Latest / Brian Thomas / The "Smither-vent" - Episode 146 - Citizens of Cincinnati! We told you so!!!

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The "Smither-vent" - Episode 146 - Citizens of Cincinnati! We told you so!!! · Brian Thomas

0:10
Speaker 1: Fifty five KRCD talk station, Dan Carolyn for Brian Thomas
0:16
Speaker 1: and always great to be here on Mondays because this
0:18
Speaker 1: is appointment appointment radio. Whenever Chris Smitherman comes to visit,
0:23
Speaker 1: and every Monday at this time he does, and it
0:25
Speaker 1: is the smither Event. And Chris Smithman, I hope you
0:28
Speaker 1: had a great weekend. Good to be with you this morning.
0:31
Speaker 2: Good to be with you too, brother. I think the
0:33
Speaker 2: conversation starting out of the gate man is flooding. And
0:38
Speaker 2: you know, we got a heavy rain and a lot
0:42
Speaker 2: of our communities right got hit with standing water, call them,
0:49
Speaker 2: call them small lakes. And the connection, brother, is this
0:55
Speaker 2: big discussion you know that the mayor had and the
0:58
Speaker 2: city council had, you know, sell our railroad. We're gonna
1:01
Speaker 2: get one point six billion. It's going to solve all
1:04
Speaker 2: of our infrastructure issues. They sent list out to all
1:08
Speaker 2: the fifty two neighborhoods. List, Dan Carroll, They said, list
1:11
Speaker 2: out to all the neighborhoods, right pleasant Ridge, Hyde Park,
1:15
Speaker 2: you know, North Avondale. You know we've owned this thing
1:19
Speaker 2: for over two hundred years. You know it's we own
1:23
Speaker 2: land three hundred, three hundred miles. Dan Carroll from Cincinnati
1:27
Speaker 2: to Tennessee. We own the air rights. Amazon you know,
1:31
Speaker 2: wanted to put their drones up. Everybody would be paying
1:34
Speaker 2: us money, and we were getting over thirty million dollars,
1:38
Speaker 2: and we were in negotiations for a new contract which
1:41
Speaker 2: would have put us over forty million dollars a year
1:44
Speaker 2: coming in that each city council would have had the
1:47
Speaker 2: self direction on how that money has spent. Dan Carroll,
1:50
Speaker 2: Now we got to talk to a board, right that
1:52
Speaker 2: might meet at the Queen City Country Club down there.
1:57
Speaker 2: No one knows who's on the board. No one knows
2:00
Speaker 2: are we even getting the money right? This is the insanity.
2:04
Speaker 2: And then we get a heavy rain. By the way,
2:06
Speaker 2: let me share with everybody. I know our sewer systems
2:08
Speaker 2: are in trouble. I get it right. I know they're
2:11
Speaker 2: under stress. But we could be doing something about it.
2:16
Speaker 2: That's the problem. And in the mayor three days later
2:18
Speaker 2: comes out with some lame statement about what's happening with
2:22
Speaker 2: a possible flood gate that failed. The reality of it
2:26
Speaker 2: is that if all of the things that he said
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Speaker 2: he was gonna do with the one point six billion dollars,
2:32
Speaker 2: we get a heavy rain and somebody dies in Hyde Park.
2:36
Speaker 2: That's the reality of where we are. You know, when
2:39
Speaker 2: you have standing water, anybody listening, very dangerous isral training.
2:44
Speaker 2: Anybody could die, very serious loss of property meaning blood flood.
2:49
Speaker 2: The flood water is going into people's basements, Dan Carroll,
2:53
Speaker 2: or cars, which are facts. We're underwater, underwater, dude. So
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Speaker 2: I'm saying, watching this city council, it is clear that
3:02
Speaker 2: they do not know what they're doing and that they
3:05
Speaker 2: overpromised to us. And I thought the one point six
3:08
Speaker 2: billion was a low number, right. I thought we should
3:11
Speaker 2: have been in the four or five billion dollars. We
3:13
Speaker 2: were going to sell the three hundred miles of railroad
3:16
Speaker 2: all the way down to Tennessee. But we got screwed.
