Good morning. Good morning. What's happening, family? Welcome to the show. It is Michelle White here at W-A-D-O-V, 860-8106.5-F-M. I am sitting in the midst of crazy land. I got the most special colleagues.
It just does not, it just does not get any better. I keep holding that hope every day when I walk in the studio. It's going to be better. It's going to be better. And then Jermaine says hello in the restaurant. Let me say good morning to the brothers in the building. Clock 10. Who you with? Just shoot today. Just shoot. Go ahead and sing it. Just shoot.
So you good? You all right though? Yeah, I'm all right. I'm all right. My man. Right out. Hello. Well, you know, it's always good.
Is it me? Yes, it is. Yes, it is. It is I. It is I. It is I. First thing in the morning. How you doing? What was all this whining? I mean, wait, wait till it's time to start the show. Who had a rough night last night? I did. I had sleep good.
I'm looking at him like, bruh. We're about to start. There's no time. Let me tell them the story. He'll be like, two, three, go! He's so dirty. He's so dirty. Oh my god. It's like working with Keith every day. Is it so dirty? Yo, you dirty. Hey.
Well, you know, Sam, hello, hello, Sam. It's good to see you. It's good to be a client. It would not seem like that song would be a hit. Right, but it's a hit. It's a beat. It's a beat. It's a beat. It's a beat. It's a beat. It's a beat. It's a beat. It's a beat. It's a beat. It's a beat. It's a beat. It's a beat. It's a beat. It's a beat. It's a beat. It's a beat. It's a beat. It's a beat.
He can just drop the mic. Everybody say hello to everybody your car at home. We're gonna do it all at the same time. All right, go drink. Hello
I can see it in your eyes. I don't think we know the rest though. That's it. That's all the time. I can see it now. I don't know. I don't know if we know the rest. Why did my girl, I know you were singing the song in your kitchen. Don't act like you wasn't. Deborah, I know you were singing in your kitchen too. Your husband just turned around. I was like, what you doing girl? To the folks on line, good morning, good morning. Somebody said sang that song.
Jermaine, as you know, you see I'm dragging out coming to you. I know. You know, it's probably cloudy outside. It feels pretty good. Meteorologist Mayn Ocondella was outside. And as I was analyzing the weather out on the weather deck outside, we got a weather deck. On the side of the building? On the side of the building. The weather deck. I like that. That's the weather deck right there. That's the weather deck. Okay, okay. It was a little breezy. A little breeze came through and a little stench
So today is gonna be full of air Watch what you smell
Turn that mic off, boy. Turn it off. It's a special day. Turn it off. Today. At least that's what they told us, Clark. Here we go. It's Wednesday. And on Wednesday, someone asked a question. Nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah
I was contemplating as I was sitting at home with me myself. I dropped a big word. And I, yeah, you know, sitting at home with John. We're going to keep multi-syllabic. Yeah. That means numerous. All right, come on. And you know, I was contemplating me, myself, and I. And myself said to me, if the first million in business
It's hard to make. Why won't you just start with the second million? Back to the show. You know that question. The first million in business and you know, they always say the first million is hard to make in business. Yeah.
So, why won't you just start with the second? Yeah, for some folks, it will never be. It will never be ready. People who ask questions will never make that for me. I don't know. Never got that far. Anybody that was waiting on me to have a come back, keep waiting. There's nothing. I have nothing. How about this, Michelle? And then I know we can go home. Okay, what you got? If you have an issue with people talking behind your back, why won't you just turn around?
If you have an issue, just turn around.
He is out. He is out. All right. So, uh, I guess coming in this morning, but before we get to, and that's the good folks from Milwaukee County, we got the office of emergency management coming through.
You know when hey Shelby Shelby, I forgot to say happy anniversary Happy anniversary. Yeah, I saw that She's celebrating anniversary So happy anniversary But I had talked about yesterday briefly on the show That on the Ed Sheeran concert tour that the
artists He a rapper but I have a hard time calling them a rapper but Macklemore Was asked off the tour forced off the tour by Robert Kraft Because Robert Kraft said that Macklemore had one of the concerts he said free Palestine and Robert Kraft is like, you know
Yeah, he's has a history of saying things that are harmful to the Jewish people. And so he told the promoters of the Ed Sheeran concert and Macklemore was one of the people opening up. If he stays on the tour, y'all can't perform at our stadiums. Yeah, I talked about this yesterday. Where do you be?
and uh and so Craft who is a NFL team owner and owns one of the stadiums, right? Huh? So he owns really good thank you. Yes. Yeah. And so he got with other NFL owners and got them to also agree to keep Macklemore from performing in their venue and what followed yesterday
I really appreciate it because there were other bands that were on the lineup. The other bands came off the tour in support of Macklemore. The other bands came off the tour so they lost their money because this is
where is the line between free speech and you hurt my feelings? Because black folks should be seeing people every day. Where is the line? And then you get other NFL player, I mean other NFL team owner, stadium owners to basically black ball this dude from performing at their venue. So now what else do you black ball?
When we saw you know, you got groups if if I'm I Don't know Jill Scott talk about reparations. She can't come Dave Chappelle say something crazy you don't like he can't come and I was talking to somebody about this yesterday and there was a but there's a history of this We've seen venues black bar people for their political stances for years For years, but this is the thing
And it won't happen because people people just ridiculous But if the same way we told target to kick bricks You could tell Robert Kraft and these other owners if that's how you gonna do with your stuff fine, but we don't have to come We don't have to support it We don't have to participate because It's as city is to believe
that nobody can ever say anything that makes you, I mean, that's why we are where we are with the conversation about slavery right now. Cause white folks feel uncomfortable when you gotta turn around and look at your kids and explain to children what your great great grandparents did.
It's hard to see yourself depicted in roots whipping people with a chain. It's hard to see yourself trying to explain lynching all these people in our history. It's hard to explain that you drain a whole swimming pool because a black child got in it. Or a black superstar put her toe in the pool and you drain the whole pool. Or you cement the pool.
Because you don't want your white kids getting a pool with black children. See it's hard to explain the ignorance. So rather than explain it, you just banish it. You refuse to tell it.
I am sick and tired of people acting like nobody can say nothing that is in opposition to positions of the Jewish community. And while they put out a statement saying, we're not saying you don't have freedom of speech, but this is anti-Semitic. Give examples. Give real concrete examples.
But Robert Kraft you've made no statement about what's going on with the settlers in Israel killing these people that's on a land You've said none of that and and this is what brought me to a broader moment Driving in I was listed in the serious exam. I'm driving in in the morning particularly Professor Carr
and Lamont. They had Karen Hunter on there this morning. And she has landed what I would, oh wait, somebody said Ed's band pulled off too? He would be acapella? His own band pulled off? Oh, I gotta look that up too. Man, that's a heck of a, come on now. That's a boss move. Because you willing to give up something of your own?
in support of a cause or, you know, a position. So Karen Hunter was announcing this morning on their show on our Carsnip show that she will be interviewing Colin Kaepernick today. When I tell you I will be nowhere but at that radio, listening to that interview, Colin Kaepernick has dropped a new book. It's called The Perilous Fight.
