What up y'all welcome back welcome back to the award winning one on one seven the truth Live from the American family insurance studios, it's your boy Ray nitty
I got something on the menu for y'all today, man.
Are your finances low?
Your mindset off track?
Or are you ready to get into real estate?
Tune in to the journey with Coach Erika every first and third Saturday from 11 a.m.
to noon on 1017 The Truth.
It's all about mindset, money, and real estate, helping you take the next step towards building a better future.
How y'all feeling, man?
We got some old family in the building today, man.
Kel, what are you doing, man?
Hi, Nitty.
How are you?
like, this Kelly?
Yes.
I'm feeling good.
How about yourself?
Thank you.
I appreciate that.
I truly do.
Let me hold this book up.
We was looking for a picture so we could put it up on the YouTube.
Can you send us a text message so we could throw it up on the YouTube, a cover of it?
All right, he gonna zoom in on it.
But we got Kelly, where my notes at?
So I could say the right questions and stuff.
We got Kelly Melton in the building who has her self-published, newly published children's book, Riley's Big Day at the Itzy Bitsy Scholars.
All right, you're gonna have to tell us about this, right?
It's upcoming book signing event as well.
She's signing books.
Tell them what school you went to.
Like, hold a book steady.
Like, I can't even get a good Zoom because I'm moving so much.
All right, here we go.
Right here.
There it is.
There it is.
Where is the... There we go.
Got it.
Got Erica right under the... Miss Crowley right under the joint.
How you doing?
I'll get your book back.
How you doing, Kels?
I'm doing pretty good.
I appreciate you all.
I'm accepting this interview so I can tell the audience about Riley's big day.
I'm going to give the people a little bit about you real quick and then I'm going to let them tell you about yourself.
Kelly Melton is a Milwaukee native, early childhood educator, self published children's author, advocate and trainer.
She has more than a decade of experience in early childhood education and is passionate about supporting children and families.
Her work focuses on early literacy, representation, inclusion, and creating learning environments where every child feels seen, valued, and supported.
She is the author of two children's books, not just the one we're talking about today.
Two children's books, including Did You Say Baby?
We got that one here too, so we can hold that one up.
I didn't bring it.
I'll send pictures of both.
Okay, we'll get pictures of that one or two.
And her newest release, as we just said, Riley's Big Day at the Itsy Bitsy Scholars.
All right?
So, tell us a little bit more about yourself, now that I've given our listeners and audience a quick rundown of
you.
Oh, yes, sir.
I've been in the field of early education for over 10 years, over a decade.
I've owned my own family child care business, my child care center called the Itzy Bitsy Scholars.
I ran it with my mother.
And I was in that business for six years.
And now I have gone to actually assisting child care providers with getting licensed by the state of Wisconsin.
And I also do trainings, like you mentioned before.
I have a workshop called Intentional Bookshelves that I present at different conferences.
encouraging educators to implement different books that show inclusion, so show characters that look like black and brown children, and different family dynamics, inclusion all over.
So I'm an educator.
I'm a past child care provider.
I assist child care providers with getting licensed by the state.
And I also train.
So I am trained to be a fundamentals, a family child care providers class.
So I teach that class so those providers can have the education to open up a child care
Yes, I can.
Absolutely.
It's not very difficult, but if you have the right people in your corner that are not going to gate keep information that is going to, you know, be a help to you is not harder at all.
And your pre licensing technical consultant will also be there for you throughout your entire process.
And that process is free.
So you have.
a multitude of resources.
If you're interested in that process, you can open a family child care out of your home, and you can also open a commercial space.
So it is harder to find buildings or commercial spaces, but it's not a hard process.
Overall, if you have a love for children and your heart is in the right place, it's not hard to get families connected and run a successful program.
It's a different feel.
This is strictly childcare.
I was gonna say, I
me
So as you know, the name of my child care was the Itsy Bitsy Scholars.
So I wrote this book back a little bit after the COVID.
And so I was having.
a bit of a struggle with some of the families that were enrolling with separation anxiety with the
So since they were, you know, in the home during COVID only exposed to their immediate families,
parents and siblings, if they had siblings, when they were, when the world opened back up and they were going into different learning environments, it was a bit of a struggle as far as
So some of the kids did not want to leave their parents.
They did not want to be in environments with other people.
They did not transition socially very well.
So I figured I should create a tool, a better tool than early literacy, incorporating early literacy.
How about a book about transitioning to the first day of an early learning environment?
So I figured that this book would assist
Parents with having those conversations to the children with children saying hey, we're gonna start a new school tomorrow Or we're gonna start a school next week.
So How is Riley feeling in this situation?
How do you feel in this situation and just open those doors to having those conversations so a lot of both my books are told from a child's perspective and They're realistic fiction books.
So I want to make sure my audience is
I'm relating to the stories with these everyday experiences.
We have activity and coloring book as well.
