Balancing Public Service and Ranch Life: Richard Egan on North State Rocks

Speaker 2 [00.00.07]: Okay. So hi, Richard. Thanks for joining us. Thanks for joining us at North State Rocks podcast. Uh, so your number four, we've had I think, you know, most everybody we've had, uh, Kerry, uh, Camacho's number one, uh, Travis quarter was number two. Uh, and then Michael Carrick was number three. So you're number four. Really grateful for your time. That's probably the biggest thing I want to tell you is. Thank you. I know how busy you are. Well, you're not quite as busy now that you're retired, but I'm sure you found plenty to do on the ranch world and all of that. So thanks for being here. That's number 

Speaker 1 [00.00.43]: one. Yeah. No, Perry, it's my pleasure. And I really I appreciate what you're you're doing with this and kind of highlighting some positive things and and, you know, happy to happy to join and share my story. Excellent, excellent. Okay, so you know what I love about what I love about you, Richard, is you're kind of that rare individual where you've been, you know, you're ranching, you know, boots in the dirt and then also have had that just in spectacular, you know, um, service background with Lassen County, too, or you're interacting with the community and, and dealing with, uh, hey, God damn it, I pay your I pay my taxes, pay for your salary type stuff. And of course, then you're on the ranch side going, yeah, I pay him, too, buddy, I get it. 

Speaker 2 [00.01.28]: Uh, so, um, I guess I want to start with kind of your ranch. I think that's probably the, you know, good. And then we'll get to your your career in the in the county second. But, um, tell me a little bit about, you know, the history of your ranch. You know, how how it came to be, how you know what the ownership looks like, and then also what a day in, in Richard's boots on the ranch look like to for us. Sure. I'm happy to. I don't know if it'll be quite as exciting as. Is as you make it sound. But. But if it goes, I think it's great, you know. So. So my parents moved up to the Susanville area in 1970, uh, when I was a young boy. I was three. So essentially all of my memories, um, are from this area, and, and my parents, uh, bought a ranch up here, a couple ranches and, and, uh, and so I grew up in that environment, um, work at, you know, there was I come from a pretty large family. There's, uh, five of us siblings, uh, spread six years apart. So pretty close. Close but big, um, family. And so we all grew up, uh, working on the ranch. And my dad had us driving tractors when we were, you know, eight, nine, ten years old and and, uh, taking care of feeding cows and horses and, and so I kind of grew up with that, um, you know, just as I didn't know any better. It was just that it was just kind of part of life. And, um, and I look back and really, I'm grateful for that because. Because I really enjoyed it back then. But but that's kind of how 

Speaker 1 [00.03.03]: I, I guess I first got my interest in, in, uh, agriculture and, and the cattle especially. Um, but as far as how how things evolved, um, you know, I, I grew up in the I guess I would consider it to be a real traditional type family on the ranch for, for those days in the early 70s, you know, doing the four H and, um, FFA and, and those sorts of things, um, with, uh, with the family. Very family. Our family has always been very close, the five of us siblings and and my parents, when they were were alive, we were always kind of a very, uh, close family. And, um, and so I never really envisioned doing not having that as part of my life. I would say. Yeah, but, you know, but as, as things turn out, um, when I graduated from high school, um, quite a long time ago now, 1985, um, 

Speaker 2 [00.04.10]: went to, uh, to Chico State and studied agriculture. There was my, the degree that I, that I. That I received, but some getting back to the ranch in the in the business structure in, uh, so in 1985, um, all five of us siblings were, were either in college or entering college. Uh, I have a two older brothers, an older sister and my twin brother, Joe, that I know you met. Yeah. And, um, and so we were all, um, entering college or in college. And, uh, my father, at the time, he was a young man, by, at least by today's standards, uh, was 50 years old and got diagnosed with terminal cancer and subsequently died six months later. So, uh, so that, you know, kind of radically changed the trajectory of, of the family farm, um, at that point. And, um, he was very adamant, uh, back at that time that, uh, you know, because we were all able bodied, um, you know, young adults at that point. Right? And, you know, say, you know, we were all saying, well, we, you know, we'll stay home and take care of the farm and all the stuff that they had going on and so forth. And my mom and dad both were very adamant about the fact that, no, that's not what we're doing. You guys are all going to go, um, get an education. Education has always been a big, um, priority in my family going back generations. Wow. And so, so at that time, um, the family really scaled things back. Uh, my my father died about six months later. My mom, uh, sold all the cows, all the, you know, all the livestock, all the equipment. Um, a big part of the ranches and and and just kind of leased things out while we all were away, uh, at college, and, um. You know, and we had a lot of family disagreements about that at the time about whether that was the appropriate thing to do or not. You know, I think, you know, 30 plus years later, it was. But yeah. But anyway, so, you know, so I finished up my education there at Chico, got my degree in agriculture and, and and during my time at college, I spent my summers coming back to the Susanville area, and I, I worked for, um, uh, local ranchers, uh, on the haying crews, the Haggerty and Hansen families, and did that every summer, which I, you know, it was hard work, but it was rewarding work. And I, you know, I look back fondly on those days, too. Yeah. Yeah. In doing that and I kind of always wanted to be involved in that, but not necessarily as a, as a worker, but more of a manager owner. And, and so, uh, you know, time goes on and I, and I, uh, met my wife, who's currently my wife, um, has been my wife for quite a while. Holly, I know you've met. Yep, yep. Holly's 

Speaker 1 [00.07.19]: amazing in college, and she was also studying agriculture, and and she, uh, had taken a job as an ag teacher down in Sacramento Valley. In Arbuckle. And so, uh, I, uh, took a job in the Calusa area. Uh, working for farm credit, uh, which is really, I guess I would say that was kind of my first, um, professional job, so to speak. Uh, doing ag lending and analysis and that sort of thing, and, and, um, and really, um, enjoyed that. But I was always kind of drawn back to, to the Susanville area. I, you know, I always envisioned, uh, living here, raising a family, having a ranch and that sort of thing. And, um, and, uh, my wife, however, uh, Holly was from Southern California. It wasn't. It wasn't so. Right. Yeah. Wasn't so, uh, enamored, I guess, at the time, at least. Um, uh, with the area. Uh, but, uh, but time goes on. And after a few years down in the valley. Um. A teaching position at Lassen High School came available and I and I convinced Holly to apply for that job. Um, and, uh, and kind of made a deal with I made a deal with her that, uh, you know, if if you get the job and we move up there, we'll go up there for three years. And if if you don't like it, I'll go or I'll move wherever you want to go. But but we got to give it a try. And she reluctantly agreed to that. Yeah. And as you know, I probably couldn't, you know, drag her out of here now. Oh, yeah. Yeah. The rest is history. Um, but but anyway, that's kind of how we we came back to, um, to the area and, um, you know, in the cattle business. So you told me how 

Speaker 2 [00.09.16]: she came back. Right. So you're her career path. But what what did you do or did? Did you guys work apart for a while or elaborate on that just a little 

Speaker 1 [00.09.25]: bit more? No. Real really kind of interesting. We actually, at the same time that the, um, teaching position came available there, uh, was advertised a job at the county, uh, for a brand new position. And I really want to get into this because it's kind of a it's a very interesting story. It was, um, the county had, uh, you know, and I didn't know this when I applied for the position. So. Right. They had, uh, uh, and there's some parallels to, I think, what's going on today too, that are kind of interesting. But this is in 1994. Um, the county had hired a consultant. To come in and apply for grants and um, and they were in hindsight and hindsight is what it is. They were indiscriminately applying for any free money that was out there. And, and they hadn't, hadn't really put in a lot of put a lot of thought into administering the grant. Sure. So they they had hired this consultant. He'd gone out and, you know, wrote all these great grant applications and got all these great grants. And then they were kind of, you know, dumped in the county's lap. And so they decided, hey, we need somebody to manage these grants. Right. And I applied for that job. Um, and, and God, what 

Speaker 2 [00.10.45]: was the title? What was the job title at the time? 

