Ken Pentel

Ken Pentel (born c. 1961) (pronounced pen-TELL) is an American politician. Pentel was the 2006 Green party candidate for Minnesota governor with running-mate Danene Provencher. Pentel ran for this position twice before, in 1998 and 2002.

Biography
Pentel grew up in Minneapolis and graduated from Hopkins High School. His father owned Pentel Pontiac and his mother was an employment counselor. After high school, Pentel studied theater at the University of Minnesota for a couple of years before moving to California, intending to go into show business. Having seen the results of pollution in California, Pentel became interested in the environmental movement. When he arrived back in the Twin Cities in 1986, Pentel joined Greenpeace, where he worked for 11 years as a field manager, volunteer organizer and lobbyist. As of 2006, Ken is 45 years old and still actively involved in local environmental activism.

Issues
His platform consists of:


 * Stable, livable-wage jobs
 * Single-payer healthcare to cover all Minnesotans
 * Increased funding for education
 * Affordable low-cost housing
 * Clean water, air and soil
 * Clean, publicly financed elections
 * Instant runoff voting
 * Proportional representation
 * Corporate accountability
 * Rewards for efficient and sustainable energy
 * Tax breaks for local family farmers and organic agriculture
 * An economically and ethnically diverse administration

Election Results

 * 2006 - Governor - 4th of 6 running 10,854 votes, for 0.49%
 * 2002 - Governor - 4th of 7 running 50,589 votes, for 2.25%
 * 1998 - Governor - 4th of 8 running 6,983 votes, for 0.3%

Post-election activities
Today, Pentel is pursuing the creation of a nonpartisan, political organization called the Ecology-Democracy Network with a primary goal to establish ecological whole-cost accounting in Minnesota.