Yes.
addition to the books.
Because of my inclusive workshops.
So I'm always talking about intentional bookshelves and how we should be having characters that look like.
black and brown children and making sure all children feel represented and seen when it comes to literature.
You may not know, but it's very slim when it comes to representation in books with picture books.
A lot of authors create books
And they have characters that are Caucasian that are white or they're animals or they're some kind of creation, but they're never black children, brown children.
So I just wanted to contribute to literacy in that way to make sure my characters, the people that are reading, I mean, in the people that are reading my books, the children can see themselves in my
sorry.
No worries, Kaylee Somalik.
And Kaylee is, she's done several murals around the city.
a
artist.
Yes, she's local.
Nice.
And I loved her work, so I reached out
man.
Look at Riley, look.
And I asked her if she did illustrations, and she said that she had never done anything like that before, but she was willing to try.
So we went on this journey together, we did, did you say baby?
And together and then when it was time for Riley's big day at the SCPC scholars, it was no question that I would ask her to be my illustrator once again.
And if you take a look in the back, maybe they actually have some notes, so notes to parents.
I highlighted some of the influential scholars in the field of education so educators could relate.
And
also some of our black influencers.
in education.
So I wanted everyone to get something out of this book, whether it be an educator, whether it be a parent, whether it be the children that we're reading these stories to.
I wanted to make sure this book was intentional with connecting to communities.
Absolutely.
Thank you.
know.
So I'll read a message for parents.
Riley's Big Day at the Itty Bitty Scholars was created not only to help children feel confident on their first day of school, but also to give parents peace of mind as they balance work and family responsibilities.
Children show us when they love their child care or school environment.
They talk about their teachers and friends at home, engage in school like play, and look forward to returning each day.
However, every child is unique.
Part-time attendance or major life changes can sometimes make transitions more challenging.
With patience, consistency, and a nurturing environment, we can support children as they adjust, grow, and thrive.
Thank you for entrusting educators with your child's early learning journey.
Together, we are building strong foundations for a brighter future.
What up y'all
welcome back welcome back welcome back to the award-winning one-on-one seven the truth live from the American family insurance studios This is the lunch break with Ray nitty Maybe Shannon will join us back tomorrow.
This is the extended version brother Z holding us down with the production and sound We here with my homie man.
I know Kelly from way back in the day, man
Kelly Melton talking about her new children's book.
This is book two.
Book two, man.
So I got some more questions for you.
Got some more questions for you.
Why is preparing children for their first school experience so important?
It's very important because you want to make sure they feel comfortable in that new environment.
So they're stepping into a new space that is not familiar.
So you want to make sure you do everything that you can as a parent to make that transition go smoothly.
Well, you can tell like the longer goodbyes.
So, you know, when they're struggling, they're holding on to your leg.
They don't want to
let you
go.
You
know, they're crying and screaming, you know, during drop offs.
Sometimes it can be normal to a certain extent.
But you can tell which families have a harder time with it because of those signs.
Depending on the parent because in my experience,
Yeah.
Definitely depending on the parent because some parents understand.
Um, hey, you know, I have to go to work and you know, you will be fine.
You know, it's going to be okay.
You're in good hands with the early childhood provider.
The teacher is going to take care of you.
You're going to have a good time and this is going to be very a short time that you're going to be upset.
But some parents, um, that don't really have, you know, if they're not working or in the, it's separation for them as well.
So they
true.
They they feel like, oh my gosh, I don't want to leave my baby.
They're crying too.
So both of them are the baby crying and the mama crying.
Everybody's crying that drop off, you know, or some people say they cry in the car, you know, it's a transition for both parents and children.
So you just want to put parents at ease that they're in good hands and you want to make sure the children feel comfortable as
Yeah.
I think like, how long, how long does the separation anxiety last for parents?
Cause I feel like they just be like, I can't wait to drop this boy off at school.
So how long you think that lasts for parents?
Or is it like a constant thing where they're nervous about like, ah, is my baby gonna be okay?
No, I think parents transition, of course, way faster.
I know
did.
They notice.
They notice like, okay, I feel comfortable after the first couple of drop offs.
You see, you know, all the other kids engaged
they're like, okay, now you can engage too.
Like, I don't want my child to be the one, you know?
So I think that parents are just way quicker.
But it's just making that child comfortable.
And eventually some some children will have that thing where all drop offs are kind of like, I really don't want to go.
they get there, they're having
Mm hmm.
So I you in my program, I used to send parents pictures.
So I gave that example in in the book, like my teacher sent a picture because I would always want my parents to feel like.
They're really okay.
So I would
send pictures of them laughing
and
playing with their friends.
I'm like, I'm videoing.
This
just a shot.
They're having a great time.
So I would reassure parents that way as well.
