Latest / Rick Outzen: (we don’t) color on the dog / Sherri Myers: Why She’s Back
Transcript
- Rick Outzen: Thank you for watching. I'm Rick Altson. This is Rick's Blog Live. The goal is to get the newsmakers in front of you. We've got two races in the city of Pensacola for the City Council, District 4, and District 2. We got with us right now Sherry Myers. Sherry, thank you for joining us. Sherri Myers: Thank you for having me. Rick Outzen: it we're Sherry, you served 12 years on the council. You've sat out a term because term limits. What do you see now about city government? that you might not have seen before and well you know why come back? Sherri Myers: That's a great question. And what I want to do is answer that today. All right. Because it's an important question. So when I left city council, I you know, I was term limited out and I accepted that. I never planned on running for city council again. I didn't. Never entered my mind. So some things happened though that changed my mind and I want to talk about those today. All right. So basically when I left, I w I was done. I thought. So when I left, there was a million dollars and a line item budget for a community center at Tippin Park. And that was something that I couldn't believe it when it happened. Ro Grover said, you know, that was a top priority for him. However, I kept seeing the money go other places. I mean, the city had issued an RFQ. We had, I think, six or seven contractors submit responses and we hired one. We planned an a community-wide input session for Tippin Park residents, community. And then for some reason, I never knew why, it was cancelled. And that was in probably the latter part of twenty twenty two. So anyway, things rocked on and other candidates ran for my seat, Charles Bear being one of them, and I supported him because I had known him from city council and I had worked on other campaigns of his and he asked me if I would support him and I said, Yes, if you promised to fight for us. That was very important to me. And he said, You know I will. And I believed him. So getting back to Tippin Park. So on January the nineteenth of twenty twenty-three, that was the day I went down there and received the recognition as Council Emeritus. I didn't see Tippin Park on the agenda. I mean, it wasn't on there, but it was. And it was in A budget resolution. They say the devil is in the detail. Well, honey, let me tell you, it was really in the detail. I had no reason to even look at a budget resolution because I didn't think it had anything to do with Tippin Park, with the community center. So when I get home, I get a call. From a friend of mine who had been down there with me, and she had reason to stay there. So she called me and she said, Did you know they took all of that money out of the Tippin Park Community Center? And Charles Baer voted for it. I was shocked. I was. I I I I was devastated. So Rick Outzen: That put the fire in the belly to run? Sherri Myers: No, no, no, no, no, it didn't. Okay. I didn't even think about it. But what I did do is I went back and and looked at it, and it was shocking to me that he sat there and he was prepared to take nine hundred thousand dollars of LOST money that our district does not get very much of and I've got the statistics to prove it, just in case you want to know. But Jennifer Brer is said, wait a minute. We can't do take everything away from them. You can't buy anything with $100,000. She gave a very passionate plea to save some of that money. And then she did a very clever thing. She just said, Well, let's change it from tipping community. resource center and athletic program to Tippin Park. So right now there's four hundred about four hundred and twenty thousand dollars in there for Tippin Park. So he did support her amendment. He did do do that. Rick Outzen: We're gonna run out of time. Sherri Myers: But well anyway. It's all all it started with Tippin' Park. Okay. But that is not what propelled me or caused me to want to run again. Rick Outzen: All right. So so tell me why. I I'm not I'm gonna stay to the question. You'll we've only got about three minutes left, so we've Sherri Myers: Why they do it because I I know that I'm the name you can trust, the name people know, and I am a name. If I give your promise, I am going to keep it. And I will tell you why I didn't keep it if I don't keep it. But I can tell you that I am always responsive, always was. For anybody who called me, they got a call back. For anybody who texted me, they got a text back. For anybody who sent me an email, and you know what, I can prove it because when I left I asked the city, I said, I want a thumb drive with all of my emails on there because I wanted to be able to prove my response. And so I responded to people no matter where where they are, and I and I worked on a lot a lot of issues throughout this city. Rick Outzen: So so we've got we've we've got a minute left. Okay. And what would you say you the p what was your proudest accomplishment as a council member? Sherri Myers: My proudest accomplishment as a council member is that I made it a point on almost every agenda to have an agenda item with my name on it because the charter says the city council is the governing body, it is the legislative body, and I was going to have something on there one way or another, whether it was an ordinance or resolution. So that is the big difference that I see now is when I look at a j an agenda, it looks like the mayor is sponsoring everything. And you know what? I get along fine with DC Reeves, by the way. And we are working on some projects together. Carpenter Creek being one of them. So if you look at my little flyer there. It tells you what basically my priorities are. Fire station number three is the thing that I'm the most proud of because it's all about LOST and how we use LOST and what is is a priority. Fire station number three on Summit got rebuilt because of me. Right. Rick Outzen: Sherry, thank you so much for coming on. The nine minutes goes fast. Always does. It always does. We'll go ahead and take a break. We'll be right back.