Roger Tilles

Roger B. Tilles was elected to a five-year term as the Regent for the Tenth Judicial District, commencing on April 1, 2005, re-elected to a second five-year term by concurrent resolution effective April 1, 2010, and re-elected to a third five-year term effective April 1, 2015, and most recently re-elected to a fourth five year term effective April 1,2020.

Regent Tilles graduated in 1968 from Amherst College with a Bachelor of Arts degree and from the University of Michigan College of Law in 1971. He became Director of Law and Legislation for the Michigan Department of Education, was elected to the Michigan State Board of Education, and in 1975, he became the Executive Secretary to the Speaker of the Michigan House of Representatives. During this time in Michigan he taught education and the law at University of Michigan, Michigan State, Eastern Michigan and Central Michigan Universities’ Schools of Education. He was also the counsel to the Michigan Teacher Tenure Commission as well as a Special Education Hearing Officer. After being a candidate for U.S. Congress, he opened his own law practice in Washington D.C. in 1978, until his return to Long Island in 1983 where he was the Director of the Tilles Investment Companies. He received a provisional N.Y.C teaching certificate in 1971, following education courses at C.W. Post. He is a member of the New York, D.C. and Michigan Bar Associations.

He was Chair and founding member of the Association for a Better Long Island, past acting Chair of the Long Island Regional Planning Board, served as a Chair of the Long Island University Board of Trustees, served on the Boards of WNET/Channel 13 and WLIW/Channel21 and has been Executive Vice Chairman of the Tilles Center For The Performing Arts, in addition to serving on the Board of Executive Board of Long Island Association. He has also worked to form the Long Island Arts Alliance, bringing together the cultural institutions of Long Island.

He is also involved with significant interfaith activities: two of the most prominent being Project Understanding, which he formed with Monsignor Tom Hartman in 1987, bringing Catholic and Jewish teenagers together annually on a mission to Israel; and as the producer of the first Vatican commemoration of the Holocaust under the auspices of Pope John Paul II in Rome in 1994.

He is a member and past President of Temple Beth-El of Great Neck, was on the Board of The Jewish Outreach Institute and has been a member of the National Young Leadership Cabinet of the UJA.

Roger Tilles, resident of Manhasset, was born and educated in Great Neck in its public schools. Roger’s daughters, Eliana and Hanaleah, graduated from the Great Neck public schools.