Speaker 1 [00.10.47]: At the time, it was called Development Specialist. And the job title really didn't know 

Speaker 2 [00.10.53]: didn't didn't represent what you were really doing very well. 

Speaker 1 [00.10.56]: It really didn't. And, and so, um, and I, and I took I, you know, to be quite frank, I kind of took the job thinking, you know, gosh, I, I need to make a living and make some money so that I can afford to buy some cows and, and, and, and make a living doing that. And that was kind of my intent. You know, it 

Speaker 2 [00.11.15]: was a time at that time your mom is still held on to the ranch, just so been leasing it out. Correct? 

Speaker 1 [00.11.21]: Right, right. So my mom was still living in the in the old ranch house and living on the ranch and just leasing the property out. And, you know, and just kind of a sidetrack, my my mother was just a saint and one of the toughest people that you could ever meet. You know, you can imagine being a, a widow at about 50 years of age with five kids in college and, and everything that goes along with that. And she, you know, you look back very fondly on that too, but that's incredible. Yeah. Yeah. You know, and that's part of the reason I think, you know, the in my family. Family is really, really important. 

Speaker 2 [00.12.01]: Yeah. Absolutely. Makes sense. Yeah. It sounds like an understatement. Deal with the five of 

Speaker 1 [00.12.06]: you. Yeah. 

Speaker 2 [00.12.07]: Imagine. Right. And then. Yeah. Okay. So, anyway, sorry to interrupt. Keep going. Yeah. 

Speaker 1 [00.12.12]: So anyway, we, uh, I took this job, and and I'll just describe a couple of the grants because they're actually kind of humorous, I think, in hindsight. Um, uh, they, they had, uh, one of the grants they had applied for was for, uh, two. It was a federal estate grant from the federal and state to the county government to, um, take some money and loan it to a private party to start a business. Um, in the hopes that that would create some jobs. And then the repayment of that loan to the county would then be used to make more loans. Right? Yeah. You know, that looks good on paper, sounds good on paper, but a lot of businesses fail when they start up. So yeah, I'm interested to see 

Speaker 2 [00.12.54]: where this goes okay. Yeah. So just prior to me getting there they had gotten this grant. They had made this I think $300,000 loan, which, you know, it probably would be equivalent to more like $1 million today, right? Of course. Yeah. They had loaned this 3 million or $300,000 out to a company called the California Pork Company, the California 

Speaker 1 [00.13.15]: Wet company, California pork Company. 

Speaker 2 [00.13.17]: Pork like port? 

Speaker 1 [00.13.19]: No. Pork like pig. Oh, pork. Okay. All right. I'm with you. Yeah. And? And the principals of that organization were, uh, the chairman of the planning commission at the time, and I think the president or vice president of the community college. And. Yeah, what could go wrong? So the idea was to build a hog farm in the Wendell area. Okay. Um. And raise pigs and and, uh, and sell them locally. Uh, you know, and I, you know, coming from agriculture, you know, there and you know this as well as I do, you know, there's reason that, uh, certain things are done in certain areas of the country. We fatten cattle in Kansas, Colorado and Nebraska because that's where they grow corn. Yeah. Similarly, that's where you raise pigs because that's where the feed is. Yes. And the and the favorable climate and so forth. Yes. Anyway, anyway, so they loaned this money out, um, to do this, to buy property, build, uh, infrastructure, buy hogs. And, and the money had all been spent. Um, and so my first job was to kind of go out and see how things were going out there. And, uh, the building was still in a pile had never been erected. There was no hogs and there never were any hogs. Oh my goodness. And all of the, um, the documentation in terms of, um, uh, loan agreements and security instruments and things like that was either unexpected or insufficient in some other way. And they were in and everything was in, uh, in a second or third position behind a local bank who had also kind of gotten sucked along for the ride on this. So. So anyway, um, that project ultimately failed in grand fashion, and a lot of, a lot of people would, will remember that, um, it's, uh, it's kind of where I cut my teeth in in terms of the county government in, in, uh, articulating the, um, you know, the issues surrounding that and to the Board of Supervisors and, you know, here's why. You, you know, you leave lending to the professionals and local governments are not that good at it and so forth. Right. Um, another grant was to, um. Uh, construct 12 homes in in Lassen county and and, um, uh, sell them or make them available to lower income people. Um, four in Beaver, four in Doyle, as I recall, in four in Westwood. And you know and you'll know from your, your, your, your business. Um, when, uh, local or state government does a public works project, they are required to, to, um, pay, uh, prevailing wage. And, and I always use quotes when I say prevailing wage because it's, it's never the prevailing rate of rate of wage in the local area. Right. 

Speaker 2 [00.16.21]: Yeah. It's it's union wages is what it really is in the 

Speaker 1 [00.16.24]: city. It's. Yeah, pretty much what it is. Yeah, yeah. So anyway, we, we built these, you know, the idea was to build these $80,000 homes at a cost of about $150,000, and then sell them to people that were creditworthy and couldn't afford them and hope to get repaid. 

Speaker 2 [00.16.43]: Again. Again? What could go wrong? Right? Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, part of the notion of a lot of these grants were that, um, they had to be made to people that were otherwise creditworthy because it was unfair to compete with the bank. So, you know, so there they were. So and this is a maybe a long way of explaining to you why I'm why often I'm seen as the cynic in terms of, um, uh, of grants and economic development, that sort of thing. But yeah. But anyway, uh, so, so during the course of all that I had, um, you know, it became my role to, to address the Board of Supervisors and kind of explain, you know, the ramifications of doing certain things. And then both of those instances the county ended up having to take, you know, essentially taxpayer, local taxpayer money to repay those grants because the terms and conditions of them were not met. And how that, you know, and how that impacts other services by the county 100%. 

Speaker 1 [00.17.45]: Yeah. And and which is, um, you know, it was a real eye opener for me in terms of how you, you, uh, and you see it today, a lot of people, you know, see a great opportunity to go do something and, and, um, and there's so many strings attached that it ends up costing money and not achieving the goal that you wanted. Right? So I've become, over the years, very I don't want to say cynical, but very cautious about those sorts of. Yeah. Um, and, and during the course of that, I, you know, I made many, many presentations to the Board of Supervisors and analysis about risk and costs and so forth. And, um. And I guess I know I'm, I'm getting way off the topic here, but but I back to the ranch. I never envisioned I'd get that involved in county in county business. At that point in my career, I really just needed a job for a few years until I. Yeah. Yeah. Make a living doing that? Yeah. But, uh, at the shortly after that, the the county administrative officer that was there at the time, a fellow named Bill Bixby had seen me, um, doing what I was doing and my analytical skills and my presentation and so forth, and said, you know, hey, would you I want to he said, I want to create a position that, um, essentially addresses the county budget in a holistic way. And, you know, back at the time, the county budget was about $40 million. It's, you know, a fraction of what it is today. But it was still complex, a lot of, um, revenue sources and a lot of different priorities. And, and, you know, I want, you know, one person to kind of have a handle on that. And, and after, you know, working and my prior position was, um, was housed in the planning, uh, and building department and, um, you know, I would have taken after some of these grant things, I would have been happy being the spotter at the landfill. And so when the county administrative officer came to me and said, hey, I kind of like what I see, would you come over or work for me? I, I jumped at the opportunity. Oh I bet. You know. And absolutely. And so glad I did. Um, so I went over there and, you know, kind of got involved in, in the purchasing and the personnel management and, and a lot of the funding, um, issues that, that are, you know, can be pretty complex in the county and. Did some refinancing. You know, we did some things back then where interest rates had come down. We had a jail that we had a big note on. And and I took on as a project, refinancing that and saving a lot of money just in interest savings. Oh, amazing. A couple other projects. We built a juvenile hall and and and things, some special projects like that. That's kind of where I, you know, I guess I, I transitioned from, uh, this is a job to make a little money and buy a few cows to right to a professional career where I, you know, where I'm going to spend a lot of time. Yeah. And. Yeah. And so, you know, and it's amazing how fast time passes when you look back on it. 