Got it.
a malpractice or a bad practice for providers to have platforms or cameras in their daycare or schools or whatever where parents could actually log in and see.
their kids and because, you know, sometimes people don't be knowing how their kids are acting in school, whether it be good or acting up, right?
We just hear either what the teacher tells us or what the kid tells us, right?
So is this something that you think could be implemented or is already being implemented where people could view their kids behavior?
I know, um, at all.
Academy of Science, they use class dojo, right?
Where you can just check in, but it's more text message based if I'm not mistaken.
But if you can visually see how your kid is acting up, I wonder if that will help kids from you.
Like, you know what?
My mama looking at me on this camera.
Let me not act a fool in this class today.
I don't I don't consider it a mouth practice.
I do say that to each his own.
as far as when child care providers decide to do cameras.
It's a good thing, a pro and a con, a good thing
and a
bad thing.
It's good for providers to cover themselves because then providers can say, you know, this is what happened from a provider perspective.
But I think that it could be challenging as well because if parents are constantly watching like a...
live feed of their child, they have a lot of input.
So they're gonna say, they wanna teach the class
and I think you should have done this or why aren't they learning this or tell my baby to play with this person is just a lot of control.
So I think that it can be good in certain situations, but it can also be challenging to the school or
environment.
because
So it's definitely multiple perspectives on how monitoring children through the camera can be.
But in my program, I did not.
I did not
have a live feed.
I did take pictures and I communicated.
All the time whenever they wanted if they wanted to call if they even wanted to FaceTime sometimes I was open to that but as far as a live camera I didn't find that to be effective for me.
again Read books like Riley's big dad.
dollars Go to the library find other books that your child can relate to just make the
I'm transition smooth by just having those conversations after you read different books and have, yeah, talk to like family members, get everyone on the same page with making it a good experience for the child.
Because these are the early years for children are the most.
Effective years.
These are the years where those brain synapses are connecting.
These children are learning and they're developing the most.
So it's really good for their development to see.
Characters that look like them so they can feel seen in stories.
So if they feel representative, they feel seen, then they'll perform better.
We went to high school together.
Oh, yeah, you
Riverside.
you
We met at Urban Underground.
Urban Underground,
It was just, it was, and then it was being
Sharing it, sharing it with their communities.
Pretty much, yeah, just sharing it with their communities, other parents, other classrooms, because reading it is definitely the only way that you can use it as a tool, reading it and having those conversations.
So Ms.
Deanna Moore, who is the librarian at the Martin Luther King Branch, I connected with her.
I've done a read aloud at the Washington Park Branch.
And we connected and she, we pulled some strings and we're able to do the event there.
So what we can expect is Deanna is going to do a couple of songs.
I'm going to read the book.
We're going to talk about writing and we're going to talk about being an author in general.
We're also going to sign books and pretty much answer any questions any children or families have.
right?
A Greyhound.
Oh no, that's Washington.
Greyhound.
Jazzy ain't go to Sherwood.
You was in theater with Amanda.
Y'all be knowing my woman.
So where can listeners purchase the book and learn more about your work?
No, I ain't mad.
I
got to go home.
I ain't mad.
She just be talking a lot of shorewood crap when I get off the air.
But yeah, what can listeners purchase the book and learn more about your work?
Yes, you can learn more about my work at www.theitsybitsyscholars.com.
The books are available for purchase on Amazon.
They're also available.
on YouTube, I do read aloud on YouTube, and then you can also check them out at the library.
So they're in the Milwaukee Public Library.
And you can request them at your local library.
We have a library control number in both books in Riley's Big Dead, the ACBC Scholars, and Did You Say Baby?
No, I don't have anything else really.
No, that's it.
But thank you so much for the opportunity.
If you have any questions for me, you can always reach out.
But again, my website is www.thetcbcscholars.com.
So reach out to connect.
my social media handle on Instagram is author Kelly M.
All right, don't go anywhere y'all when we come back We will be rapping this staying up right here on the award winning one on one seven the truth What up y'all welcome welcome welcome welcome back welcome back
It's the last half hour two with the lunch break crew, man.
Ray Nitty, maybe Shannon DJ, brother Z holding us down with the brother in sound.
With the production in sound.
Live on the award-winning 10170 True from the American Family Insurance Studios.
How y'all feeling, man?
It was a full day today, man.
It was a full day today.
Shannon couldn't join us today because her studio got broken into if you wasn't on.
able to hear that.
And we talked to.
Brother Earl.
Earl Ingram today, I got put up on Gracie's corner today.
That was unexpected.
Jazzy, do you know about Gracie's corner?
I might be the only person everybody knows about this.
Do you know about the Taki song, too?
She don't know.
We got to put her on.
We got to put her on.
We got to put her on on the red five slapper.
It's a red five banger.
We had a great conversation today, y'all.
Look, it's not like I'm ready to wrap this up an hour early.
And we had a good time talking to y'all today.
I
go by the name of Dane Jones.
