Candidate for
Trustee; Los Rios Community College District; Trustee Area 6

http://kenbarnes.com/election/about

Ken Barnes is a small business owner and community volunteer, a visionary who dreams big and loves to give his time in service to others. Raised in the south Sacramento neighborhood of Meadowview, Ken is a product of the good public schools in both the Sacramento and Elk Grove districts. After graduating from Valley High School in 1988, he enrolled at Sacramento City College, which he attended for a year before the corporate world called to him.

While serving as the youngest chairman of the Elk Grove Unified School District's Finance Committee (1992-1994) Ken began his award-winning career in advertising at the Sacramento Bee. In 1998, he joined the dot-com start up, Realtor.com and continued his commitment to serving the community on a variety of boards and non-profits including the Sacramento Human Rights and Fair Housing Commission, and as a Board Member of the Fulton-El Camino Recreation and Park District. Currently, Ken is a member of the Executive Committee of the California State NAACP, and board member of the Relationship Skills Center (formerly the Healthy Marriage Project).

In 2002, Ken applied his talent for strategic thinking and small business sense and started a successful merchant card services firm, initially specializing in processing electronic checks and credit cards for businesses throughout California's Central Valley. That same year, Ken began studying Chinese at Sacramento City College with a vision of preparing for potential future opportunities.

Ken's desire to further his education and impact his community led him to re-enter the Los Rios Community College District in 2005 as an American River College student. With his diligence and dedication, Ken was able to balance the day to day operations of his successful payment processing business, serve the community, and complete a two year degree in eight months. The availability, affordability and quality of the education he received as a Phi Theta Kappa honors graduate of American River College gave him more opportunities and options than his life previously offered.

Ken transferred to Columbia University and moved to New York City in December 2005, where he earned a degree in Political Science with emphasis in International Relations and Human Rights. With the Chinese language coursework he completed at Los Rios, Ken successfully lived in Beijing during the summers of 2006 and 2007; he took several other trips to study Chinese and work to expand his business overseas prior to returning home to Sacramento in March 2009.

An avid traveler, Ken has flown more than one million air miles in the past decade, and when he's not in the air he can often be found on the American River bike trail. Ken and his wife Melanie have been married for 14 years, and live in the Arden Arcade neighborhood of Sacramento.