LWVC Board
President - Janis R. Hirohama, LWV Beach Cities
Janis was elected President of the LWVC in 2007, becoming the first woman of color to head the state League. She is a member of the LWV Beach Cities and has been a League member since 1994. Janis has held leadership positions on the local, state, and national levels of the organization. From 2000 to 2004 she served on the Board of Directors of the LWV United States—two years as a board member and two years as First Vice President. She served on the LWVC board as Secretary from 1998-2000. For the LWVC she also coordinated the Building the Future membership incentive program and served on the Diversity Task Force. Janis is a past president of the LWV Beach Cities (1997-1998), where she also served as Voter Service Director, Speakers Bureau Coordinator, and Outreach Director. She has been a facilitator and speaker at diversity
workshops at the local, state, ILO, and national levels of League.
Janis has been a member of the EdSource Board of Directors since 2007. She also serves on the Steering Committee for the California Judicial Council’s Commission on Impartial Courts. She has appeared as a speaker or panelist at a variety of public policy forums and events, including the Pat Brown Institute’s California Policy Issues Conference and the Public Policy Institute of California’s “Crisis in Confidence” forum.
An attorney, Janis has an A.B. in history from Washington University in St. Louis and a J.D. from the New York University School of Law. Her areas of professional expertise include voting rights, criminal law, and fairness education. She lives in Manhattan Beach with her husband, Jim Pollard, who is also a League member. In her spare time, Janis enjoys reading, travel, and genealogy.
She can be reached by emailing president (at) lwvc.org.
First Vice President - Trudy Jarratt, LWV San Luis Obispo County
Trudy Jarratt has been a member of League since 1996. She has served as the LWVC Vice President since July 2007 and is a member of the Finance, Executive, Personnel and
Nominating committees. She also manages Leadership Council and the Biennial Convention for LWVC. Trudy is a past president of the LWV San Luis Obispo County and has managed the Development, Communications and Special Projects portfolios including a successful membership drive. She co-produces the League television shows “SLO Democracy” and “Public Issues”. Trudy served as Chair of the LWVUS Nominating Committee 2004-2006.
Trudy has served her community over the years as Secretary of the Arroyo Grande Community Hospital Board and Chair of the Arroyo Grande Hospital Foundation Board; member of The South County Health Care Alliance; Co-President/Incorporator of SLO County Public Access Television Producers, Inc.; Vice-Chair Central Coast Women’s Political Committee; Co-Founder SLO County Clean Campaign Coalition; President Quota International Five Cities; Marketing Director, Clark Center Foundation; Development Chair, Clark Center Performing Arts Association.
Trudy retired early from Hughes Electronics in Southern California after 22 years of employment where she held the position of Manager of Administration and Data Management. Upon moving to the Central Coast with her husband, she began a new profession as a Real Estate Broker and was appointed to the San Luis Obispo County Assessment Appeals Board 2003-2005. In 2000 Trudy created TJ Consulting, which specialized in marketing strategies and public speaking coaching. Trudy is currently
retired.
She can be reached by emailing vicepresident (at) lwvc.org.
Second Vice President - Xandra Kayden, LWV Los Angeles
Xandra Kayden taught urban politics at UCLA and has been a senior fellow at the School of Public Affairs since 1998. Most recently she served as executive director of a commission to memorialize Senator Robert F. Kennedy at the schools being built at the site of the Ambassador Hotel where he was assassinated. She is continuing as a member of the design team for a UCLA pilot school to open at the site, and on the advisory committee on social justice to the complex.
She joined the League in Los Angeles in 1990 to chair a study of charter reform, served as president of the city League for two terms in the late ‘90s, and served three terms on the national board, chairing the update on presidential selection, and coordinating the program on civil liberty and security issues. She has been an MTA since 2000, and was national board liaison to eight states and Hong Kong.