Speaker 2 [00.21.08]: Yeah. Because I was I was just doing the math in 94. And then I mean, you, you, you, you retired obviously here in December of 24. And that makes sense. It's like 30 years of service. Right. So. 

Speaker 1 [00.21.20]: Right. Um, I, I've always felt like you were too young to be retiring, but 30 years of public service is a lot. Uh, especially, uh, uh, it's not easy. You know, you go in front of the board all the time, you know, and, uh, having to justify the decisions and people second guessing you all the time, and, uh, you know, that's their job. I get that, too. But at the same time, it's it's got to be exhausting, you know? Always being second guessed. You know, for 30 years. And you seem to have really deftly, uh. 

Speaker 2 [00.21.50]: Navigated that political 

Speaker 1 [00.21.53]: because, you know, these these county positions are political, right? You have to get along with with all the people and ultimately the board. Board 

Speaker 2 [00.22.01]: can. Well, is that true? Is I don't want to talk out of turn here. Can the board fire the CEO position? 

Speaker 1 [00.22.09]: Yeah. So, um, and I have held many positions within the county, but in most recently that I retired from the county executive position, uh, works directly at the will of the Board of Supervisors. Okay. Yeah. And yeah. So it's there, you know, it's the role of the executive to execute the board's will. And, you know, fortunately, most of the time in my career, I was I would say I had similar philosophy and was like minded most of the time with the board. So that, um, made that easier. Yeah. Yeah. Do that. 

Speaker 2 [00.22.47]: Well, I think I think what's critical in that is that that ranching background that you have and not, you know, I unfortunately, a lot of people that I think ascend through government have just always been employees. And, you know, there's a lot of great examples of people that have done an amazing job at that. But there's also a lot of examples of people that have never, you know, have never had to make a budget work. They've never had to, you know, hey, guess what? Fertilizer just went up 25% overnight and we got to figure out how to get through it. Um, and a lot of the things that, you know, you deal with in ranching, there's not enough cash to cover it. How am I going to get to the other end? I've got to feed my cattle. I've got to plant my crops. I've got to do those things. And and and rural, 

Speaker 1 [00.23.35]: rural, 

Speaker 2 [00.23.36]: northern, northeastern rural California people are figuring that out every day. And and I will say that I feel like last county compared to most counties is really well run economically. 

Speaker 1 [00.23.47]: And, uh, yeah, that's a 

Speaker 2 [00.23.49]: direct reflection of your leadership for so many years. And who who taught you, uh, to be a good leader as well? So can you expand on that a little 

Speaker 1 [00.23.58]: bit for us? Yeah, sure. You know, and and getting back to the ranch, you know, you're you're absolutely right. You're, um. And in our instance, in our business. Um, I and I haven't really gotten back to that. But, you know, we started, um, almost immediately once, uh, Holly and I moved back to the area, uh, thinking about and, and, uh, building a concept for, for the cattle business. And we grew it very slowly over the last 30 years. We started with, uh, um, I went up to I can remember it like it was yesterday. I drove up to the Modoc auction yard in in Holly's Honda Accord and ready 

Speaker 2 [00.24.40]: to haul from cattle. And I was, uh, then I was sitting in the in the sale yard there, and I had recognized a friend from down here that had taken some cattle up there to sell. And so the light bulb went on that his trailer was probably going to be empty on the way home. And so I said, you know, I said, hey, Ron. What, uh, what are you doing this afternoon? Um, I'm thinking about bidding on some cows. And he goes, oh, nothing. I'm just going to head back. So so I, I bid on the first eight cows that Holly and I bought, and they were eight old broken, mouth bred cows. And I remember buying them and I and I looked back at my friend Ron and he said, that's plenty to fill my trailer. You know, and he brought him back for me. But I guess the point of that is, you know, you're always trying to to make something out of nothing when you're, when you're in that business. But anyway, um, so yeah. Yeah. So the, you know, you're absolutely right that there were a lot of people that helped. Um. Uh, shape my perspective on things, right in, in local government. Um, and there's just really too many to mention, but but I will mention a few. Um, when I was a young and I, I mentioned, you know, my, the first part of my career, that was about the first five years of my career when I worked for planning and then the county administrative officer. And, um, about it was in 1998, actually, uh, the treasurer, tax collector at the time had announced that she was going to retire. And, um, I had some people, uh, in the county that other the department heads that I had worked with. Um, Ron Gerald is kind of a famous sheriff from days gone by, um, Teresa Nagle, Irene Doyle, uh, Ken Bunch, um, who were all, you know, that I really looked up to and admired as far as their leadership. And, you know, they came to me and encouraged me. Hey, why don't you put your run your, you know, put your name in the hat for this, uh, elected position. We, you know, we like, you know, how you present, how you, um, you know, I've always been kind of a straightforward person, right? I hope to work and and, uh, a lot due to, to, you know, seeing some of those people and how they operated and, and, um, and I mentioned, uh, Bill Bixby, the county executive at the time, um, also just a, you know, a real he's gone now. Um, but he was an old school, uh, straightforward, no nonsense, uh, no, um, you know, no coddling, no nothing kind of guy. Right and. Right. Yeah. And, uh, I really learned a lot from him about the hard truths about, uh, public service and. So so anyway, with the encouragement of those people and also just a lot of, um, you know, local, uh, residents and supporters and friends and family, I said, okay, I guess, you know, I, I guess I'm in this county thing. I'm going to I'm going to run for the, the tax collector position. Right. And, you know, and, and, uh, little did I know at the time when I signed up, I was going to be running against the, um, the chairman of the board of supervisors, my wife and the assistant tax collector at the time. So what could go wrong? 

Speaker 1 [00.28.14]: Yeah, it wasn't a, you know, it wasn't a slam dunk shoo in, uh, election. And I, I, um, I often say, um, you know, everybody should run for public office once, and, uh, but if you do it twice, you're probably crazy. Because, uh, it's, you know, it's extremely rewarding to find, uh, people in the community that that you don't even know, that support you, that support you and what you believe in and what. Yeah, what you stand for and, and but again. And then it's also very. And I was at a young age, I was 

Speaker 2 [00.28.54]: um. Pick 31. Okay. Ran for the office. And so, you know. I mean, looking back, I wasn't as mature as I am now about a lot of things. And you find, you know, your friends are supporting your opponent and, you know, people that you thought were you, you know, you were your diehard supporters or not. You you go through this, um, emotional roller coaster during that period of time. But but anyway, I was successful. So, so I was elected to that position and, and right around the same time that we, uh, my wife and I had our son Nathan, uh, and so and, you know, and I'll digress just a little bit there on the on the family side, too. Um, you know, when you can't do the kinds of, um, careers that I have had, um, and, and accomplish the things in terms of business without a supportive family and, you know, and I've been blessed and I think you have as well with, with the family that, um, believe in you and support you and, you know, kind of pick up the slack when you're, when you're not able to. Yeah. So I give them especially my wife, a lot of credit, but also my son, um, you know, grown and, um. 

