New Leadership

What

up y'all, welcome back, welcome back, welcome back.

It's your boy Ray Nitty holding it down on the grapevine.

Live from the American Family Assurance Studios, this is Truth 10170, award-winning 10170, Truth.

Man, we talking about...

Our culture, man, preserving our culture.

Preserving our history.

How are we protecting it?

We talked about the books they getting rid of.

Shout out to everybody in the chat too.

833-212-1017 is the number to dial.

833-212-1017 is the number to dial.

We had the caller call in and talked about books that he was able to intercept probably from being destroyed, if we be honest.

They probably was gonna get ready to destroy.

So I'm glad they in the hands of somebody that's gonna help preserve the history of our people like Stokely Carmichael's, Medgar Evans, all of these type of folks.

We want to do something with these books.

And as he was talking, I was getting chills because it reminded me of a project I was trying to help my homie Chad with before he passed, before he was murdered.

If you knew Chad, he stood for en masse incarceration.

That was his life mission.

You probably see me wearing en masse incarceration shirts or hoodies.

That was his brand.

But he had one specific goal that he wanted to see change in the House of Corrections.

He wanted to see a different level of books that was being offered.

to brothers and sisters in the system.

Because what was offered, it just wasn't appealing.

It wasn't stimulating enough.

So we wanted to get as many books as we can in Chad.

He even went and collected some books.

He had some books himself.

And I think his sister and his mom, and they still have some of them books.

And I wanted to figure out a way to get that library up.

a new library that had a section dedicated to Bro and the forward thinking that he wanted to bring to a community that he was passionate about.

A voiceless community who wasn't often heard.

Shannon was a part of that.

Beko was a part of that.

It was all when he was doing the awareness campaign in the House of Corrections.

And then Franklin as well.

But Shannon said, I need a few of those books.

Abstract noir says, Jordan's are just shoes.

Teach people that the banjo is our instrument.

Teach them what call and response in gospel and jazz music was where it came from.

Shannon also said, I'm with it.

Truth family book club.

Teach them to full the full like okra rice cultivation gumbo inspiration dishes come from Africa.

Talk to him.

Sherita says I need them books and you could also tell everyone about Hidden Colors.

It's five episodes and it's on YouTube.

Hidden Colors talks about our history and how a lot of things came from a black person.

Jazz West Cousin Jazz said there's a book in a movie called Fahrenheit 451 where owning a book or books was illegal.

The firefighters would raid houses for books, and if they found some, they'd burn the books and the house.

Everything that we come up with is dope, Shannon says, or cool.

They want parts by they mean the entire world, but give no credit to us.

They want to save the negative for our culture.

That's what I'm saying.

It was hard for me to sit down and watch people just try to blame a whole music scene.

for the acts of a few.

But when we blame a whole white generation for the acts of slave masters, the easy response for them to say is, oh, that was so long ago, my family didn't own slaves.

Well, my family was in downtown cutting up.

It's like, when when it's your culture and narrative,

There has some negativity on it.

You don't want to talk about it.

But we want to bring ours to the forefront.

We got Black Conscious on the line.

How you feeling, man?

You live on the grapevine.

It's a great day to be alive.

Now it's yourself and health as well.

And you're hitting all cylinders on this one, G. But I'm going to tell you something.

Another thing they blame us for.

If a story doesn't have or didn't get their ticket delivery, they have blamed that on us too.

Let's not forget about that.

So, you know, if BW3s or one of these other list places go down and they don't have chicken, they have blamed that on us.

So I try my mission with my grandkids and all young youth who would give me that listening ear is to share with them the importance of embracing who you are as a African-American in this United States.

I also teach with my grandkids because I had to tread lightly on other children's kids, other friends' kids.

The importance of, if you're gonna travel, go to Africa first.

Don't let all these other places be something that's not even, they only want your dollars, they don't really want you.

These African countries will take you brother and show you the best time and love on you and embrace you and welcome you back to your original.

Mm-hmm.

And go

from there.

Mm-hmm.

But

respect and have respect for yourself and embrace your blackness.

Mm-hmm.

A lot along what the caller said, but I think the caller has already gave you of that mission you look at one step closer to achieve it because now he has the literature in the

books.

Mm-hmm.

So you could team up with him and find a venue and start that process of which you want that goal you try to achieve.

No,

absolutely.

He's got the books.

Absolutely.

And I'm

quite sure if he got books, there's other like-minded people that's also willing to share that knowledge.

We just got to find these youth and maybe some old heads to come and absorb that knowledge and then spread it on.

It is not a one thing that's going to fix all.

It's a collaboration of what everybody can pour in to keep this culture alive.

because the devil is a lot.

And all days are those pink toes who want to keep you and focus only on the badness of you.

But there's a lot of greatness because we stand on great shoulders.

Yeah, 100%.

And I agree with you 100%.

I'm waiting to get back in touch with the caller.

Thank you for calling in Black Conscious.

I'm waiting to get back in touch with the caller because we got space.

We put $70 million on Center Street to help change the narrative of our culture.

And even when we did, they tried to tear it down.

I spoke about it.

It's what provoked me to run for office.

Seeing how black people were being poisoned and ignored, allowing multi-billion dollar corporations to come in to our to our communities, dump toxins into our sewage, poison our families and leave and just shut down.

That's what prompt me to run the environmental injustice that I saw our people having to endure.

And we talked about it on this show, the impact of exposure to toxins and chemicals and the type of impacts that it has on somebody's hyperactivity, the ability to make good decisions.

But we just highlight the violence.

We just highlight the violence.

We don't highlight the conditions that these young people had to grow up in.

The poison that they had to take in.

We don't talk about it.

We just highlight the violence, the end result, the byproduct of racism, poverty, environmental injustice.

It's easy to highlight the byproduct of what they created.

Don't ask me who they is you know we all know They don't need a name So yeah They gonna use our culture against us The culture that they created the culture that they uplifted the industries that they prepared an image of ourselves in

from our music.

That's why a club can say, oh, it's just we don't want none of these songs.

