Latest / KSEV Mornings with Craig and Wayne / 7-31-26 The Craig Collins Show

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7-31-26 The Craig Collins Show · KSEV Mornings with Craig and Wayne

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Spectacle here.
• 0:04
  Speaker 2: Stimulated.
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: There you go back, you start becoming a team.
• 0:13
  Speaker 3: Is the Craig Pullin Show.
• 0:15
  Speaker 4: Jesus, oh God, no, oh yeah.
• 0:19
  Speaker 2: This station as well the ultimate power in the universe.
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: A good man, Craig.
• 0:25
  Speaker 4: That's right, it is the Craig Collins Show KSCV, the
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  Speaker 4: Voice of Texas seven hundred. AM thrilled to be with
• 0:32
  Speaker 4: you and thrilled to have two veteran guests today. I
• 0:35
  Speaker 4: have a guest at six o'clock and then another guest
• 0:38
  Speaker 4: at six point thirty. My first guest, who I will
• 0:40
  Speaker 4: immediately bring on air and let's make sure that her
• 0:42
  Speaker 4: microphone is working.
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: Angie, how are you doing? Hi for the invitation anytime.
• 0:49
  Speaker 4: I am thrilled that so many veterans had reached out
• 0:52
  Speaker 4: to me via a social media post I put out
• 0:54
  Speaker 4: in a specific veteran community on Facebook. And I'm even
• 0:58
  Speaker 4: more excited about a commonversation.
• 1:00
  Speaker 2: With you because of what you do.
• 1:03
  Speaker 4: But before we get into what your current profession is,
• 1:05
  Speaker 4: do you want to actually start by telling us about
• 1:07
  Speaker 4: your military experience?
• 1:09
  Speaker 3: Yeah?
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  Speaker 5: So I served the Marine Corps for four years from
• 1:13
  Speaker 5: two thousand and seven to twy eleven.
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: Okay, and what were you doing in the Marine Corps.
• 1:18
  Speaker 3: Yes, my job was admin.
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  Speaker 2: So administration, okay, soon administration. But you go through the
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: brutal training of the Marine Corps.
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  Speaker 5: Yes, of course, you go to boot camp and then
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  Speaker 5: MCT Marine Corps training and then the regular school school
• 1:32
  Speaker 5: to learn on your MOS and then you get station
• 1:35
  Speaker 5: in the military base.
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  Speaker 2: Awesome.
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  Speaker 4: So let me ask you this actually, because this will
• 1:38
  Speaker 4: be an important part of the focus.
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: What do you do now professionally?
• 1:43
  Speaker 3: Yeah, so I work as.
• 1:44
  Speaker 5: A licensed mental health therapist in parropractice. So my work
• 1:49
  Speaker 5: I work with adult and then couples.
• 1:52
  Speaker 4: Okay, So my first question is more specific to the
• 1:56
  Speaker 4: boot camp stuff, and I'm really curious about how you
• 1:58
  Speaker 4: think about it now as a mental health professional, because
• 2:02
  Speaker 4: I have several Marine family members, and I know the
• 2:05
  Speaker 4: Marines pride themselves on a description of boot camp that
• 2:09
  Speaker 4: tears you down to build you back up, and so
• 2:12
  Speaker 4: in that vein, do you think that that is what happens?
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  Speaker 2: Do you?
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  Speaker 4: What is your reaction to going through a boot camp
• 2:19
  Speaker 4: that is sort of known for being more difficult than.
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  Speaker 5: Most Yes, I think the preparation started before I left
• 2:27
  Speaker 5: for boot camp and really talking to other female Marines
• 2:32
  Speaker 5: as far as how they made it through a lot
• 2:35
  Speaker 5: of pushing mental you know, looking at it now as
• 2:39
  Speaker 5: a therapist, you know, trying to get your strength from
• 2:43
  Speaker 5: I don't know where, you know, I was verily nineteen
• 2:45
  Speaker 5: years old and now reflecting back, and you know, I'm like,
• 2:48
  Speaker 5: I don't even know how I did it, but I
• 2:50
  Speaker 5: know I that is what I wanted to do, and
• 2:53
  Speaker 5: I had to put a lot of mental work in
• 2:55
  Speaker 5: the process, even though you know, physically was exhausting, but
• 2:58
  Speaker 5: I know the mental piece was cret go in order
• 3:00
  Speaker 5: to graduate into make it.
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: You said you want to do that at nineteen, Can
• 3:04
  Speaker 2: I ask you why?
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  Speaker 3: Yeah? So I wanted to become a police officer. I
• 3:08
  Speaker 3: wanted to go into law enforcement.
• 3:11
  Speaker 5: Yes, So my goal was to go, you know, join
• 3:15
  Speaker 5: the military, get the military experience that I needed, go
• 3:18
  Speaker 5: to college, you know, get my bachelor's degree in criminal justice,
• 3:21
  Speaker 5: and then join a police department. So that was that
• 3:24
  Speaker 5: was the goal back then.
• 3:25
  Speaker 4: Wow, that's that's amazing, to be honest. And then instead
• 3:29
  Speaker 4: of doing that road, for some reason, you get the
• 3:31
  Speaker 4: pull of mental health.
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: What happened there?
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, so I was already I was.
• 3:37
  Speaker 5: I was actually accepted at LAPD because I went to
• 3:42
  Speaker 5: I was a stationed in Camp Pillton, California, So the
• 3:45
  Speaker 5: plan was to get out and enjoy LAPD. But I
• 3:48
  Speaker 5: was finishing my internship for my bachelor's degree in criminal justice,
• 3:53
  Speaker 5: and then I did something related more to social work,
• 3:56
  Speaker 5: and and that changed everything because then I decided to
• 3:59
  Speaker 5: move back home, which was Florida, and then my plans change.
• 4:03
  Speaker 2: Oh wow.
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  Speaker 4: So at this point, I'd love to transition the conversation
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  Speaker 4: to be focused on specifically mental health and veterans.
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  Speaker 2: Is that what your practice is doing a lot of?
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  Speaker 2: Are you? Because here's here's the way I should ask
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  Speaker 2: the question.
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  Speaker 4: Because I've been doing this Veteran Voices segment for a
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  Speaker 4: bit now, and one of the things I noticed that's
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  Speaker 4: most significant, most important EVETS is a value in one
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  Speaker 4: veteran being better at understanding another veteran than a regular civilian.
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  Speaker 4: And so, since you're someone who served, since you're someone
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  Speaker 4: who went through boot camp and all the training, do
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  Speaker 4: you wind up dealing with veterans that come in and
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  Speaker 4: is that something where you have a better ability to
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  Speaker 4: serve them as a mental health professional?
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  Speaker 1: Yes?
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  Speaker 5: Absolutely, I do have quite a few veterans. It's really
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  Speaker 5: hard when it comes to once again and we're talking
• 4:52
  Speaker 5: a little bit.
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  Speaker 3: About it, you and I before going on air, this.
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  Speaker 5: Sigma behind seeking help and the culture that affects you
• 4:59
  Speaker 5: in the Sorry, so I do work with with with
• 5:03
  Speaker 5: veterans now and we talk about that right, like the
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  Speaker 5: how unfortunately in the military you don't seek help because hey,
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  Speaker 5: you're strong, right, you can make it. That's the mentality
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  Speaker 5: that I understand now why because you go on missions,
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  Speaker 5: you get deployee, so you have to have the mental
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  Speaker 5: toughness to be able to push through and accomplish the mission. However,
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  Speaker 5: when you're out in the civilian world, things are completely different.
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  Speaker 4: That's that's interesting for you to say it that way.
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  Speaker 4: And I've heard that version before, and I don't know
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  Speaker 4: what the right solution is for veterans that are trying
• 5:34
  Speaker 4: to deal with a lot on their own and believing
• 5:36
  Speaker 4: and maybe it comes from a family connection. I've heard
• 5:39
  Speaker 4: a lot of veterans say, and I think there's even
• 5:41
  Speaker 4: a day for it where you just call veterans that
• 5:44
  Speaker 4: you knew or served with and do like a buddy check,
• 5:46
  Speaker 4: a veteran buddy check thing. Because I've here, I'll tell
• 5:51
  Speaker 4: it to you this way. Angie, and I think that
• 5:53
  Speaker 4: this is a pretty this you'll understand this more than
• 5:56
  Speaker 4: a lot of the audience will. I was talking to
• 5:58
  Speaker 4: a veteran that was doing an art show, and he
• 6:01
  Speaker 4: was talking to me about not signing up for veteran benefits,
• 6:03
  Speaker 4: like not going through any of that process of any
• 6:06
  Speaker 4: level of his own personal disability.
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  Speaker 2: And he didn't have an arm, he had lost it
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  Speaker 2: in conflict.
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  Speaker 4: And I'm talking to this man who had that significant
• 6:16
  Speaker 4: of an injury, and he's like, there's other people out
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  Speaker 4: there who need those services.
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  Speaker 2: More than me.