I never do books on audio. LaKeisha runs circles around me on her audio books. This will be the first audio book that I purchased because I want to listen to it while I'm traveling. He made sure that the book was not going to be sold in Target. Come on now, G.
Because the distributors had it set to be sold in Target. He made sure that the book was not going to be sold in Target. I don't care what kind of money I lose. We got a protest. We got issues with Target. Don't put my book in Target. And you know, I think about how what seemed like it was going to be a catastrophic financial loss for Colin Kaepernick.
in terms of taking that knee and trying to highlight, uh, the, the, the treatment, the murders of unarmed black people at the hands of law enforcement. And at that moment, you losing everything. You have worked for your entire life. And, you know, you're getting fake tryouts and fake, you know, you know, touches like some team really is going to look at you, but Donald Trump in effect made sure.
that this brother got black ball for standing up for black folks. And of course, the majority of black folks left him hanging. Many of y'all listening. Because I can't turn off the NFL. Damn, what you talking about, Michelle? I don't care. And yes, I'm rocking with Jay Z on the halftime show. Forget you, Michelle. I don't right now. I get it. I understand.
I just know we'll still be on the back of the bus messing with you, Negroes. But not realizing that taking that stand and that position would end up changing this brother's life. And the money that he is making now, long term money. He has now written two books.
He has the movie He is doing the speaking engagements. He has the foundation His life got set on a completely different trajectory because he took a stand I Look at myself The the the opportunities that have been created for me because I did stuff that was uncomfortable
I sacrificed I worked places for free For free I've worked at this radio station before for free When it was tight And they said we we you know, we need some help I worked for over a year for free. I came here every day y'all did not know and I was working for free because what was happening is
that needed to be said on this radio station, the information that needed to get to our community was that important. And so you sacrifice. When I went to go work for African World Festival, I was working for free. But doing that ended up getting me an invitation to the White House from Barack Obama.
Come talk to us and tell us what we gotta do to help save these black festivals. You don't understand sometimes that when you are sacrificing and you are doing the difficult thing and when you take in a position that a lot of people won't take, there's usually
a reward somewhere down the road, even if it never comes, and I don't see it in my lifetime, it made a difference for somebody. Y'all, that's the thing I keep trying to stress. When I was talking about, and I gotta break, but when I was talking about yesterday, about understanding the assignment, it's too many of us, and let me not say us, because I'm not in it, it's too many of y'all.
That when I talked about you sending kids out here to go to school in the morning They don't understand the assignment you adults don't understand the assignment either when when when we talk about what we got to do to add to move a needle for us as a people to Get better opportunities To be treated with humanity and respect to not roll back the clock on civil rights to not have people you know
The the the one woman who thought she was doing something when she called Hakeem Jefferies a pack monkey. I can disagree with you supporting a pack But how did this woman feel comfortable calling this black man a monkey? Oh Well, I didn't understand all the cultural nuance. I know you didn't But y'all we don't want to sacrifice anything
We don't want to do the hard thing. We don't want to work collectively to make the changes that we need to or to stop people from hurting us. On one hand, the target boycott was not a heavy lift because you can go other places. You could shop elsewhere. But the things that truly make us uncomfortable
how many people listening to me are willing to be uncomfortable to secure rights for black people? I think about the marches. I think about the beatings, the lunch counters, the city ins. And you can't get Negroes to tell the NFL until y'all stop acting janky.
And I know the number of coaches have increased. Black coaches, some conditions have gotten somewhat better. I get that part. But that's only been because there have been people outside of y'all ringing the bell. Y'all didn't help bring about change. Other people did. Y'all just getting the benefit from seeing the black coaches and the black this and the black that. But it was other people who took them hard hits.
whose names got put on watch list, who got black ball from organizations so that y'all could be comfortable and sit up and watch your damn football game. I'm just going to keep asking the question. What are you willing to sacrifice to make it a fairer situation for your own people?
for your own children, for your own grandchildren. What are you doing to make this country work better for that grandchild that's coming up behind you? Because, yep, you can put all the clothes on their back, the experiences, take them on the trip, you know, we can go to Martha's Vineyard. But if I'm not pouring nothing else in the atlas and helping to fight to make sure that when I'm gone, I'm leaving something that this boy
He don't have to get treated like black me and got treated in 1940 He'll have to get treated that way. What are you doing? And I know we get tired of always having to be doing But that's the situation we in so it's like we drown in and we decide to stop swimming
The water is deep and we decide I'm just gonna put my hands down and see if I float on to safety I'm gonna say it again that that referendum If black folks sit on it behind and and people that support The idea of diversity equity inclusion sit on y'all behind and let that referendum get passed in this state shame on every one of us
And there will be black people who stay at home not understanding that your behind was on the menu. I got to take a break. I'll be right back. Hey, welcome back to the show. All right. So just a couple of quick things. Number one, I went back to go pull it because somebody had texted me and said that even Sharon's own band members were planning to exit the tour. I'm looking for that information. I did see though that.
As I reported, four of the supporting acts for the upcoming dates, they've all come off the tour. I appreciated what one player, I mean, one performer said in particular, a young guy from Ireland, he said that, wait, where's his comments? I appreciate it. Okay, he said,
His name is Aaron Rowe, an Irish singer who opened for Sharon in Australia earlier in the year, and he was scheduled for the 10 remaining dates in North America. So this is some nice money. 10 dates in North America. He said, I don't take this decision lightly.
Ed has been a friend to me and has changed my life. I could never thank him enough for this. But as Irish people, we know all too well about genocide, forced famine, and violent occupation. I stand by and allow, I cannot stand by and allow billionaires to use their position of power to silence the rightful voices of those who speak up against Israeli genocide and who highlighted the savage murder of children.
I would lose all respect for myself to carry you on as normal. And I'm going to say again, the level of frustration and outrage that I feel at watching people lose their careers, their jobs. I think about the sister at Harvard.
You work your entire life to get somewhere and because somebody says oh you didn't do enough to protect this group or that group, you know, you lose everything Everything that this woman this sister had worked for just in the blink of an eye is gone. Well, she should have said more I'm doing every thing I can within the purview of my role and my position it became a witch hunt
And I just don't think that many people that support Israel understand what the look looks like here in the US because all these other challenges and issues are going on. Like I said, and I'm going to keep beating that drum in the state of Wisconsin. Mandated education is the Holocaust, the Jewish Holocaust. It didn't happen in this country, but it's mandated education twice.
in middle school and in high school. You're an American child. You're not forced to learn about American history, which includes slavery, but you're forced to learn about the Jewish Holocaust. And then the people teaching it are not even fricking educators. They like somebody's great-great-grandmama who's a survivor. Just telling stories.
