Reached by KTW for a Where Are They Now profile, former Cache Creek mayor and Thompson-Nicola Regional District chair John Ranta said he is no longer much of a newsmaker.
The 73-year-old former politician, who resides in a duplex in Cache Creek with wife Carmen, is effectively retired and has been abiding by public health orders that have kept him largely at home during the COVID-19 pandemic.
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In lieu of perusing council and regional district agendas, Ranta these days sifts through honey-do lists.
“Working around the house,” the handyman said. “Trying to get some of the projects that my wife has identified done.”
Quick-witted Ranta offers quips, but few details, when asked how he is doing. He is “better than nothing on a cold night” and also “trying to stay alive.”
Among details left open for interpretation include whether he will again run for public office. The next civic elections will take place in October 2022.
“I don’t have any plans at the present time, but it’s not something I would rule out,” Ranta said. “Every time I go to the post office, I bump into somebody that suggests that I should run again.”
One thing is clear — Ranta misses politics. Specifically, he said he misses the opportunity to serve and make things better for people he represents. He does not feel like he dodged a bullet, with respect to the COVID-19 pandemic. Instead, he alluded to experience gleaned from past wildfire emergencies, in 2013 and 2017, which he called “huge challenges.”
“You deal with the situation as it arises and do your best to deal with it appropriately,” Ranta said.
He has thought about the severity of the pandemic (his wife knows two people who were infected with the virus and he called the year as a whole a “drag”) and has been surprised by some in the public with anti-mask and anti-vaccination sentiments.
“I don’t really understand that and I think political leaders need to do their best to reinforce the value of taking vaccines and wearing masks and social distancing and all that sort of stuff,” he said.
Regardless of whether he again seeks office, Ranta will do his part in leading by example — following public health orders by staying home and tackling his honey-do list one project at a time.
“I’m putting a new bathtub in right now,” Ranta noted.