She did undergraduate and graduate work at Columbia University in American history, holds a Ph.D. in political science from Harvard, and did post-doctoral work at Stanford on organizational behavior. She participated in and studied American political institutions for many years at all levels of government, and was the founding director of the Women's Action Program in the Department of Health, Education and Welfare—the first government program to respond to the women's movement of the 1960s and '70s. She
has authored a number of books and contributed to journals and magazines.
She was a regular contributor to The Los Angeles Times on urban issues for over a decade and does consulting on campaign finance, ethics, urban, and ethnic issues.
She can be reached by emailing vpadvocacy (at) lwvc.org.
Secretary - Caroline deLlamas, LWV East San Gabriel Valley
Caroline has been a League Member since 1968 and has held most portfolios at the Local League level, including that of President, and currently serves on the board of the East San Gabriel Valley League.
At the state level, she now serves as the Southern Coordinator for the LWVC Management Training Advisor Program (MTAs) and is the Management Training Advisor for three Local Leagues. During this past year, she was one of the state coordinators for the LWVUS Membership Recruitment Initiative Program (MRI, or as we call it in California, MGIK!) responsible for five Local League participants.
A retired Professional City Clerk/Treasurer, she has a consulting business to provide Interim Municipal Clerk Services to California cities. She is a past president of the City Clerks Association of California and holds membership in various professional organizations, including the National Association of Parliamentarians and Soroptimist International.
Caroline resides in Covina with her husband Lloyd deLlamas. They have two adult daughters.
She can be reached by emailing secretary (at) lwvc.org.
Treasurer - Barbara Boles, LWV Central San Mateo County
Barbara joined the League in Loveland, Colorado in 1969, shortly after relocating there with her young family. She worked on many study committees and first served on the
local board as voter service director and then as program vice-president. Her most significant accomplishment in Loveland was originating “The Old Fashioned Political
Rally”, a candidate and ballot issues forum, which attracted over 1,000 citizens in 1972 and has continued to be held for every general election since then.
After moving to the Bay Area in 1998, Barbara first hooked up with the Central San Mateo County League and served as its treasurer for one year. She is now a member of the South San Mateo County League and has served as secretary, president and Ed Fund chairman. Barbara has been a member of the LWVC budget committee for the past three years. Barbara has worked in the accounting and financial management profession for the past 30 years. She currently is the CFO of CodoniX, an electronic medical record software company.
She can be reached by emailing treasurer (at) lwvc.org.
Advocacy/Program Director - Charolette Fox, LWV State Member
Charolette Fox is the current Natural Resources Director for the League of Women Voters of California and has served on both the program committee and the legislation committee. Since its inception she has been the LWVC representative to Green California, a collaboration of 65 nonprofit organizations and state agencies actively engaged in environmental legislation.
She is a past president of the LWV North San Diego County and also of the LWV Southwest Riverside County. In 2008 she was honored as Woman of the Year by the Riverside County Board of Supervisors. Her civic activities include appointments to the Temecula Community Services Commission and the Riverside County Historical Commission, and she holds a current certificate of completion for AB 1234, California Ethics Training. She serves on-call in an advisory capacity to several local and regional groups working on land use and clean and green issues, and is the public member elected to the board of directors for the Water Education Foundation.
Charolette is a member of the Riverside County Court-Community Committee, a group under the auspices of the Riverside County Superior Court concerned about juvenile justice, selection and appointment of state judges, judicial independence, and the security of courts, jurors, defendants and plaintiffs. She is a member of California Women Lead (formerly known as California Elected Women), and a graduate and member of CORO of Southern California.
Charolette attended San Diego State University, with a double major in Art and Business. A mother and grandmother, her interests include promoting school gardens, ushering for community theatre performances, and judging the National History Day Contest for Riverside County.
She can be reached by emailing natural_resources (at) lwvc.org.