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  Speaker 4: And I'm dumbfounded hearing that from this person and looking
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  Speaker 4: at him and like, how do I kindly say to
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  Speaker 4: this hero that I respect for what he did. You
• 6:30
  Speaker 4: should go get those benefits, You should go get those services,
• 6:33
  Speaker 4: and probably should be talking to someone like you as well.
• 6:37
  Speaker 4: How do you think we go about solving the problem
• 6:39
  Speaker 4: of veterans just dealing with stuff on their own?
• 6:42
  Speaker 3: Yes, I think, And I've.
• 6:44
  Speaker 5: Heard that from clients where they explain to me the
• 6:49
  Speaker 5: hesitation behind seeking help because others have had it worse
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  Speaker 5: than me with unecessarily recognizing and validating that they also
• 6:58
  Speaker 5: have gone through experiences and they also need the help
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  Speaker 5: just as not to somebody else who have needed it.
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  Speaker 3: You also need that help.
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  Speaker 5: And I think that's where we have to break this
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  Speaker 5: stigma of just because somebody is high worse, that doesn't
• 7:13
  Speaker 5: mean that you don't need it. You also need it,
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  Speaker 5: and this is the reason why. But I can see
• 7:19
  Speaker 5: that happening because I heard that a lot from some
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  Speaker 5: of my clients.
• 7:22
  Speaker 4: Well, and to go even further with it, And it
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  Speaker 4: doesn't matter what political side of the aylle you're on,
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  Speaker 4: the government's not great at spending money, so why leave
• 7:27
  Speaker 4: them more money to spend on stuff that's not you.
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  Speaker 4: That's what I always tell veterans like that money is
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  Speaker 4: supposed to be for you, and if you leave that
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  Speaker 4: in the bucket in Washington, d C.
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  Speaker 2: It's going to go somewhere. I much less wanted to
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  Speaker 2: go than.
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  Speaker 4: These people who deserve this sort of whatever benefit they
• 7:42
  Speaker 4: can get from it.
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  Speaker 5: Yeah, I agree, and I think me as a veteran,
• 7:47
  Speaker 5: you know, back back in the days I try to go,
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  Speaker 5: we'll go through the VA process of getting help my
• 7:54
  Speaker 5: mental health as well, and you know it was hard
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  Speaker 5: for them to call me back and you know, finding
• 8:02
  Speaker 5: my own the episode of my own, but there is
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  Speaker 5: there's a whole lot of you know, we're talking about
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  Speaker 5: something else related to getting wanted to get the help,
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  Speaker 5: going for the help, and then you don't receiving it
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  Speaker 5: on the.
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  Speaker 3: Other on the other end.
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  Speaker 2: Well, and what's crazy to me too, You said that
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  Speaker 2: you were an admin.
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  Speaker 4: I'm guessing them that means you weren't deployed to a
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  Speaker 4: conflict of any kind.
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  Speaker 3: No, I wasn't. I was stationed with Base. It was
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  Speaker 3: non employee with Okay.
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  Speaker 4: So what's interesting about that is there's a lot of
• 8:26
  Speaker 4: veterans that still qualify for disability because other things can
• 8:29
  Speaker 4: happen to them during their their time and service, and
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  Speaker 4: you can be deemed some level, even up to one
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  Speaker 4: hundred percent disabled. I knew a woman who was not
• 8:37
  Speaker 4: deployed in conflict but got in like a horrible car accident,
• 8:40
  Speaker 4: well serving in a place here in the United States,
• 8:44
  Speaker 4: and that wound up eventually being covered by benefits. So
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  Speaker 4: is that part of what you're talking about, is that
• 8:49
  Speaker 4: that battle with justifying the request because it's harder for
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  Speaker 4: some than others.
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  Speaker 5: Yes, absolutely I do receive disability and I was not employeed,
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  Speaker 5: But the other medical reasons why I qualify. But the
• 9:03
  Speaker 5: other part, especially something that I see with clients I
• 9:05
  Speaker 5: have the diagnosis of PTSD post traumatic stress disorder, is
• 9:09
  Speaker 5: that you have to explain yourself over and over again
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  Speaker 5: why you qualify for that, your symptoms. You have to
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  Speaker 5: repeat the story and a lot of you know, veterans, obviously,
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  Speaker 5: they don't want to repeat the story over and over
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  Speaker 5: again because he's already traumatizing as it is just to
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  Speaker 5: remember the event. And now you have to tell multiple people,
• 9:28
  Speaker 5: you know, some of these officers in order for you
• 9:30
  Speaker 5: to qualify. So I can see a lot of hesitation
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  Speaker 5: because some of them they don't want to remember seeing
• 9:34
  Speaker 5: their body, you know, being blown up.
• 9:36
  Speaker 3: Who wants to remember that?
• 9:37
  Speaker 5: Yeah, but that is something that that is a factor
• 9:40
  Speaker 5: as well in asking for help and getting the benefits.
• 9:43
  Speaker 3: That they deserve.
• 9:43
  Speaker 2: Yeah. No, amen, absolutely.
• 9:45
  Speaker 4: So I'm going to ask you another question about just
• 9:47
  Speaker 4: treating veterans or working in the world of mental health,
• 9:51
  Speaker 4: and I'll tell you another story of another veteran that
• 9:53
  Speaker 4: I talked to. He served for a number of years
• 9:56
  Speaker 4: in the Navy, and he had a significant amount of
• 9:59
  Speaker 4: negative interactions with people above him.
• 10:02
  Speaker 2: That's usually the way he described it.
• 10:03
  Speaker 4: He's like he just didn't think he had good leadership
• 10:06
  Speaker 4: and it wound up causing a anger about service in general.
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  Speaker 4: And so I wonder about that because there's veterans I
• 10:13
  Speaker 4: talk to, and the whole point of this segment is
• 10:15
  Speaker 4: to encourage people to think about, you know, serving our country.
• 10:19
  Speaker 2: We need people to do it.
• 10:20
  Speaker 4: But I don't want to shy away from the reality
• 10:22
  Speaker 4: that some do leave years of military service with more
• 10:27
  Speaker 4: anger at some of that experience than others. And so
• 10:31
  Speaker 4: I don't know if you can figure out a way
• 10:33
  Speaker 4: to kind of handle a question that didn't really come
• 10:35
  Speaker 4: out there about the people who have such a different
• 10:38
  Speaker 4: experience and wind up so much more disheartened by something
• 10:42
  Speaker 4: that we still are incredibly grateful that they did.
• 10:45
  Speaker 5: Yes, And I think some of the things that can
• 10:47
  Speaker 5: affect them is that, you know, when they find themselves
• 10:51
  Speaker 5: having another job and having difficulties in connecting or communicating
• 10:56
  Speaker 5: with people.
• 10:58
  Speaker 3: Authority, you know, your boss, for example.
• 11:01
  Speaker 5: I think, and that's something something that I see with
• 11:04
  Speaker 5: clients where they have they start having difficulties at work
• 11:07
  Speaker 5: with navigating their emotions and then they're like, well, you know,
• 11:12
  Speaker 5: I got fired because I just lost it.
• 11:14
  Speaker 3: And then we dig deeper.
• 11:15
  Speaker 5: And this is when it comes to, obviously the process
• 11:17
  Speaker 5: of therapy, trying to figure out where is that coming from,
• 11:21
  Speaker 5: what happened, what are some of the triggers, What events
• 11:23
  Speaker 5: are you experience in the past and now are being
• 11:25
  Speaker 5: activating in the present? But is your brain remembering past
• 11:28
  Speaker 5: events and responding to them like if you're back then
• 11:30
  Speaker 5: but you're now. But if you don't have the tools
• 11:33
  Speaker 5: and the emotional regulation skills needed in order to to
• 11:37
  Speaker 5: process all of that, then you're going to continue to
• 11:39
  Speaker 5: respond like you're.
• 11:40
  Speaker 3: Back then and you're not anymore sure. So helping the
• 11:43
  Speaker 3: clients make the connection as well.
• 11:45
  Speaker 2: And helping them live in the present.
• 11:47
  Speaker 3: Yes, absolutely, because your brain will.
• 11:49
  Speaker 5: It's like you have one foot in the past and
• 11:51
  Speaker 5: the other one in the present, especially with PTSD and
• 11:54
  Speaker 5: some of sometimes you know with therapy, is helping them
• 11:57
  Speaker 5: like you're in the present and what can.
• 11:58
  Speaker 3: You do what you're feeling triggered? And what are your triggers?
• 12:02
  Speaker 5: In becoming more aware so they can have more understanding
• 12:05
  Speaker 5: and those are the tools that they can use in
• 12:06
  Speaker 5: order to manage your emotions better.
• 12:08
  Speaker 2: I do want to ask you about a somewhat sensitive topic.
• 12:10
  Speaker 4: It's not politics per se, but politicians have an opinion
• 12:13
  Speaker 4: on it.
• 12:14
  Speaker 2: And I'm here in Texas.
• 12:16
  Speaker 4: I've talked to veterans about medicinal benefits of like pot
• 12:20
  Speaker 4: and how valuable that is. And I'm not asking you
• 12:23
  Speaker 4: if you want to have If you want to plead
• 12:25
  Speaker 4: the fifth in the question, you can do that too.
