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Board of Directors

Fran Wielin, President

Fran Wielin has lived in Rolling Hills Estates with her husband Sid since 1972. She was born in Southern California and has lived here all of her life, including attending Occidental College. She retired as a hospital Medical Technologist, became a volunteer with the Friends of the Library, and served nine years as a Trustee of the Palos Verdes Library District. She has volunteered with the Palos Verdes Land Conservancy and as President and Newsletter Editor of PVP American Association of University Women. She is President and Calendar Editor for the Palos Verdes Peninsula Coordinating Council.

Judy Bayer, Vice-Chair

Judy Bayer has resided in Rolling Hills Estates for over fifty years. She began her career as director of the Palos Verdes Hills Cooperative Nursery School. In 1983, she graduated from Southwestern University School of Law and was employed as a Principal Deputy County Counsel for Los Angeles County. Assigned to the Dependency Division, she served on The Interagency Council on Child Abuse and Neglect. She has been a member of the Parks and Activities and Planning Commissions for the City of Rolling Hills Estates and on the City's Equestrian and Environmental Committees. She has served on the H.E.L.P. Board of Directors and as Academic Vice President of Omnilore, a peer teaching/learning organization affiliated with Cal State Dominguez Hills. Currently she is the Chair of the Rollingwood Homeowners Association and a member of the Rolling Hills Estates General Plan Action Committee.

Carolynn Petru, Secretary

Carolynn Petru has lived and worked on the Palos Verdes Peninsula nearly continuously since 1966. A graduate of Palos Verdes High School, she has a Bachelor’s degree in Environmental Planning from UC Davis and a Master’s degree in Urban Planning from UCLA. She recently retired from the City of Rancho Palos Verdes, where she spent 29 years serving the community. For most of her career, she was the Deputy City Manager, working on special projects for the City Council and supervising several functional areas at City Hall including public safety, emergency preparedness, community outreach, human resources and information/technology. Other positions she held at one time or another included Director of Planning, City Clerk, Director of Recreation & Parks, and just prior to her retirement, Acting City Manager. She lives in Rancho Palos Verdes with her husband and best friend since high school, Andy Petru.

Dennis McLean, Chief Financial Officer

Dennis McLean was born in Detroit, Michigan and lived most of his early life in the Detroit area. Dennis was a partner of a regional CPA firm based in suburban Detroit where he served agribusinesses, governmental agencies, not-for-profit agencies and even an airline. Dennis moved to California from Michigan with his son Aaron in 1996 when he began serving the City of Rancho Palos Verdes as its Finance Director until early 2016. Upon retiring from government service, Dennis founded McLean & Associates, Certified Public Accountants. Dennis previously served as a part-time Adjunct Faculty Professor at CSU Dominguez Hills, teaching advanced accounting and taxation. He is a member of AICPA Tax Section, AICPA Not- For-Profit Section of the AICPA, the California Society of Municipal Finance Officers and CalCPA’s. Dennis is a member of the Palos Verdes Peninsula Chamber of Commerce serving members of the community as a practicing CPA and assisting the Young Entrepreneur’s program. A graceful, happy, fulfilling retirement with his wife Laurie is on his “bucket-list”. Dennis is an avid cyclist, hiker, enjoys film, music and sports.

Maria Ashla, Director

Maria Ashla moved to the Peninsula in 1994 to be near her children and grandchildren. She had recently retired from Children's Hospital Los Angeles where she held the position of Clinical Laboratories Administrative Director. Maria has a bachelor's degree in Biology from Immaculate Heart College and two Master's Degrees in Educations and Health Care Management. Upon arriving in the Peninsula, she became active in the Palos Verdes branch of AAUW and assumed several leadership positions including two terms as Chair. In 2014 Sherry May, the Village Founder, introduced the Village Concept as a potential AAUW project and Maria joined the effort. She has been involved in the PVP Village ever since and currently works closely with the Executive Director in a variety of administrative tasks. Maria is a widow but considers herself fortunate to have her children, grandchildren and greatgrandchildren close by as well as the Village community.

Helen Dennis, Director

Helen Dennis is a nationally recognized leader on issues of aging, employment and retirement. She has been the recipient of numerous awards for her teaching at the Davis School at USC’s Andrus Gerontology Center and for her contributions to the field of aging, the community and literary arts. As editor and author and columnist, she is a frequent speaker and weekly columnist on Successful Aging for the Los Angeles Newspaper Group reaching 1.3 million readers and has assisted over 10,000 employees to prepare for the non-financial aspects of their retirement.In her volunteer life, Helen has served as president of five nonprofit organizations and continues to serve on several boards. Fully engaged in the field of aging, she was a delegate to the 2005 White House Conference on Aging and has extensive experience with the media.

