Candidate for
Board Member; San Marcos Unified School District

Randy Walton was born and raised in Southern California and has lived in San Marcos for 10 years. He and his wife Kristen have been married for 15 years and are the parents of sons Redmond, age 11, and Ryan, age 7. Redmond and Ryan both attend school in the San Marcos Unified School District, where Kristen is an active volunteer.

Randy moved from the Los Angeles area to San Diego to attend UCSD. A few years after receiving his bachelor's degree from UCSD, he enrolled in law school at California Western School of Law , and graduated in 1997. He was admitted to the bar that same year.

As an attorney, Randy is a partner in the firm Walton Barber LLP, a small civil law firm in Carlsbad focusing on personal injury, wrongful death, and commercial real estate litigation. A substantial portion of Randy's law practice is dedicated to the representation of victims of elder abuse and neglect in the nursing home setting, an area of law he is considered by many to be an authority.

Community involvement has always been important to Randy. He is a founding board member of the Valley of Discovery Education Foundation (VDEF), a non-profit organization in San Marcos dedicated to assisting San Marcos High School and Mission High School raise money to supplement on-campus programs. In its four years, VDEF has raised well over $50,000 for San Marcos high schools. More recently, Randy was instrumental in the acquisition of a $6 million grant from the Leichtag Family Foundation to fund SMUSD's PACE Promise, a program that guarantees admission to CSUSM for qualifying SMUSD students.

In addition, in 2005 Randy was appointed by the San Marcos City Council to the Ridgeline Task Force, a committee of local citizens who drafted a law to preserve the ridgelines of San Marcos. He also serves as an advisor to Cancer for College, a non-profit organization that provides college scholarships to kids that have triumphed over cancer.

The community activity Randy may enjoy most is his participation in San Marcos Youth Baseball, a league that serves over 1000 San Marcos kids from ages 5 thru 14. Randy serves on the league's executive board, and, more importantly, is a coach on his son's team.