• 12:27
  Speaker 4: But I wonder, and I've always thought this, that vets
• 12:29
  Speaker 4: should have a different avenue to anything that seems to
• 12:33
  Speaker 4: help them than everyone else. I'm more accepting of the
• 12:36
  Speaker 4: idea that veterans who say this is more helpful to
• 12:40
  Speaker 4: me than showing up at the VA and being given
• 12:42
  Speaker 4: a handful of pills that in certain scenarios maybe that's okay.
• 12:46
  Speaker 4: But I don't know how you feel about that as
• 12:48
  Speaker 4: a mental health professional, or if it's a silly topic
• 12:50
  Speaker 4: to discuss.
• 12:51
  Speaker 5: Yeah, I do have a combination, you know, I do
• 12:54
  Speaker 5: work with different clients. I think what that trend with
• 12:58
  Speaker 5: my veteran clients are whether they use some kind of you.
• 13:02
  Speaker 3: Know, marijuana or they use alcohol.
• 13:07
  Speaker 5: The question always goes back to is that what what's
• 13:11
  Speaker 5: underneath that? Like you're using a lot of the times
• 13:14
  Speaker 5: we you know, clients use that because whether they're trying
• 13:17
  Speaker 5: to film more relaxed, or they're trying to numb some
• 13:21
  Speaker 5: of the pain that they're experienced, and then not being
• 13:23
  Speaker 5: able to work through some of those things because obviously,
• 13:27
  Speaker 5: you know, you don't talk about how you feel, right,
• 13:29
  Speaker 5: particularly with men, you don't express your needs.
• 13:32
  Speaker 3: You don't express what you want sure to.
• 13:34
  Speaker 5: Just take it, and so they find I see the
• 13:37
  Speaker 5: trend in in utilizing those things just to avoid those
• 13:41
  Speaker 5: certain extent, But at the same time, I'm very cautious
• 13:44
  Speaker 5: about that too, because also if this is something that's
• 13:47
  Speaker 5: helping them make it through, I try to be open minded.
• 13:51
  Speaker 3: About it as well.
• 13:52
  Speaker 4: Yeah, but as you said, if it's if it's really
• 13:54
  Speaker 4: masking some other issue and you as a person who
• 13:57
  Speaker 4: can get to those issues with them, maybe they're way
• 14:00
  Speaker 4: to get them to a place where they don't need anything.
• 14:03
  Speaker 3: Absolutely, and we can incorporate some other some other things
• 14:06
  Speaker 3: that might be more healthy.
• 14:08
  Speaker 5: Absolutely, But I also recognize the purpose of using those things,
• 14:13
  Speaker 5: and I normalize that, Like I can see why you're
• 14:15
  Speaker 5: using alcohol to feel your to numb your feelings because
• 14:18
  Speaker 5: of what you went through, what you experience, and I
• 14:20
  Speaker 5: can see how that has been helpful to a certain
• 14:23
  Speaker 5: extent to push through and to be able to make it,
• 14:26
  Speaker 5: but at the same time, it's not something that is.
• 14:28
  Speaker 3: Healthy for you.
• 14:29
  Speaker 2: Yeah, no, yes, fair enough.
• 14:31
  Speaker 4: So we only have a little bit of a more
• 14:33
  Speaker 4: time left. It's about a half an hour conversation that
• 14:35
  Speaker 4: I take kind of a long commercial break and I'll
• 14:37
  Speaker 4: have another veteran to another uninterrupted commercial or commercial free conversation.
• 14:42
  Speaker 4: But I want to talk about suicide and veterans specifically
• 14:46
  Speaker 4: with you, if you don't mind. As a mental health professional,
• 14:48
  Speaker 4: I'm sure you're aware of the horrible statistics about the
• 14:51
  Speaker 4: amount of vets who take their lives. I think it's
• 14:54
  Speaker 4: twenty two veterans a day or something. I don't even
• 14:57
  Speaker 4: know if that's the most updated number.
• 14:59
  Speaker 2: What are you solutions as a professional?
• 15:02
  Speaker 4: And I'm sure I shouldn't even use that word because
• 15:04
  Speaker 4: there's not probably a full solution, but what are some
• 15:06
  Speaker 4: of the strategies to fix some of that, to get us,
• 15:10
  Speaker 4: you know, down in the rate of people who inevitably
• 15:13
  Speaker 4: harm themselves?
• 15:15
  Speaker 5: I think you know, I'm very thankful for you to
• 15:18
  Speaker 5: even do this segment because I feel like it empowers
• 15:23
  Speaker 5: veterans to ask for help, It empowers people to see
• 15:26
  Speaker 5: you know what, this is how I'm feeling. There's something
• 15:29
  Speaker 5: going on with me, and I need to ask for help.
• 15:33
  Speaker 5: I think the more that we talk about it, the
• 15:35
  Speaker 5: more the more that we can normalize that there are
• 15:37
  Speaker 5: ways for them to get the help needed.
• 15:39
  Speaker 3: But when we don't address them all these things what.
• 15:41
  Speaker 5: We don't talk about, when we don't give space, people
• 15:44
  Speaker 5: are struggling and they keep things in and because they
• 15:47
  Speaker 5: don't know how to navigate the swiss Ado thoughts, they
• 15:49
  Speaker 5: don't know why are they having those thoughts. They don't
• 15:51
  Speaker 5: know how, you know, they don't know how they're feeling
• 15:54
  Speaker 5: at time because they just don't have the emotion of
• 15:56
  Speaker 5: vocabulary to identify that automatically, their mindset.
• 15:59
  Speaker 3: Is going to go like there is no solution, I'm done.
• 16:01
  Speaker 3: I don't want to keep living like this.
• 16:03
  Speaker 5: And with clients that have a tended suicide, something that
• 16:07
  Speaker 5: I see is that they want to leave, but they
• 16:10
  Speaker 5: don't want to keep living like that with that pain. Wow,
• 16:15
  Speaker 5: it's not that they don't want to leave anymore. They
• 16:16
  Speaker 5: want to, but they don't want to keep living in
• 16:19
  Speaker 5: those conditions.
• 16:20
  Speaker 4: So yeah, well, and I was gonna say more specifically,
• 16:23
  Speaker 4: they probably get to a point where they don't believe
• 16:25
  Speaker 4: they can find a way out of that feeling.
• 16:28
  Speaker 5: Yes, absolutely, especially when you don't get the help needed,
• 16:32
  Speaker 5: then you might find yourself struggling with those thoughts that
• 16:35
  Speaker 5: you know nothing is going to fix it, when in reality,
• 16:37
  Speaker 5: there they're options. It's just that we have to allow
• 16:40
  Speaker 5: ourselves to ask a friend to you know, to hold
• 16:43
  Speaker 5: a nine to eight number, go to the hospital and
• 16:46
  Speaker 5: make sure that we can get.
• 16:48
  Speaker 3: The help needed.
• 16:49
  Speaker 5: Well.
• 16:49
  Speaker 4: And like we've said started at the beginning of the conversation,
• 16:51
  Speaker 4: I think this is where it's really great. The people
• 16:53
  Speaker 4: like you are out there who are veterans who served,
• 16:55
  Speaker 4: who are also now doing a service that veterans struggle
• 16:58
  Speaker 4: to do. They struggle to make that connection and do
• 17:02
  Speaker 4: that sort of thing. Is that veterans are looking for
• 17:04
  Speaker 4: people that understand them, and it truly is only other veterans.
• 17:07
  Speaker 4: I'll end the conversation on this and I want your
• 17:09
  Speaker 4: reaction to it. I got to go to a Navy
• 17:13
  Speaker 4: sub reunion, so these are guys they hadn't seen each
• 17:16
  Speaker 4: other in like twenty or thirty years. I think the
• 17:18
  Speaker 4: submarine was getting decommissioned, so they were all getting together
• 17:20
  Speaker 4: to celebrate it and it was amazing to watch people
• 17:24
  Speaker 4: that were sort of shy when they were alone, sort
• 17:25
  Speaker 4: of like bottled up all get into the room together
• 17:28
  Speaker 4: and be the people that they served with. And the
• 17:30
  Speaker 4: way that that atmosphere changed, like that was the most friendly.
• 17:33
  Speaker 4: They're yelling at each other, they're like hitting each other,
• 17:36
  Speaker 4: like it was just it was incredible to watch the
• 17:37
  Speaker 4: dynamic shift completely in the room. And I don't think
• 17:40
  Speaker 4: you can capture that as civilians with a veteran. I
• 17:43
  Speaker 4: think you need another veteran and even if it's not
• 17:46
  Speaker 4: somebody you served with to get people into that space.
• 17:48
  Speaker 2: Is that true?
• 17:50
  Speaker 3: Yeah? Absolutely?
• 17:51
  Speaker 5: And I think now I've seen, you know, because I
• 17:54
  Speaker 5: am a therapist, I see hospitals or you know, even
• 17:57
  Speaker 5: organizations that they are opening up in units.
• 18:00
  Speaker 3: Which I think is amazing. Sure, because when you're able to.
