2025 Board of Directors Election

Our unit is led by an eleven-person board of directors with each volunteer board member serving a 2-year term. The six unit members who are volunteering to fill the six openings in 2025 are alphabetically: H. Paul Davis, David Merenbach, Alex Narasin, John Schwartz, Dana Shelley and Stephanie Younquist.

Our unit bylaws require us to hold an election in November even if it is an uncontested election. Game directors will make announcements when voting has started and they will facilitate the voting process. All unit members are eligible to vote.

We are not able to hold elections via electronic means so once again we will set up voting boxes at the locations where we hold games. The voting boxes will be available during the first half of November. Voting ballots, envelopes and instructions will be next to the boxes. It is important that you insert the ballot in the envelope, seal it, and print and sign your name on the outside of the envelope. Please take a couple of minutes to vote.

Here are the photos and biographies of the candidates:

H. Paul Davis

I am a Ruby Life Master. Until Covid, I taught a class for Advanced Beginners at the Sunnyvale and Cupertino Senior Centers.

We have an aging duplicate bridge population, and I am most interested in growing that population by welcoming newer and less experienced players with lectures, classes, limited games and special events to increase Face to Face (F2F) game attendance. For example, Pro-Am games have been successful at other units and have enabled newer players to play with more experienced players. I would also like to increase F2F attendance in our Unit by offering more Swiss Teams and special events.

We can work together on our Board to hold various events and see what works the best. I think that F2F bridge is more satisfying than online bridge and helps develop a community of players that enjoy the interaction and sociability by meeting with other people.

Professionally, I have Master’s Degrees in Education and Public Health from UC Berkeley, and a Master’s Degree in Clinical Psychology from the JFK School of Professional Psychology.

David Merenbach (Incumbent)

I am a Past President of Unit 503 and continue to volunteer my time to strengthen the bridge community in the Palo Alto area. I learned bridge as a teen and caddied many tournaments as a youth. $7/hour was real money back in the day! I did not play much for years and never played duplicate until I took it up with my wife ten years ago.

In addition to competitive bridge, I am passionate about Cal football and travel. I have attended over 300 Cal football games in 10 states. As to non-football related travel, I have been to every continent except Antarctica and have been to 49 states and more than 55 countries. In the last two years, I have been lucky enough to go to Qatar for the World Cup and to Paris for the Olympics.

I am a big believer that we should give back to organizations that provide us a big benefit. To that end, I have served on the board of Castilleja School for the past six years, including five years as the Finance Chair. Previously I was Board President for Pied Piper Players a community theater group in San Mateo where my children were active and served on the advisory board for Junior Achievement for the Bay Area for almost a decade. I have also coached and refereed youth soccer, coached youth Lacrosse and was the girls’ varsity lacrosse coach for Castilleja High School for one year.

Lisa and I have three daughters. Danielle, Stephanie and Rebecca two of them live on the East Coast and Stephanie lives in Dublin, Ireland. Our hope, and their stated goal, is that they will return to California someday. We live in hope!

Alex Narasin

I am excited to be serving on the board for an organization that fosters a game that I love so much. I am hoping to encourage and welcome newcomers to come experience the joys of playing duplicate at our club.

I started learning bridge 20 years ago with 11 other women who I am still playing with today. We have played in airports, beaches, restaurants, foreign counties, and hotel rooms. Nothing stops us from playing, not even Covid or complaints from our husbands and children.

Bridge is a language that both my dad and I spoke, and it helped reinforce our relationship in his older years. Playing Bridge with my dad before he passed away is something I will always cherish.

Aside from bridge, my family and I foster dogs. If you have ever played at my table, you have surely been subjected to photos of my latest litter.

I have been married to a reluctant bridge player for 31 years and we have 3 grown children one of which won a bridge trophy at this very bridge center when he was 8.

Looking forward seeing you at the bridge table.

