By Lookout Staff

March 3, 2016 -- The Santa Monica Conservancy is electing new board members and handing out preservation awards at its annual meeting on Saturday.

The organization, the largest of its kind focused on preservation in Santa Monica, will elect six nominees to its board during its meeting at the Grand Pavilion of the St. Monica Church, 725 California Avenue, from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m., officials said.

The new board members, who serve three-year terms, include newcomers to the board as well as a founder and other veteran members. They are:

Kaitlin Drisko, nominated for her second board term. She is the principal of Drisko Studio Architects, a Santa Monica firm which focuses on historic preservation and the architecture of historic and cultural properties;

Michael Folonis, a longtime architect who has served on the Conservancy board since 2007. He is the former chair of the Santa Monica Architectural Review Board. Folonis also chairs the Gregory Ain Historic Overlay Preservation Zone (HPOZ);

Mario Fonda-Bonardi, a principal of Fonda-Bonardi & Hohman Architects, who specializes in residential design. He serves on the Santa Monica Planning Commission. In 2008, he received the Conservancy’s David G. Cameron Preservation Award in for his preservation work on Santa Monica’s landmark Shotgun House;

Nina Fresco, a founding board member of the Conservancy. She also serves on the City Planning Commission, chaired the Civic Auditorium Working Group and has served three terms on the Landmarks Commission;

Ruthann Lehre, who is chair of the Conservancy’s Program Committee. She developed its Downtown Walking Tour with Carol Lemlein and leads the docent program at the Annenberg Community Beach House.

Lehrer was also designated architectural historian on the Santa Monica Landmarks Commission until her term ended in 2014;

Laurel Schmidt, a former Landmarks Commissioner who is also leader of the docent program at the Preservation Resource Center. She taught at SMASH, later served as a principal and director in the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District and now works with museums on docent education. This would be her second term on the Conservancy Board.

This year’s Nominating Committee included Board members Lemlein, who is chair, as well as members John Zinner, Mike Deasy and Hilda Weiss.

Founded in 2002, the Santa Monica Conservancy has campaigned for landmark status for such sites as the Embassy Hotel Apartments, the Builder’s Exchange and Phillips Chapel. Officials there said it formed support organizations to help save Santa Monica’s last intact shotgun house and, more recently, to rally public support for transforming the historic Marion Davies estate into the Annenberg Community Beach House.

It also conducts weekly downtown walking tours of La Mesa Drive, Adelaide Drive and the Third Street Historic District, and a docent-led tour of Pacific Palisades Park and its Ocean Avenue neighborhood.

In addition, officials also said the Conservancy also established the docent program at the Annenberg Community Beach House, as well as championed the inclusion of preservation guidelines in the downtown redevelopment plan and consideration of preservation in the City’s Land use and Circulation Element.