You know this one
Hot Cheetos and Takis.
We was talking about how it was like, dang, you don't want to hate on these kids for pushing this cancer song.
But, dang, they could be pushing murder.
They could be talking about spinning the blocks on their apps and all of these other things.
But they say, you know what, we'll make a song about snacks.
Then it's like,
I feel like I'm at that age now.
I'm just going to complain about everything.
So I'm trying not to complain about this hot cheetos and tacos because it's slap.
The song slaps and they could have been using a voice to make something totally demonic, which is we had when you were screening the call, you said somebody referred to all the big Frida's and the Western names as kind of demonic because of the sounds.
But I'm like.
Maybe we need to make more jazz.
This is what jazz is doing over at.
Howard Fuller, if I'm not mistaken, not Hot Cheetos and Takis.
I'm talking about, you know, using music and challenging young people to put a different narrative out there, put a different message out there.
I always say this, man, our people moves to the rhythm of the drum.
We are music driven people.
And that's not just because we like the sounds of 808.
I think it is just in our DNA.
That's how we communicate it.
Let's think about this.
It's how we communicated back in the day in Africa.
The drums, the Jim Bay drums, the Congo drums.
Jim Bay for sure.
It's how we communicate.
It's how they communicated with other villages.
It was the sounds of the drum.
They knew when it was time for war because of the sounds of the drum.
They knew when it was time to gather because of the sounds of the drums.
We moved to the sound of the beat of the drums.
And I think right now, our community is moving to the same sound of the drum.
It's just 808 now.
It's just 808 right now.
And the messaging is not always the greatest that's attached to the beat, unfortunately.
It's not always the greatest.
So I could appreciate a Gracie's corner.
We had brother Black Conscious called here.
You know, he said.
And I get it.
A 3 3 2 1 2 10 17 is a number to dial a 3 3 2 1 2 10 17 is a number to dial.
I get it.
He's like.
Do we we need to be careful?
Let me say that.
He said, we need to be careful because of.
The doors that that could open having a big Frida or a Paul Wall or Lil John on these Gracie songs, right?
These Gracie corner songs because of.
It might entice the same kids who's learning about buckling up to go here.
What else is Little John teaching?
What else is big free to teach?
And.
I just want to be a little bit more optimistic and be like, OK.
In the same light that they could research the negative teachings or songs that folks have done in the past, they could be just simply looking for more Gracie's corner music.
And I think that's what we should.
Work on Elevane.
More positive messages, y'all.
We also talked about the food desert crisis today.
That was very important.
We talked about the proximity of even if people live around healthy foods.
Shout out to the white girls waving at me.
Hey, white women.
Hey!
They like, who's that black guy with long hair?
What's up, Becky?
Oh, shoot, my wife and the child.
I'm just playing with them, baby.
They was waving at them.
They waved at me first, Amanda.
Don't put hands on me.
She said, wasn't here for the conversation, but Big Frida does dance music.
Not sure if I ever heard him talking about sliding on an op.
No.
We've heard Lil John say it though.
We've heard Lil John slide on out.
But the conversation was, maybe we should pull up one more to, they know the Gracie corner song.
I'm obviously, I'm the only one that don't know.
So you just want to listen
to another one.
That's what I'm saying.
Little background music to just get me through the segment.
I'm dogging it here.
But no, I wasn't about saying Big Frida specifically said,
who spin in the block and slide in our ops.
But he did reference Big Freedia in a not positive light as if some of the songs that Big Freedia makes could lean young people towards the wrong way or some of the songs that Paul Wall makes could lean young people towards the wrong way or some of the songs in the past that Little John has made.
Little John.
Little John has made could lean young people the wrong way.
And he was just saying that can open a door for them to go research more about these songs from these particular artists.
So that's what that was about, baby.
Not just, you know, big free to slide in on the ops.
But.
I still think it's important.
I do think it is important that.
The phobia I'll let you add the prefix.
I don't think it was that at all.
I See what you try to say, but it wasn't that that's not what that person was going for because they spoke about everybody just young people researching the You know what?
I'm gonna have to go back and listen to how he started it, but it was more so about just researching
The other songs of all these other artists that are collaborating with a Gracie's corner.
Yeah, digress.
Yeah, report, dude.
We also talked about the downfalls.
Talked about folks not being able to people choosing.
to go to the corner stores or the gas stations to purchase food and groceries and so forth, even while being not in too far proximity from a grocery store.
So even when faced with the option.
To get healthy food and a real grocery store, we still choose convenience because we could walk to the gas station.
We could walk to the grocery store.
Speaking of my wife, me and my wife was just talking about this the other day.
I don't think we take into consideration how many people don't have transportation to get to these grocery stores.
Don't go anywhere, y'all.
When we come back, we're going to wrap this thing up right here on the award-winning 1017, The Truth.
March, keep it in step.
March, march, keep it in step.