And then when folks say, well, what about black history? What about, you know, this, this indigenous people? Oh, we're going to get. Trainers to come in and teach that stuff too. So let me be clear. I got Jewish people coming in to teach me black history to my kids and the silly Republican legislature and way too many Democrats went along with that nonsense. You had never even seen the curriculum. Jesus.
Nobody looks at it, but Alberta darling you've never seen the curriculum and at first. Oh We don't need to charge you. We don't need it a budget item and now it's a budget item $200,000 for people that are not educators This is the frustration so so let me let me let me let me do this for a second Jay, let me play this
This is the NFL icon whose powerful symbolic gesture a decade ago has made the term taking a knee synonymous with standing up for social justice. Now he's taking you inside his journey in his new memoir, The Perilous Fight. Please welcome the most extraordinary Colin Kaepernick.
So you see, folks are glad to see you. But I want to get to the book because you open this book by telling a chilling story about a terrifying moment you face as a child when kids in your neighborhood chased you, called you racist names, and then tied you to a tree. Why did you decide to start the journey of this book there?
Yeah, I thought it was important to start there one to be able to pull people in and give them some of the background experience that I've had and also a lot of the context of the protest was also framed through lens of you know your privilege like what why does this matter to you you never had to face or deal with it and Even being adopted into a white family growing up in a white community middle-class white community
You still face that and I faced it from a very young age And that's just one of the many examples throughout my life that helped build the experiences that led to the protest You just mentioned you were adopted and raised by white parents in California the book is fantastic by the way I think that you will be remembered in history as a Muhammad Ali as a Tommy Smith as a Don Carlos you are that
And I adore you, you know that. But you write in the book that your parents were profoundly uncomfortable discussing race. So it's easier for you to hold your blackness close and to keep it quiet and out of their sight. So explain what you mean by that and how it affected you internally. Well, it was navigating how my blackness showed up with them. You know, culturally, just very different.
My parents are from Wisconsin. We grew up in Central California. Turlock is, I think at that point in time, was like one to 3% black. So for me in showing up as who I was, I don't think it was something they were fully prepared for. I don't think they had a lot of insight into, but it was a constant tension there, whether it was hair, clothes, music, friends, who I viewed as role models.
all of those came into play, and it gave me a sense of what I was going to have to navigate later as well. Can I ask you, because I have friends, white friends who have adopted black children, black siblings, what advice do you have for families that are dealing with that? Oh, I would say, one, make sure you have great mentors that racially identify the same as your child, give them space, give them connection there.
And also make sure that you're doing the work to educate yourself. You have to understand what it's like to be able to walk in their shoes, what they're going to have to navigate, because it's going to be drastically different from your own experience. So I think that becomes incredibly important as part of it. Well, Colin, after college, you were drafted to play for the San Francisco 49ers. You played for them for six years, and that team with you as part of it also went on to win the Super Bowl in 2013.
But in 2016, you started taking a knee during the national anthem to protest police brutality, and it quickly became a flash point, starting a national debate on everything from race, patriotism, protest. What led you to that decision to take your knee? Yeah, it was a lifetime of experiences that led to it.
A lot of learning, educating myself, you know, what kicked this off was reading the autobiography of Malcolm X, that my wife gave me, then girlfriend, that opened up a whole new understanding of the black experience historically, and also looking at systems historically. And then we're seeing a wave of police killings. You know, this is on the back of Mike Brown and Eric Garner and Tamir Rice, Sandra Bland, and then more recently leading into that,
Mario Woods and all in sterling flanica steel I've never written a book in my life So I'm playing this from YouTube. So that's why y'all hear the commercial piece. Sorry about that Hang on my second because I just I Want you all to hear this interview and there are a couple of minutes left on it Okay, are we ready let's see
Nope, they're not back yet. Okay, here we go. We got to a point where collectively the conversation was, well, we have to do something. What are we going to do? And that's what led into the protest is, can we take an action? And can I take action to help move this conversation forward and get us to a place where we actually address this issue in a meaningful way?
When I misspoke, you did not win the Super Bowl. You were in the Super Bowl. Yeah. I'm sorry. We love a shot to go back. I know. So, Helen, you had a lot of people supporting you after this protest, but you also had a lot of people getting a lot of hate. You're getting serious death threats from people who felt like you were disrespecting the flag, the country, members of the military. Were you surprised about the level of backlash that you received?
Yes and no. I mean, I think my years growing up were informative to give me some insight into what to expect on the other side of that. Also, historically, we've seen that, whether it's Tommy Smith and John Carlos, whether it's Ali, we've seen it with Kurt Flood, we've seen it with Mahmoud Abdul Rove. We've seen the response to black people protesting, black athletes protesting. Now, the part that
that was a candidly surprised me is the amount of pushback on a conversation of, hey, police shouldn't kill black people. That doesn't feel like a controversial topic to me. And I'm surprised at the level of pushback that people had on that, because we should all want to live in a society where everyone feels safe, everyone feels like they have the opportunity to thrive.
And I think that was very revealing in relation to where a lot of people stand and the work that we have to do. And Colin, just six months after you started protesting, you say you were forced to opt out of your contract with the 49ers, and you were never picked by another team again. You sued the NFL for collusion, claiming that team owners were intentionally keeping you out. They've denied this. And it ended in a confidential agreement, though.
Now, as you look back, what do you think was the reason that not a single team would give you a chance to play for them? I think it was political. I also think it was power. I think the reality is, one, I think it's important context. I didn't protest the NFL. So their response to the protest,
is very informative in relation to where they stand politically. We've seen them donate millions of dollars to Trump in this administration. And I think the other part is the realization that the amount of support the protests had, there were also boycotts of the NFL because of their response. The NFL being approximately 70% black also means that the players as the product on the field
have power in control over where the league goes and where they head directionally. If players unify around that, because if players spent one weekend and said, we're not going out there until you address this. There's no game. There's no game. There's no business. And things will change very quickly. Listen, this new book, The Perilous Fight, is out tomorrow. And you can scan the QR code at the bottom of the screen to buy a copy. And y'all know.
cause your members of the studio audience, that you are going home with a copy.
Family welcome back to the show. So I am going to close out the segment that I was just in but let me let me just do this on my way out the door on this issue First of all, I encourage people to pick up Colin Kaepernick's book the perilous fight Again, that was constant connection is always interesting and to hear him say he's had these you know conversations I've heard him talk about this before that being adopted into a white family and
having parents that did not understand or relate to his cultural identity and the things that he would encounter, even in the confines of their middle class white neighborhood. And just think about a child saying, I got tied up to a tree and called the N word. How that forms and shapes you. So when the interviewer on the view says, where you, you know, what did you, did you, how did you anticipate the
backlash. And he was like, life had already been preparing me for that. It had already been preparing me. So continue to support this brother and the work that he is doing, because again, the proceeds that he's making from these things, he's turning around and using that to fund things like an autopsy on Nolan Wells, a young brother who died in Mississippi, and continue to hold people accountable. One of the things that he said, the NFL is 70% black.