3:19
Speaker 2: And now we're seeing Dan Carroll what it looks like
3:23
Speaker 2: when we get a heavy rain in Cincinnati and now
3:26
Speaker 2: our sewer systems can't handle it. So we've got potholes,
3:30
Speaker 2: We've got roads that are trumbling. Now we have a
3:33
Speaker 2: sewer system that can't handle rain. God sent us rain,
3:38
Speaker 2: and the mayor and city council couldn't handle it well.
3:40
Speaker 1: Chris Mitherman, our friend Adam Kaylor over at the Cincinnati
3:43
Speaker 1: Exchange asked that very question, and his headline is this,
3:47
Speaker 1: why is Oakley underwater when Cincinnati has one point eight
3:51
Speaker 1: billion dollars for infrastructure? And he's already documented the structural
3:56
Speaker 1: problems with the settlement money, about how it can be used,
4:00
Speaker 1: about how it is, how it is gaining interest, how
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Speaker 1: it is growing. But yet the construction costs are growing
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Speaker 1: exponentially more than what the one point six billion dollars
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Speaker 1: is growing. So you have a structural deficit there because
4:16
Speaker 1: we get so much less bang for the buck when
4:19
Speaker 1: it comes to fix and and by the way, Chris smitheman,
4:23
Speaker 1: are you able to tell me what roads, what bridges,
4:26
Speaker 1: what infrastructure has been addressed in a meaningful way since
4:29
Speaker 1: this money has come into play. Only twelve to fourteen
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Speaker 1: percent of the funds available this year have been spent.
4:36
Speaker 1: So the money this is a very unusual problem because
4:39
Speaker 1: the money is there, and yet the people who run
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Speaker 1: city Hall or whoever you know, whatever committee is in
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Speaker 1: charge of spending this money simply can't get off there
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Speaker 1: sitting on their hands and find important, meaningful ways that
4:54
Speaker 1: can improve the lives of Cincinnatians, to spend this money
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Speaker 1: and get something done where something like this could have positumed.
5:02
Speaker 1: If someone had the foresight to see something like this
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Speaker 1: and do something about it, then we wouldn't have had
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Speaker 1: these issues we had over the weekend.
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Speaker 2: Dan Carroll. The point you just made about inflation, so
5:15
Speaker 2: we know construction costs are probably triple the national national
5:21
Speaker 2: average on inflation, maybe nine percent for construction. That's why
5:26
Speaker 2: when we were talking Dan Carroll, Brian Thomas, right, we
5:31
Speaker 2: were on myself and others Joe Strecker, we were saying, hey, listen,
5:37
Speaker 2: Jim Keefer, we're concerned that we're able to negotiate a
5:43
Speaker 2: lease agreement of six or nine percent increases. We are
5:48
Speaker 2: meaning in the lease payments. We know that when we
5:50
Speaker 2: put the money in the market, because they have to
5:53
Speaker 2: invest the market, invest the dollars much more conservatively. Right,
5:58
Speaker 2: They can't just go out here and and buy whatever
6:01
Speaker 2: they've got to invest the money, most likely with a
6:04
Speaker 2: lot of fixed instruments. They can't keep up with the
6:08
Speaker 2: nine percent increases in inflation and construction costs. That's what
6:13
Speaker 2: you just raised. What is the biggest issue, Dan Carroll,
6:17
Speaker 2: for anybody out there who's retired, who's listening to me,
6:20
Speaker 2: who's getting a pension on a monthly basis. On an
6:24
Speaker 2: annual basis, it's called inflation. This is what we were
6:28
Speaker 2: trying to tell the mayor who got his car repode twice.
6:33
Speaker 2: This is what we were trying to share with him.
6:35
Speaker 2: You're selling something that we can negotiate, meaning least payments
6:40
Speaker 2: that are higher are more in line with those construction costs. Cincinnati,
6:46
Speaker 2: we got screwed those who voted for this. This was
6:49
Speaker 2: a terrible deal. We got a big rain, We've got
6:52
Speaker 2: pleasant Ridge underwater, We've got Hyde Park under water, we've
6:56
Speaker 2: got Highways underwater, and unfortunately we had a death in
7:00
Speaker 2: high Park due to the flood. What more can we
7:03
Speaker 2: see to say this was a bad deal for Cincinnati. Dude.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, it's so. The farther we get down this road,
7:12
Speaker 1: the less appealing this deal becomes. Chris Smitherman, stay right there.
