Writing this blog has been really fun and we’ve had such kind and generous feedback from our friends who read it! To be honest, we’re still shocked we have more than 8 readers but believe or not, it’s quite a bit higher.
It seemed like a good idea to give you a spin on “Better Know A District,” for those who get that reference, and introduce you to some of the great Members we get to work with. Rep. Jimmy Panetta from California’s 20th District, represents Salinas, Santa Cruz and Carmel Valley. Jimmy was elected in 2016 and we’ve been honored to work for him since that first campaign. He serves on the Ways & Means Committee, Agriculture Committee, and Budget Committee, is a member of many caucuses, is a proud member of the Congressional Baseball Team, and co-captain of the Congressional Football Team. Read on for more!
After two days of use, I can highly recommend the 15’ Skywalker. It was more than we wanted to spend but I justified it by using our summer camp refunds.
Inspired by the first interview question, we are piling on with our first jobs so, here we go:
Haley: Lifeguard in OH
Lexi: Counselor at Camp Rainbow in NY
Madison: Hostess at a farm-to-fork restaurant in IL
Molly: Glasswasher at Abigail’s Tea Room in Lakeside, OH
Jacob: Jersey Mike’s sandwich maker in AZ
Hannah: retail at a small clothing store in NH
Isaac: bus boy at a local pub in England
Jaime: server in a catering hall in MD
Rebecca: retail at a small home decor store in SC
We’ve done some cool events, but this one was a special treat with Jimmy’s dad, Secretary Leon Panetta in September 2016. Also, I’m feeling very nostalgic for my back patio at 412 First Street SE even though it was 95 degrees that day.
MOLLY: What was your first paid job? What was the very first place of employment for Jimmy Panetta?
JIMMY PANETTA: When it came to summers for us growing up, it was “you're getting a J-O-B”. That's pretty much what it was. Now, for these kids these days, it's camps, it's vacations. For us, we had to get our summer jobs, so my first job was in seventh grade. I was a busboy/dishwasher at the restaurant that had the best '70s name because that’s when it was. The restaurant was right up here in Carmel Valley about two miles down the road and it was called the Velvet Fox.
I was a busboy until -- I'll never forget this -- I spilled tartar sauce on a lady when I was bringing it to her, and I was relegated to be a dishwasher subsequent to that. After that, I was a doorman and a yard boy at a local lodge here in Carmel Valley, and then I was a busboy at the local Mexican restaurant, Plaza Linda. I was a greenskeeper and a cart boy, because you had to work at golf clubs here, and that pretty much kept me sustained throughout high school and then throughout my junior college and it help me pay my way through college.
MOLLY: I would love for you to tell people about what really first inspired you to run for office because you've had more exposure to government service than most.
JIMMY PANETTA: It’s funny, a lot of people think, "Oh, what types of conversations did your family have at your dinner table?" My parents did a really good job keeping me and my two older brothers separate from their politics and their work as best as they could. Obviously, it was all consuming for my father who was a Member for 16 years, and then all the other things he did, but during those 16 years, my mom was his volunteer district director. They did the best they could to keep us separate. I guess you'd say it might be in our blood, but it wasn't in our heads, to be frank. It wasn’t until I got outside the house that I was really exposed to their work because people still come up to me and they don't talk about the work that my dad did as a director of CIA or SecDef or anything like that.
They always tell me a personal story how they had an issue with the federal government, they didn't know what to do, they went to their Congressman and they got service that actually affected them for the rest of their lives. It's amazing how many constituents come up to me now and talk about a story, an issue they had 40 years ago where they went to my dad and were served. And that's what inspired me because you actually can see that in this job, it's this case by case constituent casework where you can actually affect people's lives. And I pride myself and my staff on the work that they do to help people.
MOLLY: Any particular proudest moments of constituent service that come to mind?
JIMMY PANETTA: Yeah, there's a number of them. That's what's great is now I'm hearing stories not about what my parents did. I'm hearing stories about what I did, what my office did, what my staff did, which is phenomenal and that's how it should be. Obviously, it took a few years to get to that point because of the work that we've been doing. It's not overnight. I mean, we had the conversation earlier, Molly, about a lot of people want instant gratification these days. That's not getting the job done, unfortunately, a lot of the times it's grinding it out especially when you're dealing with the bureaucracy of the US government. It's a grind, it's that constant pressure of letting the government know you're not going away because you have an issue with them in order to help this constituent of yours. I'm starting to hear these stories about the good work that my staff is doing. One in particular really just kind of tells you what it's about.