And people just go with it.

Yes, we need to hold ourselves accountable.

That's a whole separate conversation.

But you will not misrepresent our culture.

You will not.

Tell a false story about our culture.

Sure.

Parts of that could be true, but you won't tell it as if it's a whole story.

I won't allow it.

I won't allow it.

Because we could tell a historic culture of serial killers.

In this state and city.

I'm just saying, protect our culture, protect what we've built, push the positive, change the narrative, because they are using the negative narrative against us right now to blame us for everything that is about to be happening downtown.

And if you're not paying attention, it's already happening.

It's going to be the escape goat for a lot of businesses That won't be successful downtown and they gonna blame it on our culture and then some people gonna say it's true It's right.

It's because black people was down there acting crazy.

That's why these businesses closed We won't pay attention to oh the cost of living is way high

The cost to go out has gotten so expensive that people aren't just drinking like they used to.

They're gonna blame it on the violent.

They ain't gonna look at the broader picture.

But when we come back, we're gonna take a look at that picture.

Because downtown businesses is closing.

And I ask a question.

Is it time for new leadership?

Don't go anywhere, y'all.

We'll be right back on the award-winning 10170 Truth.

What up y'all what up what up what up welcome back welcome back welcome back if you just joining us This is the grapevine with your boy Ray nitty holding it down brother Z got me on the production and sound live from the award-winning one on one seven the truth American family insurance studios How y'all feeling man?

We talking about the importance of our culture controlling the narrative protecting it not letting people blame a whole culture

for the mistake of a few, for the actions of a few.

I couldn't just let them say, oh, all the Milwaukee, because this is what Milwaukee music culture really is representing.

This is what we're gonna highlight.

We're gonna highlight stories of Mondo and Big Frank and what they're doing at the public library, promoting literacy.

We gonna talk about things like that.

They gonna blame us for everything.

And we giving them the ammunition to actually do it.

We giving them the ammunition to actually do it.

Okay?

Not that they invested too much money into a overpriced building or overpriced rent Leasing downtown and triple net deals.

Oh, they gonna say oh people were scared to come Because the blacks was down there fighting again Sherwin and his posse

Huh They gonna blame it all on us y'all They ain't gonna say all these businesses are leaving because They just don't see the economical impact the same because Yanis is gone Business is gonna go down

It's not as many people gonna be coming in for the Bucks games, not as many people traveling into the city.

See, I remember what it was, what life was before Giannis.

I remember life before Giannis.

I don't know if a lot of people do.

I was a seasoned ticket holder before Giannis.

Bradley Center.

Yeah, them days.

But they're going to blame our community for the reason why a lot of downtown businesses is closing.

And we're going to give them every right to do so by highlighting these actions that keep happening, not controlling our behaviors, not dealing with the issues in our community.

We gonna allow them to highlight the byproduct of our community the byproduct of the environmental injustice the byproduct of the poor education the byproduct of poverty And they're gonna use it to say that's why businesses are leaving downtown Not that

Downtown has became a place where you can't even find any damn parking.

Nobody wanna go downtown because you can't find parking.

You gotta pay to park on the street all the way up until nine o'clock.

It says scam to get you a parking ticket or to go into a parking structure.

We're not talking about all the different ways that downtown has changed to where it's less enticing to consumers and patrons.

They're gonna say, oh, it's too many fights downtown.

Low County, a Chicago-based seafood restaurant just permanently closed.

It's now Water Street location this week.

The third consecutive business to fail at that address is six years following Brew City Barbecue and Bar Louie.

And the funny part about this part is, I actually know somebody who know the owner of this.

So to hear this,

And I'm, you know what?

They never cited that.

It was violence.

Let's be clear with that.

Low County never cited that.

But I also wonder, like, how did Low County, like, promote?

Because respectfully, you know one thing our community love is a damn crab boy.

So you're telling me if we, if we downtown acting up, we wasn't at the crab spot?

That only makes sense.

Businesses are going to blame us for their failures.

They ain't going to blame themselves.

They're not going to say they didn't market properly.

They're not going to say they were overcharging in an overpriced economy.

They're not going to take into consideration that consumer fatigue is a real thing.

20% gratuity as soon as you open the door.

with terrible attitudes.

I was on Brady Street at a spot I loved.

I loved this spot.

Loved it.

Darcy is.

We even gave it an amazing review at one point and we had to go edit it.

Business service went downhill.

But they'll say it was all violence impacted service.

Sure.

I'm sure it is.

All right.

A little bit further north.

Sam's Place Jazz Cafe opens since 2021.

Historical jazz musician.

Historical.

There was no violence over there.

No.

What's the violence over there?

Consumers aren't spending like they used to.

Prices keep going up.

But it's going to be easy to blame our community.

It's going to be easy to do that.

We got Miss Sandra on the line.

I'm sorry Miss Sandra.

I had you waiting a while.

How you doing?

Talk to me.

Bad.

I'm sorry.

How are you doing today?

I'm good.

I'm good.

Just getting some thoughts out my head.

Yeah, I like what you're saying because it's true.

Like I say, this is a grand agenda.

Trump is using it every Republican and probably some Democrats too, I won't say they're out of the picture.

They use racism and it works.

It's an agenda that works and it's been working a long time for them.

I think it was instituted way when we came here, you know, off the ship, but you got these attorneys and all that, the Hedge Heritage Foundation, all these foundations, these stores we shop at, there's the ones that come up with all these ideas, how they can eliminate our progress.

And so now it's everything that's, it's the Blacks, Blacks.

So that's why when I call, I take up for us, even when I own Black people don't.

I said, I have to because that's not true.

Walgreens was believing years ago because they said they wanted to make clinics.

I read it in the paper.

I get to shoot you every day.

And they said they were moving years ago.

It wasn't just because they just moved yesterday.

And Wal-Mart was moving and closing up.

I don't even know why they opened up a new store down there on Silver Spring.

But they were closing up.

They said those were prison camps where they were storing amulets.