Britt Vanden Eykel-Huff, Ph.D., Director

Britt Huff is the Executive Director of H.E.L.P. (Healthcare and Elder Law Programs Corporation) and a member of the City Council of Rolling Hills Estates on the Palos Verdes Peninsula. She is active in the South Bay community, including local government and schools, as well as other non-profit organizations. Her service includes the L.A. BioMed Foundation Board, the Peninsula Education Foundation Board, the Peninsula Chapter of National Charity League, and the South Bay Estate Planning Council. She also served as President of the Palos Verdes Peninsula Council of PTA’s. She is a member of the Torrance and Palos Verdes Chambers of Commerce, and served on the Planning Commission of the City of Rolling Hills Estates for five years; and as Chair in 2012. She also has many years of government management experience in Washington, D.C., Boston, and Los Angeles, as well as small business marketing, public relations and nonprofit management and consulting.

Terry McGovern, Director

Terry was born and raised in Chicago, Illinois and has resided in Rancho Palos Verdes since 1997. He has had a 35-year career in advertising sales with Verizon, AT&T and the Los Angeles Times. After his own experience seeking quality care for his parents, Terry recognized the need for trusted care in the local community and founded A Peace of Mind Home Care Solutions in 2016, a very successful and well-regarded local home care agency. For several years, Terry has enjoyed being a volunteer driver for the Village.

Terry lives with his three children Josue, Ciara and Ava and enjoys attending their soccer games, track meets and bike rides at the beach.

Harriet Servis, Director

Harriet began started her career as an elementary school teacher. She and her husband Ken raised their three children in the Rolling Hills Estates home where they currently reside. She had many volunteer roles during that time including President of the Board of Directors of the Palos Verdes Hills Cooperative Nursery School and President of Friends of the Peninsula Symphony Association. She then began a career at USC where she was President of the USC Staff Retirement Association along with Program Chair of the USC Emeriti Center Board. From the beginning of PVP Village, Harriet has been an active member and volunteer, including organizing the very well received Guided Autobiography Class.

Monique Sugimoto, Director

Monique Leahy Sugimoto grew up mostly in El Paso Texas and lives in Palos Verdes Estates with her husband Haru. She studied at the University of Texas at Austin. After teaching French in Texas and English in Japan, she was involved with research and software development in natural language. She continued graduate school at UCLA. Since 2012 she has been the archivist and Local History librarian with the Palos Verdes Library District. She learned about PVP Village at the initial information meeting that was held at the Library and has been following the progress ever since.

Marianne Propst, Executive Director

Marianne Propst is no stranger to the Village. She has been serving as one of the Village volunteers in addition to working as a Referral Specialist for Coast To Coast Senior, consulting with seniors and their families on assisted living options. She also acted as an Enrichment Leader for Belmont Village in Rancho Palos Verdes.Her prior professional experience includes working as the Director of Marketing Communications for Secure Horizons, a Medicare HMO.

A resident of Palos Verdes Estates, Marianne has been deeply involved in the Peninsula community for many years, having served as a board member for the Special Children's League, American Youth Soccer - Region 10, and the Peninsula Committee for the LA Philharmonic. She also volunteered for Palos Verdes Peninsula High School and Cornerstone Elementary School.

Her educational background includes a B.A. in Health Studies from the University of California, Santa Barbara, and a M.S. in Public Health with an emphasis in planning and policy, from the University of California, Los Angeles.

She is married with two adult sons and enjoys reading, hiking, traveling and is always looking to learn something new.

Pat Sneller, Administrative Coordinator

Pat Sneller began volunteering for the Village in 2016 and became its Administrative Coordinator in April, 2018. She is a native of Los Angeles and has lived in California her entire life, except for 8 years in the Dallas area. She has a B.S. in Business Administration from Cal State Long Beach, which she pursued after the youngest of her 3 children started school in 1981. Her professional career has been spent in a variety of fields, always in a customer service capacity. Prior to joining the Village staff, she worked with 2 different referral agencies, assisting families who were searching for long-term residential care facilities for their loved ones. She loves being a part of the Village and getting to know about the fascinating lives that our members and volunteers have enjoyed.

In Memorium:
Sherry May, Ph.D., Founder and Director

Sherry May was a long time resident in Palos Verdes and had deep professional and volunteer ties to southern California. Dr. May chaired the Palos Verdes Peninsula branch of the American Association of University Women in 2012-2014 and, among other awards, received the Helen Thomas Award from the YWCA of Greater Los Angeles for her volunteer work. May taught in the Religious Studies Department at California State University Northridge for many years before going to USC. At USC she had responsibilities for alumni relations, was Dean of the College of Continuing Education and Vice Provost, Continuing Studies. After retiring she consulted with non-profit and educational institutions in areas of policy development and project implementation. Clients included California State University Northridge/Partnerships Empowering Youth To Serve, University of Southern California's Center for Religion and Civic Culture, YWCA of Greater Los Angeles, Adolescent Pregnancy Child-Watch, Girls Inc, First Congregational Church of Los Angeles, and The Children's Defense Fund.