In the 15+ years of Santa Cruz Works’ existence, we have had many people volunteer to help grow our community organization. And as the saying goes, it takes a village to raise a child as well as an organization.

In late 2008, while setting up for our monthly event at Cruzio, one person jumped up to help us dial in the sound for the spotlight band: Cruz Control. It became immediately apparent that he had experience and the “chops” for quality sound. I am referring to Tom Padula. He saw the issue, went outside to his car, and returned with a professional mixing board, set it up, and mixed the sound. Every month thereafter for 14 years, we depended on Tom to apply his wisdom and magic for every new audio issue that appeared. His wife Autumn Cardone joined him, assisting with video and setup.

Tom’s career experience is solid. He worked at Apple Computer as lead audio processing engineer for Soundtrack Pro, FinalCut Pro, and as a member of the iPad development team. He applied his knowledge to help our startup community with everything from coding for Mac apps to hackathons. He is a pillar of support for our community.

Tom and Autumn are moving on to new opportunities. We will greatly miss their “ears”, experience, wisdom, generous support, and smiling faces. We wish them the very best in their next venture.