John Schwartz (Incumbent)

John is a familiar face at the bridge club, as director of the Monday and Thursday Bridge games at the bridge center. John learned the game as a teenager but played little for many years. He studied physics as an undergrad at Cornell, before getting a law degree from Harvard. After practicing tax law, John returned to science, obtained his PhD, and then joined the physics faculty at Stanford. Soon, he left the classroom and became vice president and general counsel for Stanford for 20 years. A newspaper article referred to him as “Stanford’s Legal Eagle.”

After another 20 years in the corporate sector as General Counsel, CEO and Chairman of the Board of Nasdaq companies, John returned to bridge. In 2010, he purchased the Thursday Cubberley center bridge game and moved it to its new home at the JCC. Then, saying at the time that he wanted to change the landscape for junior players, he started the Monday JCC game which, within a year, became the area’s largest game.

To John, bridge club directing requires the real time analytical thought and problem solving he enjoys. Sure, there is a lot of work behind the scenes, he says, but the real challenge and aspiration is “getting things going well after things go wrong”, while treating everyone fairly and respectfully in the process.

John’s goal as a director is to make bridge a pleasant experience for all. He wants to attract more junior players and offer more limited sections in which they can compete. He sees serving on the board as an opportunity to give back to the game by helping discern ways to improve the bridge experience for all.

Dana Shelley

In the Boston winter of 1980-81, my then-boyfriend taught me to play bridge by dealing hands on the floor of my apartment. We’d each bid 2 hands, and when a contract was reached, I’d play declarer, and he’d play both hands on defense. We didn’t know anyone who played bridge, so my first time playing with real human beings was in an Open Club Championship at a local bridge club. My hands shook holding the cards, and we were dead last, but I was hooked!

That boyfriend (Phil Abrahamson, teacher extraordinaire!) and I have now been married for 42 years; we played duplicate bridge for 6 years, took 29 years off, and returned to the game in 2015, after I started classes with Kathy Harper. I love that the game of bridge is infinite and that there is always more to learn!

I would like to help Unit 503 thrive and grow and ensure that there continue to be fun and welcoming games for our community. I am particularly interested in growing in-person attendance at the Bridge Center. I see opportunities to attract newer (and returning!) players by offering more limited-masterpoint games, free lessons and presentations, and will work to seek new ideas and find what works.

Professionally, I have degrees in Math and Operations Research from Berkeley and Stanford, respectively. I am the Director of Budget Planning and Policy Analysis at Stanford University and plan to retire next spring after 39 years! I have enjoyed serving on the boards of other charitable organizations (Family and Children Services of Silicon Valley, the Menlo Park – Atherton Education Foundation, and the Menlo-Atherton Foundation for the Future). I have also come full circle as a helper in several of Kathy Harper classes.

Phil and I have two children and 4 young grandchildren, all of whom live waaay too far away on the east coast.

Stephanie Yoshikawa (Incumbent)

I played my first duplicate game a little over 9 years ago at the PABC Father’s Day parent-child game and then became a regular at the 0-30 game on Fridays. It was terrifying! The directors were so kind, encouraging, and helpful. I had started learning social bridge a few months prior but winning a hand only because I was lucky enough to have points wasn’t very satisfying. I love the challenge of duplicate bridge and the community of the Bridge Center.

The Bridge Center has been a wonderfully welcoming place for my family. My parents were playing at PABC long before the rest of us learned to play. My kids were heavily involved in youth bridge through SiVY (Silicon Valley Youth Bridge). I have served on our unit 503 Board of Directors for the last 4 years and am currently serving as the Vice President of the board.

I care about encouraging new bridge players, making the bridge center an enjoyable place for all of our members, and making it fun for everyone with special events. This is my third year volunteering in Kathy Harper’s classes, and I’ve mentored a few players. I have organized many of the PABC special events and I’ve been on the SiVY committee for about eight years. I was one of the intermediate/newcomer (I/N) event co-chairs at the 2019 Fall NABC in San Francisco and will be doing that again in 2025.

I was born at El Camino Hospital, grew up in Sunnyvale, and went to Berkeley and Stanford studying Materials Science and Engineering.

The bridge Center has had such a positive impact on my family’s life, giving us so much joy and passion. I have been happy to give back as a board member these last four years and currently as vice president. I would like to continue to help make it even better.