| News - Wednesday, August 15, 2007
Election 2007: Uncontested election for Woodside council seats?
by Andrea Gemmet
Unless a brave soul with a well-developed sense of civic duty steps forward this week, it appears Woodside may have an uncontested Town Council election in November.
There are four candidates for the four seats up for election on the seven-member council, but there's still time for a challenger to step forward in two of the races, thanks to the extended candidate deadline of Aug. 15.
Incumbents Ron Romines in District 1 and Sue Boynton in District 3 are running for re-election, and both have returned their nomination papers and had them verified, said Woodside Town Clerk Janet Koelsch. No challengers have stepped forward to run for either of those seats, and those seats are now closed to all but write-in candidates.
The two other incumbents, Paul Goeld in District 5 and Pete Sinclair in District 7, are not running for election, triggering a five-day extension in the candidate filing period.
District 5
Dave Burow says he's ready to represent his Woodside Hills neighborhood on the Woodside Town Council.
As of the Almanac's press time on Monday, Mr. Burow, 54, was the only declared candidate for the council's District 5 seat.
Mr. Burow said that Councilman Goeld and several other people active in the Woodside community encouraged him to run. He was one of several prospective candidates sounded out by Mr. Goeld, he said. "I was the only one ready to step and (run) at this time," Mr. Burow said.
He is the CEO of Catalytic Inc., a Palo Alto-based company that makes signal processing design tools. Before joining Catalytic in January 2006, he was executive chairman of Arithmatica, an intellectual property and electronic design automation firm.
He holds a bachelor's degree in engineering from Purdue University and a master's degree in business administration from the University of Chicago.
Mr. Burow has been a Woodside resident since 1984, and he's serving his second year on the Woodside Hills Homeowners Association Architectural Review Board, he said. He and his wife recently lived in Emerald Hills for about a year while their home was being remodeled, but have since returned to Woodside Hills, he said.
He said he might be willing to step aside if another good candidate chooses to run for the council seat, but so far, no one has.
"I mostly just want to make sure that (Woodside Hills) is represented by someone with good sense," he said.
District 7
Old La Honda Road resident Peter Mason, 57, grew up in the Bay Area and lived in Palo Alto before moving to Woodside five and a half years ago. He's been a member of the Woodside Architectural and Site Review Board since February 2004, and is currently its chair. He filed his candidate papers on Aug. 10, said Ms. Koelsch.
"I enjoy serving the town and trying to maintain what we have as a rural environment," Mr. Mason said.
He is a vice president at the newly renamed architectural firm HKS/Hill Glazier Studio, specializing in high-end hotels and resorts. The firm's projects include the Ritz-Carlton at Half Moon Bay and the Four Seasons Hotel in East Palo Alto.
He received his bachelor's degree in architecture from Cal Poly and has worked as a licensed architect since the mid-1970s, Mr. Mason said.
In Woodside, he's worked on a few small residential building projects, including his own property and those of a few friends, but he's been careful to steer clear of any conflicts of interest while on the ASRB, Mr. Mason said. "I'm not trying to make money out of it," he said.
Besides serving on the ASRB, he helped the Folger Stable committee find an architect for its historic restoration project, Mr. Mason said.
He has one child and is married to Virginia Dare, the chair of the Woodside Open Space Committee.
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