Catching Up With Pat O'Hara

Tables covered with Petunias in brilliant shades of purples and pinks were displayed in front of O'Hara's Nursery on a sunny Tuesday morning.

Chickens clucked inside their coup on the Shelton Road property. Behind the main building, the owner, wearing a rimmed hat and a pair of sunglasses, walked up the dirt driveway running alongside a row of greenhouses.

Pat O'Hara, 46, who bought the land in 1989 - the same tract he grew up on, placed a green leafy plant in the coup for the poulets to peck away at.

"These chickens are very docile," he said with a smile. "They each have their own personality."

O'Hara opened small doors behind the nests and collected brown eggs that were laid.

The Monroe native has been a vocal personality in town politics over most of the past decade, serving on the Board of Education, then the Town Council. He is now on the Planning & Zoning Commission.

Some have accused O'Hara of laying the groundwork for higher office, but he says different issues have led him from one board to another.

"I have no road map," O'Hara said. "I'm here to serve. In eight years I haven't got one red cent."

In fact, O'Hara said a dispute over his son Sean's school bus transportation is what fired him up enough to approach the Republican Town Committee in 2001, when Jim Weinberger's appointment to the Board of Finance left a vacancy on the Board of Education.

Though he is a die-hard Republican, O'Hara's parents are Democrats.

"Ronald Reagan," O'Hara summed up the reason for his divergent political path. "The hostages were being held in Iran and the clock was ticking."

O'Hara was enrolled at the University of Bridgeport at the time.

"I voted with two other U.B. students," he said. "I remember standing in a very long line. It was for Ronald Reagan because of the promise. Jimmy Carter wasn't getting it done."

'Part of the solution'

The O'Hara family has a tradition of participating in local politics. Pat's mother, Maryann Hawkins, served on the Board of Education in 1974 and his father, Eugene, was chairman of the Conservation Commission and of the building committee for Masuk High School's 1978 renovation project.

"Dad told me stories about Tip O'Neill and he worked on Congressman Bill Ratchford's campaign," O'Hara recalled.

When O'Hara became angry over his son's bus transportation a few years ago, he decided he could either "whine or become part of the solution." That led to his following in his parents footsteps.

O'Hara's family also influenced his career path.

His father took him to Jones Tree Farm as a fourth-grader to plant baby spruce trees in paper cups for his class.

"When my dad was a teacher, they all had a second job," O'Hara said of the tree farm. "That was his."

O'Hara later worked there on an "as-needed" basis and met his future wife, Donna, who was employed there full-time.

"Phillip Jones was a matchmaker," O'Hara said of his old boss with a chuckle.

Donna and Pat O'Hara have been married for 18 years. They have a son, Sean, 15, and a daughter, Molly, 14.

When O'Hara was 13, he worked for Emile Tramposch at Flower Field Nursery on Cutlers Farm Road.

"He gave me opportunities to grow," O'Hara said. "Ricky Stebbins and I got to grow pachysandras one year and he allowed us to keep most of the proceeds."

Now owner of O'Hara's Nursery, O'Hara said he has seven greenhouses and two acres of field production and sells annuals, perennials, vegetables and ground cover - both wholesale and retail.

"We also give people ideas," he said. "My wife is a designer. People go into the greenhouse and their jaws drop."

Bolds stances

Pat O'Hara has never been timid about taking strong stances during his career in Monroe politics.

Two years ago, he sided with Friends of Monroe, a citizens group that fought to keep the automatic budget referendum intact when the charter was being revised.

"We would have went from the automatic referendum to no referendum," O'Hara contended. "More people came out for that vote than in the 2007 municipal election and defeated it by 81%. Fewer people came out to vote for that than to sign the petition.

"The proposal was too drastic and the more you errode the people's ability to hold their government accountable for what they spend, the more money they're going to spend. Government needs to be accountable."

O'Hara believes this especially applies to the state legislature, which is controlled by the Democratic majority.

Charter Revision was a particularly contentious issue, as is the annual budget battle.

He alluded to a time when the Historical Society wanted to move artist David Merrill's mural from Masuk to Edith Wheeler Memorial Library as an instance when opposing sides - he wanted it to stay in the high school - settled their differences in a way that was best for the town.

"With budget discussions we've lost sight of that," O'Hara said. "We have people calling each other names."

O'Hara was most recently in the news for expressing his belief that the way teachers' contracts are handled must be done differently.

"I come from a teaching family," he said. "I know what it's like to have a father who was not paid decent. I know teachers were not well paid in the '60s and '70s, and I want them to have a good wage. But we can't continue in this manner. It's unsustainable."

In O'Hara's opinion, the salaries are increasing too rapidly, raising property taxes and forcing seniors, people living on fixed incomes and young families who can't afford it out of town.

"Maybe we should have more farmers," O'Hara said with a smile. "I know if I put the same crop in the ground every year, eventually it won't grow."