If brothers wanted to do something to help make changes in the way things are done, you could do it. And then these owners, one owner gave Trump's campaign $100 million. She gave Trump $100 million. They was like her annual payroll is $180 million. You gave him almost 60% of your payroll.
in a campaign contribution. So at some point you're gonna have to pick a side y'all and not wanting to be inconvenienced, not wanting to give something up, eventually you're gonna have to. It's gonna come to your doorstep. And then the first time an injustice happens, you wanna rally the community, but you haven't showed up for anybody.
I'mma leave that. Now. I don't know if I'll follow that. I don't know if I'll follow that. I think we almost need to have like a moment of silence for that to sit and resonate with everybody. And it's perfect and it's cool. That voice, none other than Mrs. Maya Clark, Office of Equity. You know, and as I say, I say it all the time, I keep trying to figure out how long we gonna be able to even keep the name.
You know, I think the mission stays. But as everybody is navigating the shifting in culture in how we view these things, you know, we are we are one of the folks that are really hanging on to the nail to maintain that we lead him with that. This is the Office of Equity. I mean, when I say I respect that fight.
because there are other people that have already abdicated. And now we're the office of people loving people. I don't, some best, I don't know. But it's so- Opportunity, we've heard office of opportunity or you know- Yeah, yeah. Nationally. Yeah, because people trying to tap dance around a small group of people who don't want to talk intelligently about the issues. Yeah. So for folks that are not familiar with you, please introduce yourself to my remind folks of the work you do, the role you play at Milwaukee County.
Absolutely. And thanks so much for having us. I mean, because as you just mentioned in that previous segment, like these are very important times and they're pivotal times, right? Where we have to stand ground and we have to be able to continue to advocate for what's right for people across the community. And that's what we really try to do in the office of equity. And so as the executive director, and by the way, my name is Sumaya Clark, we really are trying to make sure that people across the county and when we think about across the county.
That's all 19 municipalities. That is people across age groups. And also like looking at race, right? We know that race is important. Gender is important. And there are differences in terms of like health outcomes, how healthy our communities are, all of these things based on where you live or how you look.
And we want to make sure that we can take those things into consideration as we're, um, coming up with strategies that are going to meet the needs of all of the people that we are responsible for serving. So you brought a young sister in today who this is, I think this is our first time meeting. Okay. This is our first time meeting. Oh, do me a favor. You can bring it closer. Yeah. No, just pull it in.
Yeah, but you look familiar. I'm not really sure. We are pleased to welcome to the studio Cassandra live all. How are you this morning? I'm good. I'm good for folks that are not familiar. Don't remember when you have been to the show before reminding what you do. I
Um, the executive director of our office of emergency management. So with the county that basically covers, um, preparedness planning, which is one of the topics we want to talk about today, but we also, um, support our public safety partners across the county. So we do, um, 911 communications, radio communications in EMO, EMS, medical direction. Okay. That's a lot. And so, um, I'm always, and I always do the backstory piece. So I know that.
I'm going to do it again. But for folks that, you know, like, are listening, like, that's kind of cool. How do you get into this work? So how does that start for you, Cassandra?
I've always been a public servant so I think that's been at the forefront and I think just as I transitioned through life I kind of looked at ways that I can lean in and help people and so this was one of those areas where I was like I'm a pretty analytical person so I like to look at situations and say like what's the situation what do we need to do how do we address it and so that kind of just naturally parlayed into
leaning into this work once I became aware of it as a complete field and then just saying like how do we get in here and start getting people prepared for life because let's face it times are changing and we got to keep making sure that people are prepared for the different things that come.
So when you talk about preparedness when, you know, uh, Jermaine, he does the may no weather report. It is the worst two minutes of my life every day. It is the worst two minutes. But there are just things that we don't always think about when we talk about emergency preparedness. And I, what went on with the folks down in Gary? Uh,
in relationship to the power outages. And, you know, whether folks had emergency generators, they had food, they had some kind of way to be able to take care of themselves in this crisis. They were at one point saying that power could have been, I think power had easily been off in many black households in Gary because predominantly black city.
for as long as four weeks. They had said that it could have gone until about September 12th or September 14th. And so, you know, we started calling around, like, what can we, because it wasn't being talked about on any great large scale, particularly, I think, because of the community that was impacted. So we were trying to figure out how to give a voice and raise voice. And then, you know, we think about what goes on in our own community and then
Many of us, like, I always laugh at Lena Taylor, Judge Taylor. Like, she was the first black person I ever knew who had a generator. You know, it had multiple generators. Like, oh, no, it's three or four. You need one. It used to crack me up. Just never thinking about it. So at the core, when we talk about emergency preparedness, what is it that our community needs to understand about what that really means on an individual level or family or community level?
Oh, that's that's all kind of levels there. So I think like what we really need to understand, I think first and foremost is kind of making an assessment of what risks we have. And so I think that's the biggest thing, like thinking about what things are we in danger of. And so when you're looking at your life and how you're interacting in the world, like power is an issue, we all are very relying on power. But as human beings and organic entities, we need resources in terms of water and food. So you're just thinking about what things could come my way and prepare.
and prepare for those kind of things. So you think about when we were kids, we have fire, fire drills and we had tornado drills because someone made that assessment that those were risks that we had to prepare for. And so that in fundamentally is preparedness. And so just identifying what your risks are and then saying, OK, if this were to happen, let's just have a conversation. And just a simple conversation already is putting you 10 steps ahead. Just the thought of a situation possibly happening already makes your wheel start.
turning in your head about what should we do in the event that something like that happens. So when you said it, you said there are levels to this thing. So we're talking about at the very granular, you know, families inside their homes, you all are looking at this from a 30,000 foot perch at county. And so what are the things that you are thinking about in relationship to the county in terms of emergency preparedness? So I'll go, I'll roll it back a little bit. Like when I came into the county, I came in in the midst of COVID.
And so I didn't know anything about epidemiology, you know, any of that kind of stuff, pandemic. So just thinking about like, here we now have this pandemic going across the county, across the world that people need access to.
food and water and medication and PPE and like, who even heard of PPE before that? You know what I mean? Like I didn't know. And so just kind of looking at those things and seeing how people are impacted in Milwaukee County was one of the first to really call out that it was impacting our black communities at a higher rate. If you remember the beginning, people weren't.