Speaker 1 [00.30.19]: Off doing his own thing. But but anyway. So yeah. So I did that I, I. And I being the, um, treasurer tax collector of rural California county, um, is by far the best job in the county, but bar none and I've had several. 

Speaker 2 [00.30.38]: See, I would just I mean, my knee jerk assumption would be that people are pissed at you that they're having the you're raising their taxes and they're having to write checks to you. And, uh, I know I'm never happy writing the massive checks that we write to Lassen County for, for the tax stuff. And that's never a fun time for me. So, uh, help me out with why you would define that as one of the best jobs. Yeah. You know, there's some an element of that, I'll grant that. Um, but there's, there's a lot of sides to the to the office and the treasurer side, which doesn't get as much. Um, you know, billing as the tax collector side is really an important and interesting component. Um, it's you're, you're entrusted with, um, you know, keeping safe, keeping the money of the county, which, you know, back then was 40 million. Now it's about 150 or so. Yeah. And investing that and and guarding it. Um, you're also not as an elected official. Elected treasure. You're not. Um. You don't have a thumb on you by a board or a supervisor or or you're you're essentially, um, empowered to operate your department the way that you think it should be, you know, within obviously within certain boundaries. Sure. Um, and you get to see I think, um, people like yourself, you get to see the people that, in my view, the public servants are really working for the people that are paying the bills. Yeah. And, you know, the homeowners and the business owners and, you know, you get to see them twice a year coming in. Yeah. Granted, they're not always happy, but they are good people. And you know, you mentioned earlier, you know, you know, sometimes you're when you're a public servant, you've got the people that say, you know, I pay your salary and you work for me. And, and I got to say, um, categorically. And you get to see as tax collector, you get to see who actually pays the big tax bills and who doesn't. It's true. It's very often the ones that are, are not paying, uh, the tax bills or, um, paying a very small tax bill. They're the most local ones. And, and the, you know, the ones that are, you know, paying the multi-million dollar tax bills are, are, you know, some of the most, uh, generous and. Best people that you see 

Speaker 1 [00.33.05]: the other side. And I always felt like I did more economic development as a tax collector than I ever did back in planning. Um, I and I was very aggressive about, um, selling tax delinquent property, and not because I enjoyed kicking widows out of their home. Right. Right. Yeah. Yeah. But because when you. I saw it over, you know, the 15 years that I was a tax collector, you would have, for example, uh, you know, a dilapidated home in a neighborhood or dilapidated piece of property with an absentee landowner or, you know, a landowner who had gone to prison or what have you. Right. That wasn't paying their taxes. And we'd conduct a tax sale, and you would have a lot of people, um, you know, the neighbors in the neighborhood or entrepreneurs or, you know, people that just are, you know, trying to make something out of nothing, come and buy that property at a tax sale for, you know, a small amount of money. Put a bunch of sweat equity into it and either live in it, rent it out, or resell it, and you drive by those homes, you know, maybe a year or two after you sold this fallen down thing and there's a, you know, there's a nice home. And yeah, somebody made a few bucks and yeah, you know, and most importantly, 

Speaker 2 [00.34.24]: you didn't start the degeneration of an entire sector of the community. You know, and that's and that's how it starts is, you know, one place going completely dilapidated, weeds growing everywhere, trash piling up, and God forbid, homeless people starting to live there and everything else. And then pretty soon it's almost like a cancer that seems like it spreads. And I feel like that philosophy you took really attack that at the root cause before it could get out of 

Speaker 1 [00.34.49]: hand. Yeah. You know, and a lot of my friends would joke about how much I enjoy. So. I guess there's a little bit of truth to that. But yeah, there's 

Speaker 2 [00.34.59]: a good reason. I mean, and yes, it's. Yeah. So there's, there's terrible things that happen to people and you got to have empathy for that. You know, And I know you do. I know you well enough that you've had empathy for that kind of stuff. But your responsibility is to the greater good of your community and your county. And so that's why you've got to do the heart. It's it's like in my business, it's like letting go a maybe talented but cancerous member of our team, right? I mean, it hurts. I think if you ever are in the place where it's easy to let people go or it's easy to sell property like that, that you probably shouldn't be doing it. But when you remind yourself you have an obligation to do it for the greater good. In my case of our team and of our of our company culture, in your case, to a whole community and to a county, then then you've got to suck it up and do it, you know. And so that's how I sleep at night. I'm sure that's probably very similar philosophies of what you're talking about here. Yeah, yeah. And during my time as, as tax collector and I sincerely really did enjoy it. Um, I also had the opportunity to we. Brought in some efficiencies to the to the department and and, you know, little things but things like, um, you know, making taxes payable online and and improving the, the systems that we utilized for assessment and collection and that sort of thing. Yeah. And and it did a really I feel like we did a really good job and set the stage for how that needs to be done and that there's certainty. And then, um, if you don't pay your taxes, there's consequences. And and not in a mean fashion, but just that there is certainty that everybody's going to pay their share. And, and I felt like we really we really did a good job there. And I also had the opportunity to get involved in some of the risk management of the county, which isn't really a traditional, um, treasurer tax collector role. Um, but but I was interested in it. And there is a component of investment and because of the self-insured nature of local governments. And so I, I got involved in that on behalf of the county, um, to try to mitigate some of the costs of insurance. And I know, you know, in your business. Oh, oh, my God, it's brutal. 

Speaker 1 [00.37.18]: Yeah. Workman's comp and liability and property. 

Speaker 2 [00.37.22]: Oh it's insane. It's a yeah, it's a growing cost. And and so um, in the, in the public sector in the, in the county government, um, we formed several or two, primarily two joint powers authorities between, uh, rural counties and larger counties to self-insured and administer our own workman's comp, uh, program. And, um, you know, and, you know, just as kind of a. Insight into how that works. You know, when you hire a third party administrator, as a lot of jurisdiction did in administering workman's comp, um, that third party administrator gets compensated based on how many cases there are. And so there's, you know, there's almost like a conflict of interest. 

Speaker 1 [00.38.17]: Yeah. Settling those cases 100%. Yeah. And so we you know, we took the approach that, you know, I don't like workman's comp. I think there's a lot of bad, um, claims that are made, frankly. Um, and they need to be challenged. But at the end of the day, um, the foremost, um, cost savings measure is to process them through the process and get them, get them taken care of and off the books. And so I really involve myself in that a little bit. Um, and I think that, you know, that's, that's proven to be a good strategy. We can the county continues that today. Um, but in so doing, um, and, you know, boards of supervisors are a very unique, um, body, uh, I guess, to say the least. But of course, 

Speaker 2 [00.39.06]: they're all section of the community. So of course is going to be interesting, right? Yeah. And, and, you know, some of some of my favorite people, um, in the world were on the boards of supervisors and some people that weren't. Yeah, and everything in between. Right. But, um, you know, from time to time, over the course of my career as tax collector, the board would, um, either they would have a vacancy in the county executive position, and that could be because they fired him. Because they they got mad or, you know, for one reason or another. And but oftentimes without, um, you know, without a real succession plan. Right. So these do come around. And then the executives fired and, and then the board would go, oh, hey, we don't have an executive. Yeah. And, and several times they look to me to, to kind of fill in the role, uh, on an interim basis, like, you know, Richard, would you kind of keep the wheels on the bus while we recruit and hire? Right. And I did that several times. And I, you know, I think probably because of my background with the budget and some other things that, yeah, it was valuable to the organization to do that. And, and each time I will say, you know, there were, you know, one or more board members that said, hey, you know, maybe you ought to just apply for the permanent job. And at the time, I'm thinking, you know, I got a son in high school. I, you know, I need to work a few more years. Yeah. I don't know if I'm ready to be. And, yeah, 

Speaker 1 [00.40.31]: I want to wake up every day and wonder if I'm looking for a job. You know, so I, I, I didn't I didn't do it initially. Um, but, um. You know, as time went on and I became more involved and involved in things, um, about, uh, I think it was my fourth term as a tax collector. Um, they had this episode where there was a suddenly a vacancy in the, in the executive office, and they asked me to be interim, and I, you know, I said, yeah, sure. And, and and then I thought about it and I said, you know what? I'm, I'm kind of tired of just seeing executives come and go. I think I want to, you know, put my name out there and, and see if maybe I can bring some stability to it. Yeah. And, you know, unfortunately, at the time, the board agreed. And they and they hired me to do that. 

