CHAMBER LEADER HAS UPBEAT APPROACH.

Byline: Bettie Rencoret Senior columnist

Jean Ray has been getting her feet wet this summer as the new president of the Palmdale Chamber of Commerce.

When she assumed office July 1, she knew she had her work cut out for her, but she accepted that with enthusiasm.

``We're on a forward move,'' she said, ``and we're optimistic about the future.''

The chamber will be do many things to benefit the city as well as its business establishments, said Ray, who owns Sierra Travel Service.

``My mission statement for the year is to serve and promote all of the businesses in the area. To that end, during my term of office I'd like to establish a speakers' bureau and offer seminars to help businesses restructure and/or expand, so that they can continue to operate in a profitable manner,'' she said.

She called the chamber's chief executive officer, Leigh Engdahl, ``a real dynamo who has lots of plans for promotion and services.''

``One of the things Leigh and I are planning this year is an antique fair,'' Ray said. ``No one has tried one of those in this area before and we think it will go over well. There have been similar things but nothing like what we have in mind.''

Planned again, she said, is the pro golf tournament. The proceeds from that are earmarked to supply Palmdale schools special equipment for handicapped students.

Ray is winding down her two-year term as president of the Palmdale Regional Airport Advisory Council.

She has been interested in airports and air travel ever since she was a young woman in St. Louis, when she worked for Frontier Airlines.

``Taking my first flight to get there from my hometown of Alamogordo, New Mexico, and seeing all the facets that involved - the tickets, reservations, seating and everything - really made an impression on me,'' she said.

That carried over into her current association. She states that she is working harder and longer hours now than she ever has in her life, but she loves it.

She noted there is a lot to be said for personal attention and contact.

``It's a lot of work, but when we're through, the clients have something they can rely on, and someone they can complain to, not just some printout from the Internet,'' Ray said.

Jean was in her middle teens when she and Kenneth Ray were married July 26, 1955 in El Paso, Texas.

When he became an aerospace engineer for the jet aircraft flight test division in data processing at Edwards Air Force Base in 1972, they moved to Lancaster.

For their first few years here, Jean stayed home to raise their four sons, twins Gene, now of Jackson Hole, Wyo., and Ken, Lancaster; Bryan, Lancaster; and Sean, High Rolls, N.M.

Then in 1979, she went to work for the late Norm Rough, at Sierra Travel Agency.

In 1983 she was named manager of the Palmdale office and since the agency was a longtime member of the Palmdale chamber, she got involved.

In 1991, the year she bought Sierra Travel, she became an ambassador and campaigned for a seat on the board of directors, which led to her recent appointment as president.

As if she were not busy enough with her agency, the chamber and the PRA Advisory Council, she volunteers for the Special Olympics and the Gift Foundation of Antelope Valley Hospital and is a member of the Antelope Valley Board of Trade and the American Association of Travel Agents.

Her travel agency and her community activities consume most of her time at the moment, but sometime in the future she plans to move on to career No. 2.

When Ken retired from Lockheed in 1995, they bought an apple orchard and ranch in New Mexico, where she spends some of her weekends.

``Ken is working the ranch now, and when I decide to retire, sometime down the road, that's where I'll go,'' she said. ``It's beautiful there. It's at 7,000 feet, and deer come down all the time. We've even had a fox.''

They market their apples each year from a roadside stand. Some of their regular customers come from as far as El Paso, Texas, she said.

``When I go down there, I take off my business suit, put on jeans and change my role to that of a farmer. Ken and I both love it,'' Ray said.

Asked about how they manage being apart so much of the time, she said it is difficult.

``We're making these personal sacrifices right now,'' she said, ``in order to attain our eventual goal - peace and quiet in retirement on our own apple ranch. That's what we'll call heaven!''

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PHOTO (Color) Jean Ray is Palmdale Chamber of Commerce president.

Bettie Rencoret/Special to the Daily News