When voters go to the ballot box on Tuesday they will have to
choose between proven experience and political rhetoric in the 12th
state Senate District race, Democratic candidate Rusty Areias
said.
When voters go to the ballot box on Tuesday they will have to choose between proven experience and political rhetoric in the 12th state Senate District race, Democratic candidate Rusty Areias said.
Areias, 53, who served as the state Assemblyman representing San Benito County for 12 years, said he is the better choice to represent the county in the state Senate because he has a proven track record and that his Republican opponent Jeff Denham.
“To my knowledge he has never held an elective office before,” Areias said.
Running for the state senate wasn’t sudden. Areias said he has been moving toward the run for a while.
“We have run this campaign like you should run a campaign. We started last Jan. 15, and I’ve taken three days off the whole time,” Areias said. “Every day we’re driving 300 to 400 miles a day, starting early in the morning in coffee shops just talking to people,” Areias said.
He said that unlike his opponent, Areias has put the time in to prove he can do the job.
“In my 12 years in the Assembly I had 103 bills signed by two Republican governors,” Areias said. “I have worked hard for San Benito County in the past and I will do so again if I’m elected to office.”
Areias, who has spent the past four years working as the director of state parks, said it was through his efforts as an assemblyman working with local residents that Caltrans allocated the funding for an overpass at the Highway 25 and U.S. 101 interchange.
“Can you imagine that that used to be a flat surface interchange,” Areias said.
He said that it was also by working with local constituents that he convinced the state to come up with the funding for the Highway 156 bypass, which reduced the amount of semi-truck traffic entering downtown Hollister.
He said that transportation has always been a big issue with him and he knows its importance to San Benito County and the rest of the oddly shaped district, which includes King City, Greenfield, Soledad, Gonzales, Salinas, all of San Benito County, Madera, Atwater, Turlock, Ceres, and a portion of Merced.
“Other than the mountain range in between, this district has many similar needs,” Areias said. “Just as we have many people from San Benito County commuting to the Silicon Valley. There are approximately 14,000 people from Modesto who have to commute to work every day.”
He said many of them commute to the Bay Area along Highway 152, which he helped secure the funding for its widening.
He said transportation has become a critical issue for communities throughout the district.
“As people are being forced to commute farther and farther to work everyday we need a reliable way to get people there so that they are spending less time commuting and more time with their families,” Areias said. “I’m also a big advocate for the bullet train in the Central Valley.”
Areias said he would also work for a commuter rail line connecting Hollister with Caltrain in Gilroy.
