Langley will be without an incumbent in the 2015 mayoral election.

Mayor Fred McCarthy announced his decision not to seek re-election Monday morning. In an interview with The Record, he said he wants to pursue other interests, chief among them his family.

“It was a matter of looking at four more years,” he said in his City Hall office, a small room that looks out over Saratoga Passage, a waterway he enjoys sailing through on his vintage boat.

Instead of running meetings in 2016, McCarthy said he’d like to be with family more, travel, sail, ride his motorcycle, take out his classic Ford truck, work on a book based on his experiences in the Vietnam War, improve his instrumentation skills and return to teaching graduate-level courses in education.

“Whidbey Island is a pretty nice place,” he said. “You have to slow down and enjoy it.”

He denied that criticism over the marina access project was a factor.

“That all goes with the territory,” he said through a wide smile. “When you’re in the kitchen, you better be ready for the heat.”

When he applied to be appointed as interim mayor in February 2013, he said he did so with goals in mind for the Village by the Sea. He came out of semi-retirement after retiring as superintendent of the South Whidbey School District in 2011.

At the time, Langley was reeling from a scandal involving its former mayor, Larry Kwarsick, who had been charged and pled guilty to falsifying a city document when he was the city planner.

Among a field of five candidates, including a pair of city council members, McCarthy was selected to lead Langley as its interim mayor. He won re-election in November 2013 unopposed.

“I came into the job with a certain set of things I wanted to accomplish,” McCarthy said.

He is credited for meeting several times with the disenfranchised owners of the Dog House Tavern. At one point in spring 2014, the owners—frustrated with the city’s permit process and refusal to vacate part of the land adjacent to the tavern—considered demolition. McCarthy asked to meet with them to hear their concerns and explain the city’s position of being unable to make a gift of public funds. Those meetings resulted in the recently approved land exchange requested by the tavern owners, Charlie and Janice Kleiner of Issaquah, who are now pursuing partial restoration/renovation.

“We will do anything we can on our part to help facilitate their next steps,” McCarthy said.

Talking the Kleiners down from tearing down a century-old, historic building was an example of McCarthy’s tranquil demeanor, one of the mayor’s great strengths in the opinion of Langley Main Street Association president Janet Ploof.

“What a shame,” she said, upon hearing the news. “It’s too bad for us to lose him at this point because he’s such a calm peacekeeper with a ferocious practicality.”

With the marina access/bluff conveyance project still undecided, however, there remain major projects to be resolved. McCarthy said he plans to see work begin on the Dog House and an alternative chosen to move people between the marina, owned and operated by the Port of South Whidbey, and Langley’s commercial core along Cascade Avenue/First Street, Second Street and Anthes Avenue.

“I hate to see him step aside right in the middle of it,” said Councilman Bruce Allen, who was one of the appointment candidates in 2013.

Given all of the mayor’s initiatives and endeavors, he has Allen actively trying to talk him into running. Allen said since learning of the mayor’s decision April 1 (an unfortunate date for such an announcement) he has recommended that McCarthy shed some of his extraneous engagements.

As mayor, McCarthy represents Langley on several county and regional boards: the Island County Council of Governments, the Island County Substance Abuse Prevention Coalition, the Law and Justice Council and the Skagit-Island Regional Transportation Planning Organization, to name just a handful.

“He’s taken on a whole lot more than the mayor’s job,” Allen said. “My sense is if he drops some of the extracurriculars he’ll have more time … I probably won’t win, but I won’t let it die.”

McCarthy implemented economic development forums along with some city council members, which turned into monthly economic development meetings in 2014 and quarterly meetings this year. A training program for department supervisors was installed by McCarthy that also began this year.

Among his accomplishments, McCarthy cited the mayor’s awards he began passing out in recognition of service to Langley by citizens, groups and business owners. It’s not codified yet, and he said he plans to make it a fixture of City Hall’s future. With eight months left in his term, the mayor will be busy.

“I don’t plan to start skating,” McCarthy said.

The field for Langley’s mayor will not be set until May 15 when the candidate filing week ends.

Beyond the mayor, three city council positions held by Jim Sundberg, Bruce Allen and Robin Black will be up for election.

“I can’t even imagine what’s going to come next,” Ploof said.