Advocacy/Program Director - Julie Rajan, LWV Palos Verdes Peninsula
Julie Rajan has served as the Social Policy Director since March 2006, and during the past year has primarily focused her work on former Sheila Kuehl’s health care bill, SB 840, and education related legislation. The Hewlett Foundation’s renewal grant of the School Finance Exploratory Partnership has been completed and the final report submitted to the foundation. The current federal and state budget crises have brought into greater focus the need for greater vigilance on education, health care and social services issues, and Julie has been working with the Social Policy off-board consultants to ensure services are not undermined.
In her professional life, Julie was the Executive Director of the California Clean Money Campaign, and was instrumental in placing Assembly member Loni Hancock’s California Fair Elections Act (AB 583), onto the June 2010 ballot. She views the successful passage of the June 2010 initiative as the reform that will allow other reforms, particularly in the social policy area.
Julie first joined the League as the executive director of LWV Los Angeles in 2001. She holds a degree in Business from the University of Neuchatel, Switzerland, and has worked in the nonprofit arena in several countries. Julie lives in Palos Verdes with her husband, while her daughter resides in Washington, D.C., and her son will soon move to Chicago to further his graduate studies. In her precious spare time, she attempts to keep her garden under control and go to the theatre and art museums as much as
possible.
She can be reached by emailing socialpolicy (at) lwvc.org.
Advocacy/Program Director - Suzanne Stassevitch, LWV San Francisco
Born in New York City and raised in St. Louis, Suzanne moved to San Francisco in 1976 to pursue her lifelong passion for the performing arts after earning a B.A. in Theater Arts at the University of Missouri, Kansas City and graduate work at the University of Oregon and SFSU (M.A. 1978).
As a member of IATSE, Theatrical Wardrobe Union Local 784, Suzanne built a career in the Costume and Wardrobe Departments in Bay Area Broadway Theatres, Ballet Companies, and San Francisco Opera. As a member of a Local 784 her activities included working as a Union Steward, contract negotiations, Health and Welfare Administrator Local 784 1982-1992, developing an apprentice program and sitting on the Apprentice Board, 1985-1993. Suzanne worked for 15 years at San Francisco Opera as a Wardrobe Department Head and a traveling Costume Supervisor. During this time she was an active volunteer at her son’s school and had the privilege of working as a volunteer at the Textile Conservation Labs at the Fine Arts Museum San Francisco.
In 2001 Suzanne decided to redirect her activities toward community interests and to study and develop her own work in textiles arts.
Community interests have included training as an Adult Literacy tutor in 2000 and working with for Project Read, an Adult Literacy Project in San Francisco, following her mother’s path into the LWV and taking a lead in the LWVSF Speaker’s Bureau, represent the League on the City Ballot Simplification Committee and working on small community theatrical events. As vice president of voter service programs for LWVSF since 2004, Suzanne and her team expanded content and programs available on the League’s Web site, increased the distribution of Pro Con materials city-wide in three languages, and coordinated a vote-by-mail promotion in San Francisco.
She can be reached by emailing sstassevitch (at) lwvc.org.
Director - Thea Brodkin, LWV Santa Monica
Thea Brodkin has been a League member for over forty years in New Jersey, Michigan, Arizona as well as California, serving on the Board of Directors in Los Angeles, Orange Coast, and Santa Monica Leagues. Thea has held many positions with local Leagues, but voter service is her passion.
Moving to California in 1973, Thea first encountered local politics as the League appointee on Judge Egly’s School Desegregation Monitoring Committee and as Education Consultant for LWV Los Angeles. For over ten years, she also served as a high school speaker for Planned Parenthood. Thea then concentrated on voter service activities, working on candidate forums, registration drives, ballot measure presentations, researching local ballot measures, and publishing voter guides. For many years, Thea was the LWVC League Consultant on Candidate Debates before being appointed State Voting Rights Consultant.
