Meet the Board: Mary M. Geong

Mary M. Geong started her professional career teaching history and home economics in middle school, but changed course in the 1970s.

“Baby boomers were too busy with their careers to start families, schools were closed due to low enrollment and I was laid off due to low seniority,” she says. “I decided to find a job with a higher level of security. Since I was good with numbers, I went back to school to study accounting. I figured all companies need accountants, and they still do.”

Geong has a bachelor’s degree in history and a teaching credential from San Francisco State University. She also holds a bachelor’s degree in accounting, along with an MBA and master’s degree in taxation, from Golden Gate University. She is a senior program specialist for the Franchise Tax Board.

“The irony is that I prefer reading a romance book over a tax book any day,” she says.

Geong has worked in the FTB’s Oakland and San Francisco offices for 15 years. “There’s never a dull moment with changing tax issues, tax shelters, and both cooperative and difficult taxpayers or tax representatives,” says Geong. “I have worked in various departments, including personal income tax, partnerships, multistate corporations, etc. I guess once a teacher, always a teacher, because now I also train the new auditors in the Oakland office.”

Geong is on the Speaker Bureau representing the FTB at tax practitioner meetings, small-business seminars and—because she speaks fluent Cantonese and some Mandarin—Chinese TV and radio stations. She has served as an East Bay Chapter board member and board member for East Bay Chapter of Enrolled Agents, East Bay Chapter of Goodwill, ASCEND, Oakland Rotary Club No. 3, Piedmont Asian American Club and Sequoyah Heights Homeowner Association.

Outside of her professional accomplishments, Geong relates that her claim to fame was buying four raffle tickets at $50 a pop for the Oakland Rotary Scholarship fund-raiser and winning a baby Mercedes-Benz valued at $40,000. “I received a 1099MISC, paid the income taxes, car registration and sales taxes, which in my mind, was still a bargain!”

This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 30th, 2009 at 12:21 pm and is filed under Chapter News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.