Avenidas Board of Directors

Barbara Krimsky Binder

Chair

Barbara Krimsky Binder is a Certified Financial Planner practitioner and the founder of BKB Financial Advisors, a fee-only investment advisory firm. Barbara’s firm provides customized and objective financial planning services, and her clientele includes many older adults. Barbara has presented at both Avenidas’ Financial and Housing Conferences and has been a preferred provider of the Avenidas Village since its inception in 2007. An active and thoughtful long-distance provider of support and frequent visitor to both her mother and her father-in-law, Barbara is very engaged with the mission of Avenidas.

Hank Massey

Vice Chair

Dexter Dawes

Treasurer

In his professional life, whether as investment banker, managing general partner of a growth fund, or co-founder of a software firm, Dexter Dawes earned the reputation as an astute and successful businessman, CEO and negotiator. Dexter took his talents and experience serving on 16 corporate boards and applied them on behalf of many non-profits, helping them make sound decisions pertaining to financial strength. A few examples are his active involvement in the investment issues and the development of financial guidelines at Channing House, serving on the Bond Oversight Committee while a trustee of Foothill/De Anza College, and helping the Utilities Commission, where he served for 11 years. Other non-profit boards Dexter served on included Palo Alto-Los Altos AYSO, president of Paly Sports Boosters and board president of the Philharmonic Baroque Orchestra and Chorale. Dexter lives with his wife in Palo Alto.

Rick Stern

Secretary

Rick Stern is recently retired from Stern Mortgage Company, a Palo Alto-based company that he founded about 35 years ago. His educational background includes a B.S. in Marketing from Bradley University and a degree in Hotel, Motel, and Restaurant Management from the University of Nevada-Las Vegas. In 2010, Rick and Stern Mortgage received the “Outstanding Business” Tall Tree Award by the Palo Alto Chamber of Commerce in honor of the company’s commitment to a “community-minded business ethic that serves to enhance the richness of Palo Alto.” Over the years, Rick has contributed many hours of volunteer work to local organizations including the Kiwanis, YMCA and Chamber of Commerce. He has vast experience in the areas of business management and fund development.

Loren Brown

Director at Large

Loren Brown is a 37-year construction industry veteran and President of Vance Brown, Inc. Loren is serving his fourth term on the Avenidas Board and is on the Facilities Task Force and Investment Committees. He has served on the board of several non-profit organizations including the East Palo Alto Senior Center, Palo Alto Community Fund, Castilleja School and Addison Elementary School PTA. Loren currently serves on the boards of Community Skating, Inc., Reaching and Inspiring Success through Education (RISE) and as well as the Stanford Construction Institute’s Advisory Committee.

Jeremy Burns

Director at Large

Jeremy Burns is the co-founder of Burns Loew, a professional law corporation in Mountain View. Prior to the launch of the firm in 2011, he worked for several well-known local law firms including Carr, McClellan, Quinn Emanuel, and KPMG. He is a graduate of UC Berkeley School of Law. Since starting his firm, Jeremy has successfully handled many diverse legal cases, including estate and trust litigation, personal injury, contract disputes involving technology companies, and employment law matters. Outside of work, he is the primary family caregiver for his 85-year-old father, who resides at PA Commons and is an active member of Avenidas. Jeremy also assists his aunt (a Palo Alto resident) in caring for his 93-year-old maternal grandmother in Los Altos. All of this on top of being a devoted husband to his wife and the father to two young active children at home.

Hui (Debra) Cen

Director at Large

Hui (Debra) Cen is a co-founder and President of WizChinese, a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization devoted to helping Chinese immigrants to integrate into local communities. She is also the founder and President of Impact GoGo, a social enterprise startup providing a simple, easy and fun social media platform for various types of charity giving. She came to the US from China 31 years ago to pursue her doctorate study and devoted her first 12 years in US to biomedical research. In 1998, Debra became an entrepreneur and since co-founded several biomedical research reagent companies. Among them, SABiosciences became successful and was acquired by Qiagen.

Debra retired from her biotech career in 2012 and reinvented herself to become a social entrepreneur. In 2013, she co-founded Palo Alto Chinese Parents’ Club and later a non-profit organization, WizChinese. Since then, she has been tirelessly working on connecting Chinese immigrants with the greater communities and facilitates integration of Chinese immigrants into US society. In 2017, she founded Impact GoGo and worked with a team of co-founders to create a social media app that will make charity giving a daily fun experience. The company is currently in stealth mode and the app is expected to be released in the summer 2018.

Michael Couch

Director at Large

Mike Couch is active in the Channing House Board of Trustees, Community School of Music and Arts, and Advisory Council for the University of Oregon’s College of Arts and Science. He was honored as Los Altos Hill Volunteer or the Year 1995.

Chris Douvos

Director at Large

Chris Douvos, Venture Investment Associates (VIA) Managing Director, joined VIA in 2011 as head of the Firm’s Palo Alto office. As a General Partner and investment committee member, his activities span all of VIA’s investing and client outreach efforts. He represents VIA on nine advisory boards. Prior to joining VIA, he spent seven years co-heading the private equity program at The Investment Fund For Foundations (TIFF). In this role, he was responsible for over $1 billion in capital commitments and represented TIFF on over a dozen VC and LBO partnership advisory boards. Prior to joining TIFF, Chris worked on Princeton University’s endowment team, where his duties included selection and evaluation of external managers, risk analysis, and asset allocation modeling. Previously, he was a strategy consultant at Monitor Company working with clients in various industries and as an analyst for Monitor’s principal investing activities.