So if we look up stuff and start reading up the evil stuff these people are doing, they're going after their own white people.

They think it's just us because you got too much automation, you got robots coming in, you got job elimination.

If you call the gas company, you talk to the recorder, all those jobs are gone.

They're closing up hospitals.

So I believe they have to de-populate.

The lawyer too de-populates.

You guys are black people are your problem, they're your enemies.

And we're not.

And we don't know them, they don't know us.

And then one more thing I want to say now after Simon says rock and roll, it's fading away, you know, like the songs that the black people sing for now if you watch Becca got talent, you see this, um, country western that's winning.

You know, our soul.

He told that girl.

He says soul music is dissolving.

So everything we do and that we do so good to China dissolve it and then don't forget our unions.

We had unions.

We worked together.

They managed to ship the unions without showing the

job.

And so now we don't have each other to fight with.

We got together.

I retired from Alan Brandy.

We got together and we marched on those people.

So that's what I had to say.

Man, thank you for calling Miss Sandra.

And you absolutely right.

You 100% right.

Thank you for calling in once again.

Thank you for calling in.

Miss Sandra is right.

They take away everything we put together.

And then blame us.

All right.

I ran for office because I got a bunch of people that I know that got businesses downtown and they heard about the struggles and I hear about it.

I saw how not only business owners but consumers.

were treated downtown.

I also saw the difference between how resources in the most influential district in the city of Milwaukee, the fourth automatic district, how is there not more communication conversations about when we talk to the folks in those harbor apartments, the most wealthiest affluent apartments in the state of Wisconsin.

The conversation wasn't we're blaming Milwaukee for all it was like

How can we help?

How can we help be a part?

We understand our privilege.

What can we do to help the North Side?

That's what the conversation was.

When everybody told me, man, they're nitty, they're white people, they ain't gonna listen to you.

They wanna hear nothing you talking about.

And they proved everybody wrong.

And then when I put together a coalition,

To figure out how these people that care could help it was blocked By the sitting order It was blocked By the sitting order Because he didn't put together when they have been waiting for you to get to put something in

So I put some people together that could answer eight questions.

But that was too much like doing somebody's job for them to have 20 years to do it.

But I'm just the rapper.

I get labeled just the rapper.

I had to deal with the blatant racism on my page that I had to answer for.

Ain't that crazy?

Don't go anywhere, y'all.

We'll be right back after these messages.

We'll continue the conversation.

Downtown businesses is closing and we're gonna be the one to blame and new leadership is not even a topic on the table.

Don't go anywhere, y'all.

We'll be right back.

What up y'all welcome back welcome back welcome back welcome back Since the grapevine with your boy Ray nitty You were listening to one on one seven the truth Milwaukee black talk live from the American family insurance studios Man brother Z holding us down with the production and sound We just get some thoughts out of my head y'all don't mind me

We just talking about.

You know.

The town, the city, they get ready to blame everything on us.

I think Milwaukee is entering into.

And I can be wrong.

This is just a guess.

I'm looking at how things are.

I'm looking at how life was before Yanis after Yanis.

We built all of these things.

If we think all of this building that happened around the Pfizer form and that didn't drive the cost of a lot of these buildings up, which then got passed on to consumers in some way, shape or form, I don't think y'all understand what's really going on.

Milwaukee District Number Four is probably the most influential district.

Entertainment, the liquor licenses, the money, the revenue that's coming through there.

So businesses leaving downtown is not a good thing.

I may be.

Could it be happening?

Maybe.

But the conversations that I had with residents and business owners, it was a fearful environment.

It was a fearful environment.

For residents businesses owners and his wife She was scared too But I asked the question for 20 years 20 years we allow somebody to sit with no real strategic plan What was the strategic plan on how we grow a downtown safely while still reaching across automatic districts saying hey

How could we spread the love?

How could we spread the resources?

To impact families on the north side so they have things to do So idol kids don't travel today, you know what I'm like how but when you put it in place as the rapper It gets shut down See, I don't know why y'all gave me no damn

Position at no radio station.

I feel like I'm just waiting for the day one day to be like, all right, bro, you feel to him enough.

We enjoyed what you did, Nitty, but that's enough.

Twenty years.

Twenty years.

We allow leadership to sit.

No real plan.

No real plan No real safety strategy for a whole entertainment district a growing entertainment district even how they went about the street car didn't even make sense It just slapping things up man How do you have a street car not prioritized that the first destinations are going to be to all the attractions that we just built

How was it not an automatic drop off by the Pfizer for how was it not an automatic drop off to all of these into the paps and all of these how I'm just a rapper How does it not go right over there by the beard the beard center how

No real plan, no real strategy, just a bunch of threats, bullying.

I'm just asking questions.

It's going to be more businesses leaving downtown.

Let's be clear.

All right.

Three connected downtown businesses under carving hospitality group, sports club, barrel, burrito and experts only.

all closed abruptly in January with no public explanation.

A replacement operator later withdrew its own applications to take over the space.

Now let's talk about the office market data.

Downtown Milwaukee's office vacancy rates since roughly at 19%.

19 to 24% depending on the exact

Market Boundary measured biz time, C-A-R-W versus Cushman and Wakefield, meaning somewhere between one in five and nearly one in four downtown office spaces sit empty right now.

So it's uneven.

Class A top tier buildings are seeing a real demand and companies relocating into downtown.

Pfizer, All-Spring Global, InterPak.

tool group, all move downtown in recent years while older class B and C buildings face a much tougher reality with far higher vacancy.

For contrast, Southeast Wisconsin's retail vacancy rate is a tight 6.2 percent, meaning the closures aren't about a lack of demand for retail space citywide.

They're concentrated specifically in certain downtown corridors and certain older office product.

So I want to phrase the leadership question and let's frame it fairly.

All right.

I got to frame it fairly because you know, I could be passionate.

Business owners closing have cited real macro pressures as well.

Food costs, but they lead with violence.

The main headline is violence.

But they don't say food costs reduce discretionary spending ah The North Water Street areas documented violence problem this show has covered And that is obviously a City Hall failure specifically right because what we can't do is blame politicians for people acting a fool

Can't do that, right?