• 18:05
  Speaker 5: You know, it's like it's that you're back in the military,
• 18:08
  Speaker 5: Like they get it, the understand they've they've been through
• 18:11
  Speaker 5: some of the things that you have been through or
• 18:13
  Speaker 5: or they know what it's like. So I think that
• 18:15
  Speaker 5: right there can be healing itself. And I always encourage
• 18:19
  Speaker 5: my my veteran clients, like, you know, let's let's find.
• 18:22
  Speaker 3: You a support system.
• 18:23
  Speaker 5: Let's find you, you know, support groups or veterans, because
• 18:26
  Speaker 5: that right there is going to You're going to be
• 18:29
  Speaker 5: you know, spending time with with with with with art
• 18:31
  Speaker 5: people right which they get it, and that right there
• 18:35
  Speaker 5: can be healing in many ways and perhaps can encourage
• 18:38
  Speaker 5: you to seek help as well.
• 18:39
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 18:39
  Speaker 4: No, it's amazing. Well, thank you so much for the time.
• 18:41
  Speaker 4: I do want to give you the opportunity. You said
• 18:44
  Speaker 4: you're currently in Florida.
• 18:45
  Speaker 3: No, I'm currently in Houston, Texas.
• 18:47
  Speaker 2: Okay, you're back in these exactics.
• 18:48
  Speaker 4: So I want you to give out all your information
• 18:50
  Speaker 4: for anybody listening that would like to connect with you
• 18:53
  Speaker 4: any of that stuff.
• 18:54
  Speaker 5: Yes, so, so my website is w w W dot
• 18:58
  Speaker 5: adi a are I Hope h O p E Counseling
• 19:03
  Speaker 5: dot com. Our phone number is three four six nine
• 19:06
  Speaker 5: four six five six three nine, and you can follow
• 19:08
  Speaker 5: us on Instagram. Than ADDI O R I Hope Counseling.
• 19:13
  Speaker 2: Dot Yeah, yeah, I gotcha.
• 19:16
  Speaker 3: You know what I mean.
• 19:17
  Speaker 4: No, perfect, So that's Ori E O R I Hope
• 19:20
  Speaker 4: Counseling dot com. Three four six nine four six five
• 19:23
  Speaker 4: six three nine. You've repeated a bunch of times you
• 19:26
  Speaker 4: speak English and Spanish. Well, yeah, you speak English and.
• 19:29
  Speaker 3: Spanish Spanish as well. We're are a group of six
• 19:33
  Speaker 3: therapies here.
• 19:33
  Speaker 4: Oh wow, and you're all bilingual, okay, all right, yeah yeah.
• 19:38
  Speaker 4: And then there's one guy like me that's there. I'm
• 19:39
  Speaker 4: married dull Latina and she wants me to learn Spanish
• 19:42
  Speaker 4: so bad and I still have not me too, Okay,
• 19:45
  Speaker 4: I know the bad words.
• 19:46
  Speaker 2: I know at least those.
• 19:47
  Speaker 4: Yeah, when she's throwing the chocola at me, I know
• 19:50
  Speaker 4: what she's saying.
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: Thank you so much for hanging out with us, for
• 19:53
  Speaker 2: the opportunity.
• 19:54
  Speaker 4: Sure, of course we're going to take a quick break.
• 19:56
  Speaker 4: A lot coming up. This is the Craig Collins Show
• 19:59
  Speaker 4: k s e V The Voice of Taxes. This is
• 20:02
  Speaker 4: the Voice of Taxes KSV seven hundred am. My name
• 20:06
  Speaker 4: is Craig Collins. Is the Craig Collins Show. You can
• 20:08
  Speaker 4: hit that red button in front of you to turn
• 20:10
  Speaker 4: your microphone on. Sir John is in studio and pull
• 20:12
  Speaker 4: that mike closer to you too.
• 20:14
  Speaker 2: Good. How are you doing.
• 20:15
  Speaker 4: I'm not sure if you're actually on the air, which
• 20:17
  Speaker 4: is one other kind of thing that we'd actually need. Lucas,
• 20:19
  Speaker 4: thank you Lucas is doing double duty running both video
• 20:22
  Speaker 4: and audio so we can get this going. So thank
• 20:24
  Speaker 4: you very much, Lucas. One more time, John, how you
• 20:26
  Speaker 4: doing doing well, sir? And you I'm doing great. Tell
• 20:30
  Speaker 4: me what organization are you with?
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: Okay? So I represent the Houston Regional Veterans Chamber of Commerce.
• 20:35
  Speaker 2: Okay, that feels like an important organization.
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: I would like to think it is.
• 20:39
  Speaker 4: Okay, good, And so you're dealing with all the veteran
• 20:41
  Speaker 4: owned companies.
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: That's what we do. So we spoke with a person
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: your previous guests, Angela, and she talked about the mental
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: health and the health issues of veterans.
• 20:50
  Speaker 2: Correct.
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: What I like to do is lean into a different
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: aspect of the veteran, the veteran entrepreneur, Okay, the business owner,
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: the person who got out and said, Hey, I'm gonna
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: take these skill sets that the military has pushed into me.
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: Sure do something great with those things. Sure, that's where
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: I'm coming to play.
• 21:03
  Speaker 2: That's amazing.
• 21:04
  Speaker 4: So before we get too deep into what all that is,
• 21:07
  Speaker 4: when you sat down, you said, hey, just to let
• 21:09
  Speaker 4: you know, I know another guy that.
• 21:10
  Speaker 2: Works here, Gary Elliott, Gary Elliott.
• 21:12
  Speaker 4: Gary Elliot's Marine Gary Elliott passed away earlier.
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: This year, and I'm very sorry to hear that.
• 21:17
  Speaker 4: Yeah, And the reason that I thought it was so
• 21:19
  Speaker 4: interesting that you'd name dropped Gary so quickly, and this
• 21:22
  Speaker 4: is something you didn't know and I only talked about,
• 21:24
  Speaker 4: I think once.
• 21:24
  Speaker 2: In the show. The reason I have my job is
• 21:26
  Speaker 2: Gary Elliott.
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: Wow.
• 21:27
  Speaker 4: So the reason I'm sitting here talking to you, the
• 21:29
  Speaker 4: reason we're now doing it on air radio segment to
• 21:31
  Speaker 4: help promote veterans is Gary. I got a job offer
• 21:34
  Speaker 4: a couple months after starting here to go be somewhere else,
• 21:37
  Speaker 4: and because of some things going on, Gary facilitated away
• 21:40
  Speaker 4: for my job to get better at this radio station
• 21:43
  Speaker 4: and then stay, and my wife wanted to stay. She
• 21:45
  Speaker 4: had a good job and so and Gary only knew
• 21:48
  Speaker 4: me like four months when he did this for me,
• 21:50
  Speaker 4: So that might be a nice place to start. Veterans
• 21:54
  Speaker 4: care about other people in a way that very few
• 21:57
  Speaker 4: humans do. And it was one of the things that
• 22:00
  Speaker 4: most impacted me about knowing Gary is how incredible it
• 22:03
  Speaker 4: was for someone to give a crap about a dude
• 22:05
  Speaker 4: that you've known for like three months and to be like,
• 22:07
  Speaker 4: I'm going to help you get a job, even if
• 22:09
  Speaker 4: it harmed him in a way because it took away
• 22:12
  Speaker 4: from some of what he was doing.
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: So here's why, Because as a veteran, we put our
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: lives on the line for people we've literally just met. Hey,
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: you know, we're literally slammed together and said, hey, you
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: got YouTube go do a great thing together. And oh,
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: by the way, one of you may not come home.
• 22:25
  Speaker 2: Sure, And so we.
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: Learned to put our trust in people, and we look
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: beyond the superficial and we look into your core and
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: if we trust you, it's because you're worth trusting. And
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: we get that good at understanding people and their mannerisms and.
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: Their character and like assessing it in a few minutes.
• 22:42
  Speaker 4: Okay, So with Gary, I imagine a lot of what
• 22:45
  Speaker 4: you were doing was some of the PSA work that
• 22:47
  Speaker 4: he did here.
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: He did a lot of PSA work with Okay, sir.
• 22:49
  Speaker 4: And so let's get into it. Let's actually talk about
• 22:51
  Speaker 4: the Chamber of commerce. What are some of the biggest
• 22:54
  Speaker 4: things that you're either involved in, our biggest challenges that
• 22:56
  Speaker 4: you're facing.
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: So we're biggest things that we're involved in right now
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: are leading the charge for veteran entrepreneurship across the region.
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: Of Houston. And why is that such a big deal
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: Because we are the third largest metropolis in the United States,
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: and oh, by the way, Texas has the number one
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: veteran population out of all the states. And oh, by
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: the way, Houston has over half a million veterans living here. Yes,
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: so we are now, if not number one, we're in
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: very close number two to Los Angeles. Wow, with the
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: veteran population.
• 23:25
  Speaker 2: And now I think you're number one. Actually I talked
• 23:26
  Speaker 2: to a guest a couple weeks ago.
