About the Honorable Timothy M. Kaine

Timothy M. Kaine became the 70th governor of the Commonwealth of Virginia on January 14, 2006.

To date, his marquee initiatives have focused on education and transportation. In education, Governor Kaine aspires to move the commonwealth from competence to excellence.

Currently, he is championing efforts to expand pre-kindergarten education, a proposal that will require a significant investment of state monies. In transportation, Governor Kaine is promoting greater accountability, with a focus on measurable improvements, better connections between land use and transportation planning, and greater investments in road, rail, and public transportation infrastructure.

During his first year in office, he recruited transportation professionals and made advances in land-use reforms he believes will strengthen Virginia’s transportation network. He also struggled through a record-setting, prolonged legislative session that failed to advance his transportation plan. Observers note that Kaine had a trying first year and that much is at stake for  him and the commonwealth in the coming year.

Governor Kaine’s career of public service began when he took a year off from law school to volunteer with missionaries in Honduras. There, he served as the principal of a small Catholic school that taught teenagers basic carpentry and welding skills.

He practiced law in Richmond for 17 years, representing people who had been denied housing opportunities because of their race or disability. He won many precedent-setting cases in this area and was recognized by local, state, and national organizations for his fair-housing advocacy.

Governor Kaine entered political life in 1994 and was elected to four terms on the Richmond City Council, including two terms as mayor, where he worked to build Richmond’s first new schools in a generation, cut taxes, and slash the crime rate. Richmond’s success in reducing violent crime won national recognition from Presidents Clinton and Bush, the National Rifle Association, and gun-safety organizations. The improvements in Richmond’s economy during Kaine’s tenure earned the city its first listing in Forbes magazine’s annual ranking of the top 10 cities in America for doing business. While mayor of Richmond, Kaine served as the Jepson School’s leader-in-residence.

Kaine was elected Virginia’s lieutenant governor in 2001. When he ran for governor four years later, he touted his side-by-side work with Governor Mark Warner to reform the state’s budget and invest new resources in education. These reforms led Governing magazine to recognize Virginia in 2005 as the “Best Managed State in America.” In 2005, Kaine defeated then-Attorney General Jerry Kilgore in the gubernatorial race.

Since his election, Kaine has been a prominent voice of the Democratic Party. He gave the 2006 Democratic response to President Bush’s State of the Union address.

Born in St. Paul, Minn., in 1958, Kaine grew up in Kansas City working in his father’s ironworking shop. He graduated from the University of Missouri in 1979 and earned his J.D. from Harvard Law School in 1983.

Governor Kaine is married to Anne Holton, a former legal aid lawyer and juvenile court judge. Anne’s father, Linwood Holton, served as governor of Virginia from 1970 to 1974. Anne works diligently to serve the commonwealth with a particular focus on the needs of Virginia’s children in foster care.  The Kaines’ three children—Nat, Woody, and Annella—attend Richmond Public Schools. The family is active in their church and spends as much time as possible outdoors enjoying Virginia’s scenic beauty.

About the Jepson School of Leadership Studies

The Jepson School of Leadership Studies was founded in 1992 to fill a significant void in higher education. The Jepson School sees leadership as a process and a relationship among people. All too often, institutions focus on imparting career skills or talk about preparing future leaders, without developing a true understanding of leadership—the knowledge, ability, and conviction to drive change and positively impact the world. In bridging this critical gap, Jepson established itself as a pioneer in the field of leadership studies and a respected center for scholarship and education and the national conversation about leadership. Public programs such as this presentation by the governor help further that conversation.

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