March, keep it in step.
March, march, keep it in step.
The ants go marching one by one.
Hurrah,
hurrah,
The ants go marching one by one.
Hurrah, hurrah, uh-uh.
Hey, y'all sound crazy, man.
I'm going to get put on this weekend.
I'm gonna have some plenty Gracie playing in the uh... In the uh, what's the name man?
Her music is on Spotify and Apple by the way.
I bet it is.
They ain't for the miss not one second to monetize this.
She's probably doing shows.
Is she doing shows?
Why would she be?
Alright y'all, we talk about, let's go in and talk about, we're gonna try to get everything done in these next few minutes here.
Gas stations, corner stores, what's actually on the shelf.
And then what's actually being done to fix this problem?
See if we get through this.
I tried to smooth through it.
Communities with abundant convenience stores relative to supermarket show a documented 20 percent higher prevalent.
We did this already.
Gas station.
Here we go.
All right.
What's actually on the shelves when a grocery store closes, residents don't just stop eating.
We don't stop eat.
Think think Metcalf Park stop eating because pick a same set of we from the cloth.
They shift to us ever whatever is closest.
And that's overwhelmingly convenient stores, gas stations, dollar stores and fast food.
Per every Milwaukee expert and resident quoted in this year's coverage.
UW Milwaukee Urban Development Professor Dr. Kirk Harris.
put the actual mechanics of the barrier bluntly.
Try taking three buses with two transfers with kids to get to the grocery store.
Think about how that ice cream in your grocery container is going to look when you've taken three buses traveled across town.
That barrier got literally more expensive this year.
Milwaukee County Transit System raised fares.
in twenty twenty six from two dollars to two dollars and seventy five cents per ride while also adjusting routes to close a fourteen million dollar budget gap, meaning getting to a real grocery store now costs more and may take longer than it did last year.
Corner stores and gas stations aren't a neutral substitute.
Research consistently finds the small format store stock foods that are higher in sugar, sodium and saturated fats is often significantly more expensive per item than large supermarkets and rarely carries fresh produce at all.
All right.
Whenever you go to a gas station and see that they got that little.
One banana sitting on the damn shelf that's because they want your damn food stamps and it's a requirement They got to have some sort of fresh damn food.
So they put this old-ass apple and banana in this basket So they make sure that I could sell Could sell you these honey buns now because I got this old banana here.
All right Corner stores and gas stations are not neutral
We said.
The term food apartheid, coined by activist Karen Washington, cited directly by Milwaukee officials is specifically meant to reframe this, not a naturally occurring.
Desert, but the predictable result of redlining, disinvestment and specific corporate and policy decisions layered on top of each other for decades.
This isn't about individual willpower or bad choices at the register.
When the only realistic option within a reasonable bus ride is a gas station, the choice to eat unhealthy is being made by neighborhoods, food, environment before a single person ever walks in the door.
So that's why I shout out Miss Farina and the Dream Chasers and what they they give out food every Friday.
They go to multiple communities.
They get a U-Haul truck, go to the food pantry, get a U-Haul truck full of food and give it away to the community.
We don't get Miss Farina on the show.
Talk about what Dream Chasers got going on.
Last and final segment, y'all.
What's actually being done to fix this?
Nothing.
No, I'm just playing.
I'm just playing.
I'm just playing.
What the city has already put money behind, right?
The Common Council approved nearly a $3 million relief package specifically to help keep existing grocers open and fund grants for new entrepreneurs looking to open stores in underserved neighborhoods.
Mayor Cavalier Johnson separately announced a roughly $1 million proposal in February, 2026, standing outside a century food location specifically aimed at stabilizing independent grocers and pharmacies at risk at closing.
of closing.
Metro Pantry opened at Locust and Humboldt in the River West neighborhood in June 2026 in the same building a dollar general have vacated in 2024 explicitly built to bring fresh food produce to a block that previously had none.
Some of the policy changes in motion, but it's not yet finished.
Common Council members are actively drafting an ordinance to require more advanced notice from grocers before closing a store, aimed at giving the city and residents real lead time to find a replacement or organize a response rather than finding out from a sign taped to the door.
Separate proposed ordinance would formally support recruiting and retaining grocery stores citywide, not just
reacting store by store after each closure announcement.
Here's the honest limits of these efforts for balance, academic evaluations of similar healthy corner store convention, programs in order in other cities, East L.A.
and Boyle Heights, California is the most rigorously studied example.
Found real improvements in perceived access and views of corner stores.
but no measurable change in actual fruit slash vegetable purchasing or consumption.
Simply adding produce to a corner store shelves doesn't reliably change what people actually buy and eat.
So they're like, I put it on the corner store show.
They still ain't going to eat it.
They want these takis and what is it?
I talk to you, the hot chills.
Nashville, CDC.
Funded Corner Store Initiative found the same core lesson.