7:15
Speaker 1: We got to get to a break and I've got
7:16
Speaker 1: some more questions for you on the other side of this.
7:19
Speaker 1: On fifty five krc the talk.
7:21
Speaker 2: Station being prepared is everything but pre claiming our own
7:24
Speaker 2: final arrangementation.
7:28
Speaker 1: Fifty five KRCV talk station. We are in the midst
7:31
Speaker 1: of a Smith event and Chris Smitherman, this is a
7:34
Speaker 1: question I've been wanting to ask you ever since I
7:37
Speaker 1: first saw this last week, and today is July the twentieth,
7:41
Speaker 1: and starting at noon today at the Juvenile Court Assessment
7:45
Speaker 1: Center on William Howard's Aft Road, the Hamilton County Juvenile
7:49
Speaker 1: Court is hosting the Equality Ohio Legal Clinic in partnership
7:54
Speaker 1: with Cincinnati Pride in trans Ohio, a free legal clinic
7:58
Speaker 1: they call it for transplus and LGBTQ plus youth on Monday,
8:04
Speaker 1: and so they want to the Hamilton County Juvenile Court
8:09
Speaker 1: wants to have a free clinic that is going to
8:12
Speaker 1: help kids change their name, change their gender markers, and
8:18
Speaker 1: seal their criminal records. To my way of thinking, this
8:22
Speaker 1: is something that the juvenile court really should not be
8:24
Speaker 1: involved in.
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Speaker 2: What say you? I agree? I agree. There's so many
8:30
Speaker 2: other issues that the juvenile court system should be tackling.
8:35
Speaker 2: And an example of that would be the epidemic of
8:39
Speaker 2: black youth killing each other. And it's not even youth anymore.
8:43
Speaker 2: Like the thirty seven year old killed in witting Hill
8:46
Speaker 2: over the weekend, right, murdered? Right are the stabbing that
8:50
Speaker 2: you talked about in Kennedy Heights, Right, These aren't eighteen
8:54
Speaker 2: year olds and fourteen year olds. Right. These are grown people, right,
8:58
Speaker 2: but the super majority of them are black men who
9:02
Speaker 2: are killing each other. So you would think the juvenile
9:04
Speaker 2: court system, since the base of the Democratic Party is
9:08
Speaker 2: the Black Americans that live here, live in Cincinnati, live
9:12
Speaker 2: in Hamilton County, that they would spend some time talking
9:16
Speaker 2: about what's happening with our juveniles, specifically those who are
9:21
Speaker 2: murdering each other. And the only reason Dan Carroll the
9:24
Speaker 2: murder rate isn't higher is you see emergency care systems
9:29
Speaker 2: over there. We've got the best doctors in the world
9:32
Speaker 2: that are putting Humpty Dumpty back together again. If that
9:36
Speaker 2: wasn't happening, when somebody shot three times and they they
9:40
Speaker 2: make their way over to the emergency rooms, in normal circumstances,
9:43
Speaker 2: they would die. They don't die because of our emergency
9:48
Speaker 2: teams in the emergency rooms across the whether it's Christ's Hospital,
9:52
Speaker 2: whether it's you See, whether it's but as the it
9:54
Speaker 2: doesn't matter. When somebody shows up, they don't go a man,
9:58
Speaker 2: let me see your insurance card. They take them right.
10:01
Speaker 2: And what's also crazy is that we have to dispatch
10:04
Speaker 2: sometimes our law enforcement there to keep the opposing sides
10:08
Speaker 2: together because somebody shot them and wanted them to die.
10:11
Speaker 2: They're there in the waiting room wanting to fight the
10:13
Speaker 2: doctors who are trying to save the lives of people.
10:16
Speaker 2: It's like a war like Iraq out here. Fifty shots
10:20
Speaker 2: fired in Clifton, Dude, fifty shots Think about somebody putting
10:25
Speaker 2: a clip, putting their magazine back in and then opening fire.