Chris authors a blog, www.SuperLP.com, which explores various investment topics and is a regular contributor to industry discourse as a conference speaker and graduate school lecturer. Chris earned his B.A. with Distinction from Yale College in 1994 and an M.B.A. from Yale School of Management in 2001. He was awarded the CFA Charter in 2004. He currently sits on the investment committee of Castilleja School.

Bill Friedman

Director at Large

Bill Friedman was trained as a lawyer, spent some time with the SEC, then as General Counsel to ROLM Corporation before going into management running Western U.S. operations for five years. Bill has served on the board of Castilleja School for 15 years, chairing the Development Committee for 12 years and the Trustee and Governance Committee for two years. He is also on the board of the International School of the Peninsula and on the board of Stanbridge Academy. He served two terms on the Avenidas board from 2011 to 2017, and after one year off the board, he is now returning to serve a third term.

Cindy Hofen

Director at Large

Cindy Hofen is the owner/manager of Managing Moves and More, which is a service catering to seniors wanting to age in place and to moving seniors from their homes to more appropriate living quarters. She volunteered to be on the Village Vendor Team and is always available to assist and support. Cindy is an excellent speaker, participating most recently in the Avenidas Boomer University. She has participated in several of the Avenidas’ Capital Campaigns. She recently became a Certified Aging in Place Specialist.

Larry Klein

Director at Large

Larry Klein is currently an attorney with Thoits Law. He joined the firm in 2010 as Senior Counsel after practicing as a named shareholder with the Palo Alto firm of Ritchey Fisher Whitman & Klein from 1967 to 2005 when his firm merged with the national law firm of Dorsey & Whitney LLP. He was of counsel to Dorsey from 2005 to 2009. A graduate of Cornell University (B.A. Economics) and Harvard Law School (J.D., Magna Cum Laude), Larry’s early legal career focused on taxation and then expanded to handling corporate, estate planning, and trust administration matters. He is actively involved in the local community on many levels, having served as a Palo Alto City Council Member from 1981-1989 and then again from 2005 to 2015, including a stint as Mayor of Palo Alto from 1984 to 1989. He is also a former board officer and board chair of Avenidas.

Julie Yu Lau

Director at Large

Julie Yu Lau has been marketing real estate in California associated with Coldwell Banker since 1989. She is committed as a full-time professional to her career in real estate and loves what she does. Julie serves her clients with honesty, integrity, knowledge and enthusiasm. It is her goal to make each transaction as enjoyable as possible and to approach all problems solving with competence and creativity so to ultimately provide her clients with the best possible service to their fullest satisfaction. Julie has a BS degree in Accounting from Indiana State University and an MBA with a concentration in Finance from Notre Dame de Namur University.

Nancy McGaraghan

Director at Large

Nancy McGaraghan worked as a CPA before raising a family. Later she became certified in medical ethics and then pursued a degree in Theology at Berkeley. She has worked at St. Patrick’s Seminary as business manager and at the Jesuit Retreat in Los Altos as a spiritual director.

Eliane Neukermans

Director at Large

Eliane Neukermans is retired from teaching at Castilleja for 25 years (math, French and economics) and is an active community volunteer. Her volunteer activities have focused on education, social entrepreneurship, environmental sustainability and women’s development. She has been an active fundraiser for the Saint Elisabeth Seton School, is on the Board of the business school at Santa Clara University and is a member of the board of the Palo Alto Community Fund.

Margo Ogus

Director at Large

Margo Rich Ogus is an economic consultant and expert witness, through her company, Economic Solutions, Inc.  She is a graduate of Cornell and Stanford Universities and a long-time resident of Palo Alto.  She has served on the board, and as chair, of Palo Alto Community Child Care and other local organizations.

Jim Phillips

Director at Large

Jim Phillips is an active community volunteer. He retired as a line executive with Lockheed in the company’s Space Systems Division, having spent 37 years in systems development with General Electric, LTV, and Lockheed. Jim has served as chair of the Palo Alto Family YMCA and Peninsula Habitat for Humanity, and on the boards of the YMCA of the Mid-Peninsula, Palo Alto Community Child Care, Foundation for a College Education, YWCA of the Mid-Peninsula Donor Advised Fund, One Dollar for Life, and the Kiwanis Club of Palo Alto where he’s a past president. He holds a B.S. and M.S. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Texas-Austin.

Linda Dairiki Shortliffe

Director at Large

Dr. Linda Dairiki Shortliffe is a highly esteemed and accomplished physician within the Department of Urology at Stanford University Medical Center. She completed her undergraduate degree at Harvard College (Radcliffe) and her medical training at Stanford University. Linda has led and participated in numerous research endeavors at both Stanford University Medical Center and other premier medical institutions, and she has engaged in multiple teaching activities at Stanford University School of Medicine, sharing her vast knowledge and expertise with new generations of emerging medical professionals.

On a personal level, she is a Baby Boomer currently caring for her two aging parents who reside at Channing House. Linda herself is also a long-time resident of Palo Alto. In her free time, she volunteers with MedShare, a nonprofit organization based in San Leandro, CA.

Jerome B. Spector

Director at Large

Jerome B. Spector has fifty years of experience of working with individuals, estates, and trusts, and closely held businesses. Jerry has taught and worked with individuals and families to assist them in reaching their financial goals by long range planning for tax transactions, estate and financial planning.

He states that when a tax return is completed, the only question should be: how close did we come to the projection? Mr. Spector retired from full time practice in 2017. Today, he provides consulting on tax and cash flow planning and in the area of estate and trust planning. He has authored and taught classes for CPA firms, the California CPA Society, and the California Bar Association. In October 2012 Jerry was appointed as a Commissioner for The California Board of Legal Specialization Estate Planning, Trust, & Probate Law. In 2019 he will service as the vice-chair of the Board.