JOHNSTON COUNTY, N.C. — The longtime county manager here said his time in professional baseball played a key role in his development as a leader.

Rick Hester grew up around county politics. His father, Robert, served for eight years on the Bladen County Board of Commissioners. He still remembers Robert taking constituent calls even on Sunday evenings and getting to work on their problems right away. 

“I always thought that was pretty cool to do something and help a community in some way,” he said.

Still, when Hester graduated from Clemson University in the 1980s, he had his sights set on another career: major league baseball.

Hester played for three years on the minor league affiliates for the Texas Rangers and pitched in an exhibition game. But by 1986, his career was over.

After returning to North Carolina to finish his college degree, Hester went to work for Johnston County's planning and land use department the following year. It was there he tackled his first major project: naming all of the county's roads. At the time, most simply had a number and none had the now-familiar green street signs.

“Sometimes it wasn't easy because there was a difference of opinion on what the road should be named,” he said.

Hester and others spent months cataloging all of Johnston County's unnamed roads, deciding on names and then installing green street signs.

Next, he and his colleagues put together the county's first-ever zoning, first for the four townships closest to Wake County and then for the rest of the county two years later.

“It was great. I've been around here long enough to remember those things now,” he said.

Hester spent the next decade steadily climbing the ranks to assistant county manager.

In January of 1999, he became interim county manager. That July, the board of commissioners made his position official, a job he has held ever since.

Officials with the N.C. Association of County Commissioners said they believe Hester has the longest active tenure of any county manager in a single county. County managers are appointed by their county's board of commissioners and have no fixed term.

In more than two decades on the job, Hester has watched the county grow from 121,000 to 209,000, cementing its transition from rural to urban county in 2020. That necessitated a number of infrastructure projects. The county doubled the size of its landfill to 1,000 acres, just as its population began to grow rapidly. He helped the emergency communications team roll out 911 service for the entire county.

Hester said his career wouldn't have gone anywhere without the support of his family. Hester and his wife raised a son and a daughter during his time working for Johnston County and just welcomed their first grandchild.

“You're on call 24/7/365. That's just the way it is with this job,” he said. “They've been very supportive of me and I really appreciate it.”

Even though his baseball career didn't pan out the way he hoped, Hester said it played a crucial role in shaping the way he approaches his job. Besides learning how to work with a team, Hester said it taught him a lesson in resiliency.

“You're going to have good days and bad days. But no matter what, you've got to keep going,” he said.