But the office market data does show a real.

Bifurcation newer, well located buildings are thriving, well older downtown stock struggles, which is a policy relevant question about incentives, conversations and what's being done for class B and C buildings.

That's what I'm saying about leadership People don't sit and look at the whole thing as a No, I say something get myself in trouble So the good question is right is new leadership the right frame am I being tough am I being too

bias on Bob.

Or is this more accurately which specific policies or adaptive reuse incentives?

Why do I gotta think of things like this?

I'm just a damn rapper.

Safety investment in specific corridors like North Water Street.

We've yet to have a real specific safety plan.

I don't.

We've yet to have a real.

I've seen Austin, Texas.

I look at what they do for South by Southwest.

I look at how the police partners with other private entities to create a healthy environment in Houston.

And people say, oh, that's a big city.

That's a big city.

What's that?

All right, PT.

Houston.

What'd I say?

What'd I say?

Talk to me, Jazz.

I was shouting out your connection in Houston when you was doing

the work.

Oh, got you, got you, got you.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Looking at what they was doing in Houston, how community worked with police officers and also other private entities to protect.

Event spaces.

Against large and.

Small potential activities.

So.

In 20 years.

In 20 years, fam, you ain't really put no real plan together to help protect small businesses.

Let's throw the violence in there.

Yeah, absolutely.

Violence is happening down time.

We have yet to put a real state safety plan.

You just sat and watch it because you like seeing it.

I saw it happen.

I saw how you looked.

at that whole situation when new styles and I got denied and we had to file a complaint to go down there.

It's like people enjoy the circus that they create.

It's like, ah, look at my world.

I'm the king around here.

Businesses should not have to operate in fear, not only from fear of violence, but fear of their leadership.

And let's be honest, it's a toxic environment to navigate to navigate down there city hall.

Them orders is stressed the hell out.

Businesses should not have businesses and consumers, residents, citizens should not have to operate in fear.

They should not have to go out in fear.

And you damn show should not be fearful of your elected official who is supposed to help you excel and grow as a citizen or as a business.

And that's what I was going to do.

Bring community and business together.

Was bringing businesses and community together.

See how we create coalitions.

See how we create safety corridors.

in our entertainment districts.

See how we partner and try to privatize critical response teams.

So the burden isn't just on the city to pay for these type of services.

I'm sure small businesses would come together and pull together a small stipend.

All the licenses that's downtown we got a whole another show that we gonna do one of these days on how many liquor licenses are really in the city of Milwaukee.

I bet y'all don't know that number.

And majority of them is downtown.

So that's what we was doing.

That's what we was working on.

I saw the importance of getting business and community members at the table in one of the most affluent districts in the city.

We like to talk about Milwaukee being the economical engine of the state and all of this other things, but we don't talk about the businesses.

We don't talk about the people actually spending the dollars, the residents.

We don't bring them together.

We don't have real conversation and look at what collaboration could look like When you try to do it as the rapper We'll be back after these messages.

Don't go What up y'all welcome back

Welcome back.

Welcome back.

It's your boy Ray needy holding it down on the grapevine You were listening to one on one seven the truth Milwaukee black talk live from the American Family Assurance Studios Brother Z holding us down with the production and sound man We talking about it was about culture We talked about how they was gonna blame our culture for a lot of the businesses closing remember the garage bar

That was quick they went from two weeks to not no more at all And I just thought it was funny how that wrote the rollout was so janky First a text that clearly says this is from ownership Then an immediate rollback that said It was a rogue employee.

They never had anything to do with ownership.

They didn't have permission

Then saying the intentions was to eliminate so they didn't have and they didn't have permission or this was the intention But either way now they permanently closed And they blame it violence And I'm not saying ignore our issues and behaviors because we be cutting up But I'm saying

has leadership really done enough to address the needs of these businesses.

I don't think so.

I don't think so.

And it ain't just about the businesses is what resources have we done?

What have we laid out?

What have we put to give them an alternative option?

I don't know.

Maybe if people would have invested in something called the locking Y'all so stupid y'all stupid But you would rather not invest in a proven System because of the people that's behind

Well, the kids don't have nothing to do.

I saw people make a way out of no way.

People offered to build it.

Locked in, turn vacant buildings into sanctuaries for young people.

They had me producing at three in the morning.

These kids went to sleep.

They wouldn't sleep.

I'm producer.

I'm not even a producer.

But you know what?

Let me teach them how to make beats before they teach you how they beat.

But we won't invest in that program.

Why?

Why?

Why?

We keep investing in the same failed.

Hey, I think it put out.

I think it put out, man.

Y'all didn't say here no more to have an economical impact.

It's all about money.

Whether we want to believe it or not.

They blame it violence because it's impacted money.

And the best way to blame a problem is to blame us.

Yannis was traded to Miami Heat June 22nd, 2026.

And in his 13 year running for 13 years, the longest tenure and most statistically dominant career in franchise history, including the city's first NBA title since 1971.

I remember that.

Well, not 71.

I wasn't around for that.

But it's funny why Kareem Abdul-Jabbar said he left this city, should Google it.

Whatever his exact annual economic impact was, estimates for a superstar's local economic effect, game night spending, tourism, brand visibility, typically run into the tens of millions annually for a small market.

Milwaukee is now the same size city without its single biggest global brand ambassador of the last decade.

And I think businesses are seeing the red flag and jumping ship early.

They're like, we don't even want to see what it's going to be like.

This is just a theory.

This is just a theory.

But we don't got much time left before it's time to tap in with jazz.

Milwaukee city on budget numbers actually show Milwaukee's 2026 budget is over $2 billion requiring a 3% property tax levy increase, a 4% average increase in user fees, a $10 increase in vehicle registration fees.

They raising us up to hell.

Meaning taxes and fees are already going up again this year on top of prior year increases.