People didn't think that it affected us at first and then it came out that it was really really hard. We were immune. Yeah, we thought we were immune. We were immune to COVID. And then the first people to die are our Black people. And a lot of that has to do with the socioeconomic and the, you know, many of us living in close proximity to each other and things like that. So we look at that kind of stuff like...
pulling up data and really making a true picture of like the reality is is this is impacting people who are in these social vulnerabilities and so leaning into that and saying like and now that we've identified a group that needs help and we've identified a need what are we doing overall so. But how much of it is respond responding because like COVID you know I don't know that a lot of us saw that coming. Yeah. Versus forecasting and you know we're getting out ahead these are the things that we anticipate come our way we've looked to
historically of what's happened, and then outside of COVID, next biggest thing that we responded to. And then, Samaya, I'm going to bring you in because I want to be able to talk about, because just that whole piece, like when we talked about with COVID, the disparate impact on communities of color. I remember working in the senator's office and everything had shut down.
But I kept going to work to the Capitol, even though nobody else, none of our staff, they all worked remotely. And I remember talking to a representative liaison from Walmart, who used to work with our office on stuff. And she just said, oh, sent this little cute email. Oh, we're nestling in, you know, into this working at home situation. And, you know, blah, blah, blah. But if you need to reach me and girl, we emailed her back like, well, I'm glad you nestling in.
Because on East Capital, them Black folks is working in there and they don't have any shields up. They don't have any mask on. I'm watching some people wear bandanas on their faces. Can we get some PPE down at Walmart while you nestle in? It was, I mean, like, and you could, when I tell y'all, if y'all don't understand the importance and the significance of having somebody in a position of power to advocate for you. Because the next thing I know, we was getting an email.
If you haven't been, go down there. I went down there. When you pull up on the parking lot, you get into COVID announcement. I go in, I see the lanes have been marked off. I see the shields up. Everybody has masks. And so A, the power of having effective representation. But understanding when everybody else got to stay home, most black people had jobs that didn't allow them to stay home.
you had to report to a brick and mortar. So I wanted to bring that in. But if you do you remember what I asked you? Okay. Yeah. When we talk about like how do we stand for so COVID was like an anomaly that we weren't prepared for. But we look at like just looking at the news and looking at it. To be in favor, lean into the microphone. When we look at what what what has happened across the.
the history of Milwaukee. So we see flooding. Flooding is in the forefront of everyone's mind now because we just had a couple of incidents of flooding. But we look at, you know, in California... Oh, you didn't see my Facebook video. In California, we had, you know, they have a fire season. So that's their threat. Here, usually it's weather related because we have extremes in the weather. We have heat.
We have calls. So those are things that we look at across time to say, these are the things that we have seen historically impact communities across Milwaukee County. And then we try to prepare for stuff like that. So we have warming rooms and cooling rooms to kind of cover those two extremes of the weather for people who may be unhoused or people who have power outages or things like that. So they have somewhere to go. So those are some of the things that we think of. But my job is literally to scan the horizon and say, what do I think is coming down the road?
So before I do the equity question, let me ask the question that if I'm Michelle sitting at home, paying attention to everything that's happening on the news, one of the things
When you talked about like the tornado and I remember, you know, like what the drills were Somebody had a joke on Facebook where they talked about remember when they told us like in the event of a I don't know a nuclear fallout something that how you putting books over your head and you all the sub user it was like We laugh at it today because like seriously, but do you all ever have to think about like a 9-11 a war?
and how that impacts the county in terms of emergency preparedness. Does any of that come into your purview or is that more of a state level function? Because I'm just kind of curious. It does to to the extent that we can because obviously we don't have like bomb shelters available to evacuate people to. So it is some of that where
we try to just have individuals have an understanding of having essentials in case of any scenario. So again, we talk about being organic organisms, needing water and food. So regardless of the scenario, like I can protect you from a bomb, but in the event that the infrastructure fails, what would you need? So that kind of is universal across many types of emergencies. So just having those, like some of the things like I tell people and in my family, like we keep water.
You know, we keep bottled water or I feel milk jugs up with water just so we have portable waters. If we need to go to the bathroom, things like that. So, water is life for me. So, we lean heavily into that. We use our, we keep everything charged. Like when storms come, I charge everything. I'm like, if it got a battery, plug it in. Because it may be the only line of communication we have if we lose power.
if we have a Gary situation. Some of the things, though, to just talk about one of the only things. So like even like old phones, you can still make a call to emergency services. Yeah, I think that's important. Yeah, we charge like old iPads, old computers, because that may when it's all said and done, that may be the only line of communication that we can write. And that is true that even for a phone that has disconnected service.
you plug that phone up, you can still dial 911 on that phone. And thank you for mentioning that. So bring in the equity piece of this conversation when we talk about emergency preparedness. Because like I said, Lena was the first black person. I mean, the first person I knew, period, with the generator. But definitely, and I'm aware of them. I hadn't really thought about, like, do we need to get one? But talk about that.
equity side of this conversation, Samaya. Absolutely. So if we go back to even the example with COVID, I think that's like a really good example. So Milwaukee County were, we were one of the first jurisdictions in the US to actually disaggregate the data, meaning breaking down the data so that we can actually look to see who is being impacted. That's how we knew it was black people who were being impacted first, black men.
over the age of 40 were impacted most initially.
And they were dying at higher rates initially, right? And so, again, looking at age, ability, gender, all of these sort of sponsors so that we can better meet the needs. One of the things that was also really important during that time was our communication, because initially, you know, when we thought about the communication, it was like, oh, just, you know, stay this distance or, you know, safe at home and all of that. And we had to say, OK, well, what about people who don't have a safe home? Or what about people who don't have, you know,
like multiple rooms within their home. So we actually changed the messaging. There was a huge, there was a joint information center where you had people like Athena Communications and others come together working with the state, with the city of Milwaukee, with other municipal health departments to figure out what is the appropriate messaging that's gonna work across. So again, that's based on knowing who lives here,
Honoring that and then making sure that our messages are actually going to resonate with those those individuals across those communities And I just want to just just jump in real quick because I I can hear Keon Jackson Malone whenever like some we even had I think Excuse me advertisements, but That you know the news media different, you know, Tony Evers different folks those safe at home and Keon would I just he would mumble it under his breath and
that phrase irked him so bad because he would always say, what if home is not safe? Exactly. Exactly. And he would talk about whether it's domestic violence, whether you know, you got people.
you don't even have, I mean, you don't even have the stuff that you need to survive on a regular basis, yet alone in a pandemic and emergency. So I just had to interject that because he would mumble it. I was like, okay, Keon, he would mumble it under his breath all the time. What if home is not safe? And what if home is not safe? And so we needed to shift as people who were responsible for the health of our community, we have to shift that messaging and also our approach. So, you know, the housing division did things like
like in partnership with hotels, even for first responders, because if I'm out responding, I may not be able to go home to my family to put them at risk. So there were all of these things that were put in place. And then, yeah, so I think those are just like some good examples. And then we have seen examples in other places where data wasn't disaggregated like a Flint, Michigan.