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: You can just passed good job, but I can't confirm that,
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: so I won't speak to it.
• 23:31
  Speaker 2: I think you can go ahead, but.
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: I know doctor Jones at the Mayor's office says one,
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna go with her. But so that's important because
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: we have over sixty thousand veteran entrepreneurs here in Houston.
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: What are they going? What are they doing? That's important? Yes,
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: And when we start talking about you know, Discount Tire, Nike, Adidas,
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: since US Uniform, those are all veteran founded companies, we
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: don't know. We don't talk about.
• 23:54
  Speaker 2: That now, we don't you know?
• 23:55
  Speaker 4: Now you know it's I just got Discount Tire Tires
• 23:57
  Speaker 4: recently because I wanted.
• 23:58
  Speaker 2: To save some money.
• 23:59
  Speaker 4: I didn't know I was even doing that, which is awesome.
• 24:01
  Speaker 4: Let me ask you this way, because this is kind
• 24:03
  Speaker 4: of what came up in the last conversation. As a
• 24:06
  Speaker 4: mental health professional who also was a veteran, she winds
• 24:08
  Speaker 4: up being more capable of helping other vets. Sure thats
• 24:12
  Speaker 4: are interested in talking to someone who also served. I
• 24:15
  Speaker 4: imagine for a lot of the companies that you wind
• 24:17
  Speaker 4: up working with, there's a poll from the veteran community
• 24:21
  Speaker 4: to support these veteran organizations because of that shared experience.
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: For sure. And what we try and do, and here's
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: what I know is that the veteran is closely tied
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: with his local community. Will I say, when you spend
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: a dollar with a veteran, you're spending it in four
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: or five different places. He's going to spend it with
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: his family, He's going to pay his bills, he's going
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: to support his local Little League club. He's going to
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: pour back into his community because that's something he cherishes
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: because he has spent time away from such things. Yes,
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: and even if your previous veteran was on a military
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: base installation, that's great. But here's the thing, and she
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: didn't talk about this. And every veteran has done this,
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: and every veteran knows this sacrifice. Whether you served an
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: admin or you were front line grunt, it doesn't matter.
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: Every day. Every day, sir, you signed a check up
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: to and including your life, and you slid that across
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: the table to the US government. And fortunately, because most
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: of them came home, the check was slid back to us,
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: maybe with a corner ripped off, maybe ripped in half,
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: but it was slid back to you. And we honor
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: that sacrifice, and we honor and you know what that
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: means something. And so when I say, hey, I'm a
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: veter known business. I'm a realtor. I own a real
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: estate brokerage in South Houston. When I say I'm a
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: veter known company, my community surrounds that and they say, hey, listen,
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: we want to do business with a person whose character
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: we know, and that's important.
• 25:34
  Speaker 2: No, you're absolutely.
• 25:35
  Speaker 5: You know.
• 25:35
  Speaker 4: It's so funny because there was another real estate guy
• 25:37
  Speaker 4: that I knew in Illinois when I was doing this segment,
• 25:38
  Speaker 4: and not only did he work with a bunch of
• 25:40
  Speaker 4: veterans to get a bunch of people houses, I'd use
• 25:42
  Speaker 4: all the veteran benefits you can, which sometimes they didn't
• 25:45
  Speaker 4: want to, and he's like, no, do use them, use
• 25:46
  Speaker 4: everything you can.
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: And we'll talk about that here in a minute. I
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: can tell you no.
• 25:49
  Speaker 4: But the other thing that I find is incredible about
• 25:51
  Speaker 4: that is, yes, by and large, when you're working with
• 25:54
  Speaker 4: certain companies. I'm not trying to crap on other businesses
• 25:57
  Speaker 4: out there, that's not the intention of this comment. But
• 25:59
  Speaker 4: there's a difference between knowing that the person that owns
• 26:02
  Speaker 4: the company that you're working with did that for our
• 26:05
  Speaker 4: country because it gives you an expectation that my experience
• 26:09
  Speaker 4: is in fact likely to be better, and even if
• 26:11
  Speaker 4: it's not that good, I feel like the company might
• 26:13
  Speaker 4: do more to respond to it, because, as you said,
• 26:16
  Speaker 4: the character has been demonstrated before they even open the
• 26:19
  Speaker 4: doors to the business.
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: And I've yet to meet the American citizen when they say, oh,
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: well he's a veteran, will poop pooh that guy, that's
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: that's Americans you can get.
• 26:28
  Speaker 4: I feel well, unfortunately at a certain time, because I've
• 26:30
  Speaker 4: talked with a lot of the Vietnam guys.
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: But now, yes, absolutely, yes, absolutely, now yeah, and unfortunately
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: we see there's an undertone of the society that doesn't
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: support veteran and that's unfortunate because there air freedoms and
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: liberties to say such a things were bought for and
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: paid by the veteran. Exactly, you're welcome, yeh. But when
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: it comes down to do you support veteran and we
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: as a as an organization, as the Houston Regional Veterans Chamber,
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: we poke a big finger in the chest of large corporations.
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: Hey do you support veteran? Oh? Yeah, yeah, we give
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: ten percent discount. Okay, well yeah, but one it comes
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: to purchasing, when you spend a million dollar RFP with
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: the company, do you ask if they're a veteran. We
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: have LGBTQ, we have female, we have Hispanic, we have black,
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: we have Indian, we have all of the things. Sure,
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: but no one answers, Oh, we don't ask if they're
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: veteran or not. Yeah, I know, but would.
• 27:17
  Speaker 2: You and you should probably should maybe should please?
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: And so that's the question. And we're getting a lot
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: of traction, especially because we're partnering up with Rice University
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: their veteran business. It's the largest veteran business battle on
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: the planet. Goldman Sachs ten thousand program, API American Pultrolium
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: Institute their Blue Wave program. We're pushing veteran entrepreneurs and
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: veteran businesses through those programs so that when the petroleum
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: industry looks at them, they're already blessed off, all right,
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: and they're ready to go. They're plug and play.
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: Okay, So let me ask you this. I'm a veteran.
• 27:50
  Speaker 4: I'm not a veteran, but let's say that I was
• 27:52
  Speaker 4: one and I wanted to start a business. Do I
• 27:54
  Speaker 4: turn to you early on in that process to get help?
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: You absolutely can. We have a lot of resources, and
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: there are a lot of resources that are both state, local,
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: and federal for you to start a business. And I'll
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: tell you what. One of the biggest resources we have
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: in our pocket is not a veteran organization. It's called
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: SCORE s c O. R. And they do an amazing
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: job for the city of Houston. And my good friend
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: Mark Winchester, who's the director for the SBA.
• 28:20
  Speaker 2: I think I need to meet a lot of your friends,
• 28:22
  Speaker 2: but you should. Okay, I would like to.
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: But he is actually he's a submariner. But so the
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: SBA supports SCORE. The or score organization. And these are
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: retired executives that go to work and they'll tear apart
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: your business before you even have a business. They'll help
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: you tear apart your business and say, hey, listen, don't
• 28:37
  Speaker 1: quit your day job. Let's get this thing off the
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: round first. Or hey, you're onto something here, let's clean
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: it up and get to work. And they'll help you
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: do that. We'll plug into those resources. My good friend
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: Greg Shiagamase's Air Force veteran, and the TVC. We'll get
• 28:49
  Speaker 1: you your EI in number and we'll waive your franchise taxes.
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: By the way. We'll get you hooked up. Pick a thing.
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: We got you And and there's a lot of businesses.
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: And here's the challenge I have as the VET the
• 28:59
  Speaker 1: Houston Reach No Veteran Chamber of Commerce. I have businesses
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: that sell twenty dollars tubes of paint cream and I
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: have a sixty million dollars self defense company. Everybody in between, wow, right,
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: I mean tried it. They do is try and staffing.
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: They do great work across all sectors for technical job placements.
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: And I've got a guy who does We're working well.
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: Everybody in between.
• 29:19
  Speaker 2: Now it's amazing to think.
• 29:21
  Speaker 4: You know what's funny about wood working guys is, for
• 29:22
  Speaker 4: some reason it's so cathartic for a lot of the veteran.
• 29:25
  Speaker 2: Yeah, do that.
• 29:25
  Speaker 4: Like I've met some guys and you go into their
• 29:27
  Speaker 4: groad and you're like, holy crap, why do you have
• 29:28
  Speaker 4: this much stuff?
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: Yeah?
• 29:29
  Speaker 2: Like, I just keep doing it. But I want to
• 29:32
  Speaker 2: talk about something else.
• 29:34
  Speaker 4: You keep dropping the branch of military that people served in,
• 29:38
  Speaker 4: and I think I failed to ask you yours, John,
• 29:40
  Speaker 4: you were in the army.
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: I was in the army yes day. I was a
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: twelve Bravo combat engineer.
• 29:43
  Speaker 2: Okay. And how long did you serve?
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: I did four? Five years?
• 29:46
  Speaker 2: Five years? Did you get deployed into combat?
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: I did well, not into combat, but I was in Bosnia, Okay,
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: Bosi Hert Scovina.
