Waring never practiced law in the traditional sense – law school, bar exam, then attorney; then again, it was never his goal. He pursued his legal education to establish a foundation for a greater vision.

“I’m a Charleston native,” said Waring. “I grew up in a really small town outside of John’s Island called Red Top. So, I have a different view and vision of what a community is. We all grew up together. We all shared good times together. We shared our bad times. I started to see some things in smaller communities as I matured and became a part of the workforce, I saw some of the inequities and I wanted to put myself in a place where I could do something for the people in my community — to be a voice … I thought that a non-traditional course of education could get me to a point or I could be that voice where I could be an advocate for the people.”

Along his professional journey, Waring started hearing a phrase that intrigued him: Economic development.

“I boil it down to access — access to healthcare, access to education, access to affordable housing, access to a job that pays a living wage,” he said. “When I looked back at the life of my mother. She’s 81 years old and lives in Red Top. When she was 12 years old her mother became ill with cancer and, because of a lack of access, my mother had to stop school in the seventh grade to become a caretaker for her mother. Life went on.

“She never did get the opportunity to go back to school. She started a family and she became a single mother of five children and took care of us with the seventh grade education.”