Candidate for
Council Member; City of Imperial Beach

Ed grew up in San Diego as the eldest son in a low income working class family. He attended schools in Southeast San Diego, graduated from Morse High and went on to attend UCSD where he earned a BA in Economics and became the first member of his family to receive a college degree. He then took two years off to work in low income communities in the Bay Area with the Dept. of Housing and Urban Development, where he helped bring in new funding for small businesses, housing, and parks.

Ed continued his work helping people and communities while attending New York University Law School, where he worked in a legal aid office in Harlem and spent two summers helping rural families in Alabama protect their land and homes from being taken, sometimes illegally, by developers. After receiving his law degree he worked in a leading Washington, DC law firm mainly on business, regulatory and international matters while doing pro bono work in support of labor rights.

He was recruited into the Foreign Service with the U.S. Agency for International Development, and served in several overseas posts as a regional legal advisor, in Washington as an Assistant General Counsel, and later in assignments as Director of USAID missions in two countries. In these assignments, Ed helped improve and simplify the administration of government programs abroad while bringing needed help in education, environmental, democracy and business development programs to millions of people.

Ed returned to San Diego in 2001 to take a senior position as Associate Vice Chancellor for Resource Administration at his alma mater, UC San Diego, where he served as the chief operating and financial officer for the division of student affairs. He oversaw a budget of $80 million and 2,000 full and part time employees. Ed also managed the student affairs capital improvements program and budget, and contributed directly to the development of several campus buildings and the central area of the campus, known as the campus "downtown." He retired from the University in June of 2014 to devote full time to serving the Imperial Beach community.

Ed and Leah Goodwin married in 2013. Between them they have six adult children and six grandchildren. Ed enjoys body surfing, walking the IB trails and the beach for exercise, and making a difference in the Imperial Beach Community he calls home.