Right because if you look at even what happened there the water wasn't great There was data for time, but when you don't break it out and look geographically across to see how there's Impact how things are impacted differently across then you can have a whole area like Flint that is like having higher levels of of Problems with the water and not you and we're not even we're not looking at that
So data is so important. So important. Well, I'm just okay. So maybe that was Yeah, that was intentional. Well, yeah, we divert we diverted these people's drinking water source. So that they knew was garbage. Okay, that was okay. I mean, but you get my I'm sorry. I was like we have access to data
or if community has access to data, then you're better able to know. And that's one of the things that I would say OEM has been very good at is like if you Google their website, they have all of these dashboards. So with all of these dashboards, there are very specific data indicators that you can look at and you could see how things in your neighborhood are being impacted, right? So those are the types of things, transparency with data that that's one example of
a strategy that helps to advance equity when you have the transparency around information. All right, so let me do this real quick. And then we'll take a quick break, but you have an educator listening. They said, this is also where you will find the uniqueness of Milwaukee public school buildings. Many of them were built during a time when nuclear warfare was on the minds of the public, especially during World War II.
On some of the old buildings, you will see a sign that says fallout shelter. A fallout shelter could withstand certain, really, certain nuclear capabilities of that time. That is why they made good shelter during times of crisis. Old school gymnasiums either have no windows or high windows, which are a good shield from tornadoes and old school nuclear bombs. So they say, so I went to Rufus King does right over here. Okay. And if you go through the art room,
there's like a little maybe for current students don't don't don't they listen to this but like if you go through the art room there was this like almost like trap door in the floor that would go down into like some sort of old shelter oh really so I may or may not be aware of that at Rufus King somebody said they listened they said
Yes, the room behind the art room which I haven't publicly said I don't think I said much I need to say more that about mr. Ballester a pastor Yeah, and so I know my son with the king so he had a lot of people somebody said there that was also
the reason our gym was built in a pit for that purpose as well, for people to be able to go down into that gym area for safety. Is that not crazy? Okay, so let me take a quick break. When we come back, I want to talk about that dashboard because, you know, helping people navigate, understand what kinds of things they can find here. So we'll do that. And I always ask about the money, you know, budget wise, how y'all holding up? We know the budget process.
everybody can be asked to tighten a belt. But do we even have the luxury of tightening our belt on something like Office of Emergency Management? So we'll do that. All right, y'all. Michelle Bryant, WNLV, 860 AM, 106.5 FM. I'm going to get me a generator today. I'll be right back.
Welcome back to the show. So we are fortunate this morning. We are talking to Cassandra libel and What's that ladies name miss Clark? So Maya From the office of equity for Samaya director of executive directors office of equity Cassandra. What's your title over at office of executive director? Okay, I love it. I love it. And So we're talking about
emergency preparedness. I mentioned the dashboard before we went to break talking about what people can find there. But I do know we have a phone call. So I'm gonna get them in real quick. Hey, caller. What's happening? Good morning. Good morning. I have something to share with you. You were talking about cabinet. And his fight. I've almost experienced all of that in my life.
I'm 28 years old, reverse. I've had police brutality. I've been qualified for things that wouldn't deny me because they knew me. I don't take none. Anybody who knows me, I don't take none. I was in the military. I didn't take any.
I had some friends who worked for UWM and MATC. And that stuff that your president put on the DEI stuff, it affected them and they lost their jobs. Yes, many people had. That's amazing and stuff. But I'm going to put this on you. We need to just be equal to people. That's part of DEI.
When we do what with for the people equity people as part of the people. Okay. I got you. Go ahead, sir. Be careful that your president don't get rid of your own. But anyway, this is on you. I'm a shell. We need to get a hub where we can get together and help our people out with everything. By the money and getting what you need. And I told right out about this already.
And I want you in on it too. We've got to teach our people how to have money, how to quit renting cars. When the car gets repoed, you rented it and they got their money and you didn't get your car. And you have a good one. All right, thank you. I appreciate the car. Yeah, we know that the fight is real. And ironically, that level of preparedness, because even though
It may seem like the conversation is disjointed from Kaepernick to what we're doing now, but it is literally about preparedness. One of the things I said yesterday when I was talking, I brought up again this morning, understanding the assignment. When we are walking out of these homes, going into these classrooms, going to these different environments.
we're not just showing up for the immediate moment. This is down the road. We are planning for the future, planning for our community. The way we show up creates opportunities for other people. And so, you know, I get the thread that preparedness looks like many things across the line. I went to the website and you have a how do I section.
And it covers, you know, a number of things. How do I prepare for the season? Make an emergency kit. Prepare as a person with functional needs. And you got to tell me what that is. Prepare my pet. Decide to stay or go to a number of people that you see. We're going to wait it out. We just going to wait it out. We've seen it before. And now we're looking for you.
So understanding the flood risk, protecting myself online. I just talked about talking to somebody yesterday who said that they had been the victim of a scam. And my mother, I remember somebody had gone into her bank account and she was just, you know, but she had given them the information. She was like, oh my God, she can see the money like flying out of her account while we were on the phone. I was like, Mom, hang up the phone and call the bank.
Hang up the phone and call the bank. So real quickly, one of the things that I'm interested in, that making an emergency kit, I was telling you during the break, I met somebody who said they have a go bag. I don't have one. I've not thought about any event of an emergency. What do I need to grab? Do I need a copy of my ID, a copy of my birth certificate? What do you need?
What do you say when I ask that question? Sure. I think all of the above. The more you can have, the better. But you also want to make sure that you can be mobile in the event you need to. So I think having important documents, sometimes that doesn't matter right now. But having those documents available to you, so whether you have the actual document or copies of your documents are important. But then you think about what's your immediate need.
We keep first day kits everywhere. We have tons of first day kits. Most people got one first day kit. Every vehicle we have has a first day kit. Every vehicle we have, we have...
Knives in the car and not as weapons, but as tools Matches things like that safety pins just weird things, you know So like I just sent my son off to college and I literally took if you think like I Garrett's popcorn, you know those little tens of popcorn So I get the little tin and I literally just threw a whole bunch of stuff in there gauze tape Band-Aids Vaseline alcohol needles and threads like all kind of weird things that just
We essentially was ever in your junk drawer in that kitchen. You know, we all got that drawer in our kitchen. There's a whole bunch of stuff in there, batteries, all of that stuff. We have that drawer because it's basically our preparedness kit. Yeah. I mean, the time does come to when you really need it. Yeah. And you're like, I need one of those. Even it might be a ketchup package in that drawer, you know, but you that's really like the essential.
