Martha Whitmer Bark

Martha Bark ( Whitmer; July 30, 1928 – May 1, 2015) was an American Republican Party politician, who served in the New Jersey State Senate from 1997 to 2008, where she represented the 8th Legislative District. She served as Deputy Minority Leader from 2004 to 2008. She was a member of the lower house of the New Jersey Legislature, the New Jersey General Assembly, from 1995 to 1997.

She served on the Medford Township Public Schools Board of Education from 1973 to 1978. Later, she served on the Medford Township council from 1980 to 1987 and was the township's mayor in 1981 and 1985. Bark served on the Burlington County Board of Chosen Freeholders from 1984 to 1997. After winning re-election to the Assembly in the 1995 general election, Bark was appointed to the State Senate on January 14, 1997 to succeed C. William Haines who died of cancer on December 18, 1996.

She served in the Senate on the Budget and Appropriations Committee, the Economic Growth Committee and on the Joint Committee on the Public Schools.

, Bark was facing a New Jersey State investigation over about $330,000 that she was paid by the Burlington County Bridge Commission and the Burlington County Institute of Technology for part-time work performed from 1997 to 2003. It was alleged that these were patronage jobs which were created in order to funnel income to Senator Bark for jobs that were not advertised to the public and for which there are no records of actual work performed by the Senator. Though she did not cite the probe as a reason, Bark announced her retirement from the Senate in January 2007.

She died on May 1, 2015, at Virtua Voorhees Hospital in Voorhees, New Jersey.

Legacy Bark was survived by her three children and six grandchildren.