10:30
Speaker 2: Fifty shots fired in Clifton. This tells you that the
10:34
Speaker 2: crime is bleeding over, is moving around now. It's going
10:38
Speaker 2: to start hitting these neighborhoods that have not experienced this
10:41
Speaker 2: kind of violence. And one other thing, Dan Carroll, you
10:44
Speaker 2: said that really got me going on the break. It
10:47
Speaker 2: was the money isn't being spent for infrastructure. So the
10:50
Speaker 2: first segment you said, eleven or twelve percent of the
10:53
Speaker 2: money is only out of the door, right, That means
10:56
Speaker 2: that eighty eight percent of the money is sitting there
11:00
Speaker 2: that is not being spent. Let's forget about whether you
11:03
Speaker 2: and I agree whether the one point six billion was
11:05
Speaker 2: a good deal or bad. Let's go with what former
11:08
Speaker 2: Mayor Charlie Luken said, Why aren't you sending the money
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Speaker 2: out when I when I was sitting on City Council.
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Speaker 1: Boy, and the money is there, the money that is
11:19
Speaker 1: being sent out is is still sitting is still sitting
11:22
Speaker 1: there idle. It's they don't have a plan to say,
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Speaker 1: when we get X amount of dollars, we are going
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Speaker 1: to do this project, this project, this project that we
11:32
Speaker 1: don't have the foresight to have the contractors in place,
11:35
Speaker 1: to have everything in place, and as soon as that
11:37
Speaker 1: money is available, boom you get going on those jobs.
11:41
Speaker 1: But that has not happened. And that shows, correct, just
11:44
Speaker 1: the terrible level of incompetence at city Hall that you
11:48
Speaker 1: and I have been talking about for years now.
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Speaker 2: Correct, Dan Carroll, this is not This is what frustrates me.
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Speaker 2: They sent those big pamphlets out because the railroad spent
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Speaker 2: somewhere between five and six million dollars to convent Cincinnati
12:04
Speaker 2: voters that this was a good deal. It's the most
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Speaker 2: money ever spent on an issue in the history of
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Speaker 2: the city. They knew. Why would they want to keep
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Speaker 2: paying thirty or forty million when they can give us
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Speaker 2: one point six billion present value and then us transition
12:19
Speaker 2: the risk to the stock market instead of the company
12:22
Speaker 2: paying us that money. We never missed the payment but
12:26
Speaker 2: if the forty million or thirty six million had come
12:28
Speaker 2: into the city, right, this is what would happen, Dan Carroll,
12:31
Speaker 2: you and I could be asking city council and the
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Speaker 2: mayor what did you do with the thirty six million
12:35
Speaker 2: dollar check you just got? Right now? Nobody knows. You
12:38
Speaker 2: can't even name it. I can't even name the five
12:41
Speaker 2: people that are on the board. You and I can't
12:43
Speaker 2: even say, why is only twelve percent of the money out?
12:46
Speaker 2: Where's the rest of the money. All we know is
12:48
Speaker 2: floods are happening, potholes are happening, sidewalks are crumbling, streets
12:52
Speaker 2: are falling apart, and city council has no answer, just
12:56
Speaker 2: a lame statement from a mayor who is in competent
13:00
Speaker 2: and doesn't know what he's doing.
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Speaker 1: Mayor, well, I think our mayor was out of town.
13:05
Speaker 1: Wasn't our mayor out of town again this past week?
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Speaker 2: Of course, of course he is brother. Of course he
13:10
Speaker 2: is Dan care Look, of course brother. Of course, ye
13:13
Speaker 2: bigger fish. Let me let me that bigger fishing problem.
13:16
Speaker 2: Because here's the reality. Well, Chris, turn on your TV
13:19
Speaker 2: and you see him on ABC News, you see him
13:22
Speaker 2: on these national programs. Why isn't he holding press conferences
13:26
Speaker 2: where the flood is saying this is how we're going
13:28
Speaker 2: to solve the problem.
