Five vie for architectural board slots Five vie for architectural board slots (September 09, 2005)

Applicants live in Half Moon Bay, San Jose and cities in between

by Jocelyn Dong

Five candidates have applied for positions on the city's Architectural Review Board, which considers the design and compatibility of proposed developments in the city.

Four of the applicants don't live in Palo Alto, but two of those have practices in the city. Palo Alto residency isn't a requirement for the board. One of the current members lives outside of the city.

Monday night, the City Council will select which of the five applicants they would like to interview for the three-year, volunteer posts. There are currently two positions open.

The applicants are:

* Stan Field, a Half Moon Bay resident with a Palo Alto architectural practice. Field has been a visiting professor of architecture at U.C. Berkeley and spent 35 years in private practice, including work in South Africa and Israel.

* Lori Hsu, a Woodside resident and licensed architect who worked for five years for Charles Rose Architects/Thompson and Rose Architects and has been self-employed since 2002.

* Grace Lee, a Palo Alto resident and a designer with CJW Architecture of Portola Valley. She has practiced for 11 years in the Bay Area and been a lecturer and studio instructor in architecture at U.C. Berkeley for five years.

* Clare Malone Pritchard, a Cupertino resident and architect with Stoecker and Northway Architects in Palo Alto for 18 years. She participated in Leadership Midpeninsula in 2003, among other local civic involvement.

* Sassan Pedramrazi is a San Jose resident who works as a designer for Habitec Architects of San Jose. He has lectured and taught architecture at the National University in Tehran, Iran and practiced at several Tehran firms.

The ARB is not the only Palo Alto board that allows non-residents to participate. The Historic Resources Board and Public Art Commission also accept members who live in other cities. Four other commissions do require residency. For the Utilities Advisory Commission, four out of five commissioners must live in the city.

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