For median valued Milwaukee home hundred and ninety two thousand five hundred dollars the city portion of property tax bill is rising roughly fourteen hundred dollars and that's before county and MPS Portions are added You want us to fully fund them

The city's genuine bright spot a new 2% local sales tax enabled by 2023 state law generated $200 million in 2024 alone and combined with increased state shared revenue has added over 240 million in new annual revenue.

The reason Milwaukee has avoided the unattainable budget cuts.

The Wisconsin Policy Forum was warning

about recently as 2022.

I wish I had more time.

So for revenue now makes up 20% of the city's general purposes.

Feed revenue now makes up 20% of the city's general purpose budget, 161 million.

That's crazy.

20% of our budget is just from fees alone.

Think of that.

We so, we lack so much creativity.

We lack so much talent.

We lack so much brain power that we can't even think of different revenue streams that don't raise our costs.

The city has been leaning harder on fees precisely because property tax and state aid growth has been slow for years.

So I'm saying this from residents to business owners.

I think it's time for changing the most economical, the most influential district in the city of Milwaukee.

It's time to really bring these communities together, not have somebody in position that's going to stop these conversations from happening, that's going to block it because people say, oh, you don't do that.

That's just my district.

Ain't no one to talk about this.

Shut your cheap.

But anyway.

That's my time on the grapevine.

Hope it ain't the last time.

I love y'all, man.

Jazz Tyler is up next.

It's your boy Ray Nitty, tune in.

I'll make sure you follow me on Facebook, on Instagram, at Ray Nitty, R-A-Y-N-I-T-T-I.

I might get a little YouTube channel poppin', man.

Get my Sherwin Hughes views on.

This might be Nitty's for Bitty.

I don't know.

We'll be back.

you

What up y'all?

What up?

What up?

What up?

What up?

What up?

What up?

Welcome.

Welcome.

Welcome.

What up?

How you feeling?

How you feeling?

It is your boy Ray Nitty holding it down on the grapevine.

You are listening to 1017, the truth.

Milwaukee Black talk live from American Family Assurance Studios.

DJ Brother Z holding this down with the production and sound, man.

I'm here with y'all for the next two hours, man.

We're talking about all things black.

Blackhead thing today, man.

We talking about all that.

We talking about pretty much all things black all the time, I guess, right?

How y'all feeling?

833-212-1017.

That's the number to dial.

Join the conversation.

If you got a thought you'd like to share, it's Wednesday.

It's middle of the week.

We need some excitement.

If you just want to call in and show some love to somebody, you could do that.

It's Wednesday.

Let's feel today with love.

Black love black excellence.

We're gonna be talking about a couple things on today's show man We had an interesting conversation not too long ago, but please join the YouTube chat man if you're not Able to listen in your car you could join on YouTube like share please share with somebody if you on social media copy this YouTube Channel right now and pace it or if you're in your car

Pull over for one second.

Please do me this huge favor I'm trying to test the theory you in the car.

I need you to pull over get somewhere safe All right So we call this calling response in our community Get somewhere safe.

I need you to pull out your phone and go to YouTube search 101.7 the truth All right, go to the grapevine show should say live

Then I want you to hit subscribe like a share copy hit that share arrow and go paste it on your social medias, please Please I'm testing something out I'm testing something now.

Maybe one day they'll let us do a giveaway right and we could test that for For the first few people that like a share we got something special for y'all All right, so that's what we want to do

But this just like a little small quick test man, but today I Want to talk about Black man all things black yesterday.

We talked about the importance of the black buying power the importance of organizing our black dollar our black thoughts our black votes our black people We talked about all of that.

We also talked about the importance of group economics and power nominees by dr. Claude

And we talked about that and it brought up another conversation that I wanted to get into today.

I wanted to talk about our black contributions to society because right now it seems like, you know, people forgot a lot of the amazing things that black people contributed to this country.

And they rewrite that history with a bunch of

What is black culture doing right now to society and so forth?

So I think it was good to just remind people.

So that's what we're going to do today.

We'll talk about our black contributions to society, but we wanted to highlight one in particular.

I wanted to highlight one in particular because.

And it's a wild reason why to because actually, you know, AI, this is this is the

the bad part about AI.

People just create anything.

And they had created a flyer, and I thought this woman had passed recently.

So I had sent it over to Shannon, and we was going to talk about it.

And I was like, man, Shannon, the lady that made the GPS die.

And Shannon was like, man, I think she been passed.

I'm like, you show

and show enough.

Needless to say, we still want to talk about the great impact that Ms.

Gladys West has.

So we going to highlight Ms.

Gladys West today, right?

The woman who helped build GPS.

You know, when you lost, it's crazy.

When you lost in the world, just leave it up to a black woman to help you find your way.

Ain't that, ain't that ironic?

Saving a lost world behind it all is a black woman She passed in January 17 2026 at the age of 1990 in the age of 1995 at the age of 95 All right Gladys West grew up on a tobacco farm in rural, Sutherland, Virginia graduated valovictorian of her

segregated high school and earned a scholarship to the HBCU Virginia State College.

I was talking to my peoples at Virginia, man.

Miss Hollywood, what'd it do?

Doc Love out there in VA right now.

Now Virginia State University, where she earned both a bachelor's and master's degree in mathematics.

If you know, what was the documentary about?

Was it Hidden Colors?

That was a part of it, if I'm not mistaken.

In 1956, she was hired at the Naval Proving Ground in Dalgren, Virginia.

Only the second black woman ever hired there.

One of just four black employees at the facility at the time.

She worked there for 42 years.

her actual contributions.

Because we're talking about what black people have contributed to this society that we still use today, that we still take advantage of, that we hardly ever get recognition for.

But people question our impact on society.

They try to water it down and and and change the narrative like we just only brought violence.

Like we was just violent people.

But they never talked about where such violence was learned.

But that's for another conversation.

Today we're talking about the contributions of our black culture, our black inventors, our black people to this society.

And our first main highlight, we're talking about Gladys West, all right?

So here's some of her actual contributions.

West.

programmed some of the era's most powerful computers to build increasingly accurate.

All right.