13:29
Speaker 1: That's a good question. It's it seems that whenever we
13:33
Speaker 1: have serious issues like this, the mayor is is usually
13:37
Speaker 1: he's usually not here or he's either phoning it in
13:41
Speaker 1: one or the other. So Chris, stay right there and
13:44
Speaker 1: we'll continue on with the Smith event coming up on
13:46
Speaker 1: fifty five k r S the talk station.
13:48
Speaker 2: His Ryan Thomas here with from USA in Silas know
13:50
Speaker 2: Steve seven.
13:57
Speaker 1: On this Monday morning. We continue on with the Smith event.
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Speaker 1: And Chris, I was thinking about you cited the example
14:02
Speaker 1: of the fifty shots that were fired this past not
14:06
Speaker 1: this past weekend, but last weekend at the Airbnb situation,
14:10
Speaker 1: and I was thinking fifty shots fired, And when you
14:13
Speaker 1: said that, I was thinking that maybe we're fortunate that
14:15
Speaker 1: the people engaged in firing those shots were so poor
14:19
Speaker 1: at their marksmanship that more people were not hit, killed,
14:23
Speaker 1: or wounded in that shooting. But I was looking at
14:25
Speaker 1: the story in the Cincinnati enquire of the thirty seven
14:29
Speaker 1: year old who was shot and killed in Winton Hills
14:32
Speaker 1: over the weekend, and at the end of the article,
14:35
Speaker 1: the Inquirer reassures us that citywide shootings are down this
14:38
Speaker 1: year compared to last year, with only one hundred and
14:41
Speaker 1: nineteen reported shootings across Cincinnati compared to what we had
14:47
Speaker 1: one hundred twenty nine in twenty twenty five. So now
14:51
Speaker 1: we have the specter of the city who they want to,
14:57
Speaker 1: I guess, recommit to the collaborative of agreement or strengthen
15:01
Speaker 1: it or add to it somehow. So we've got these
15:04
Speaker 1: serious issues going on with infrastructure, with crime and things
15:09
Speaker 1: like this, and Iris Rowley is again taking the lead
15:13
Speaker 1: when it comes to when it comes to reaffirming this
15:18
Speaker 1: collaborative agreement and then furthering the notion that our Cincinnati
15:23
Speaker 1: police are racist because of the amount of stops that
15:26
Speaker 1: they make in certain neighborhoods.
15:29
Speaker 2: That's insane, That's completely insane. I since that police department
15:35
Speaker 2: best in the country. People travel from all over the world.
15:38
Speaker 2: When I was chair of Law and Public Faiety, they
15:39
Speaker 2: always came in here to figure out how we were
15:42
Speaker 2: doing what we were doing our best technology, And I
15:45
Speaker 2: want every officer out there to hear you and I
15:48
Speaker 2: continue to tell them you're doing a great job. Stop
15:51
Speaker 2: listening to this nonsense and get out here and enforce
15:54
Speaker 2: the law. Right now, the other part of this, I'm
15:57
Speaker 2: going to say something that I usually don't do and
15:59
Speaker 2: deal with some identity politics. All right, I'm gonna take
16:02
Speaker 2: a risk here, and I'm gonna say to the city,
16:05
Speaker 2: they keep sending the message that they just don't care
16:08
Speaker 2: about black men killing themselves. Right. It's not the guns.
16:13
Speaker 2: These are people that are deciding to kill each other.
16:16
Speaker 2: Right now. If the mayor woke up and seventy or
16:19
Speaker 2: eighty white men were shooting each other in the city,
16:24
Speaker 2: I guarantee you he'd be holding press conferences all over
16:27
Speaker 2: the place trying to figure it out what's going on.
16:30
Speaker 2: But they really just don't care. This is what's so
16:33
Speaker 2: frustrating about, in my opinion, black Americans who tie themselves
16:38
Speaker 2: to the Democratics party one day, and I'm a Black American.
16:43
Speaker 2: One day, We're gonna have to wake up and understand
16:45
Speaker 2: that these Dixiocrats do not care about us. Right that
16:49
Speaker 2: the Republican Party is the party that freed black Americans.