Programs succeed only when they combine store-level changes with community trust building and address the real barriers residents face.
I'm sorry.
Real barriers residents identify.
In Nashville case, mistrust of store owners and a history of poor quality produce, not just physical shelf space.
So the bottom line for our audience is money and new stores matter.
And Milwaukee is genuinely putting real dollars behind this right now, but the research is clear that opening a store alone doesn't automatically fix eating habits built around costs, trust and transportation.
The fixes that actually work combine access with affordability, trust and transit, not just access alone.
So I'm a close y'all with this feed MKE hunger task force and the find the food center all run existing produce access and mobile market programs in Milwaukee right now All right, and it was worth naming those by name so you all would know where to go We talked about closing gaps in all of these things man as we get ready to wrap this thing up y'all
We have brother Earl Ingram on here and I asked him about, you know, he shared an amazing history lesson on, you know, Milwaukee.
How it was.
You said Milwaukee was one of the most affluent places for black people in the 70s.
In the 70s.
Then you mentioned.
The word pension so many times So many times Milwaukee had a pension crisis in 2020 not not 2020.
I'm tripping in the year 2000 Okay The year 2000 Milwaukee had a huge pension crisis scandal this was before
County Executive David Crowley.
This was even before Scott Walker, but it was the birth of Scott Walker.
It was Tom Amit.
I want y'all to research.
Go do some research on Tom Amit, County Executive back in 2000, and signed off on an amazing pension plan.
That cost us plenty plenty plenty money money that we still cutting Money that we still trying to figure out how to fill gaps and wait till this city budget come out y'all It's gonna be another hundred million dollars that we got to feel all because all this money is going to pensions We raised the taxes made 200 plus million from taxes.
There you go
Let me get off this mic so God could come in here and do his work.
Y'all, y'all have a good day.
It's your boy Ray Diddy signing off, man.
Jazz Tyler is next.
We're past the Cadillac in the building, man.
What'd you say?
Yeah, man, let God work, man.
Pray for me faster before we get out of here, man.
Y'all have a good day, y'all.
We out.
Without safety.
Think she really she blew up during the pandemic or like right after the pandemic because her parents were Trying to find something educational like on YouTube or online essentially for their daughter Gracie and they couldn't find anything especially for a child of color at that that had other Quote-quote stars of the show that you know the child could look up to so
with the dad having the musical background that he has.
And I think her mom has some type of musical background as well.
They created this and have their daughter being the actual voice.
So they're definitely legends for
Hey, I'm living and glad to be alive.
Amen.
Amen,
it's just self and health as well.
So we got to be careful about, you know, things coming out with these beats because we're exposing our kids.
I mean, big Frida.
And then your kids ask the question, ma, dad.
Why does that man look like a woman?
And why are we saying, oh, what next?
He did he doing, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh.
No, no, no, no, no, no.
have to give you that.
I'm not disputing you whatsoever.
Nursery rhymes.
Because African, as Africans, way before all that was.
communicated.
That's
least, however.
However, the message is getting lost by the people that you are teaming up with.
I could respect that, right?
I could respect that.
But at what point in society?
Now, I could agree with you, right?
We could dilute the message because of the messenger that's chosen.
I could give you that black conscious, right?
My question is, at what point do we say, OK, these.
Folks that are turning a corner that still have influence if they're changing their message and their narrative.
Like, is that not something that we should elevate?
Because somebody who was possibly putting like you brought up big freedom, right?
Like somebody who is change.
I'm not saying big freedom is changing her whole tune to make Miss Gracie music.
So I'm not trying to say that.
But do you think they're still not?
a place for where people of influence can put positive messages behind these type of sounds and help, you know, these young people not listen to the raw version of a P. Diddy song or a big free to song.
Absolutely.
But I also believe we don't need to expose our children to certain adult type things in order for them to catch.
Because then that's going to make awareness on other stuff that they don't need to be exposed with I mean its exposure is going to be regardless in our presence or outside of our presence But unfortunately with this computer technology and things like that.
They're way more advanced than we ever was coming up as kids And then exposed to things way more way more than what we were supposed to as kids So we can we can put a lock on there They can go into the room and watch something else and still have that exposure
Absolutely, there's ways.
There's a lot of creative ways to do that.
I just don't think Paul Wall, Frida and others of that caliber should be the ones called upon, but they are.
And here's what we are now.
And I don't want us to get lost in the beat because it's Paul Wall, whatever, you know.
I want to make sure I'm listening to understand and I respond.
Right.
You're saying it doesn't sound like you're saying.
You have a problem with the beat and the sound or even the messaging.
You're worried about, OK, now Gracie's Corner has now put these kids onto a big Frida.
They may go and YouTube more of Big Frida's music that is not Gracie's Corner related.
Is that what you say?
Producer, give me a ding.
Say that one more time.
I'm actually for the, there you go.
Okay, gotcha.
