If someone calls Robert Scattini a good old boy, he considers
the source before passing judgment.
From his friends, it’s a compliment, he says. From his foes,
it’s probably a jab
– a reference to his longtime residence in San Benito County, a
contempt for his mostly traditional views. A disdain for his many
alliances and influence.
If someone calls Robert Scattini a good old boy, he considers the source before passing judgment.
From his friends, it’s a compliment, he says. From his foes, it’s probably a jab – a reference to his longtime residence in San Benito County, a contempt for his mostly traditional views. A disdain for his many alliances and influence.
To Scattini – known as Robbie to friends and peers – those attributes speak loudly, in a dignified way, for themselves. It’s who he is, a good old boy, after 60 years in San Benito County, nearly 20 of which have been spent in elected roles.
“I consider myself a good old boy,” said Scattini, 63. “But I have enough sense to understand, too, we have to make changes.”
After a year on the City Council, that sense has become his trademark. Seated on the Council dais, he has questioned. And questioned more.
At times, he has insisted, furiously, that things change. The old way, what he believes was an overly-cozy trust of city staff, was the wrong way.
Scattini, needless to say, is not afraid to speak his mind. He’s a self-proclaimed straight shooter, even if his peers don’t like what he’s saying.
“I’m a doer, I don’t just sit back,” Scattini said. “I say things up there maybe I shouldn’t say.”
He never regrets it, though, he said. And whether his frankness gets him in trouble, he responded, “Just (Tony) Bruscia gets mad at me.”
Though Scattini has encountered a few surprises as a councilman, there isn’t too much about local politics or culture he hasn’t experienced. He has lived here his whole life, except the first two years.
He’s a career cop. At 20, in 1960, he started with the county Sheriff’s Department as a deputy. He moved on to the California Highway Patrol from 1966 to 1983, when he was elected county sheriff.
He lost the 1987 re-election bid by seven votes, but returned to county law enforcement months later when the Board of Supervisors appointed him to the constable position – its term having three years left after the former constable retired.
He won two subsequent elections, while his title was changed to marshal in 1996. And he’s making another run in 2004. The marshal carries out court orders and is the enforcer of the judicial system.
Scattini, though, was never just a cop. He taught criminal justice at Gavilan College for 15 years. He taught traffic school, two nights a week, for 15 years. He has been a member of the Chamber of Commerce since he was 24, and the Elks’ Club since he was 35.
Plus, he’s an airplane owner, and was an airport commissioner for 19 years.
“I love airplanes,” he said. “I’ve been an airplane buff since I was a little kid.”
It was during his 40-plus years of law enforcement – including countless graveyard shifts waiting to bust drunk drivers – that Scattini developed a thick-skinned outlook, a long slate of stories, a tongue-in-cheek sense of humor and more cliche adages than a tired sports writer.
“Rumors are like belly buttons,” he offered as an example. “Everybody’s got one.”
He recalled one time getting a call over the dispatch that a car was driving in reverse on Pacheco Pass. He didn’t believe it – until he and his partner caught up with the motorist.
“The only gear he had was reverse. He said he drove all the way from Los Banos in reverse.”
While he has always maintained a jesting presence, political life in San Benito County isn’t so funny these days, he acknowledged.
This past summer, City Manager Dale Shaddox unveiled a dismal long-term budget outlook. Scattini was preaching that fate, he said, almost immediately upon taking the oath a year ago. He studied the budget, he said, and realized how much fat could be, eventually must be, trimmed.
“When times were good and money was coming in,” Scattini said, “I think there was an awful lot of waste.”
But it’s not just his Council seat giving him problems lately. He has been the subject of frequent dialogue on the Free Lance Opinion page – both good and bad, he said. Much of it has revolved around his standing as marshal.
While he accepts he can’t please everyone, he’s adamantly against the Citizens Voice column, which allows readers an anonymous forum.
“A person can’t defend himself,” said Scattini, who went on to point out, to those who believe the Marshal’s Office should combine with the Sheriff’s Department, “They’ll have to hire a person or two to do the job, so they’re not going to gain anything by it.”
He also said he suspects one or two people of bashing him, while he has not, he insisted, solicited any of the positive remarks.
“I have a very, very good idea about who’s writing about me,” he said. “This individual just wants to destroy this office.”
Countywide, his share of acrimony is only a small portion, though, he said. The local political scene is more vicious now than any time he can remember.
He believes the Growth Control Initiative, known as Measure G on the March ballot, has caused much of the rancor. The measure, he believes, “has torn this county apart.”
“In my short stay in this county, and I’ve only been here 60 years, I think it’s the most devastating issue that has come before this county.”
Regardless of those few vocal residents, Scattini believes he is well liked. It’s hard to dispute the evidence.
Before the November 2002 election, while other candidates were out knocking on doors and heavily campaigning, Scattini didn’t do much. He never even knocked on a door, he said.
He met with the newspapers and ran a few commercials on a Hispanic radio station. His district is 74-percent Hispanic, and he was facing a Hispanic incumbent in Peggy Corrales. Scattini won the election by 20 votes.
“I feel comfortable if I was to run in any district, I could probably do the same thing,” he said.
He doesn’t enjoy every part of his two elected roles. He’s not in it for glamour, he said, or to move up a political ladder.
“I really care about the people in this town, and I really care about Hollister.”
