Four candidates are running for two open seats on the Mountain View Whisman School District board this November, and one of them spent much of last year trying to recall one of his current opponents. Incumbents Devon Conley and Bill Lambert are seeking new terms, while newcomers Quintin Riis and Sundar Subbarayan are challenging them for the two available spots on the five-member board.
Riis and Subbarayan entered the race before the filing period closed earlier this month, according to the Mountain View Voice. Riis is a father of two with one child currently enrolled in the district, and he led an unsuccessful effort last year to recall Conley, a campaign he announced at a June 2025 board meeting. That recall drive failed to gather enough signatures to reach the ballot, but Riis told the Voice that the experience shaped his decision to run this time around, saying he was concerned no one else would challenge the incumbents. “No one deserves a walk-on, especially the current board with all of the recent controversies we've faced,” he said.
Two Incumbents Point to Records on the Board
Conley, first elected to the board in 2018 and re-elected in 2022, previously worked as a teacher at the district's Stevenson Elementary School. She points to expanding free after-school care for low-income students, hiring counselors for each school, and adopting a new literacy curriculum as accomplishments from her tenure. Conley also ran unsuccessfully for Mountain View City Council in 2024, and she said she's running for the board again because her work there remains unfinished.
Lambert has served on the board on and off since 2012, stepping away after declining to seek re-election in 2016 before rejoining in 2022. He works as an intellectual property partner at Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton LLP and holds a doctorate in chemical physics, a background he says brings a scientist's rigor and a lawyer's thoughtfulness to the board. Lambert said he remains committed to preparing students to attend college.
Newcomers Pitch Fiscal Oversight and New Programs
Subbarayan, the other newcomer in the race, has two children who graduated from Los Altos High School after attending Stevenson Elementary and Crittenden Middle School within the district. He served as head of school implementations for Khan Academy from 2011 to 2012, helping to integrate the platform, founded in Mountain View in 2006, into both the Mountain View Whisman and Los Altos school districts. Subbarayan now sits on the district's artificial intelligence committee and mentors students at Los Altos High School, and he said public education has driven his career and personal life. He's running on three focuses: successful student education, wise financial decisions, and discourse within the district, adding that every voice should be heard.
Riis, for his part, plans to introduce a formal gifted and talented program in the district and says he wants to reduce spending he considers wasteful. That fiscal framing lands amid lingering scrutiny of district spending: public members previously raised alarms over contracts for coaching and meditation sessions for administrators, criticism that helped fuel both Riis's recall attempt and broader turnover on the board.
A Board Reshaped by Recent Turmoil
The five-member board already looks different from what it did two years ago. Three current trustees — Charles DiFazio, Lisa Henry, and Ana Reed — were newly elected in November 2024 and now hold terms running through late 2028, replacing incumbents amid the fallout from spending controversies under former Superintendent Ayindé Rudolph. Rudolph resigned in November 2024 after taking a short-term leave, receiving a $98,259 severance payout, following public outcry over administrative contracts that included a $121,150 deal for guided staff meditation with a self-described “master energy healer” and a $370,000 personal coaching contract for his former supervisor, as reported by the Palo Alto Daily Post.
An extraordinary audit by the state's Fiscal Crisis and Management Assistance Team, released in August 2025, found no evidence of fraud or illegal fiscal activity tied to Rudolph's contracts, though the report flagged extensive taxpayer-funded travel, the Daily Post reported. The district hired former Los Altos School District chief Jeffrey Baier as permanent superintendent in March 2025 under a three-year, $385,000-a-year contract, after he had served as interim leader since that February.
Fiscal Pressure Continues Even as Voters Backed New Funding
Despite the turmoil, voters overwhelmingly renewed local school funding in November 2024, approving Measure AA with 74% support to continue a $0.15-per-square-foot parcel tax generating roughly $5.4 million annually for teacher retention and core academic programs. That tax took effect in July 2025. Even so, the district approved $7.4 million in budget cuts for the 2026-27 fiscal year this past January, including a salary freeze for about 60 non-represented administrative staff and a 15% reduction in district office positions, cuts the district says are meant to protect direct classroom instruction.
The district serves roughly 4,600 students across nine elementary schools and two middle schools, with Hispanic students making up 39.3% of enrollment, Asian students 22.5%, and White students 21.8%, according to district demographic data from late 2025. About 26.2% of students qualify for free or reduced-price meals. Unlike the neighboring Mountain View-Los Altos High School District, which shifted this year to geographic trustee areas under the California Voting Rights Act, Mountain View Whisman continues to elect all five of its trustees at-large, as Hoodline previously reported in coverage of the broader local school board landscape.
Voters will decide among Conley, Lambert, Riis, and Subbarayan when the board election takes place in November.