I can understand that.
I can understand that.
You're saying it opens the door.
It's like, yes.
It's an educational song, yes, for this moment, but you're like, we don't know what door or path they might go down and want to see more Paul Wall.
And now they listening to lean sipping and syrup sipping.
And
those rhymes are at an age level that they're not able to comprehend and understand what's being put on them or
is exposing them at that time.
They just hearing this rhythm, but yet still in their spirit, this is also being absorbed.
Because if they do go to that and watch other film of Paul Wall and
Exactly.
about the nursery
I could respect that, right?
I would hope, and I'm not saying that this is true, I would hope because I know it's still a possibility.
That they would go and research more of Gracie than they would of Paul wall But I get what you're saying we can't count on that that would be the outcome all the time I get that a hundred percent brother conscious black conscious
because it Because I'm gonna leave you with this it wouldn't be Gracie would be the hook But Paul wall there would be the real that real demand To other exposures
you.
But I could also say on the same hand, Gracie could be what reels them into other exposures as well.
Because just like they have the opportunity to go research more Paul Wall or Big Freedia, they also have that chance to say I want to hear more Gracie's corner.
So I agree with you.
I agree with you 100% brother black conscious.
I see what you're saying with it.
At first I was like, what is going with this?
But I understand what you're going with it and I appreciate you sharing that knowledge with us.
And, um, it would
make me
man.
Hold on, hold on, hold on.
But I know Ray Neity would do it in a form that's, that's respectful and educational and on something righteousness.
So they might see some yams.
But that might be you holding up yams and shaking them.
Candy yams.
You see how that goes?
Candy yams.
Yes, sir.
Yes, sir.
Yes, sir.
You got two actually yams in your hand
plan on a
leave you with that.
Peace, Milwaukee.
Hey, that was good.
I appreciate you, Black Conscious.
That was good.
That was good, man.
I can respect what Brother Black Conscious just said.
I can respect that.
I could respect that a hundred percent because at first he was losing me a little bit at first, you know, because it's easy for us to want to be like, man, we finally got something that, you know, kids could listen to that sound good.
And it's not poisonous lyrics attached to the sound.
Right.
Yeah.
When I screamed to me, he called it demonic.
Yeah.
See.
So I was like, all right, hold on.
So and he's talking about.
the gateway that it opens to what those artists that are featured are could possibly lead to.
Which is understandable.
Super understandable.
Super understandable.
But then again, it's
not like she's doing whole albums, you know,
artists.
Like they're making a guest appearance in a episode that's, you know, on YouTube.
And these songs are two minutes, you know, a minute and a half of a 15 or 20 minute
educational show about, you know, the countries of Africa about the alphabet about the consonants about, you know, just like in reading like about everything else.
So
because it's like, wait, what?
Lil' John.
Let me go see
Because now it's something for the parents and for the kids.
It's something that the parents don't mind listening to 24-7 because they know the artist.
And
You see, I was just getting up here, jigging like I was down in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
First time hearing it.
First time hearing it.
But it was a sound that was
memorable to me.
I'm very familiar with Big Freedia and the New Orleans bounce sound.
So it just felt now I can't like I wish my kids was younger.
So I could be like, let's go listen to some Gracie's corner.
Like one may not hurt.
So I agree with him.
I would I would challenge our brother Black conscious to think exactly what he said.
Right.
But just add a little bullet point and he say Gracie is the hook.
to get the kids in, and maybe the Paul Walls and the Big Freeders is the hook to get the parents in.
And once we get them in, I would like to believe that good intentions will come behind it.
And that goes back to parents playing a more important role, like, okay, we gotta be involved and figure out what our kids are listening to.
If we could bring them to Gracie's Corner, don't just leave them there on their own so they could go figure out what's on the next corner.
Let's keep them.
Let's keep narrating, navigating them on where they should go.
Don't go anywhere, y'all.
When we come back, when we come back, we'll keep this conversation going.
We're talking about food deserts.
We're talking about Gracie's Corner and just really the influence sounds.
and music and messaging has over our community and young people.
So don't go anywhere, y'all.
We'll be back on the award-winning 10170
Truth.
Now sing with
Happy.
Gracie a little Caribbean vibe.
Hey, man, I'm sorry.
I love it.
I love it, man.
I love it.
I think that's very special what they doing.
And I don't think people realize how much money it is in creating.
Healthy content for kids and young people.
Look at Miss Rachel.
She was eating in the pandemic.
Look at Miss Rachel.
I don't think we realize how important it is or how vital it is.
To create healthy, relatable content.
for our young kids.
One of my favorite shows as a parent that I used to watch with my kids was Backyardigans.
The Backyardigans had some slaps on it.
You hear me?
You'll back your friends now back yardigans.
They have some slaps.
Yep.
Yep.
Yep.
Yep.
Dance to the worm in polka.
Back yard against has some slaps, man.