A graduate of Smith College majoring in government and the USC School of Public Administration with an emphasis on local government, Thea has always been interested in elections and the public’s access to government. On becoming a widow six years ago, Thea went back to work for the L.A. County Registrar of Voters as a public outreach assistant. She provides answers to voter’s questions before an election, and handles investigations of and response to complaints after the election. Between elections, The
belongs to two book groups, plays tennis and loves babysitting for her California grandson. She saves frequent flier miles to see the other two in Texas.
She can be reached by emailing tbrodkin (at) lwvc.org.
Director - Linda R. Davis, LWV Cupertino-Sunnyvale
Linda R. Davis turned to the League of Women Voters for help in 1986 when she was a clueless voter who had just moved to California and was facing initiatives for the first
time. Linda found the League’s candidate forums and printed guide to candidates and measures to be so helpful that she promptly jumped into active involvement in the
Cupertino-Sunnyvale League. For about five years, Linda dedicated herself 100 percent to the League. During that time, her local League doubled in membership and built a solid reserve fund, as well as gained considerable visibility in the community.
Linda has been involved with every aspect of local League work over the years. Her more visible roles include leading League study committees, being an advocacy speaker on good government issues, and managing televised congressional debates (for a rare competitive race). Her less visible roles include mentoring/training League members, creating/maintaining databases, and instituting/overseeing sound financial practices. In recent years, she has focused on building a pro/con team to deliver high-quality presentations on ballot measures.
Linda served as the LWVC League budget chair from 1999 to 2003. She has also been involved with the Easy Voter Guide project since 2000, serving as project manager for the 2002 election cycle, co-managing the project in 2003, and contributing to content development since then.
Linda is married to Serge Rudaz, holds degrees in physics, and is a student of aikido.
She can be reached by emailing ldavis (at) lwvc.org.
Membership Services Director - Bonnie Hamlin, LWV Oakland
Bonnie joined the League as a nationally recruited member in response to the League’s sponsorship of the 1980 Presidential debates. She became active locally when she got to know an Oakland League member who was serving on the LWVUS Arms Control study committee in 1982. She has served LWV Oakland as a Unit Chair, Treasurer, VOTER Newsletter Editor, Program Vice President, Administrative Vice President, President, and Chair of the Nominating and Membership Committees. In 2006-07 she was the Membership Recruitment Initiative Coordinator for LWV Oakland.
She has been Alameda County Coordinator, Northern California Liaison, and a member of the Steering Committee of LWVC Ed Fund’s Smart Voter project, and serves as Management Training Advisor for the Diablo Valley, Eden Area, Piedmont, and West Contra Costa County Leagues of Women Voters.
As Member Services Director for LWVC Bonnie coordinates California Leagues’ participation in LWVUS’s Membership Recruitment Initiative and, working with Crownie Billik and Caroline de Llamas, coordinates the Management Training Advisor program for LWVC.
Bonnie and her husband are proud grandparents of a little boy, are active members of Montclair Presbyterian Church, where Bonnie sings in the choir, and enjoy tracing the genealogies of our families.
She can be reached by emailing members (at) lwvc.org.
Communications Director - Jennifer Waggoner, LWV San Francisco
Jenny joined the LWVC board in 2007 as Communications Director. She serves on the Executive, Finance, and Budget Committees and contributes to many others. She first joined the League in San Francisco in 2001 and has served in many roles, including President, Vice President, and Budget Chair. She strongly believes in the League’s core values, is grateful for the opportunities the League offers, and feels the greatest value for her has been the mentors she has found and their encouragement to mentor
others through the League.
Jennifer has worked for many years as a consultant, typically in operations, finance and communications for nonprofits and small businesses. She holds a degree in Government from Claremont McKenna College and a Diploma in Public Policy from the University of Edinburgh. She enjoys the flexibility and variety of her work, allowing her to dedicate significant time to the League and to be able to travel (she often works remotely from Seattle or Lake Tahoe and hopes to spend several months in Rome, Italy in 2010). She lives in central San Francisco with her domestic partner, David LaMacchia.
She can be reached by emailing communications (at) lwvc.org.