out of politics and to put ideas first.
He runs a well respected and award winning ad agency: The Next Wave.
He teaches a seminar, Webistetology monthly that introduces businesses to using open source tools to manage their websites themselves.
He sells printing via The Next Wave Printing.
He has also been a speaker at many professional conferences on using the web efficiently.
He lives across the street from his office and his dog goes to work with him everyday.
In his limited spare time, he likes to play ice hockey, work out, read, and blog. He prefers scooters and motorcycles and bicycles as modes of transportation.