• 29:52
  Speaker 4: Do you have any sort of reaction sometimes to everything
• 29:55
  Speaker 4: we're talking about as far as the Middle East, you
• 29:56
  Speaker 4: don't have to we don't have to go down that road.
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: So here's the challenge, and this is something that we're
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: finally seeing in Iran, but we should have seen decades ago.
• 30:05
  Speaker 1: Take the you spend millions of dollars training the world's
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: best guard dog. This dog will respond to your commands,
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: your commands only, and will kill everything you put in
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: front of it. Yeah, and then you put it on
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: a three foot leash.
• 30:15
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah, no, Amen, that's basically what we've done for centuries,
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: oh go, for decades in the US military.
• 30:21
  Speaker 4: Is I'm stunned with how quickly you explained that, because
• 30:25
  Speaker 4: like you were starting the thing and I'm like, all right,
• 30:27
  Speaker 4: it's going to take a little bit from it, and
• 30:28
  Speaker 4: like punchline boom, We're right there. Because you're absolutely right,
• 30:30
  Speaker 4: there's a leash, and I feel like that leash is
• 30:33
  Speaker 4: on a lot of people. One of the other organizations,
• 30:36
  Speaker 4: or one of the other groups that I find this
• 30:38
  Speaker 4: with is veterans who wind up becoming police officers.
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: Oh yes.
• 30:41
  Speaker 2: My last guest said.
• 30:43
  Speaker 4: That she was contemplating that road before going somewhere a
• 30:45
  Speaker 4: different road. And I've talked to vets who are in
• 30:48
  Speaker 4: the police force, and like, you can't believe how much
• 30:51
  Speaker 4: further the red tape is gone from my experience in one.
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: To the other. Correct. Yeah, And their challenge is as
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: a US military veteran, you're designed to do a certain
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: thing the killed nation's enemy bottom line in front. Yeah,
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: As a police officer, you designed to protect. So the
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: mission is similar but different, and any l e O
• 31:07
  Speaker 1: who was formerly a veteran had had to do a
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: significant mind shift. The camaraderie is the same. The fact
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: you're still a lethal force out there is the same. However,
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: your mindset has to shift because now you're a protector.
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: Your job is to stand in the way of danger, not.
• 31:23
  Speaker 2: Sure the opposite danger.
• 31:25
  Speaker 4: You mentioned the word camaraderie, and I was thinking about
• 31:27
  Speaker 4: one of the big benefits of the Chamber of Commerce
• 31:30
  Speaker 4: for veterans specifically, and it's once these organizations are created,
• 31:33
  Speaker 4: once these businesses start to succeed, I imagine you create
• 31:36
  Speaker 4: an opportunity for them to co mingle.
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, we do all over the city. We
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: have three mixers running right now across the city, and
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: we actually network with other organizations like Cup of Joey.
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: We bring other out outside entrepreneurs in the space. But
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: one of the one I want to bring up to you, sir,
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: is this Veteran business marketplace. Okay, this is at wings
• 31:54
  Speaker 1: Over Houston, which is the third largest air show planets.
• 31:57
  Speaker 2: Show before me goes every year.
• 31:59
  Speaker 1: Yes, and so what we have done the Veterans Chamber
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: of Commerce in the middle right down the center line
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: of the wings of wings over Houston. Wow, is the
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: Veteran business marketplace. We have a forty by eighty festime.
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: We put forty veteran entrepreneurs in there.
• 32:11
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I remember this from last year.
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: And those guys go ham And last year we had
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: one thousand people an hour coming through there. So if
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: you're a veteran business owner in the city of Houston
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: and you can hear my voice, you need to be
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: at this event and you need to get a table.
• 32:24
  Speaker 4: Were you guys close to the ones who like the
• 32:26
  Speaker 4: time the autographs like.
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: We're right next to We take, we take care of Yeah,
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: this legends and heroes town, we take, we take care
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: of them.
• 32:32
  Speaker 2: Okay, cool, Okay cool.
• 32:33
  Speaker 4: So tell me a little bit more about the ways
• 32:36
  Speaker 4: that organizations can benefit from knowing the Chamber of Commerce better.
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: So, the Veterans Chamber of Commerce is the easy button.
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: When you say, hey, I need to source a thing,
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: you call the Veterans Chamber and say who do you
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: got that does this? Yes, And chances are I've networked
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: with somebody in Houston, a veteran entrepreneur that does exactly.
• 32:54
  Speaker 4: That is that because of the size of the community
• 32:57
  Speaker 4: here that you could connect people to anybody who does
• 32:59
  Speaker 4: anything pretty much.
• 33:01
  Speaker 1: And I the Chamber is a prolific networker, and we
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: put the word out, Hey who does this? Who knows
• 33:08
  Speaker 1: a guy that does this? And chances are you know,
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: you've got Katie, You've got full shar You've got Texas City,
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: You've got Humble, You've got everybody out there. There's no
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: way I could possibly know everybody, but I know somebody
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: who does.
• 33:21
  Speaker 4: Yeah, let me ask you a different question, because, as
• 33:24
  Speaker 4: I said, I think a bit during this conversation. I've
• 33:27
  Speaker 4: done this segment other places in other states. Texas seems
• 33:30
  Speaker 4: to be better than anywhere as far as understanding the
• 33:33
  Speaker 4: value of veterans and giving back to veterans through your
• 33:37
  Speaker 4: role which is tied to the state. Do you think
• 33:39
  Speaker 4: that's true and why do you think that's true?
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: Why do I think that's true? Because Texas we valued
• 33:43
  Speaker 1: I like that.
• 33:44
  Speaker 2: You just jumped past like it is true.
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: Why it is true? Here's why, Because Texas we value
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: our freedoms in Texas. This is the I'm from Pennsylvania originally.
• 33:52
  Speaker 1: When I got to Texas, Fort Hood I realized that Texas.
• 33:56
  Speaker 1: You're a Texan first, and oh, by the way, you
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: live in the United States, right, that was.
• 34:00
  Speaker 2: Yeah, cod there's two flags in the front yard.
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: And they're allowed to fly at the same level. By
• 34:03
  Speaker 1: the way, Yeah, and this is the only state in
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: the nation that can do that.
• 34:06
  Speaker 2: Wow.
• 34:06
  Speaker 1: And the reason that's important is because Texas we value
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: our freedoms and we understand what it means to sacrifice.
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: And when you've got a US military veteran who has
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: done just that, yeah, you take you don't take that
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: for granted.
• 34:17
  Speaker 4: Yeah, No, I appreciate that you have the Thunderbirds in
• 34:19
  Speaker 4: the back of this.
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: Yes, because the Thunderbirds are actually going to do their
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: show this year.
• 34:24
  Speaker 2: Are you excited about that?
• 34:25
  Speaker 1: I get super excited.
• 34:26
  Speaker 2: I wonder if you get to connect with them at all?
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: I do. We actually have a dinner after hours and
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: we get to meet with the Thunderbirds, and those guys
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: are just jacked up.
• 34:33
  Speaker 2: Have you worked with Honor Flight at all?
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: I have not. That's actually Legends and Eurocent next time.
• 34:38
  Speaker 2: Okay, Yeah, because it's a nonprofit organization.
• 34:41
  Speaker 4: One of the things I do love about Honor Flight
• 34:43
  Speaker 4: is the way that they create these communities too, and
• 34:45
  Speaker 4: then the biggest thing is that welcome home that they do.
• 34:48
  Speaker 2: You see veterans responding to the community.
• 34:51
  Speaker 4: So in that vein, I was thinking about how you
• 34:54
  Speaker 4: connect the community to veterans, not just veterans to veterans,
• 34:57
  Speaker 4: not just you know, veteran organizations, to services or guys
• 35:00
  Speaker 4: that can get off the ground because of you, but
• 35:02
  Speaker 4: you are also pushing the community toward veteran businesses.
• 35:06
  Speaker 1: We try, we do our best, and how do you
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: do that? We basically that's exactly right. We network with
• 35:11
  Speaker 1: other organizations, Cup of Joey, the City of Houston Mayor's
• 35:14
  Speaker 1: Office of Veterans Affairs, doctor Leshandra Jones. We get out
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: in front of him as far and as fast as
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: we can, and we don't hesitate. We are not shy
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: about networking. That's one of my favorite military principles is audacity.
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: I will walk in a room and take ownership until
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: you tell me otherwise.
• 35:28
  Speaker 2: You know, can you tell me why you think veterans
• 35:30
  Speaker 2: make good business owners?
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: Yes?
• 35:34
  Speaker 2: Is that along? Is that a difficult question?
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: The challenge is, Here's what I've noticed is we see
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: a lot of marine entrepreneurs, okay, and people say why
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: is that. Well, that's a good question because marines don't
• 35:47
  Speaker 1: take like taking orders from non marines. And so they said,
• 35:50
  Speaker 1: you know what, I'd rather just do for me yea.
• 35:52
  Speaker 1: And so those marines get out there and they just say,
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: you know what, I'm gonna do it my way, come
• 35:55
  Speaker 1: hell or water. And here's the thing about a veteran,
• 35:58
  Speaker 1: And this is the challenge that I have the benefit.