Preparedness kitten we don't even think about it and you talked about smile during the break. You're having medication I have medication because I have I've been a caregiver, right? So at one point my grandmother and her husband was my granny just turned 98 Happy birthday grandma So like you know of the medication that she needed the medication that my daughter needs because she has seizures and some other things So I just have like a prescription in there. The other thing I was able to find I want to say two for like less than $20
Waterproof fireproof envelopes. So like if I have to get up and go those like you can have cash in there You could have your and it doesn't have to be a lot and you actually want just like a little bit of cash because we're so used to tapping and swiping
And if you don't have access to that money, you need to have a little bit of your powers out. You need a little money and low denominations that can go in there. And if there's flooding or anything like that, it actually keeps it from being ruined so that when you leave, you can get, you still have access to all of those things. And I just have it in a backpack. Having it all in one space so you're not running around trying to find it in the moment of the disaster, keeping it all together. And someone just said dialysis patients have to have manual meds.
medications for their treatments if there's no electricity. And the question you had about functional, if you have functional needs, that's what we're talking about. So based on your ability or your level of function. So for example, my daughter for some of her equipment.
It's it's electrically powered right so if I know that I need to be able to transport her without things that are electrically powered or if she has some sort of Breathing machine or something like that you want to be able to have backups or something that you know like To be able to keep her keep her alive if there is some sort of emergency So I see we got a caller. Let me get them in and raise another question. Hey caller. What's happening?
Hey, good morning to you. Good morning. Hey, you guys talking about prepping and prepping. Wait, talking about what it's hard to hear you mean. Prepping. Prepping. Prepping. I'm a prepper. I'm not a prepper to where I'm just crazy with it and psychotic with it, but I am a prepper and that's what you're talking about. You talked about a generator.
a generator is all right but if you can afford one you know they got one the cheapest one you might well they got some real cheap ones but the a good one will probably be about maybe 1200 to 2500 and what you want is a solar one it runs quiet so therefore if something happened they don't hear you down the block running they got some rice down there you know it's running quiet and it powers everything it's a solar one now they got something that you can put out a panel or they got something they don't even need a panel
The panel ones usually generate a little bit more electricity. And that's real, but when I was at NOB, I gave out these little crank radios, you know, that you can crank, you just crank it, or you can use, I got one that crank and sell you. You just turn it and it works, or you got the cellular. And I gave those away whoever called him and asked him a question or something. I probably did that for about two weeks, but I'll tell you something else. Rapid radio, get you one of them.
That that don't that that that cuts down all your cell phone and all of that kind of stuff You can talk all the way to Mississippi anywhere. It's like a walkie. It's like a next day or two way Okay, it's called rapid radio Get that right there because that right there your cell phone go down all of these networks that's listening all this stuff You can talk directly with my son or wherever I want to talk to my daughter whoever
It's called rapid radio and you can get like four to five of them for a deal. It's better than the cell phone and it's more personal and more private. So prepping is a great thing to do. I mean, let's be realistic. We never know. We know that the pandemic really wasn't caked out to be where it was, but it's still to be set for whatever might happen next one more time before I go. I'm talking too much when you talk about moving around.
these electric vehicles are dangerous because if anything should happen to the grid and that's all you got man you stuck if you got a up-to-date car with the old ship that's running off of electric uh system that's really dependent on electric it you're gonna be stuck man you ever seen some of the Mad Max movies and the whole world going mad and cars all over the place well that's what that looks like you know the electric car
I'm discouraging people with that money. And if you can't find you something with old copyrighted, but you know what happened with most of that money? Class for clunkers, remember that $2,500 when our president came in, he bought all that stuff. I mean, maybe they'll sell it. You got one in the backyard, $5,000, hadn't ran. But guess what? Those are the vehicles that you can use because you can create ethanol right with some ears of corn. It's just like corn whiskey, right? You can just, the more you age it, the more pony you get.
And guess what? You start a car right up, boom, boom, and burn black smoke. Guess what? It's going to get you where you got to go. I got to go. See you later. Thank you. Thank you, Meach. And while he was talking, I did take a moment to look up rapid radios. I was not familiar. I'm not sure if you ladies were. You know about them. OK, OEM, I see you. But it says, unlike cell phones, it's not a public communication. Government cannot listen in.
instant push to talk technology unlike cell phones when calling is bogged down due to a disaster when all you can get are busy signals these radios will still work.
No monthly fees unlike cell phones. They utilize every cell carrier not just one and they have global coverage possible as well So I had never heard of a rapid radio. It's isn't in hands It's like a hands-in-hands walkie-talkie like he said really you do have to think about that kind of stuff and we talk about in a critical situation if you think about like we just commemorated 9 11 and during 9 11 when that incident was going on the New York Airways got flooded
from people trying to call everybody. Right. And so people could not get a hold to their loved ones because the system was overrun with the volume of people trying to make phone calls. So just even something as simple as having a communication method in place or like one of the things I tell my family is we text because text can wait until there's an opening and then the text can go through. So you can sit on that phone and try to call all day long. But if you send a text, at least the text has a better chance of getting through some of that traffic when there is a gap in the.
In the flow of things you can sometimes that text will get through and you know ice because when we were in on vacation where we were at Martha's Vineyard My carrier T-Mobile janky is all get out. So I couldn't make a call to save my life Text messages were real scattered, but when I got back, you know on the island I mean got off the island all these messages text messages were rolling through so you're right eventually that is a
At least you know, they'll they have a window of getting through. Yeah, but I just found out what I'm getting my son for Christmas. He told me each look somebody said me finally caught in with some good So I'm definitely gonna do that and I do want to just stress the other thing that you said about the water I talked about that didn't break I want to circle back on that because when you said, you know, we have water on hand I got plenty of water on hand, but it's all bottled water
But if I need water to wash my hands water to flush the toilet water to do something else I don't want to use the water that I'm paying for that I just paid for so you talked about taking empty milk jugs Winsor and cleaning those out and putting water in them just to store so that you'd have utility water exactly and so if you have like you think about people have rain barrels and things like that any any
Any kind of container will do. So again, if we know a situation, if you have a little bit of forewarning, it's great that you fill up your bathtub, things like that. I remember back in the day we used to do that. Yeah, you could always scoop that water out to make your toilet manually flush or whatever. But yes, we all have soda bottles.
you know those kind of things any large container like that you feel like the reindeer I did and I remember I gave one away yeah you know you never know like I said it's not for you to digest right but help you for other like you said just some of those things we don't we take for granted because we have access I can turn on my faucet and water come out but we see across even in this country that that's not always the case right is so having some of that stuff you don't have to have a lot but just something to get you started because
look at what went on in Gary like it went on for weeks and so it's like you don't know how much you would need but at least those first couple of days until you can get a plan in place you'll have something to start with. Last thing I'll just ask about and I just the the responses have been great in terms of this conversation. Somebody said an EV is a generator and can sustain you in an emergency for over a week education is key.
