FOREST HILL – Clyde Holloway, a former congressman, chairman of Louisiana’s utility regulatory agency and a Southern Baptist, died Sunday at his home in Forest Hill. He was 72.
A Lecompte native, Holloway, a staunch fiscal and social conservative, owned and operated Holloway’s Nursery, a business he started with his wife in the early 1970s.
He entered Louisiana politics in 1980, when he unsuccessfully ran to unseat U.S. Rep. Gillis Long in the state’s 8th Congressional District. He ran unsuccessfully again in a 1985 special election after Long died before winning the seat in an upset in 1986.
“I became a Republican because of Barry Goldwater, and Ronald Reagan inspired me to run for Congress,” he often said.
He was re-elected twice before the 8th District was eliminated following the 1990 Census. Forest Hill was redrawn into the 6th District, where Holloway faced fellow U.S. Rep. Richard Baker. Holloway lost by about 2,700 votes when Baker took clear majorities in the two largest parishes, Livingston and East Baton Rouge, both of them around his home base of Baton Rouge.
He would run unsuccessfully for Congress five more times, the last time in 2014.
Holloway served as the Louisiana State Director of Rural Development for the U. S. Department of Agriculture under President George W. Bush before finding his niche on the Public Service Commission, which is responsible for regulating utilities.
He was elected in a special election in 2009 and re-elected in 2010. He joked that the 2010 election, his 13th bid for public office, was “lucky No. 13” because he ran unopposed. He opted not to seek re-election this year due to health reasons.
PSC Commissioner Eric Skrmetta released a statement Monday describing Holloway as “a true public servant with a long and storied career. He loved Louisiana and tried to do what was right at all times.”
Holloway is survived by his wife of 50 years, Cathie, his four children, nine grandchildren and six siblings.
