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Michael O’Hara Garcia, UF CJC Class of 1985

Michael O’Hara Garcia has dedicated his life to the betterment of society.

He currently serves as president of the Florida Olive Council, a not-for-profit agricultural research and advocacy organization he created in 2011 to help develop a sustainable and profitable olive industry in Florida.

Throughout his career, O’Hara Garcia has had much success — to which he gives credit to his beginnings in The Swamp.

“At the end of the day, it was my communication skills that got me to where I am today — and I learned most of that at the UF journalism school,” said the 1985 alumnus. “If you can communicate, you can organize — and if you organize, you can accomplish.”

O’Hara Garcia’s work for the common good extends past his work with agriculture. Before beginning the olive council, O'Hara Garcia was a strategic account manager for federal and state/local government operations, a position he held for a decade with Cisco Systems, an American multinational technology conglomerate. He led Cisco’s response to Hurricane Katrina, providing law enforcement with land mobile radio interoperability.

O'Hara Garcia assumed this position after working for the federal government for about three decades, where he served as senior technology adviser to the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Government Reform and also chief of program evaluations and a communications analyst with the U.S. Information Agency Office of Research.

He thinks it is a good idea to recognize all groups that contribute and participate in our democracy, and celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month is a good way to do that.

“Everybody should have their time in the sun,” O'Hara Garcia said, “and everyone should be recognized, which helps us all live in peace.”