Garry is a qualified town planner. He has worked in local government in various planning and management roles on the NSW Central Coast. He has been a director and part-owner of a multi-disciplinary firm of architects, planners, landscape architects and ecologists. He has been the sole practitioner of his planning consultancy. He was a member of the Hunter Wine Country Tourism Board. Since July 2012, he has researched the regulation of events. He has lectured in tourism, events, and business at the University of Newcastle. Garry is a founding member of the Australian Regional Events, created as a common national voice to represent events across regional Australia during the COVID-19 Pandemic. In 2025, he was awarded a Doctor of Philosophy in Tourism and Leisure, which examined the complexities, inconsistencies and contradictions in the way individual decision-makers in local government regulate events in the New South Wales (NSW) Hunter Region.