• 36:01
  Speaker 1: The challenge I have is it's hard to get the
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: veteran to ask for help. Sure, we don't do that, Yeah, no,
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: not right your entire military career, you're getting a knife
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: hand in the chest. Don't bring me problems, bring me solutions,
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: move out and drow fire.
• 36:12
  Speaker 2: Wow.
• 36:13
  Speaker 1: And so when the veteran entrepreneur comes across the problem,
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: he doesn't know how to ask for help with that problem.
• 36:19
  Speaker 1: He just basically says, you know what, I'm gonna throw
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: more rocks in my rock, I'm gonna do more push ups,
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna outwork this problem, and I'm gonna stick to it.
• 36:25
  Speaker 1: The problem we have is and that's the advantage. The
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: problem with that is that leads to most often divorce, bankruptcy,
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: or mental health issues, and not necessarily in that order,
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: and if if you stop, if I can get the
• 36:39
  Speaker 1: veteran to stop and think about their military service. And
• 36:43
  Speaker 1: for the most part, with the exception of a few
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: Special Forces operators, they were never sent anywhere to do
• 36:48
  Speaker 1: anything by themselves. Ever, you don't even go pee by yourself,
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: my friend, take a battle, buddy.
• 36:54
  Speaker 2: Yeah, both you both leave.
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: And you both come back. And but here we go.
• 36:58
  Speaker 1: We get out in the military, we we start a
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: business and we throw the blinders on. So don't touch me.
• 37:02
  Speaker 1: I've got this stop stop, I've got I've got at
• 37:06
  Speaker 1: least three hundred people in your foxhol with you who
• 37:08
  Speaker 1: you can ask for help. Wow, And I've seen I've
• 37:10
  Speaker 1: seen it before. I've got an AC technician who starts
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: his own company because he knows how to do ACS
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: really well. You know, he's not good at payroll taxes. Sure,
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: and he spends two or three weeks in his office
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: beating his head. You know he's not doing fixing AC's
• 37:24
  Speaker 1: earn her money.
• 37:25
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 37:25
  Speaker 1: Yeah, well, listen, listen, listen. Stop. Let me go plug
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: you in with a veteran who's a CPA who will
• 37:32
  Speaker 1: do your payroll taxes. Oh, by the way, he's not
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: gonna do it for free, but he's going to give
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: you a best damn price, and he's gonna let you
• 37:38
  Speaker 1: get back out there on the streets and turn wrenches
• 37:39
  Speaker 1: and go make money for your family and be wildly successful.
• 37:42
  Speaker 4: You know, it's really interesting about you saying that too,
• 37:44
  Speaker 4: because you point out something that I hear all the
• 37:46
  Speaker 4: time is that veterans are really bad at asking for help.
• 37:48
  Speaker 4: But when a veteran knows it's another veteran that they're asking,
• 37:50
  Speaker 4: we leap to their aid, right. But it also changes
• 37:53
  Speaker 4: something about it changes where the veteran who struggles to
• 37:55
  Speaker 4: ask seems a little bit more likely to ask another
• 37:58
  Speaker 4: vet as opposed to their civilian. And it's just because
• 38:01
  Speaker 4: you're surrounded by people who do not understand you. They
• 38:04
  Speaker 4: don't understand your experience, your life and and the challenge
• 38:08
  Speaker 4: of coming back home and or you know, whether or
• 38:11
  Speaker 4: not you were even deployed somewhere other than the United States,
• 38:14
  Speaker 4: transitioning your life away from that way of thinking.
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: Well, there's also the commonality of the language. And I
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: was well that too, But I was a platoon leader,
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: and I've had people say, well, how many black people
• 38:25
  Speaker 1: do you have in your platoon? How many Hispanic people.
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: I gotta be honest, I had thirty five troops. I
• 38:29
  Speaker 1: can't tell you it never mattered, didn't matter, It didn't matter.
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: Are you good at your job? Yep. If you're not
• 38:34
  Speaker 1: good at your job, I'll train you to be good
• 38:35
  Speaker 1: at your job. Let's go. And it never mattered. And
• 38:38
  Speaker 1: most veterans carry that with them. Is like, you know,
• 38:40
  Speaker 1: in my unit, it didn't matter. We all wore green,
• 38:43
  Speaker 1: and we all ran towards danger. Right, Okay, And here's
• 38:47
  Speaker 1: the fun part is as a veteran, you know you're
• 38:49
  Speaker 1: dealing with a Navy guy. You're gonna pick on them. Right.
• 38:52
  Speaker 1: The first thing I did is make fun of.
• 38:53
  Speaker 2: A marine a crayon joke.
• 38:55
  Speaker 1: We get some probably some craon you know, or reading
• 38:58
  Speaker 1: level joke of that matter. But everyone's got their own thing, right.
• 39:02
  Speaker 1: The Navy that will pick on the Air Force Air
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: Force pick gets picked on by the Air Force. Everybody
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: he picks on the coast guard and right, and every
• 39:08
  Speaker 1: military member wants to meet the first base force guy.
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: Oh my god, that's like a unicorn. But you dare
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: you let a civilian pick on that Navy guy? Oh yeah,
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: the Marine's gonna be the crap out of it. Yeah,
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: that's the commonality. You know.
• 39:20
  Speaker 4: It's so great about you saying that is. And I
• 39:22
  Speaker 4: told the last guest the same thing. I got to
• 39:23
  Speaker 4: go to like a reunion with a bunch of Navy
• 39:25
  Speaker 4: guys on a ship that they decommissioned, and they're all
• 39:28
  Speaker 4: making jokes, they're all crapping on each other, and I
• 39:30
  Speaker 4: tried to chime in for one and I got just destroyed.
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: Yeah, don't do it.
• 39:33
  Speaker 2: That's the worst mistake you can make in your life.
• 39:35
  Speaker 1: But here's the thing. Those guys haven't seen each other
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: in thirty five years, right, they walk in the room
• 39:39
  Speaker 1: and they're best friends instantly again, like they never left.
• 39:41
  Speaker 2: What's amazing about that too?
• 39:43
  Speaker 4: And I feel like you have to experience this through
• 39:45
  Speaker 4: the organizations that you wind up connecting.
• 39:47
  Speaker 2: They don't even have to serve together.
• 39:48
  Speaker 4: No, I've seen veterans that have the commonality of service,
• 39:52
  Speaker 4: even if it's a different conflict a different branch in
• 39:54
  Speaker 4: the military, find that same path to closeness quickly.
• 39:59
  Speaker 3: That is.
• 39:59
  Speaker 2: It's it's so interesting because I feel.
• 40:01
  Speaker 4: Like one of the challenges that maybe a lot of
• 40:04
  Speaker 4: businesses in general face today and not just veteran owned businesses.
• 40:07
  Speaker 4: But all of them is the consumer and how the
• 40:09
  Speaker 4: consumer might have changed over the last few years. For sure,
• 40:12
  Speaker 4: the demand, the behavior, everything, And yet I feel like
• 40:15
  Speaker 4: if anyone's going to do a good job of handling that,
• 40:17
  Speaker 4: it might be the vet being like, all right, what's
• 40:19
  Speaker 4: the problem.
• 40:19
  Speaker 2: Here's a solution we can be done now.
• 40:21
  Speaker 1: Yeah, but we don't have to mince words about it.
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: Let's just fix the problem, right, Yeah, And we don't
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: have in hall about the solution. We're a little bit
• 40:28
  Speaker 1: more decisive than most.
• 40:29
  Speaker 4: Yeah, no, that's true. Before I let you go, we're
• 40:31
  Speaker 4: running out of time. We have about five six minutes left.
• 40:33
  Speaker 2: Is there something specifically we haven't mentioned that you'd like
• 40:35
  Speaker 2: to bring up.
• 40:36
  Speaker 1: I'll tell you what. Here's the hardest part is finding support,
• 40:39
  Speaker 1: especially financial support. All the things we do. I've worked
• 40:42
  Speaker 1: for the chamber. I'm now the president, I was the
• 40:44
  Speaker 1: executive vice president. I've done it for free for five years. Wow.
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: All of my volunteers are worked for free and they've
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: done so for a very long time. What I'd like
• 40:53
  Speaker 1: to do is find some some financial support from the
• 40:56
  Speaker 1: City of Houston to recognize that this is I don't
• 40:59
  Speaker 1: mind I don't need to pay check. Yeah, but the
• 41:01
  Speaker 1: programs I sponsor. I would like to scholarship people into
• 41:05
  Speaker 1: the Rice Veteran Business Pedal. There's an interrance fee, right,
• 41:07
  Speaker 1: there's requirements in order to get into certain programs. The
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: Chamber can't necessarily pay for that. I would love for
• 41:13
  Speaker 1: the Chamber to be able to say, you know what,
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: this veteran we believe in, this veteran entrepreneur has got
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: a great idea. We want to make this happen for them.
• 41:20
  Speaker 2: How do you get that done?
• 41:22
  Speaker 1: Right now? It's brew force marketing.