One lady came up to me and said, "I had an issue where I wanted to get my fiancé here. He was an immigrant. He was coming into this country before Christmas and they were holding him up and I'm a teacher at a school. The immigration service was holding him up. We contacted your office, your office made some calls. Next thing you know, not only was my fiancé brought into this country, he's allowed to stay here with a proper visa and work here as a psychologist in the same school that I'm working at." So, you see, you not only help that relationship of them getting married and that family, but you helped the children at that school by having another psychologist in that school. So you see the ripple of effects of just helping one person, you can really help the community. So that's what it's about and I cannot stress that enough.
MOLLY: What's been your favorite CODEL you've been on?
JIMMY PANETTA: I've been on some cool ones. My favorite one was the one I did last summer in August 2019 where I went to West Africa. We started off in Stuttgart, Germany at AFRICOM, we got an overview of AFRICOM and the special forces operation. We then took a plane directly to Niger, went out to a couple forward operating bases, we then went to Nigeria, then went up to Mali and went out to a couple of places there, and then we ended up in France, in Paris talking about the special forces there.
I don't know if you remember the unfortunate tragedy in Niger where four special operators were killed in October of 2017? One of the reasons why more people U.S. service members weren’t killed was because of our allies. Africa is so big and it's hard to have a quick reaction force. And so, during that tragedy, we had to rely on our allies. If it weren’t for the French Mirages, the planes that flew in really low and scattered the attackers during that incident, more U.S. service members would have been killed.
Rep. Richard Hudson of North Carolina, who represents Fort Bragg, came on that CODEL and so, when we got to Paris, we set it up so he was able to present to one of the three pilots a certificate thanking them for their service, so that was a real highlight of the trip.
MOLLY: Tell us something we don't know about you. What about your favorite musician? What's your music?
JIMMY PANETTA: That's funny. My wife will kill me because she is a music person. I'm not really a music person. My songs are about what I can listen to on the plane to be honest with you. When I take the red eye back, give me my classical music that I can put on my Bose headphones to knock me out and not wake me up. And then coming back, I like to do work and I need to songs that kind of drive and get you going without distracting you.
MOLLY: I love hearing stories about your wife [Superiour Court of Monterey County Judge Carrie Panetta]. How did you meet?
JIMMY PANETTA: It was at the Alameda County District Attorney's Office in Berkeley, California. We worked there. She had worked at a civil firm in San Francisco. She could've become a partner, but she felt the drive to serve. She had heard that if you wanted to get in public service, you want to be a prosecutor, and Alameda County is the place to do it, and I say that in my biased opinion, but it's true. Alameda County is a great office. And so, she came over and fortunately, we were able to meet.
Although she was in the Oakland office at the time, she was often hanging out with my classmates. I would always make it a point to go from Berkeley to have lunch with them over in Oakland and to hang out with her and eventually, that led to the relationship that we have now.
MOLLY: And I can't believe your girls are now in eighth and ninth grade!
JIMMY PANETTA: Crazy. But you know, I got to tell you, one of the silver linings of this pandemic is that I am catching up on a lot of dinners that I've missed. An hour before dinner or an hour after dinner, we usually have outside time in which my youngest daughter, Gia and I will go out and play three games of how many free throws we can make, who has the most free throws out of 10 and then we do around the world and then my other daughter is over there hitting the softball off the tee and I'll join her as well because I got to keep up my swing for the congressional baseball game. That's been the nice thing to be honest with you is that we've actually been able to spend some good time here at home. My wife is back at work and I'll be going back to the office in the district because we've been opening up offices around California these last couple of weeks.
So it's been nice that I've been able to be here and to really get some quality time and reconnect with them in their lives right now. I look forward to continuing to do that as we continue to endure through this pandemic.
MOLLY: When do you think we go back to “Normal” again? Until we have a vaccine?
JIMMY PANETTA: Well, that's the question is what is the new normal going to be and when is it going to be here? In order to see this disease without a vaccine it will require more testing. Business can open up but is it going to business as normal? We have to provide confidence to people to continue going out, to give them an assurance that they're not going to get sick if they go out. Testing will aid that and will better inform how and when economies open back up. I think we're going to do what we do best and that's adjust, adapt, but continue to advance. We always go forward and I think we'll do that in one way or the other in order to get through this.
THANK YOU, JIMMY!
Jimmy at the 2019 Congressional Baseball game.