Speaker 2 [00.41.21]: And now I want to be clear. You you keep calling it the executive position. Are you talking about the CEO position or is this. 

Speaker 1 [00.41.28]: Yeah the same. Yeah. I used the term interchangeable, but county administrator is the county executive. Um, in, in in the titles are are interchangeable. 

Speaker 2 [00.41.40]: Understood. Yeah. I'm tracking now. Okay. 

Speaker 1 [00.41.42]: Perfect. And, um, so, uh, so that's, uh, that's what I did. And that was, you know, and I didn't, you know, at that time I was in my. Uh. Mid to late 40s. Okay. When I took on the position. 

Speaker 2 [00.41.58]: What? What year was that, then? Roughly. 

Speaker 1 [00.42.01]: Uh. I'm sorry. 2014. 2000. Okay. And, you know, by, um, by county executive standards. Pretty young. Pretty pretty young. I, I could, you know, remember, um, going to the statewide meetings and, and seeing all these old guys that were in the same position that I was in. 

Speaker 2 [00.42.23]: Yeah. Yeah. Um, but, um, you know, and so that role is, you know, it's far different than being an elected, uh, department head and that you're really, um, subordinate to the Board of Supervisors. You. Right. You. The way I always viewed the role was that I was an advisor to the board and an analyst and and provided them what I thought was the best course of action. Different alternatives. Um, but at the end of the day, executing their their action. Yep. Um, and like I said earlier, you know, most of the time I, I, I was like minded. And so it was easy. Right. But there's a, you know, there's a lot of personnel management and I know I'm, I'm not telling you anything, but yeah, there's a lot 

Speaker 1 [00.43.16]: there. It is just really, um, uh, all consuming effort sometimes. Is it fair to say in that executive position, as you call it? Um, is it fair to say that you are? You're basically the the filter between well and and the safety net between the county employees and yourself. Right. So the so the board would the board if they want somebody gone in a certain position, they kind of have to go through. Explain how that process works. They go through. 

Speaker 2 [00.43.50]: Yeah. You have to do that. They can't just fire them directly. Correct. 

Speaker 1 [00.43.53]: Right. So, so very, um, it's a little more complicated than than you might think, but there's basically three categories of, of county officers. Um, you have, you know, you have your elected officers, your, uh, treasurer, auditor, sheriff, district attorney, clerk. Okay. And those are, you know, they're they're elected by the people. Um, the county executive has some oversight over their personnel. Okay. Some oversight and their budget. Um, then you have, um, board appointed, uh, department heads, which are appointed by the Board of Supervisors, and that would be like your, until recently, your fair manager, any commissioner, chief probation officer, uh, veteran service officer. And I'm probably missing one there, but but those are appointed by the Board of Supervisors and, um, supervised in some fashion by the county executive and their their personnel and their budgets, their supervisor. Then you have, um, the the direct reports to the county executive, and those would be, um, you know, some of the larger departments and by far the bulk of the employees, that would be health and social service departments, um, planning and building, uh, the road department. Um, and that that's predominantly it, but that's by. By far the bulk of the employees. Okay. Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah. So that so. Um, but generally speaking, in, in, in having worked with, um, you know, elected, appointed and, you know, directly appointed, um, department heads generally there's a really good, um, uh, cooperation between personnel administration and those department heads because, um, because personnel management, particularly when it comes to terminations and discipline, that sort of thing is, is a minefield and very complicated. So. So if elected sheriff or elected Da might say, hey, I got a problem over here, but I don't I'm not an expert in this. I need, you know, a personnel an HR specialist to help out. So there's generally some really good, uh, cooperation and not a lot of disagreement when it comes to those sorts of decisions. But but you're right in that, um, a lot of those decisions ultimately come to the executive for, for making, um, you know, in terms of hiring, firing, um, discipline operations and that sort of thing. And there is does provide a level of insulation, um, from the Board of Supervisors. 

Speaker 2 [00.46.38]: Gotcha. Okay. 

Speaker 1 [00.46.40]: Excellent, excellent. Well, 

Speaker 2 [00.46.44]: so all right, let's get back to your ranch here just a little bit, because we kind of started Start talking about the county here. So. So how first of all, how big is your ranch? Who? You had five siblings. So all of you guys are equal owners. Uh, and then thinking I talked off camera a while ago about what? Your succession plan, which was pretty hilarious to me. So maybe I can get you to. Maybe I'll get you to share that with us one more time. But so talk us through that a little bit since we kind of jumped around here a little 

Speaker 1 [00.47.10]: bit. Yeah. So, um, our family, uh, business structure is kind of complex, but, uh, but it all boils down to, um, you know, we have the home family ranch here that my mom had. Right. And, and and three of us, my twin brother Joe and my brother Dave bought the ranch from my mother when she decided to move down closer to to my sister and my other brother down in Sacramento. Okay. This is, uh, gosh, 25 years ago now. And so we we bought it, but separately, we don't we we have a couple of family partnerships, but we generally speak and we own everything individually. Okay. And so, you know, Holly and I have a herd of cows. My brother Joe has a herd of cows, my brother Dan has a herd of cows. And and we we owned some real estate together. Um, we lease a lot of, uh, pasture together. 

Speaker 2 [00.48.05]: Uh, lease out or lease to run your cattle on. 

