Committee Structure

Membership on the Bond Oversight Committee is an excellent way that parents or Community members may participate in the facility development process of the District. The Menlo Park City School District Board of Education must appoint members to the Bond Oversight Committee. This Committee is legally required by Measure U, approved last June. The principal mission of the Committee is to represent the Community by reviewing and auditing the use of Bond funds.

The purposes of the Bond Oversight Committee are set forth by law as follows: review Bond expenditures and develop an annual report to the Board of Education and Community. Actual activities will include a review of copies of the District’s financial and performance audits, inspection of school facilities and grounds for which Bond proceeds will be expended, review of copies of deferred maintenance proposals and plans, review the District efforts to maximize Bond proceeds and review of other District records related to facility development.

The Committee shall consist of seven (7) members appointed by the Board of Education and must include:

• one representative from the business community,
• one person active in a senior citizens’ organization (open),
• one person active in a bona fide taxpayers’ organization (open),
• one person who is a parent or guardian of a child enrolled in the District, and
• one person who is both a parent or guardian and active in the Parent-Teacher-Organization or School Site Council.

A member must be a resident of the District and at least eighteen (18) years of age and may not be an employee, official of the District or a vendor, consultant or contractor for the District.

The term for membership is two years. A member cannot serve more than two terms. It is anticipated that meetings shall be quarterly. There is no compensation for the service.

The Menlo Park City School District is seeking potential candidates to fill open positions on the Bond Oversight Committee. In June 2006, voters within the Menlo Park City School District boundaries approved the Measure U Bond to modernize and provide new school facilities. The Bond was passed per Proposition 39, which requires the creation of a Bond Oversight Committee. This volunteer committee was created in September 2006 and is responsible for performing oversight activities such as review of bond expenditures and preparation of annual reports as set forth by Proposition 39. The Committee meets at minimum on a quarterly basis. The Committee is comprised of seven people from different segments of the Community.

The District is currently seeking to fill two vacant positions. One position is for a person active in a senior citizens’ organization and the other position is for a person active in a bona fide tax payers’ organization. The candidate must be at least 18 years old and a resident of the Menlo Park City School District.

For further information, please contact Ahmad Sheikholeslami at 650-321-7140. If you are interested in this position, please submit a Letter of Interest as well as background information about yourself and the organization in which you are active to: ahmad@mpcsd.org or to:

Bond Oversight Committee Meeting Calendar

Bond Oversight Committee Minutes (.pdf)

Minutes are posted after they are approved by the Committee at the next scheduled meeting.

At the October 12, 2006 Board meeting, the following Committee was appointed by the Menlo Park School Board:

There is an opening on the BOC for a Senior Representative and a Representative from a Tax Organization. If you are interested in serving on this committee, please contact Carol Metzler at the District Office.

Mark Box
Mark Box and his wife live in Menlo Park with their three children.  The oldest attends Oak Knoll School and their two younger children will enter Oak Knoll in the next two years.  He was co-chairman of the Committee To Build For The Future:  Yes on Measure U, which supported the passage of Measure U.  He currently serves on the board of the Menlo Park Atherton Education Foundation and on the board of the Menlo Atherton Cooperative Nursery School.  Professionally, Mark has served as an executive and board member of several software companies over the past 15 years.  He has an A.B. in Economics from Harvard University and a Masters of Business Administration from the Harvard Graduate School of Business.

Mark Gilles
Mark Gilles brings a broad range of experience including that of private equity investor, board member and operating executive. Mark was a founding Principal of Tangent Growth Fund L.P., a San Francisco based private equity fund. Mark began his career with Coopers and Lybrand, now Price Waterhouse-Coopers, in San Francisco. He then worked in high tech and commercial lending with major California Banks including Union Bank, Wells Fargo, and Bank of America prior to founding Tangent.

Mr. Gilles is a CPA, a member of the California Institute of CPA's and has long been active in non-profit organizations, serving for 10 years on the board of Hope Rehabilitation Services in Santa Clara. Hope is one of the largest service providers to the developmentally disabled in California . A lifelong resident of Menlo Park, Mark and his wife Mary are active in youth sports and civic affairs. Their son Paul is a sixth grader at Hillview and daughter Francesca is in the fourth grade at Oak Knoll."

Les Koonce
Les was born in Raleigh, North Carolina where he attended school and received his B.B.A from Campbell College.  Professionally, Les entered the insurance business and organized Koonce Financial Corporation in 1982. Presently, the firm provides insurance, investment and pension services to over 800 individual and corporate clients.
 
Les has served in several professional and community organizations. Included among those are the Big Brothers/Big Sisters of the Bay Area, Children's Home Society, Mid-Peninsula Boys and Girls Club, Scleroderma Research Foundation, El Camino Hospital Planned Giving Council, and the California Association of Life Underwriters (CALU).
 
He is currently a member of the Menlo Park Kiwanis Club and serves on the Board of Directors for the Menlo Park Chamber of Commerce, the Let Them Hear Foundation, and the Pacific Graduate School of Psychology (Palo Alto).
 
Les and his wife Suzanne, reside in Menlo Park, and enjoy golf, running marathons, and attending Menlo Park Presbyterian Church where Les is a Deacon.

Carey Pickus
Carey Pickus has two children at Oak Knoll Elementary School, where she has been an active parent volunteer for several years. She served as the PTO President for the 2005-2006 school year. She is a member of the District Wellness committee and a member of the District Long Term Strategic Planning Committee, and she has been a parent representive on the Social Studies Curriculum Committee. She has a law degree from Boalt Hall (UC Berkeley) and an B.S. from Northwestern University.

Mary Beth Suhr
Mary Beth and her husband Peter have been twenty year residents of Menlo Park and their children, Michael and Jamie, attend Menlo-Atherton High School and Hillview Middle School. Mary Beth has twenty years' experience working in financial services and investment management and hopes that her knowledge and understanding of project finance will provide a valuable input to the committee. She has B.S. from Santa Clara University and has earned the Chartered Financial Analyst designation. She is currently working as an investment consultant to a start-up company and is an active volunteer in the community.