16:53
Speaker 2: These are facts. Whether it was Lincoln, whether it was
16:56
Speaker 2: the Executive Order of the Emancipation Proclamation, whether it's the
16:59
Speaker 2: thirteen Amendment, the fourteenth Amendment. Let me tell you it
17:03
Speaker 2: wasn't Democrats, and certainly in dred Scott at the Supreme Court,
17:08
Speaker 2: the d scrats, the supermajority of them, told dred Scott,
17:12
Speaker 2: you're gonna be a slave, You're always gonna be property
17:15
Speaker 2: for your entire life. Then they pimp us out right
17:18
Speaker 2: and tell us birthright. We're gonna use dred Scott to
17:22
Speaker 2: say somebody can just roll in here from Europe, drop
17:26
Speaker 2: a baby from Germany. A German person comes here, drops
17:29
Speaker 2: the baby, and that baby now is an American, and
17:32
Speaker 2: they use the dread Scott case. This is them pimping
17:35
Speaker 2: us out the Democratic Party. My point is that they
17:38
Speaker 2: just don't care, Dan Carroll, and I'm trying to understand.
17:42
Speaker 2: I know you get it. I know a lot of
17:44
Speaker 2: your listeners get it. When will black Americans get it
17:47
Speaker 2: that those people that are out there pimping all this
17:49
Speaker 2: race and stirring the pot, it's all about them getting paid.
17:53
Speaker 2: It's all about them getting the next contract. It has
17:56
Speaker 2: nothing to do with solving the issues that are most
17:59
Speaker 2: important to us. The last point I want to make,
18:01
Speaker 2: dude a property taxes, and I'm connecting it to the
18:04
Speaker 2: conversation we're just having. I want property owners to be
18:08
Speaker 2: the only ones voting on property taxes. Property taxes are
18:11
Speaker 2: going through the roof in the city of Cincinnati in
18:13
Speaker 2: this November. They're gonna be all kind of levies out there.
18:16
Speaker 2: It's that's that is that is that. And Grandma in
18:19
Speaker 2: bond Hill and Evingston, on a fixed income, cannot afford
18:23
Speaker 2: her house. Not because of she's paid the house off
18:27
Speaker 2: from the bank. She's owned the house for twenty years.
18:30
Speaker 2: Her husband has passed away. She lives in bond Hill.
18:32
Speaker 2: She's a working middle class family, driving an American car.
18:35
Speaker 2: But now her property taxes now are pricing her out.
18:39
Speaker 2: They work two hundred dollars now they're four hundred dollars.
18:42
Speaker 2: And they don't connect. Voters don't connect. You're walking in there.
18:46
Speaker 2: And sixty five percent of your property taxes in the
18:48
Speaker 2: city of Cincinnati is the Cincinnati Public school system, right,
18:52
Speaker 2: that's what they are. Seventy six percent or seventy five
18:55
Speaker 2: percent of the kids there are black Americans. But we've
18:58
Speaker 2: got most of our schools failed, failing, and so why
19:02
Speaker 2: are we continuing to just throw money? And the school
19:05
Speaker 2: board says, I really don't have any real solutions for
19:07
Speaker 2: you to resolve these issues, right, and whether whatever the
19:11
Speaker 2: levee is, I don't have to name them. They're all
19:13
Speaker 2: going to be out here in November saying we need
19:15
Speaker 2: more money, we need more money. I'm letting you know,
19:18
Speaker 2: Dan Carrol, we can't afford it. And property owners, in
19:21
Speaker 2: my opinion, should be the ones voting on it. If
19:24
Speaker 2: you don't own property, you don't have skin in the game.
19:27
Speaker 2: Why do you get to go in and say I'm
19:29
Speaker 2: gonna raise your property taxes? That doesn't make any sense
19:32
Speaker 2: to me. But I can tell you what people are
19:34
Speaker 2: really talking about is affordability. Is Cincinnati affordable? And every
19:38
Speaker 2: day it becomes less affordable. And we're talking about things
19:42
Speaker 2: like the police department is racist because they're doing stops
19:45
Speaker 2: and cars and black people are the ones being stopped.