Speaker 1 [00.48.08]: We rent to put our cattle. Understood. And the way our operation works is, is, um. We were. We started out as a cow calf kind of operation where, um, we would, you know, breed cows, have calves and sell the calves as as wieners. Um, when they get weaned off the cow and then do it all again, you know, have that cow calf every year. Um, and, and we've kind of expanded that over the last 20 years to now where we, we, uh, retain ownership on all of our cattle all the way through the cycle until they're harvested. We we send them to, um, to, uh, Colorado. We have a relationship with a feedlot there where we we have them custom fed and and market them back there. Oh, wow. The lifecycle of our cows is we we have a we've acquired a lot of federal grazing permits up actually in Plumas County, predominantly some in Lassen County. But we're in the summertime. Uh, we take the cows and the. Well, maybe I'll start in the in the winter. That's probably a better way to to approach it. Our, our cows calve for the most part. And there's some notable exceptions to this. But for the most part they have in in January and February. Okay. And they're down in the Sacramento Valley at that time. We lease pasture down there. Um, the cows, uh, for the most part, all go down to, um, we graze cattle in, I think seven different counties now. Wow. Pretty much wherever we can find pasture. And so the cows will will calve down there. Um, we'll we'll brand them and and process the cattle down in the valley. And then in the early summer. May. June. We'll bring them up the cows and calves up onto the forest permits, which is a federal, you know, a lot of federally owned land and some some private leases that we have up there. Um, in they've been all right in the middle of all the recent fires that we've all heard about. Yeah, absolutely. But, uh, we, uh, we graze them up there until fall. Then we'll bring them down to, to the kind of the Susanville area where we have we own on some land, and we also lease additional land, and that's where we'll kind of we will wean those calves, um, get them processed and prepared to go to the feedlot in Colorado. Okay. In December ish, we'll send those cattle to, uh, to Colorado, and they'll finish out their, their life cycle there and get harvested there, you know, the next, uh, July in most cases. And then we'll take the cows and we'll, we'll ship them back down to the Sacramento Valley and start the process over again. Um, and in, in our case, because of, you know, the whole family has kind of been, um. In the agriculture business, but also in other professions. One of my brothers is an attorney, and my twin brother, Joe, that I do a lot with is a is a is a banker. We have kind of our business model has been really to, um, hire independent contractors to do a lot of, um, what you might think is traditionally would be done by, you know, by operator who we hire virtually all of our, our trucking. I know we've talked about that. Yeah. In the past. And I always joke about, you know, maybe I'll just buy a truck when I retire, but I'll ask them. But, uh, but we hire all of our trucking. We hire a lot of our, um, farming or okay, harvesting of our hay and our big farming and that sort of thing. And, and we've kind of been, I guess, kind of forced to do it that way because most of us, all of us have been, um, in our own professions and kind of too busy to really, to really do all of that. But but we do really enjoy, um, you know, that aspect of it. And I'm really looking forward in retirement to being able to spend more, more time doing that. Yeah. But that's kind of the the business model that we have. And and you know, I mentioned we started Holly and I started with eight cows back in 1994, I think. And. And we have steadily grown over the years. Holly and I have got about 600 mother cows now. 

Speaker 2 [00.52.38]: Oh that's amazing. 

Speaker 1 [00.52.40]: And my brothers also have a similar herd sizes and so. So it's a it's kind of a a chore to just keep feed in front of that many cows without using a lot of feeding a lot of hay, which is expensive. 

Speaker 2 [00.52.58]: So tell me, tell me with what your model. How many roughly acres does that do you guys kind of have to try and force for grazing? And I understand you supplement with some hay, but 

Speaker 1 [00.53.10]: what look look like 

Speaker 2 [00.53.11]: acreage wise for the non ag person to try and figure out how to make that 

Speaker 1 [00.53.15]: work. Yeah. And it's it's kind of all over the board you know in the, in the grazing permits up on the forest. And we graze about 800 cows give or take up on the Plumas Forest on a, on a normal summer and it's in, you know, a 75 or 80,000 acres. It's just a big, really 

Speaker 2 [00.53.37]: big. Yeah. Yeah, but probably not a lot of feed. Right? Right, right. And, you know, the cattle really have to travel. Um, down in the Sacramento Valley. It's more like, um, 10 to 20 acres per cow. Okay. For the winter season. And then in some of the irrigated grounds, um, that we also rent you in the fall and some of the hay grounds and stuff. It might be, you know, two acres to the cow. So it really it really varies. It's more about, um, you know, the, the feed availability than it is the number of acres. And we always talk in terms of, of animal unit months in terms of carrying capacity versus how many acres, because, you know, an acre out in, um, you know, out in the desert is right. Doesn't, you know, equate to an acre of Irrigated alfalfa. Yeah. So and, you know, and part of that, you know, part of the business is kind of understanding that when you we've like I mentioned, we lease a lot of land and, and more and more most of our landlords, uh, you know, some of them are, are literally, uh, Chinese owned, some are, uh, people that, you know, are complete absentee owners. I can think of really only 1 or 2 out of all the land that released that are really, um, involved in agriculture. And so, um, and they don't always know what they, what the capacity of their property is or what have you. And, and so it's really important part of what we do is trying to evaluate what, what we think we can make work. Yeah. 

Speaker 1 [00.55.16]: We've also, um, you know, fortunately, I guess fortunately, the state of California is acquired just an enormous amount of ranch land over the last 30 years. And, you know, and lo and behold, a lot of these lands that they were acquired are subject to fire. And so, you know, recently, over the last several years, the Department of Fish and Wildlife has decided that, uh, you know, cattle are maybe not such a bad thing. And they're going to, you know, bid out some grazing on these on these, uh, properties that they've owned. Um, and so we've engaged in, uh, bidding a lot of those properties to, to graze cattle. We've been successful in, in obtaining some of those. Oh that's great. Yeah. And I think that's, you know, it's one kind of bright spot, I think, in the state management. Yeah, they're doing that. Unfortunately they're not doing a lot of that in the Lassen County area. They are down in the Sacramento Valley in particular areas. So 

Speaker 2 [00.56.18]: do you think that's a direct result of of fire and then kind of correlating some fire resiliency to grazing? 

Speaker 1 [00.56.26]: It definitely is. I in some of the areas where we lease um without cattle you've got decadent. Dry grass in those foothill areas. That's just. Yeah, ripe to burn. Yeah. And also, it, um, the cattle, you know, some of that decadent, um, vegetation, even if it doesn't burn, is really not that great for wildlife. Very true. It's healthy to have some diversity. So, yeah, we've been engaging in that. And, and, um, you know, a lease with a private landowner oftentimes is a handshake and a check and, and, you know, and you unload the cows and, and and away you go. And but dealing with, um, you know, some of the agencies, uh, the bid packet and I know you're familiar with bidding, bidding state and federal jobs, you know, to if you enter into a grazing lease, sometimes you have an inch thick binder of, uh, yes. You know, we've been, you know, we've been, I think, pretty good at being able to wade through some of that stuff and be successful. Yeah, 

Speaker 2 [00.57.33]: yeah. That's amazing. 

Speaker 1 [00.57.35]: That's that's part of our part of our model. And, um, we utilize, um, you know, a lot of dogs and horses and one of my, um. You know, favorite things is is getting out there and and and working my dogs and my horses. And I'm really looking forward in retirement to doing something. Yeah, 

Speaker 2 [00.57.57]: yeah. Because dogs dogs need work and they need that continual thing. But there's nothing more rewarding than seeing a dog that you've worked and and doing its job. And because they just thrive, they just love doing their job. And, uh, you can almost just see the happiness radiate off of them when they're out there doing their job. 

Speaker 1 [00.58.15]: Yeah. Yeah. Really cool. 

Speaker 2 [00.58.18]: Okay. So let's take a second here and transition. Right. So we've talked about kind of your story and uh, the ranch and then kind of your, your, uh, community, um, uh, service, uh, through the Lassen County. Um, so part of this so what this part of this podcast is about is, you know, we've talked about some of the great things and a few of the challenges, of course, with, with where we live. But, you know, so why don't you contrast for me? Uh, You and Holly have have a couple that haven't been to this area. Kind of highlight what would be the perfect weekend to kind of show them where we live and what makes it great, and kind of talk me through how you and Hollywood approach that. 