• 41:24
  Speaker 2: Okay, but you said that you want the city of
• 41:26
  Speaker 2: Houston to help. You know. A state senator just walked
• 41:28
  Speaker 2: out of this studio an hour ago.
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: I probably met him in the parking segment.
• 41:32
  Speaker 4: But are there certain conversations going on with politicians to
• 41:36
  Speaker 4: try to find ways for.
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: I would love to I'd love to bring a veteran
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: business outreach center into the city of Houston. There's one
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: in the Valley, and there's one in Dallas Fort Worth. Okay,
• 41:44
  Speaker 1: I'd love to bring one to one San Antonio, and
• 41:47
  Speaker 1: I'd love to bring one to Houston.
• 41:48
  Speaker 4: Do you have you tried to approach this topic are
• 41:51
  Speaker 4: there like certain roadblocks that you're told exists.
• 41:53
  Speaker 2: There is it just money.
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: Everyone's pointing everybody else for permission to do a thing. Gotcha,
• 41:57
  Speaker 1: The SBA says, hey, we'd love to do it. We'll
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: support you, we got you, we'll put you in charge
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: of it. But we need the congressman that put the
• 42:03
  Speaker 1: ear mark in. Well, we need the TVC in order
• 42:05
  Speaker 1: to get the ear mark from the congressman. Well, we
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: need the tv C in order for the And so
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: everyone's there's always a next person who needs touched prior
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: to that.
• 42:13
  Speaker 4: Well, and what I really just heard while you were
• 42:15
  Speaker 4: talking about that is something that pathy is incredibly frustrating
• 42:18
  Speaker 4: to veterans like that, there's seven steps to a solution.
• 42:20
  Speaker 4: And as we were saying before, and one of the
• 42:22
  Speaker 4: biggest values of your organization in general is that if
• 42:24
  Speaker 4: I'm a veteran owned business and I come to you
• 42:26
  Speaker 4: asking for help with a problem, you're going to do
• 42:28
  Speaker 4: a direct path.
• 42:29
  Speaker 2: You're not going to do seven points direct as possible.
• 42:31
  Speaker 5: Right, right.
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: So the fortunately thing is here in Texas we have
• 42:35
  Speaker 1: a lot of Congressmen and senators who are veterans, like
• 42:38
  Speaker 1: wasn't Hunt Morgan latrell in Troynelle's all these guys are
• 42:43
  Speaker 1: our veterans and they speak our language. And so I
• 42:45
  Speaker 1: spent a week in DC lobbying for this, and they're
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: all very receptive. But they're one of four hundred and
• 42:53
  Speaker 1: thirty five people. Sure they got to get permission from
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: everybody else. Wow. And I'll tell you what. At the
• 42:58
  Speaker 1: state level, I've had some congressman push back on us saying, oh, well,
• 43:01
  Speaker 1: you guys don't need the help.
• 43:02
  Speaker 2: Why I don't know.
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: And so when when that turn off? When that state
• 43:07
  Speaker 1: congressman said, well, you doesn't need help, will prove to
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: me that I don't need help. Yeah, every other demographic
• 43:12
  Speaker 1: has some sort.
• 43:13
  Speaker 4: Of Well I'll ask you this too, because I feel
• 43:16
  Speaker 4: like this is a thing that I hear all the
• 43:17
  Speaker 4: time from veteran communities. There's always like a wait list
• 43:19
  Speaker 4: for people that want help or want a service, or
• 43:21
  Speaker 4: want something, and it's always so long.
• 43:23
  Speaker 2: And you said this.
• 43:24
  Speaker 4: At the beginning of the conversation, so we'll kind of
• 43:26
  Speaker 4: end with it. There's so many veterans that give up
• 43:29
  Speaker 4: when they hit a roadblock that they shouldn't be hitting.
• 43:31
  Speaker 4: Because there's some there's someone who served our country served
• 43:34
  Speaker 4: our community, served society, and they deserve an opportunity.
• 43:38
  Speaker 2: And if they take the time that's so.
• 43:40
  Speaker 4: Hard to get them to do, to reach out and
• 43:42
  Speaker 4: try for help, and they hit that slammed wall, they're
• 43:44
  Speaker 4: done and they usually don't come back.
• 43:46
  Speaker 1: If they reach out to us at HRVCC dot org,
• 43:48
  Speaker 1: we will do our best to find a solution and
• 43:51
  Speaker 1: or brute force the one. We'll figure it out. We'll
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: make one. Sure. And I've done it.
• 43:54
  Speaker 2: Before well and so again.
• 43:56
  Speaker 4: And I guess this goes to the funding and all
• 43:57
  Speaker 4: the other stuff that you're talking about there or do
• 43:59
  Speaker 4: you take like donation?
• 44:00
  Speaker 2: Does that how they would love?
• 44:01
  Speaker 1: Yeah? Absolutely, we have a C three into C six,
• 44:03
  Speaker 1: So you tells how do people do it? Hr v
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: CC dot org. You can call me at eight three
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: two two o five eight eight seven two.
• 44:11
  Speaker 2: Okay, do it again, say it again eight three.
• 44:13
  Speaker 1: Two two zero five eight eight seven two and we'll
• 44:16
  Speaker 1: get you connected.
• 44:16
  Speaker 2: Are you an Italian?
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: I am, I'm a Kayailian.
• 44:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 44:19
  Speaker 4: Can you say your last name for me? Cac cacalich
• 44:21
  Speaker 4: otherwise no, it's so Collins is not my real last name.
• 44:24
  Speaker 2: Okay, what is off?
• 44:25
  Speaker 5: Well?
• 44:25
  Speaker 2: I don't know off. I might tell you, but it's
• 44:28
  Speaker 2: very Italian.
• 44:29
  Speaker 4: It's so Italian in fact that I was at a
• 44:30
  Speaker 4: restaurant in Chicago and a guy goes, wait a minute,
• 44:33
  Speaker 4: what's your name?
• 44:34
  Speaker 2: And I took out my driver's license.
• 44:35
  Speaker 4: I showed I could probably do that actually on the air,
• 44:37
  Speaker 4: because they're not going to see this, huh. I took
• 44:39
  Speaker 4: out my driver's license and I showed him my my
• 44:41
  Speaker 4: last name. And the guy goes, mob Mafia. That's the
• 44:44
  Speaker 4: first thing he said. Do you see the Can you
• 44:47
  Speaker 4: see the last name there? Does that seem like a
• 44:49
  Speaker 4: mob name?
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: I know a guy?
• 44:52
  Speaker 4: I did do all right, So we have two minutes left.
• 44:56
  Speaker 4: I want you to get a last chance to say
• 44:58
  Speaker 4: anything else you want. But I really very happy to
• 45:01
  Speaker 4: have had this conversation. You gotten to know you, and
• 45:04
  Speaker 4: I hope that we can make many more connections.
• 45:06
  Speaker 1: I will come here as many times you need me
• 45:08
  Speaker 1: to in order to bring from I would love to.
• 45:10
  Speaker 1: Matter of fact, what I'd like to do is bring Amena.
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: She is my VP of operations. Okay, she's doing some
• 45:16
  Speaker 1: great work across the city of Houston, and I'd love
• 45:19
  Speaker 1: to bring her here and introduce you to She's a Navy veteran.
• 45:21
  Speaker 2: Sure.
• 45:21
  Speaker 1: And here's the thing about her, and this is I mean,
• 45:26
  Speaker 1: let me start this way. I served.
• 45:27
  Speaker 2: We only have a minute.
• 45:28
  Speaker 1: In nineteen ninety eight. I was in Bosnia, hurts Scubna. Yes,
• 45:31
  Speaker 1: And I told her and I heard her accent. I said, Oh,
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: my gosh, where are you from. She goes, oh, it's
• 45:34
  Speaker 1: in Bosnia, hurts Acubino. I was like, oh, I served
• 45:35
  Speaker 1: there in nineteen ninety eight. She goes, oh, that was
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: before I was born. Wow. I was like, Oh, just
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: punched me right in a mouthway, don't you. Thanks very much.
• 45:41
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that hurts.
• 45:42
  Speaker 1: But as a veteran, if you are an entrepreneur in
• 45:44
  Speaker 1: the city of Houston, I need to hear from you.
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: I need you to stand up loud and proud and
• 45:48
  Speaker 1: sing from the rooftops that you are a veteran and
• 45:50
  Speaker 1: let me help you do it. I'm not saying I'm
• 45:52
  Speaker 1: gonna do your push ups for you. Sure, I'm just
• 45:54
  Speaker 1: gonna help you make him do them better.
• 45:55
  Speaker 4: And that's all they need. H ou Veterans Chamber dot org.
• 45:58
  Speaker 4: HIU Veterans Chamber dot org. Thanks so much, John, It's
• 46:01
  Speaker 4: great to meet you. A lot of stuff to talk about.
• 46:04
  Speaker 4: Next time, but all this will be available on social media,
• 46:07
  Speaker 4: will send it all out to wherever you want, to
• 46:08
  Speaker 4: share it if you want, and we'll do this again
• 46:11
  Speaker 4: soon