What experience in business has prepared Rich for a position on the Albany City Council?
- I have worked in the Albany area for 38 years, been in business for 28 years, and have owned a store in Albany since 1993.
- I have been President and Chairman of Trustees at my church.
- I have been a member of the Albany Area Chamber of Commerce for many years.
- I went thru the Chamber of Commerce’s Leadership Albany program.
- I served two terms as a District Director (Oregon, Washington, Alaska, British Columbia, and Alberta, Canada) in the American Welding Society’s Districts Council, and was elected to three terms on the National Board of Directors of the 64,000 member American Welding Society. (American Welding Society is the organization that sets the standards for structural welding in the much of the world.)
- I helped found and served an initial term in the International Society of Welding Educators. I asked for a standard to be made for welding instruction for the United States, I helped form the committee, served on it and then approved the standard as a board member. (LBCC, Mt Hood CC LCC, PCC, Albany HS, Lebanon HS, Sweet Home HS and the Eugene schools all adopted that standard.)
- I am a Veteran. I have been all over the world and have a global perspective that can be applied to what we do here in Albany.
- I try to do the right thing – the vast majority of the time I get there, I have been tested.
What issues are you planning to focus most on?
1. Communication to citizens. In the absence of the truth, rumor becomes fact. We can either decide to make sure that people know what is going on, even if it is unfair to place that burden on us, or we can put up with them misunderstanding what the facts are.
To that end, a regularly published list of issues with a timeline showing when actions are needed should be established and continually updated.
2. Membership on the CARA advisory board needs to be equally based throughout the city, and the types of projects that CARA takes on should be limited to those places that actually pay tax, or if they do not pay tax, limited to a short duration loan.
What are the most important issues affecting job growth in Albany?
We are losing heavy industrial jobs and replacing them with service jobs.
We should focus on getting the “paper mill, Wah Chang, Selmet, National Foods” kind of jobs – each one of those makes 7 service jobs. You do not have to pursue the service jobs, they will just appear! Ask the question, ‘What product in my industry is needed, that someone can make, that no one makes now, that uses my product as a starter or base?’ The answer to that question is where those jobs are.
As long as we remain reactive instead of proactive to problems we will struggle. If you want a base job creator, you must first have a place ready for that job creator to land, quickly, with little trouble. Lowe’s is not built yet and it has taken years to get this far, that is unacceptable in business, and they are not even a base job creator.
How does Rich plan to balance the agenda in Ward 3 against the community as a whole?
I would wear two hats as a leader of a ward. I will have a responsibility to communicate the needs from my ward, whether or not I believe exactly the same as my constituents do. As a member of the council I will have the responsibility to vote for what is best for the entire city. I could envision a situation where I would bring something up and then have to vote against it because it was bad for the city as a whole. I would then have the duty to explain why I did what I did.
How will you interact with the Mayor of Albany?
The Mayor’s role is all about leadership. There is normally not a vote available for the Mayor, but the mayor does have the Bully Pulpit.
My role dealing with the Mayor would be as a person who sees things differently and can explain why I think a different way could be better.
Why vote for Rich?
I have been a Mensan, I think about things differently than others do. Here’s just one example: On the corner of Pacific Blvd and Airport Rd there is a building. Most of you see it as a derelict gas station. The city council sees it as a eye sore that the owner is not communicating about. I see it as an opportunity to make some money because it is made out of steel and could be scrapped – the money generated could pay for the cleanup. It’s important to the city to have creative thinkers who can come up with new solutions, and that’s exactly what I hope to do.