To build increasingly accurate mathematical models of the exact shape of the earth that are that became the.

Geotic foundation.

The GPS satellite system relies on for precision, precision.

Without it, modern GPS navigation would not be possible.

Come on now.

It would not be possible.

All the technology soldiers are using on the battlefield, even what you're using in your car.

Make sure you say thank you miss Gladys West today Yeah everybody Everybody all races All races white people when you trying to find the fastest route through Milwaukee, Wisconsin Thank old Gladys Thank Gladys all right Like the women later

depicted in the hidden figures.

That's the movie.

Hidden figures.

West work went largely unrecognized for most of her life.

Typical.

Like a lot of times, like a lot of times that we contribute to society and it goes unrecognized.

That's not new.

We always been the greatness, the genius behind a lot of these other things, these inventions.

And we gonna get into some of them.

All right.

But recognition eventually caught up.

Induction into the Air Force Space and Missile Pioneers Hall of Fame.

Look how long it took to caught up.

2018.

The National Museum.

of the Surface Navy's Freedom of the Seat Awards 2023.

And she became the first woman ever to win the UK Royal Academy of Engineering's Prince Philip's Medal.

At 70 years old, after suffering a stroke, she completed her PhD at Virginia Tech.

After suffering a stroke, imagine that.

completing that degree after most people retire, not before.

Her own words on what carried her through decades in a career basically for white men, as her biographer put it, she said she learned on genuinely enjoying the work itself and on wanting to open the door wider for the black people who'd come after her.

So what she means to society plainly is every time anyone alive today uses the turn-by-turn navigation Tags and location or replies on precise timing synced to satellites They using math by Ms.

Gladys wealth Math that she helped build largely uncredited For most of her working life

She didn't get credit.

Most of her working life, she started getting acknowledgment that sounds like in 2018.

In a facility where she was one of four black employees, y'all.

So we wanted to talk about Ms.

Gladys West in this first segment, man.

So clap it up, y'all.

That's Ms.

Gladys West.

Make sure y'all do some research.

Go check out Hidden Figures.

And, uh, learn something, man.

Learn something about our people.

Things that we contributed to this country, to this society.

Don't go anywhere.

When we come back, we're gonna get into some more black contributions to society, what we built, what we've been a part of, and what they've been trying to erase.

Don't go anywhere, y'all.

This is your boy Ray Nitty on the award-winning 10170

Truth.

What up y'all welcome back to the grapevine with your boy Ray nitty holding it down on the award-winning one-on-one seven the truth you are listening to Milwaukee black talk live from the American family and sharing studios Brother Z holding us down with the production and sound man.

How y'all feeling we talking about all things black today, man Be just joining us

We just talked about Ms.

Gladys West who was instrumental in helping develop the GPS So now we're gonna get into some more black Contributions to society man what we built We always hear about the worst of us we always trauma dump about the black community we always talk about the worst parts of our culture Today we want to talk about some good man.

We want to talk about some greatness

We want to share some of that So this segment we talking about black contributions some other things that we built and it's still some Some sad trauma a little trauma attached to it, right?

this first one Thomas L Jennings Do anybody know you know what Thomas L Jennings invented put it in the chat Let me know if you know before I get to the answer

Thomas L Jennings 1821 think about this day 1821 was the first African-American to receive a US patent For a dry sourcing process that became the foundation of modern day Did anybody know the answer?

You know the answer brother Z. I Didn't know till I did this research dry cleaning

I did not know that.

Thomas L. Jennings, 1821 was the first African American to receive a US patent for a dry sourcing process that became the foundation of modern dry cleaning.

Here's the trauma.

He used all the profits to purchase his wife's and children's freedom from slavery.

Imagine that.

Imagine that when you dry your clothes and you use dry cleaning today.

A man sacrificed all his profits in dry cleaning.

When you dry your clothes, he uses profits to pay for the freedom of his wife and children from slavery.

That's how deep that contribution goes.

That's how deep.

So when people say ignorant things like what if black people contribute?

The reason you dry your clothes right now.

It's because somebody black came up with idea.

Probably to help make.

Their life easier for drying masses clothes back there.

But all the profits.

All the profits.

He used it to purchase his wife's and his children's freedom.

Thomas L Jennings.

All right.

Lewis.

Latimer, 1848 to 1928, worked directly alongside Thomas Edison and Alexander Graham Bell, and personally invented the improved carbon filament that made light bulbs practical and long-lasting enough for mass adoption.

Louis Latimer.

Without his specific improvement.

Just going over our contributions, y'all.

See, I know people like when we talk about the negative, the killings.

That's what people like.

People like when we talk about the BS in our community and we highlight the bad and we community trauma.

dump on us to death.

But how many times, how many platforms do we usually use or get to see that uplift in our community, talking about the great things of our culture and society on a consistent basis?

Educating, entertaining.

It's OK to educate and entertain at the same time.

It's OK.

Today, we're talking about the bright side of our community, the great contributions that black people have made that is often forgotten about, often overlooked, but very, very, very heavily used in today's society.

Dryke Leaning, if you just joined us, Thomas L. Jennings invented it with a process.

And all the profits that he got, he used it to purchase his freedom, his wife and his children's freedom.

Louis Latimore.

Without his specific improvement, the electric light bulb, as we know it, doesn't happen on the same timeline.

Grandville T Woods.

1856 to 1910, a self-taught.

Electrical and mechanical engineer earned more than 50 patents covering railway and telegram systems, including a device that let moving trains communicate with stations directly improving railway safety.

Look at the year.

Look at how long ago.

We got more too.

And this is just.

This is just a few.

This is just what I could quickly grab.

Marie Van Britten Brown, a nurse, co-invented and patented a home security system with audio video monitoring in 1966.

The direct.

Technological ancestor of today's video doorbell and home security cameras.

What the flat?

Marie Van Britton Brown Do we know any of these people?

Did we know of any it's some people I knew I'm not gonna sit here and act like I knew all of them Some are new Dr. Patricia bath pioneered laser Cataract surgery and holds five patents for the surgical devices behind it technology that has restored sight to millions of people worldwide

Black woman, the reason why you could see white man.