Let's see somebody else said oh somebody else talked about the dialysis Likewise, it can run dialysis equipment for two weeks if man if managed properly you can make power with household items you Can't refund ethanol but a number of people are weighing in so the one thing I wanted to hit that I saw on the site
a family emergency plan. Yes. Samaya, you talked about your grandma, I mean your mother back in the day. Granny. Granny. Oh, my mom back in the day with the word. With the word, you know, like if this one word is not said and somebody comes, you know, supposedly to tell you I said something or, you know, trying to communicate with you. We know we have a problem, possibly. Right. And I mean, I think that's something that's important as.
as you mentioned with more and more scammers and so having some sort of like word or phrase that like that person who's calling you or that you're able to communicate with family members like a safe word or a safe phrase I think it's really important to have and
I think the idea about opportunities to communicate with folks is also really good because you don't want, you know, your device get lost and somebody else is trying to get something from you. So I think the biggest thing is to have those conversations. As you were mentioning in a previous conversation, Cassandra, about like many scenario planning. So like with your son, like
when you're driving like okay if this happens do this you know so if you can even talk a little bit about those mini scenario plans um so and you do it in a way where it's not overwhelming or anxiety provoking but it's it's more for information and to help him start to kind of model and brainstorm what his response needs to be yeah i think a big part of that is leaning to the mic for me um the scenario base is thinking just if you can envision a thing happen your mind is already preparing for
what you're going to do in it. But if you don't want to ever brings it up, like you couldn't even like, who would ever told me that this would happen, that I would have to prepare for it. So to Samiah's point, one of the things I did when my son was much younger, we were driving the car and I just said, Hey, what would you do if we had a car accident? Cause we had been thankful we hadn't had one. And so he's like, of course, I don't know. And so we went over a quick scenario just in the car. I was like, if we have, if someone hits us or something happens, I just need you to stay calm. Even if I can't respond to you, someone's going to come and help you just stay calm in the situation.
That was the whole extent of the conversation. And so I, I kid you not, like a week later we get rear-ended, you know? And so, um, so I, you know, I say a couple of choice words, but then I pull over. And, um, and so we, you know, I get out the car, I talk to the person, we do what we need to do. We handle our business, but I hear my son in the back and he's like, at this point, like six or seven, he's like, stay calm, stay calm. He's just talked to his little self in the back of the car. He's like, stay calm. And so then when it was all said and done, I was like, you all right, man?
and he's like, yeah, I'm good. But the fact that he up to that point, he never envisioned that scenario. And then because we had that real quick conversation, he was able to say, OK, I'm going to stay calm. He didn't freak out, start crying and screaming. Now I got to deal with that. So he was able to just, that was something simple in preparing it. So again, having those.
Little touch points with your family and what like you said if it's a fire Hey, this is what we need to do if there's a fire and you kind of go through it We don't do fire drills at home people don't think about that like how would you get? We take some of this stuff for granted hasn't happened I mean I hear y'all but what's the odds of it really happening and we get stuck there? Yeah, you know, I'm sure when Katrina happened
Lord have mercy. Yeah. I mean, nobody nobody was a go back, you know, medication, money, the ability to pay for gas to even get out of the area because, you know, people live in check to check. And so
The things that we just assume it will never happen, but the idea of being you know and teaching our children that I love that whole thing about an emergency plan I know in our family, you know, we gotta if anything ever jump off This the meeting place, you know, or this is who we try to get to or you know because we live all over the country
Yeah. So how did we get to one another? You know, how do we, how do we contact one another? I'm telling you right now, I'm about to buy these rapper radios out. They going out for Christmas gifts. I'm telling you, I already know somebody gonna be bad because they thought they was getting another jacket. No, you getting the rapper radio. What is this? Like you get socks at a rapper radio. See, you're so sweet. But I think it's important to also highlight like these conversations are a low cost, no cost plan.
So it's like if you can't afford a rapper radio, you can't afford a generator. Just having these conversations is a way to prepare us for these situations. Gathering up your documents, that's the way to prepare. There's no cost to that. Right. So it's like, you know, you can't get a fireproof or waterproof. Guess what? We got ziplocks, you know, like whatever you can do, having that available. My son laughs at me because I got a ziplock bag of singles. He's like, what are you doing with all of them singles? I was like, you never know. You never know. So we're going to keep these singles. So just things like that where.
You don't have to if you can prepare for things and you can buy supplies and you can buy this technology. But if you can't just put away what you can put away and and just have these conversations like stay put use the safe word. Don't you know like if you get your kid get lost when you're out in the crowd. Don't try to find me. I'll find you. You stay put. I'll come find you.
Mm-hmm. It cuz we just gonna miss each other and so I mean things like that. So is there a emergency preparedness month? Yeah, it's currently in here in it. Yes, ma'am. All right. So for emergency preparedness month, I like the idea of these waterproof fireproof envelopes. I'm gonna get ready find some order like five or six or something and I'm actually gonna give them away on the air because a I so appreciated that
And I'm going to do a couple of things to help encourage people to be able to take some of this stuff very seriously in relationship to thinking about what's the strategy, what's the plan. And like you said, something so simple is talking to that baby in that car. How many people? I just thought about George. You know, George a regular caller. They drive those grandkids to school every day. How many people have said, if we're ever in a car accident, this is what we do.
You're so right. You don't take the time because we're in go mode all the time, right? And so what we're just encouraging people to do is just take a moment.
It doesn't have to be this huge thing. You don't have to say, Oh, I need $500 to build out this thing. Like, no, like I'm going to the dollar store. I'm going to pick up one of those little small kits and I'm going to put it in a old, one of my, my grandkids old backpacks that they're not using anymore. And then next month I'm going to add something else to it. Right. So it's like little by little. And then having those conversations is something that you can do. It helps you feel more secure because you know that you're prepared and then also like your family. Well, you know,
I don't know where the toilet paper park comes in at because during COVID you could find on toilet paper nowhere. Do you hear me? I need a seal bag for that because I just remember and I called a good friend and I said, because I knew he had to connect. Bro, we need toilet paper.
You can't you can't find it those are the things that we do not think about but it is so
It's so crazy. So, okay, I know what I popped in my mind. But it's a reality. What do you think about it? I'm leaving, man. Bye. Don't look at me. Don't look at my job. You know what? I'm looking at the clock. I'm coming. I'm like, it's not Thursday. All right, family, I'm getting ready to wrap the show for today. Let me thank the Office of Equity. Let me thank Jackie Zeldan, who helps to make
you know, these appearances possible, coordinating everything. Somaya, thank you so much. It was good to see you, ma'am. Appreciate you working hard. Thank you, Clark.