HAYDEN — As the first snowstorm blankets the town of Hayden this season, Wade Holecek plans to be somewhere warm and indoors, peacefully watching the flakes swirl toward the ground.

He won’t be making phone calls at 3 a.m., putting on his boots and getting the plows ready. He won’t have to strategize with crews to clear the roads before the morning rush.

“I’m looking forward to the first snow of the year and I’m looking forward to seeing it come down and not worrying about it,” Holecek said Friday. “When I was younger I loved plowing the snow, but as I got older, not so much.”

No, Hayden’s operations and public works supervisor won’t think anything of it because after 38 years with the city, Holecek is retiring Thursday.

“I won’t have to sit up and down all night to see if it’s snowing and the boys have to go to work,” he said. “I won’t have to call and wake anyone up.”

A 1984 graduate of Coeur d’Alene High School, Holecek, 58, began his career in the city of Hayden when he was 20 years old. He saw a small town of 3,000 grow to a population of nearly 17,000 during his time in the city. He will retire as Hayden’s longest serving employee.

Hayden has definitely changed in that time, he said.

“Finucane Ranch was still going, when it was before all these houses and this was a huge field here,” he said, gesturing to the south of the town hall. “You could watch all the crazy ground squirrels in the spring with the hawks. go in, yanking them out of there.

Holecek witnessed and was instrumental in the development of approximately six parks. He saw the expansion of Hayden City Hall as it became a two-story building.

“With Hayden, for me, I evolved with him,” he said.

Holecek worked closely with Hayden’s first city administrator, the late Bob Croffoot, to establish Diamond Park, which would later be named for Croffoot, who served on the Hayden City Council for 15 years before becoming administrator.

“It was a big one when Bob Croffoot was here and we were looking for another park,” Holecek said.

He’s most proud of the efforts he and Croffoot put into upgrading Government Way from Honeysuckle to Hayden Avenue, though Holecek wishes that stretch had been five lanes when the work was done.

“Bob Croffoot and I, we went to the first meeting to get funding for this, so it was pretty cool to be involved in that,” Holecek said.

He said Croffoot always encouraged him to think about the future and ways to move the city forward.

“He was very helpful in the beginning of getting better equipment,” Holecek said. “Eventually, he was a city manager, and that was really nice.”

Hayden Parks Superintendent Ron Reno grew up with Holecek.

“Wade and I have been friends since we were little kids,” Reno said. “Our mothers and fathers were friends. They were going together on the motorcycle.”

Reno and Holecek worked together at the city for 30 years.

“The Chief is kind of unique,” ​​Reno said.

He said he was excited that his longtime friend and colleague would enter a new era of retirement.

“He’s just a great, great man,” Reno said. “He has great integrity. He always does the right thing. He was always very, very, very fair. He’s always let me do my thing – I really couldn’t be happier for him.”

Reno was also part of the Croffoot Park project, which he said was stressful, but made less so by Holecek’s connections.

“Wade has a great network of people he can rely on,” Reno said. “We relied on the airport to help us. The Lakes Highway District helped us. I was very pleased with the way the park turned out. We had a large network that helped us.”

While happy for his friend, Reno will miss working with Holecek. The two have been through a lot together.

“We argued, we argued, we drank a lot of beer, we cried together, we hugged, we worked together almost our whole lives,” Reno said.

“The biggest thing I’m going to miss about working with Wade Holecek is I’m going to miss him standing up and looking at me and saying, ‘Zip it, Reno.’ he said chuckling. “I can always tell when I’ve reached my limit because he stood up and looked at me or turned around in his chair and said, ‘Zip it up, Reno.’

Holecek has no concrete plans for his retirement. He enjoys spending time with his family and black lab, Rowdy, and enjoys being up in the hills or at a friend’s property on the Coeur d’Alene River.

“I intend to clean out my garage,” he said with a smile. “I want to do this.”

The parting words of wisdom he has for the team members he leaves behind are for them to “keep doing the great work that they’re doing.”

A retirement party will be held Thursday from 3 to 5 p.m. in the Hayden City Council Chambers to celebrate Holecek and his nearly four decades with the city.

“I was lucky,” he said. “I’ve worked with some great people.”