Why you can see these things so good, Karen?

Because Dr. Patricia Bath pioneered the laser that could save your vision.

Obviously, she ain't just created sight.

I ain't saying she created sight.

She helped saved it.

Ah.

Ah.

You know this one.

George Washington Carver.

My man.

Developed over 300 distinct products from peanuts.

Alone.

Butterbee and the greatest one of them all.

Plus hundreds more from sweet potatoes and other crops.

Good old George.

and his work on crop rotation directly rescued southern soil that has been devastated by decades of cotton monoculture.

Y'all tired yet?

Y'all tired of being educated yet on our contributions?

A 2022 academic study documented at least 726 patents specifically traceable to black inventors between 1870 and 1940 alone, a period where obtaining a patent required working through a white patent attorney who could and sometimes did exploit the arrangement.

And when the patent office itself didn't track race, meaning.

True numbers is almost certainly higher.

So.

This isn't a list of exceptions.

Let me be clear.

It's a pattern of foundational everyday technology like the light bulb.

as we use it, home security, railway safety, laser eye surgery, y'all.

Meaning the true numbers is almost certainly higher, because we know a lot of times we didn't get credit for the work that we was putting in.

We know it.

That exists in its modern form specifically because black inventors built it often while explicitly barred from full participation in the system that meant to reward that work.

Don't go anywhere, y'all.

When we come back, we'll get into more of this conversation.

We want to talk about protecting black culture from being erased.

How do we protect black culture from being erased?

I'd like to hear from you.

But don't go anywhere, y'all.

When we come back, we'll get back into this conversation on your award-winning 1017, The Truth.

What up, y'all?

What up?

What up?

What up?

What up?

Welcome back.

Welcome back.

It's your boy Ray Nitty holding it down on the grapevine.

Live from the American family, Assurance Studios, CIS 1017, the truth.

We're talking about black excellence, black greatness, black contributions to society, man.

Controlling our black narrative, not just allowing the narrative of black trauma, black violence to dominate the airwaves or our frequencies.

Because I believe we gotta have balance.

I ain't saying ignore the realistic issues that's going on in our community.

I'm not saying ignore that.

We have to talk about it.

But I feel like we spend so much time talking about the issues and not actually being active in the solutions.

So much time is spent talking.

So much time is spent setting up a meeting about the next meeting And I get tired of that I'm in a lot of these rooms and that's why I don't go to a lot of meetings no more because I remember when I was like, oh man I gotta go to this meeting I gotta go to this meeting I'm gonna be at this meeting and then you like wait a minute All right, what's up with all these meetings?

Are we moving the needle?

Is impact actually happening?

So we got to get out of these means and get to action.

We got to get to action.

We talking about a lot of black contributions that happen.

In the past, but now we want to talk about.

You know, protecting black culture from being erased.

All right.

Because if you just joined in us and you.

heard some of the Contributions that we made You would remember miss Gladys West went uncredited for most of her career Thousands of black inventors Patons still being newly documented by historians today I Could only imagine

How many black inventions were stolen?

I could only imagine.

I could only imagine how many black inventions have been stolen today.

Erasing of black culture, black history, it's not just like.

hypothetical.

Are we paying attention to what's really going on in society right now?

Erasing of black identity isn't a hypothetical.

It's already happened once and it's ongoing.

It's an ongoing risk.

It's not just old history.

The books they were moving from schools the subjects they don't want us to teach about The things they don't want young people to learn about anymore You got some people really still saying racism doesn't exist slavery wasn't really a thing like You have people saying these things

What are we doing to make sure we are protecting black culture from being erased or are we just going further down this narrative this cliff of just Nothingness Where we just want to be first to market first to have a new hot take first to have the next clickable

article, no matter what the outcome or detriment could be, whether it's real or not fake or not.

So it's already happening, y'all.

It's not just history.

And I want to make the case for why protecting

Culture matters Practically Not just sentimentally because all we have to do we need to preserve our culture We need to that's why I was passionate about You hear me say I'm gonna say it again.

I don't give a damn because it's important to me that we control the narrative around our culture I can't sit here and just allow

a sector of individuals to label an entire Milwaukee music scene and label it as the problem.

Because when you allow that, when you allow that, you allow this narrative and this stereotype to be built around a whole bunch of amazing artists that don't fit that description.

So we have to protect the culture.

Especially a culture that's heading in the right direction.

Are there some not so bright sides of our culture?

Absolutely.

But you know what?

White people don't like when you highlight racism, slavery.

But they want to make sure our culture terribleness is in the forefront.

But when we highlight theirs, it's, oh, that was so long ago.

Culture carries the specific knowledge of how communities survive.

How they organize.

how they built things under conditions designed to stop them.

We talked about it on this show.

As we do more and more shows, it's just starting to have this echoing of, damn, a lot of these topics connect.

Damn, maybe Nitty and Shannon do be knowing what they're talking about.

They just...

Deliver it in such a way that it feels like a good time.

I don't know.

We talked about Tulsa.

We talked about Black Wall Street.

We talked about how Black people built a culture, a system, vertically integrated system that was firebombed from the sky.

That's how fearful people are of our culture when we do good when we succeed When we mind in our business they won't blow us up and have So we highlight the beautifulness of our culture y'all and why it's important for us to protect it

Losing.

That history, it doesn't.

Just lose good stories.

OK, when talking about just losing great conversations and fireside chats that we can.

Oh, man, I remember the times like, no, it's not just.

Losing stories.

It's like actually losing.

our playbook for how we navigated tough ass conditions.

Excuse me.

It's like losing our playbook for how we navigated hard conditions.

So callers.

What's one piece of black culture?

A tradition a recipe a style of music a family practice You're actively making sure Gets passed to the next generation and how are you doing it?

What?

Piece of black culture are you preserving and passing on?

833-212-1017.

That's the number to dial.

Do you care about Black culture?

Do we care enough?

