July 2, 2004

Tom Louisos - a different breed of public servant

By Michael Lipton

It’s a sure bet that if West Virginia had more politicians like Tom Louisos, our state would be a better place. In fact, for my money, the whole damn world would be better off if there were a few million Tom Louisos around.

Louisos is a businessman and legislator. But he’s a far cry from the kind of "public servant" West Virginians have begrudgingly become accustomed to. Louisos is tough on coal, respectful of the environment, and an outspoken proponent of national health care. He also has opposed legislative raises (back in 1995, when his fellow legislators voted to more than double their salary, he refused the extra $8,500 for three years) and, in 1988, he sponsored a bill to limit campaign contributions to $25 per contributor per election.

Since 1990, he has refused to accept any campaign contributions and, with the exception of his first campaign in 1985 - in which he spent the grand sum of $4,000 - in his 20-odd years in office he’s spent just $1,100 or less on each of his campaigns. His opponents regularly spend $10,000 or more trying to unseat him.

"If we could get campaign finance reform I think we’d clean this whole thing up," said Louisos of his primary beef with state and national politics.

"You don’t think it matters? Some of these people wouldn’t give a hungry man a hot dog yet they’ll give me $1,000 for my campaign. And you don’t think they want something in return?

It’s hard to argue with that kind of logic. But talk to Louisos for awhile and you’ll find there’s plenty more where that came from. He seems to do everything the old fashioned way and, for the most part, it works.

Every morning at 5:30 a.m., he hops in his 1981 Chevy pick-up and drives to work at Tom’s Carryout, a business his father started back in 1961. Located across the street from what is now Collins Middle School, Now 60, Louisos worked there after school and, as quickly as he could stash his cap and gown, hired on full time, cooking everything from hot dogs and hamburgers to making barbecue and hot dog sauce. Forty-three years later, you can still find him there 12-15 hours a day, seven days a week, serving as many as 500 hot dogs a day to people he’s known - and fed - for their entire lives.

The block building that houses the carryout has changed very little since Louisos’ father built it in 1973. In front of the counter, with its barroom-issue gallon jars of Penrose hot sausage and pig’s feet, the tile is worn through to the cement. Behind the counter, in well-practiced moves, Louisos darts between the grill and the deep fryer, pausing to quickly slather onions and slaw on a few dogs - all the while keeping up a steady stream of conversation.

"I’ve been eating here every day for about 10 years," said Charles Evans, while waiting for Louisos to fix his cheeseburger ("You want the usual, Brother, extra mayonnaise?"). "Before that, I came in here with my dad."

"Everyone’s been eating Tom’s Carryout food for a long time," said Gene Walker Jr., another longtime customer. "You can’t get enough of it... hey Tom, would you lighten up on the onions, you’re killing me..."

His current employee, Kelly Kees, has worked for Tom’s for just seven months - but grew up eating his hot dogs. "I never worked at a place where the owner would come in and flip burgers," she said. "He’s a pillar of the community."

So, where do you have to go to find some dirt on Louisos?

"My ex-wife," he joked. "Actually she voted for me. She told me I was a good representative."

* * *

Louisos’ routine hasn’t changed much over the last 43 years. But along the way he’s made - and lost - a small fortune. At the peak of his acquisitions in the mid-‘90, Louisos owned a pancake house, a rafting company, assorted tracts of land and a handful of convenience stores. After a few years where "everything was going just great," he discovered the perils of "deficit spending."

"I over-extended myself," he said, "bought too much property. There’s other things that happened but I can only blame me. If you’re captain of the ship it’s you responsibility."

In 2002, the hammer came down and Louisos was forced to declare bankruptcy. It was, perhaps, the toughest time of his life. And he’s still paying off a $100,000-plus debt to Workers’ Comp. But Louisos said it taught one of the most valuable lessons of his life.

"I came out of it [bankruptcy] a much wiser man," he added. "God has always been good to me, I’ve always done well. You know, I always wondered how it could happen - now I know it can happen to anyone.

"It was humbling like you wouldn’t believe," he added. "I went from driving a Marquee Lincoln to an old ‘81 Chevy truck."

Louisos has no trouble relating his own fiscal disaster to West Virginia’s budget woes.

"Business is a gamble," he said. "You have to be vigilant. I was dong so well, I thought the prosperity would never stop. I think that makes me a good legislator.

"I know a lot of the revenue we’re depending on might not be here tomorrow," he added. "The video lottery is a good example. I’d rather err on being frugal than being wasteful."

Louisos, the son of a Greek immigrants, grew up in Killarney, a coal camp community in Raleigh County. It was long before the days of reclamation and it wasn’t until he was eight or nine that he "realized water wasn’t supposed to smell like rotten eggs."

He sites that community when illustrating what the private sector can do when a bit of legislative pressure is applied.

"You should have seen what they done to it," he said of his homeplace. "They went in and strip-mined and just destroyed the place," he said. "They shot the rock down where we used to live - it looked like a war zone. But once they passed the Mine Reclamation Act they fixed it up - and they found the money to do it."

Louisos’ father was a businessman and his grandfather was a coal miner. So, he’s familiar with the difficulty of trying to satisfy both contingencies.

"I’m for jobs but I think we have to look at the environment and what we’re doing to our neighbors," he said. "We’re having flooding today that we’ve never had before.. I think we have to look at our state and what we’re doing to it."

While they differ on issues like abortion rights and gay marriage - issues that Louisos considers personal and not political - he still gets high marks from environmentalists like Norm Steenstra, head of West Virginia Citizens Action Group.

"Tom’s a one-of-a-kind politician," said Steenstra. "I don’t always agree with his stand on issues but there’s no one in the legislature more sincere and committed to the people in little white houses than Tom."

Whether it’s cooking a hot dog, passing legislation or debating the merits of national health care and campaign spending limits, he takes his job seriously.

"I’ve eaten a hot dog every day since I’ve been here - 43 years," he said. "One reason is cause I like ‘em. The other is because I want to make sure they’re good."

Louisos gets considerably more serious when he talks about his fellow legislators and their work in Charleston.

"Sometimes, I wonder how they sleep at night," he said. "We’ve passed bills that I’ve cried over when I’ve driven home. You just fight your battles and then you move on."

Two bills that Louisos singled out were the contractor’s license bill ("There’s a lot of great carpenters and craftsmen who have a gift but who couldn’t pass a written test") and the Income Tax bill in the late-‘80s ("it took tax breaks away from working people").

Speaking of driving home, Louisos opts not to accept state money for his room and board during the session but instead drives back and forth every day, billing the state only for mileage.

Underscoring all of Louisos’ central issues is a deep and passionate concern for people.

"What we have in America today is not ‘us,’ it’s ‘me,’" he said. "I’m not against making a profit but there’s a difference between profit and greed." And Louisos makes no bones that he favors the little man.

"I mean, how much money do you need to be happy? One million? Two million? I’ve always been happy. The only thing that hurt me was when I couldn’t pay my bills.

"I don’t have to hire someone to find out what’s on these people’s minds," he added. "They come in and tell me. I’ve told some of the other legislators, you need to put on your old clothes on, come down here, sit in a corner and eat yourself a hot dog and listen to what these people have to say."

Tom’s Carryout is located at 554 Jones Avenue in Oak Hill. For info - or to place an order for some of Louisos’ barbecue - call 304/469-6260.