Speaker 1 [00.58.59]: Yeah. You know, I was thinking about that kind of just thinking about what we were going to talk about today. You know, because I, I listened to your podcast that you did with, with Mike, okay. For temperature 

Speaker 2 [00.59.11]: that day and, uh, I wasn't sure. I wasn't sure if you know what, Michael, you I was expecting this could go 1 or 2 ways. This could be absolutely a wild, crazy ride. Or. And he actually was fairly subdued, and he did a great job. He did an amazing job, but I didn't know what else to expect. I was really looking forward to it. But, 

Speaker 1 [00.59.28]: uh, yeah, unfortunately it wasn't 

Speaker 2 [00.59.30]: feeling so great, but he still did an amazing job. But anyway, go ahead, go ahead. I mean, 

Speaker 1 [00.59.35]: you know, um, I, I my perfect weekend, you know, I, I love Lassen County. I consider it my home. I've been here my whole life, I, I enjoy, um. Not just the scenery, although it's beautiful and we have Holly and I have a home that looks out over, um, Thompson Pete or looks at Thompson Pete, Diamond Mountain and to the east, out to the desert and and, um, great sunsets and sunrises and and we really enjoy I really enjoy more and more being at home. But but, um, as far as, you know, things to do. My the most enjoyment that I get, um, from the community is really, um, the social interaction with people that I've known, you know, in some cases for ten minutes. And sometimes, you know, my entire life, I'm, uh, I'm involved, as you are in, in the Rotary Club and cattlemen's organizations and chambers of commerce, and and, um, my perfect time is to go out and socialize with those, you know, friends and neighbors that I work with or know or, you know, their families. And, and we would just really enjoy it, spending time. With friends. I, you know, I do like to go hunting once in a while. Not I wouldn't consider myself to be an avid hunter. Yeah, um, but there's there's lots of time to do that. We, like I mentioned, we graze our cattle up on the Plumas Forest. Uh, we'll take our travel trailer up there for the weekend and, you know, and do some work and play at the same time. Yeah, and and those sorts of things we, you know, we love to go to, to help friends brand their cattle or gather. Do you know those? I guess what you know might seem somewhat boring things, but those are kind of the things we enjoy. We. Yeah, we enjoy having, uh, rotary parties at our house and having, you know, the, the community leaders come and and enjoy them. So. Yeah. 

Speaker 2 [01.01.44]: No. That's amazing. And, you know, I, I'm always telling people, you know, we live in God's country, right. And that's just, uh, where we get to live. You know, my wife and I travel quite a bit, you know? I mean, we all obviously have friends that travel a lot more than us, but, you know, we've been to, you know, we've been to Europe, we've been to, you know, um, Hawaii. We've been to these different places. And, uh, every time I come home, I'm like, God dang, where do we live? It's just so beautiful. And then. And then the flip side of that is, I realize that maybe it's getting older or whatever, but my tolerance for being stuck in traffic and and going going literally 400ft, hitting a stoplight and then go another 400ft and hit a stoplight. And I'm just I can literally feel the seconds of my life ticking away in traffic. And that's something we just don't deal with here. I mean, people talk about, I tell them how big the, you know, territory we cover, just between, you know, Bernie Altura, Susanville is kind of the our, you know, triangle quadrant that I spend most of my time in, uh, with our work. And, uh, it's like, oh, man, it must take you so long. And I'm like, actually, no, it's an hour and a half. And, uh, the only time that I made deal with any traffic is when it's snowing, you know, it's slowing you down. That's about an Or or Richards pushing cattle across the road. And I got to wait for the cattle. You know, I mean, that's, uh, it's just incredible. Uh, two days ago, I was. We're working on highway 36, right? Um. At that overlook at Lake Almanor there on highway. That's where we're working through that area. The job goes from Westwood to, yeah, Westwood to the Chester Causeway there. And, you know, I've got some pictures of of us working and it's got, it's got, you know, Lake Almanor on Lassen and all these snowy peaks. And it's just I mean, my gosh, we are so blessed to get to work and live. And I'm like, I can't believe this is called work. You know, people would pay to just come have these views and we get to do it for a living. So 

Speaker 1 [01.03.45]: yeah, yeah. You know, when you when you retire, someday people will begin to ask you like they've been asking me. Well, now that you and Holly are retired, where are you going to move to? And and your response is always the same. You know, I find me a better place and I'm open to entertaining it, but for now, I. I haven't found one. So I'm sticking right here. Yeah, I 

Speaker 2 [01.04.11]: yeah, I really feel like we were just so absolutely blessed. Okay, so there's one more topic that I want to make sure that I cover with you just because I'm a I'm an aviation junkie. So I, we talked about your son. So just share. Share with us here a little bit about what sons doing and kind of what his career path is because, 

Speaker 1 [01.04.29]: uh, sure, I 

Speaker 2 [01.04.30]: loved I loved hearing about 

Speaker 1 [01.04.31]: that a little bit. Yeah. So so Holly and I have have one son, um, Nathan. And, you know, he he grew up on the ranch doing ranch kids stuff and for FFA, and having a mom as a FFA advisor didn't, didn't hurt. Um, you know, he, um, you know, he's. He's the joy of our life. You know, as most parents would say, right. You know, and I think as parents, you kind of always, you know, you want your kid maybe to follow in your footsteps or, you know, take over the family business or or what have you. But and I felt I fell into that category. You know, I there's nothing I would, would like better than to have him, you know, want to be, uh, want to do what I'm doing. But, um, but, you know, as, as fate happens, right? You know, uh, and, and Nathan does really enjoy some of the ranch stuff, but he doesn't, uh, at least currently. And he's, he's 25 years old, so he's, you know, still, still it's still a kid. But but he went away to college, uh, in San Diego and got a degree in business there. Um, and worked down there for a while. Really loved San Diego. I mean, what's not to like in terms of when you're when you're in your early 20s? But, um, and then, uh, decided to change course about a year ago, um, wasn't, you know, didn't want to stick with the business, uh, position that he had and decided to do what I consider to be kind of a 180 degree turn and and go to a commercial flight school. And so he's in, in Texas right now, um, going to flight school and hoping to, to to get through with that in about a year and become a commercial pilot, which, you know, not something I would have predicted or. Yeah, or thought, but I'm, you know, as a parent, you just kind of, I think, need to be happy that your kids are being successful and happy and we sure are. And that's where it kind of worked. You were, I think, asking me the other day about what the succession plan was for the for the ranch. And I said, well, you know, there's still some hope maybe that Nathan will want to come back and take over, but if not, I guess I'm I'm going to have to stay young enough until there's some grandkids to recruit. Yeah. That's 

Speaker 2 [01.06.54]: amazing. That's amazing. So does he want to fly for the airlines or does he want to fly privately, or does he know yet? Just 

Speaker 1 [01.07.01]: fly. You know, um, he wants to fly commercially. Um. Commercial airlines. Yeah. Yeah, that's that's amazing. You know, some of my friends are, uh, are southwest pilots. One Delta pilot, one southwest pilot. And, uh, I gotta tell you, they have a pretty amazing life. Uh, you know, they both. You know, I was with one of them. We were in Boise, um, at a birthday party of a friends of ours. And, uh, you know, it was. We'd been there for the weekend, and, um, we were having coffee that morning, and, you know, he's on his phone and and, you know, he gets off his phone a little bit, and I'm like. What were you doing? He was like, I was. I was I don't know what the right terminology is, but I was basically picking up a route for this afternoon. I'm going to I'm going to be flying this afternoon. I'm going from here to, you know, I can't remember where he was going. And he was he was going to get a take off there in Boise and was going to, uh, fly to, you know, I think he does a route to Hawaii a lot. And, uh, so and I'm just like, that's just incredible. And he and I said, so you have total control. He's like, we have complete control. You know, we work when we want to work. And so, you know, I booked my calendar out, of course, for a long time. But we knew this weekend was going to be busy. But now we've been off for 3 or 4 days and I'm interested to get back to work. I'm excited to go start flying again. So I just thought, wow, 