Because we see the culture that's developing in Milwaukee.

And trust me, they're getting ready to blame everything.

Everything is getting ready to be blamed on Black culture and Black Milwaukee.

Your business is failing blame it on black violence downtown Your bar ain't selling enough drinks to underage people blame it on black cultures downtown It's the strippers strippers ain't making the money blame it on violence Black violence particularly So it's a culture narrative

That has been well intact.

And we do bear some responsibility now.

I don't don't act like we don't got no responsibility to bear in this.

But I'm saying.

When you give people.

The weapons to use against you, they don't use it.

They don't use it.

All right, what are you doing to preserve black culture?

What are you passing on a recipe a tradition Protecting culture isn't just an institutional job.

It ain't just about museums, you know schools archives it happens

at the kitchen table, in our barber shops, in the churches too.

In the churches too.

We gonna talk about churches.

I might really, I might get in trouble for the church conversation.

And in exactly the kind of conversation this show is having right now on the radio.

This is how we pass it on, y'all.

When we come back.

We're gonna take it to our carlin lines So don't go anywhere y'all this is your boy Ray nitty holding it down on the grapevine on your award-winning one on one seven the truth eight three three two one two ten seventeen That's the number to dial don't go anywhere y'all

The award-winning 10170 Truth, live from the American Family Assurance Studios.

It is your boy Ray Nitty holding it down.

Brother Z got me on the production.

It sound.

How y'all doing, man?

We talking about black culture.

What are you doing to preserve it?

How are you passing it on?

Do you care about it?

Because they are definitely trying to erase it, and they're getting ready to blame us for everything and using our culture as a narrative.

All right?

We got a couple callers on the line, but first let's go to the caller.

How you doing?

Thanks for calling in the grapevine

Brother

Ray.

How you doing?

I'm doing good brother.

How you feeling today?

You

are you are on one of my favorite topics And the fact that you mentioned today And let's let's visit today.

Yes, and

they talk bad about Jesus Ray So we can never listen to they whom you were 1000% correct about

how many people who look like us, who I include more in they than us, have given these people the weapons that they need.

And I saw an interview with Ray Allen recently where he does what I think is very important that I try to do.

He carries on the tradition of knowledge of those whose shoulders you stand upon because the

If we wait on they, for example, I hear many times on your station, other content of how schools are not teaching black history and the government is trying to erase black history, they cannot erase what our ancestors were able to pass along by word of mouth, thousands of years, unless we sanctioned.

Ray Allen in this interview talked about how every movie he's ever watched he made sure that his children watched Why why did he do this?

He said he did this not for the sake of them knowing different actors or knowing the movie but so they would know how he thought and how he saw life and some of his experiences and I see so many times that Many of us embrace being ignorant

of

those who come before us

Hip hop, your genre is a great example of that.

You have rappers who are successful rappers who say they don't know anything about Tupac, who, God bless, as his family has gotten a little bit of closure, and embrace not knowing those who are the pillars of something that we created.

And

in

doing that, you are ignoring history because in KRF1's rhymes,

I'm sure you found jewels and found out information about history in movies like minister society love Jones you you find Parts of history that you didn't know exist I heard somebody recently say After the conviction of Keefe D. They didn't even know the younger person that to talk was only 25 years old because of all of the things that he accomplished.

Yeah, so

I have right now in my possession hundreds of the books that our government was planning to remove from Milwaukee Public Schools because of a project that I worked on they were given to me.

So what I want to do is pledge today if you want some of those books and anybody who wants some of those books I have an Adam Clayton Powell novel right behind me right now in my

car.

I have books about Stokely Carmichael.

I have many books about Harriet Tubman because it was a mission of mine during this summer to intercept, like Dionne Sanders, our history

and give

anybody the opportunity to have this rich history and the joy.

And that's what I believe is the difference in some of us and others who look like us.

I had an early age embraced history.

And I lived at a time when Roots was on television and you had one TV in the house and everybody learned about our rich culture from Africa.

And any family who does not pass that on, I have grandkids who have just made it to middle school.

They've seen Roots.

They've seen many of the classics and know who Denzel Washington is.

I heard a young lady on your station, I hope jokingly, says she didn't know where Jordan's were.

People in the people in in the furthest parts of the world like Australia know what Jordans

are, right?

So it is sad if that's true But we can fix that ourselves and not connect the negativity that people who look like us that accept all the negative stereotypes and call it black culture or people who are on the sides of our worst enemies, which are Confederates

Maga Who will decide that they want to call everything negative our black culture we have people like Ayanna Presley Jasmine Crockett you Sherwin myself who carry the torch of John Lewis and Martin Luther King maker Evers and Malcolm X as We should and I just want

you to keep doing that.

Yeah, absolutely and before you go caller.

I would like to get um

If we could get your information, I would love to figure out how we could get our hands on some of those books.

I think it's very important that we do preserve that type of history.

And I want to propose some sort of like, you know, Truth Family Book Club or something, man.

Our history club, where we preserve some of this, we need those books.

So please, if we could figure out how to get back in touch.

do something with those books because they wanted them out of NPS for a reason.

And for you to be able to preserve those books, I think is extremely, extremely important, man.

And man, the phone lines are lighting up today, 833-212-1017.

We talking about culture, preserving our history, highlighting the good of our culture and not letting people talk about the bad.

Let's go to the town and then we got Beko after the town.

The town, how you doing today?

You live on The Gravevine with Ray Nitty.

What up

dog?

How you feeling boss?

Hey, um Bro, there was just talking.

Yep

That'd be the type of older folks that we need on the forefront.

Yeah, really doing something and have nice good positive ideas and on that book tip I'm finna go a little bit straight on there and I will tell you in the words of my man Bun B. Go read a book you a literate son of a

Step

up your boat cab for real.

That's what we need to be doing though, because the books is so important because check out what they're doing with the books and the AI.

The AI companies buying the books.

And

feeding

them

to the AI.

They scanning the books, feeding it to them, and then you know what they do after that?

They destroy the books.

Yep.

Get rid of it.