David and Jan Hardie

DAVID & JAN HARDIE

By John Crockett

Whether serving in leadership roles for the Parasol Tahoe Community Foundation or climbing hills on a tandem bicycle with wife Jan, David Hardie knows it takes a team, and family, effort. His lasting impact on the community through nonprofit board and financial management experience continues with programs like the Tahoe Fire Safe Initiative and new venture, Tahoe Forest Products.

Hardie joined the Board of Parasol in 2005 and respects the organization’s community foundation model. “It provides a clear picture on the needs of the community. The management of the foundation knows what the needs are and what organizations are truly performing,” he says. “In times of need, it provides leadership for the community.”

Hardie says the biggest problem facing Incline Village and throughout the Tahoe basin is, “the threat of fire and forest health. And also an insurance crisis. They’re all related.” He was instrumental in launching Parasol’s Tahoe Fire Safe Initiative in 2018. The program aims to protect people and property through mitigation projects and education. “We’re trying to work with legislators to improve insurance accessibility and defensible space,” says Hardie. “It’s a multipronged approach.”

“You can feel hopeless or distraught, but in recent years with fire, it’s brought the issue to everyone’s attention. And we need to follow through on addressing it for the rest of our life.”

His next venture, as advisor to startup Tahoe Forest Products, dovetails this need. The project will bring the first new sawmill in decades to the area with operations slated to begin in March, 2023. Fuel reduction is key to helping prevent future wildfires and TFP will serve as a cog in that process. The current inventory of logs, which will supply the mill for up to five months, were salvaged from Sierra-at-Tahoe following the Caldor Fire. Anyone who has worked with David Hardie is familiar with his financial acumen and wealth of experience. “He’s one of the more brilliant investment professionals I’ve met,” says Parasol CEO Claudia Andersen. But most people may not know that Hardie married his highschool sweetheart and also overcame dyslexia.

David and wife Jan met at age 14 during their freshman year of high school. “We met in a class with an incredibly boring teacher, so he flirted with me the entire time,” says Jan. The pair moved to Incline Village in 2004 and set an example of non-profit leadership followed by their children. Son Kirk serves on the Advisory Board of the Tahoe Environmental Research Center and daughter Cory is the Tahoe Fund Board Chair.

Hardie stepped down as Parasol Board Chair in 2020 but continues to serve in leadership roles. As Executive Chairman at Hallador Investment Advisors, Inc. the company he founded in 1974, he now focuses on strategy and tactics rather than day to day operations. With his work at Parasol, Hallador, and on multiple other for-profit boards one wonders, will he ever retire?

Jan chimes in, “Can I answer that? No. He loves work, he thrives on it. But we love to play, he has a good balance now.”

The pair ride their tandem bicycle 500 miles a year all over the world. They enjoy the social connection of the tandem bike so they can converse and tackle hills as a team. “You’re doing it together, we like the tandem better.” Memorable rides include the challenge of New Zealand’s rolling topography and pedaling from Memphis to New Orleans on the historical Natchez Trace Parkway. Next up is a circumnavigation of Tasmania.

Whether in the community or on the road, there is no slowing down the tandem of David and Jan Hardie.