Speaker 2 [01.08.21]: that's just, uh, that's pretty 

Speaker 1 [01.08.22]: amazing. Pretty amazing. Yeah. You know, I know, um, you know, and I think you talked with maybe Mike a little bit about, you know, opportunities and, and locally and, and, um, I have maybe a little different perspective on that. You know, a lot of people are often clamor for, you know, we got to find all these jobs for our kids to have so they can stay home. Right. And there's some value to that to, you know, a lot of us would like to like to have family close and that sort of thing. But on the other side of that, I think it's really important, and I think it's a great time in the world for young people to be able to go out and see the world and then come, you know, and then decide if you want to come back. Yeah, I think the happiest people that I know, a lot of them grew up here, but they went away and, and, and because of that kind of value, what we have here. Yeah. Came back with a little different mindset. Yeah. So yeah. Well, the challenge, the challenge with some of the challenges with our area is there's just not a lot to do traditional young people things. Right. There's you know, that's the and whatever you define that and if you're, you know like my oldest son hunts fishes um outdoors. You know, for him, there is no limit to things to do where we live. Right. But if you have 

Speaker 2 [01.09.45]: somebody that's, you know, they want to go to the movies at a big movie theater, they want to, you know what? You know, whatever the things are that, gosh, they're doing so out of tune now, I don't even know what kids do now very well, but they snowboard. Yeah. Yeah. 

Speaker 1: [01.10.01]: Yeah. 

Speaker 2: [01.10.03]: Well, we we grew up on motorcycles. I mean, we went everywhere on motorcycles and then, you know, three winters in the snow and, uh, my gosh, we were always just going and, uh, and so, you know, that area, this area is still. In my mind dominates that. It's just. It seems like, you know, the challenge for us now is that kids 

Speaker 1 [01.10.22]: are attached to screens a lot, right? And they're not really going outside and sometimes taking in what we have. But, uh, I agree, I'll tell you that I've done such a good job. Our succession plans have come before you can come back to work here. You have to go away for a minimum of five years and go prove yourself somewhere else. Right. And, uh, that's what I did. That's what my business partner Weston did, um, before we came back here. And I think I've done it so well. My oldest son is running his own business and lives in Redding, so at least I get to see him regularly. My daughter is absolutely killing it. Uh, in, um, Scotland, she's the youngest senior account manager at the oldest and largest advertising firm in all of Scotland. Uh, so she she's doing amazing. And my youngest son is down in Texas on a really large, uh, construction project. Absolutely loves it down there. And, uh, you know, I. And he's already bought a couple rentals and is really interested in the real estate market. And so, you know, I might have done such a good job that they never come home, which, uh, I don't know. But I will say regarding Nathan. Right. Regarding Nathan, um, and who knows what he's going to do. And it's. And I know you're like me just want to be happy and, uh, and and raise a great family and and live a fulfilling life. Right. That's what we want as parents. Uh, but one thing I, I knew I wasn't ever coming home because my dad was such a dominant force in our business, and, um. And I just felt like he could ever give up any control, you know? That was my. That was my deal. It's like he's never going to give him any, any control at all. And what 

Speaker 2 [01.12.00]: changed that mentality for me was when I had my first child and we were we were living in Stockton and I was working mostly in the East Bay. We lived in a really beautiful area of Stockton, people like Stockton. We lived there. We lived by the college. It was 

Speaker 1 [01.12.16]: beautiful park. I loved it there. However, um, I didn't want to send my kids to school there, you know? And, you know, those of us that have got you could play all three sports if you want to. You can be as active as you want or FFA. Partly protein was absolutely dominant. We were in state contention. If we didn't win it, we were pissed. You know, we were, but we were in state contention every year. Um, there's just so many opportunities that these smaller schools and we never had to go through metal detectors to get to the to get to school, you know, and didn't have to worry about gangs and some of the crazy things these kids have to worry about nowadays. Right. 

Speaker 2 [01.12.51]: So that's what changed it for me. So who knows? Who knows what's in the future for Nathan, right. Who knows? 

Speaker 1 [01.12.56]: You never know. Yeah. Never know. 

Speaker 2 [01.12.59]: Well, Richard, I really want to say thank you for joining the podcast today. Did an incredible job. What an amazing backstory. What an incredible career you have had, not only just in the ranching side of it, but just in, you know, I look at when I look at you, you are like the model of what we all hope 

Speaker 1 [01.13.19]: our, our local 

Speaker 2 [01.13.20]: government looks like. You know, you are approachable. You are, you know, solutions oriented. You know, you are. Hey, how can we solve this? But you also, uh, protect your team and say, hey, these are we've got great staff. They're working their tails off. They're doing a great job, you know, and could really walk that middle ground between, uh, between both worlds, the private world and then kind of that, that public sector world. And, uh, I'm just applaud you on, on, you know, a life well-lived and a career well served. And, uh, and I know you're not done. I know you're just getting started on the ranch and stuff, but I just want to say thank you. And just how impressed I am with, uh, with your career so far. 

Speaker 1 [01.14.03]: Well, thank you for that. And I. You know, one thing, I. I really appreciate that. And I hope I live up to that. And I agree with you. I don't think I've done, you know, three months into retirement, um, you know, it's been wonderful. I'm not I'm not a kid. Um, I haven't had a board day yet, but it's probably not the end for me. Yeah. And one thing I wanted to mention, though, um, because I just kind of touched on it, but a a real big part of my life and my. My social network and my guidance. As far as the true North is, and I know you're a member as well as Mike and Carrie is the Rotary Club. Yeah. And, um, you know, and I, I reluctantly got involved in rotary about, I don't know, 15 years ago or so, um, because I thought it was just this huge commitment and I didn't really have time for at the time. Right. But I'm so glad I did. Yeah. Because the, you know, as you know, um, you know, every week you get to visit with, you know, the leaders of the community that, you know, become your really close friends and people that you can rely on and support. And, and I just wanted to mention that because I, I just think it's such a valuable part of our community that's really under utilized. 

Speaker 2 [01.15.19]: Well, you know, I'll share with you. Um, that's how I really got to know you is through rotary. And, you know, it's funny as just the only time that that I really had interacted with the county is when we're trying to push, you know, through permits on things that we're trying to do. And, you know, sometimes those things are controversial and sometimes they're not, um, but they're never easy. Um, and so, you know, it was and it's just a natural thing that people think I'm like, man, does everybody at that county hate me? Uh, we're really not the bad guys. We're we're really just trying to to employ people and have smooth roads and all that stuff. And, you know, it's just it was it was great to. Yeah. Hey, he's just a regular guy. Just just like just like we are. So anyway, I really enjoyed getting to know you through that, but yeah. Rotary. Great plug for rotary service above self. Right. That's what that's what rotary is all about. And you know put some signs I put the flags out with you you know a couple times and uh yeah. And I, I need to continue to get more involved. And you know, it seems like there's never enough time to do everything that you want to do, but even I'd, I'd highly encourage those people that just have a little bit of time, um, to, to give it a try because. Yeah, it's, it's a great organization that does tremendous things for our 

Speaker 1 [01.16.32]: community. Yeah. Yeah. But thanks for all you do. I just really appreciate your, your, um, the way you're taking on this, um, North State rocks and and putting a, you know, some positive spin on some of the good things that are happening here. And. 

Speaker 2 [01.16.50]: Oh, well, thank you. 

Speaker 1 [01.16.51]: In a world where everything's very negative, you, you you're really doing a good thing here. And I sure appreciate 

Speaker 2 [01.16.58]: it. Yeah. Well. Well thank you, Richard, I really appreciate it means a lot coming from you. And thanks again for your time today. And, uh, and give Holly hug for me. 

Speaker 1 [01.17.05]: And you enjoy the rest of your day, okay?  

Speaker 2 [01.17.09]: Thank you. 

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