Ray Friend confirmed July 13 that he will be vacating his seat on the Hollister City Council Aug. 7. He told BenitoLink that he was doing so because he wanted to move to the Spokane, Washington area to be near family. He said he wants to move while he still has his health. Friend suffered from a mild heart problem a few months ago while in Hawaii.
According to City Manager Bill Avera, this is the first time in Hollister’s 150 history that there will be five council seats open either for election or appointment. Friend joins Jim Gillio and Karson Klauer in leaving, and Mayor Ignacio Velazquez, Vice Mayor Mickie Luna are up for re-election. Friend’s term is not up until 2020, so the council will have to appoint someone in the interim.
“All the nay-sayers have their opportunity now to change everything if they want,” he said and suggested, “Everybody goes in with the idea they’re going to set the world on fire and then they find the reality is there are a lot of battles before you accomplish something. Some of the younger people, like Karson and Jim got frustrated because there were so many battles just to get something simple, like a park, done.”
He said he would like to see more 30- and 40-year-olds step up and serve.
“It was nice to have retirees on there because they have the time to do all the committees and stuff,” he said. “I think younger people will bring a different perspective. Highway 25 was important, but it’s much more important to someone caught up in the commute that it was to me. They’d be more willing to take that battle on because the state has told us Highway 25 doesn’t go anywhere, so it’s way down on their priority list. Maybe the younger people have got the energy to get that moved up as a priority.”
Friend first became involved in local politics 25 years ago when he joined the Planning Commission and has been a council member for 10 years. Before that, he served five years during the Vietnam War in the navy aboard USS Enterprise and then worked for PG&E for 43 years. He was working in Sacramento when PG&E sent him to Hollister in 1991, and he decided to stay. He retired three years ago.
He began his public service in an effort to give something back to the community, he said.
“The opportunity came to join the Planning Commission, which I really enjoyed because I felt I was having an effect on what was going on with the city and someone was bugging me to get on the council,” he said. “Then there was an open seat and I ran unopposed twice.”
He didn’t want to make too many waves on his way out, but did admit he was frustrated more than a few times by personal feelings between him and Mayor Ignacio Velazquez.
“I just don’t agree with his tactics, but for the most part he and I probably thought more alike than either of us would admit to each other,” he said. “It’s just small-town politics. The one regret I have is now that the city has its head a little above water it can start doing some of the improvements we’ve been wanting to do. We fought for so long without any money, and now we have some and it’s easier to do the job, I’m pulling the pin.”
Friend has two particular achievements he’s proud of: bringing back the motorcycle rally and renovating the Veterans Memorial Building.
“Also, getting some of the unsecured debt paid off, so we have the money to fix some of the roads,” he added. “It was a couple million dollars a year just in interest that we paid down.”
The one area Friend most disagreed with the mayor was the battle over the 400 block.
“I didn’t like the tactics the mayor used with the referendum,” he said. “Since we’ve found out that we had the legal right to do what we were doing, I think the 400 block is going to be a benefit to the city.”
Even though the mayor and Friend have gone toe-to-toe on more than one occasion, they both saw eye-to-eye when it came to the rally. Velazquez said when he joined the council as mayor, Friend was part of the group that wanted to change directions in paying off the debt to get the financial house in order.
“Ray was that third vote that made it happen,” the mayor said, and added that being on the council is a difficult job that takes away a lot of time with families. “He’s talked about moving to Spokane before. I think you’ve got to be where your family is at. You should always choose family first.”
Avera said Friend had made so many contributions to the city there were too many to name, but thought it will be strange not having him around after so many years of serving.
“Ray brought a lot of experience to the council from his days with the Planning Commission,” he said. “We relied on him heavily with all the land developments because he understood the commission’s role in the city. Developments can be very complicated and he had a really good grasp of all of that.”
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