Kenneth W. Smith Jr. is a Certified Government Digital Services Professional (CGDSP) and is the Digital Services Officer for Brazos County, Texas where he oversees design, content, standards, security, and accessibility for Brazos County’s websites, videos, audio, branding, and other digital and creative initiatives.
For more than a decade, Ken served as the Web Communications Specialist for the City of Bryan, Texas before moving (literally across the street) to Brazos County in 2024.
In his first life, Ken was a National Politics Producer and news designer at The Washington Post where his portfolio spanned both the print and online sides of the Post’s award-winning journalism. In his 20 years as a journalist, Ken was a key player in designing the coverage of some of the biggest news stories of the 21st century, including the Post’s coverage of the Virginia Tech Mass Shooting in 2007 that won the Pulitzer Prize for Breaking News, and the inauguration of President Barack Obama in January 2009.
Ken’s work has been honored with more than 40 state and national awards from organizations including NAGW, TAMIO, 3CMA, CompTIA-PTI, Mothers Against Drunk Driving, the League of Women Voters, the American Public Power Association, and the Society for News Design.
When not working for the County, or on a freelance project, Ken spends as much time as he can watching Italian and English football, fly fishing, collecting antique Texas pottery, grilling large quantities of meat in his backyard, and spending time with his wife Jennifer, their dog Wrigley, and their 12 cats. (Yep, that’s a lot of cats.)
Born and raised in Tennessee, Ken graduated Magna Cum Laude from the University of Missouri School of Journalism, and worked for the St. Petersburg Times, the Houston Chronicle, and the Post before returning to Texas in the spring of 2013.
Ken’s wife, Jennifer Morehead, is an accomplished journalist and editor at The Washington Post, whose experiences have taken her from the plains of west Texas, to the Pacific Northwest, and from California to The New York Times.
Jennifer has served as a copy editor on multiple Pulitzer Prize-nominated special projects, including the Post’s investigation of Walter Reed Army Medical Center which won the Pulitzer Gold Medal for Public Service.