19:48
Speaker 2: But the black people in our city, the black males
19:51
Speaker 2: that I'm talking about, are murdering each other every single weekend.
19:55
Speaker 2: At the silence of this mayor who's more interested in
19:58
Speaker 2: going to Congress, more interest in being a senator, more
20:01
Speaker 2: interested in being a governor than he is the mayor
20:04
Speaker 2: of the City of Cincinnati.
20:05
Speaker 1: Well, Chris Smitherman. As always, you make so many great points,
20:08
Speaker 1: and that's why this is appointment Radio. Whenever the smither
20:12
Speaker 1: event takes place, we got to let you go.
20:15
Speaker 2: But very quickly.
20:17
Speaker 1: What's the latest on your petition and do you still
20:19
Speaker 1: have the work going on to get people to sign
20:22
Speaker 1: these petitions.
20:24
Speaker 2: Yes, they're eighty individuals people out there that are collecting
20:28
Speaker 2: signatures that are doing a great job. We thank them.
20:31
Speaker 2: If you run across one of those eighty people that
20:33
Speaker 2: are collecting signators, sign the petition. And signing the petition
20:37
Speaker 2: means that you, in democracy, don't mind the issue being
20:41
Speaker 2: on the ballot. You might not even support the issue,
20:43
Speaker 2: but give us the democracy. What's so crazy about it
20:46
Speaker 2: is the electeds are out there wanting us to sign
20:49
Speaker 2: their petitions. Next year they'll be up for reelection. City
20:53
Speaker 2: council will be up for reelection. Sign my petition, but
20:55
Speaker 2: I go, man, I don't really like you. Why am
20:57
Speaker 2: I signing your petition? I don't want you, But no
21:00
Speaker 2: sign those petitions because I believe in democracy they have
21:03
Speaker 2: a right to put their name on the ballot and
21:04
Speaker 2: I have the right to vote against them. This is
21:07
Speaker 2: what's crazy out here that people are out. Well, man,
21:08
Speaker 2: I'm not going to sign that petition because I don't agree. No,
21:11
Speaker 2: you're really a communist or a socialist, and you really
21:13
Speaker 2: don't believe in democracy. That's really what's going on. But
21:16
Speaker 2: we're doing a good job. I think all the people
21:18
Speaker 2: are out there. There's a charter amendment, so they're out
21:20
Speaker 2: there collecting signatures to simply say no city manager going
21:24
Speaker 2: for will ever ever have the sole power to fire.
21:27
Speaker 2: And by the way, I know we got to go.
21:29
Speaker 2: But Chief Washington, a black man who was fired by
21:33
Speaker 2: a black woman, is about to get paid that clearly,
21:37
Speaker 2: this three panel judge is about to rule it's coming
21:39
Speaker 2: due and they're going to send this right back to
21:41
Speaker 2: that lower court. And that lower court is going to say,
21:44
Speaker 2: you got two options. City. Listen to me down there,
21:47
Speaker 2: City solicitor. I hope you're listening. You have set aside
21:50
Speaker 2: nine million dollars for a settlement in this current budget,
21:54
Speaker 2: and I know whose name is on it, Chief Washington,
21:59
Speaker 2: because you've destroyed his reputation. You fired him without cause,
22:03
Speaker 2: and at the end of the day, you're about to
22:05
Speaker 2: pay him. And this is why this petition is so important,
22:08
Speaker 2: because we never want this to happen again. She's fired
22:11
Speaker 2: the police chief, she's pushed out the director of Public Services,
22:17
Speaker 2: and now which we're not even talking about, she's trying
22:20
Speaker 2: to push out recreation. They've got an ordinance right now
22:23
Speaker 2: saying they want to take over the recreation department essentially,
22:26
Speaker 2: which direct director reports directly to the board. She wants
22:30
Speaker 2: the rect director to report directly to her, you know why,
22:33
Speaker 2: so she can fire him too. Daniel Bett, so God
22:37
Speaker 2: bless you. People can follow me on x at vote
22:41
Speaker 2: Smitheman and Dan Carroll, you're a great American. Please give
22:45
Speaker 2: my best to your family and thank you so much
22:47
Speaker 2: for having me on. Brother Chris