Dr. Barnes holds a Ph.D. in Educational Psychology from the University of Southern California. She is the former Executive Director and President of the Board of Directors of the Harbor Free Clinic and Director of Nonprofit Training at the South Bay Volunteer Center. In addition to her work at Y.E.S., Dr. Barnes is a Management and Training Advisor for the California League of Women Voters, an organization in which she has been a participating member for over fifteen years. Active in the Palos Verdes Peninsula League of Women Voters as a candidate forum moderator and former president, she is a popular speaker and facilitator at community events. Dr. Barnes has been honored for her community work by the city and county of Los Angeles, the California State Senate, the California Assembly and the U.S. House of Representatives.

In her current position as a founding partner and president, Dr. Barnes brings her years of management and community experience to Y.E.S, as well as her work in interventions with drug and alcohol dependent families. She is a California Registered Addiction Specialist with a particular interest in the plight of alcohol dependent women and the families of alcoholics.

Dr. Mary Ellen Barnes' Story

My involvement in the area of alcohol abuse began as many people's does: a family member needed help and I was delegated to find it. The first thing that became apparent to me was that there weren't really any options. Every "program" - residential or outpatient, was the same, differing only in cost and the extravagance of their claims.

Muddling through as best I could, my family and I settled on a program that claimed to be "flexible" not a hard core 12-Step/AA program. It turned out that it wasn't really any different and the program was only a very marginal and expensive improvement over doing nothing.

The second thing that was apparent to me was the pain that substance abuse causes families. I experienced that pain myself, lost much sleep worrying about what to do to help, shed many tears of pain and frustration and watched people who are very dear to me, lose sleep and nearly ruin their health over this problem. We didn't know where to turn for real help, or advice and support.

By the time a second intervention became necessary Dr. Wilson and I had met through the course of our other work and together we implemented a much more efficient and effective plan, one that served both family and client equally well.

We discovered, in working together, that between us we had the right combination of experience and perspective to provide similar opportunities to other families and individuals. Y.E.S. was born out of our ability and the desire to provide real choices where few exist.