But let's go back to this.
The grocery store we got on this conversation, by the way, if you just joining us, we got to this point because we were talking about food deserts.
You know, the the unavailability of healthy foods.
Okay.
The unavailability of healthy foods.
We was talking about that.
And then Brother Z put me up on this song.
Takis and hot, what is it?
Hot fries, hot food.
Whatever.
Hot chips and takis.
But it was a whole song and it was song with slapper.
The song was slapping and it brought us to Gracie's Corner.
Brought us to Gracie's Corner.
And then I was like, hey, how to make me some children slaps, man.
Make me some slaps for the kids.
We got.
Earl Ingram, that's going to be joining us.
a little bit later today, y'all.
We got Brother Earl Ingram that's going to be joining us.
It's going to be a very, very dope conversation.
I remember Brother Earl was on his show and I was super young, if I'm not mistaken, either fresh out of urban underground or fresh in urban underground.
And we was just talking about, you know, young people and and.
the rights that they have and so forth.
I can't remember.
Some other folks on there with me.
Some other folks on there with me.
Some other folks from over in underground, if I can, if I'm not mistaken.
But we are talking about why our grocery stores actually leaving.
All right.
We talked about Kroger, which is the parent company of Pickett Save said they pointed to theft.
All right, but then we talked about what the data actually shows so it genuinely complicated the story Call I see you calling What's brother Z get here we'll get you right there you go right there that boy always on time So the data actually showed that the
Stores that pick and save closed down.
Thief actually declined by 13% from 2019 to 2024.
And found more theft was happening in the suburban stores than the closed urban stores.
So it directly contradicted the theft driven narrative.
For them specific closures.
For those specific closures, I'm sorry, it is not Earl Ingram.
I said I had Earl Ingram.
We got Kelly Melton.
Earl's supposed to be a two.
Got Kelly at three.
I apologize, truth, family.
We'll be talking to Kelly.
Not brother Earl.
All right.
So we're talking about what the data actually showed y'all now.
We're at the more complex less friendly headline and real factors.
All right.
Says stamper and big time reporting.
Points to operation struggling to find and retain quality employees and competing with a merchandise mix of urban stores where many essential high demand goods simply carry lower profit margins than suburban locations with more discretionary spending.
Sherman Park grocery store owner.
We talked about this.
All right.
And then we'll say this, the mirror, this mirror is a national retail pattern.
The National Retail Federation reports 112 billion in total US inventory losses in the most recent year measured up from 94 billion in 2021.
Meaning theft slash shrinkage is real.
Rising industry wide pressure.
even where it isn't the specific reason for a given Milwaukee closure.
We got Miss Sandra on the line.
Miss Sandra, how you doing?
I am just fine.
How are you doing today?
I can't complain.
I'm alive and well.
Yeah, that's good.
That's excellent.
ma'am.
Yes, but I was listening to what you were talking about, and I was listening to what Sherwin was talking about, too, about the 10-year-old boy.
There's a little piece that happened in the city here.
and the rules and the laws and stuff.
But the content that you are on is about the food deserts and the money not, the city not being able to have money to sponsor the services we need.
And to me, every time it's there, it's all systemically done.
Because we've been going through this, if you go back to history, we've been going through this for years when they moved the white people out of the city.
And it built up 43.
of the best way to get them out.
They gave them money to go out.
They got loans and everything.
So this has been years.
You see, I'm 77.
So I watched it, but we never talked politics.
My parents never talked.
They're from the South.
And I guess they were afraid to say anything.
So we didn't talk politics.
So we really didn't know what was going on, but we saw the signs saying the white people would say we're not moving to Siberia.
We like it here.
The next minute you saw those signs go down and they moved.
But anyways, what my point is,
When they talk about blue deserts, I look at every central city where black people are.
go through the whole city and go through the whole routine, and it's all systemically done, and it's done to black, not only black, poor people.
What they want to do is give it a services, you know, like the welfare of the health people.
Stuff like that, you know, they want to give it a service, it's where we got kind of a chance.
they want to do everything yourself.
They want to privatize everything, the post office.
And they want you to pay even more.
So we think it's bad.
Now it's going to go up even higher and higher and higher.
And it's so wrong when you just took one city, you steal the money.
They say we pay the most in taxes in the city of Milwaukee.
They take all the money and put it where they want.
So Robin Garth had a million dollar staff.
He had health care, he had a heart attack.
He got a chance to go to other doctors, right?
Mm-hmm.
And we have to fight.
Now, they're talking about we got to do this.
I'm dealing with it, not myself and my family.
My husband just died of kidney disease.
My daughter is taking my dialysis.
Now, I'm finding it even harder for us to get the right kind of health that we need.
We have to stay on top of those people to keep from seeing you in and out the hospital.
So that's what they do.
And one time they sent her out and she's about to die.
They call me three times, tell me she's coming
back.
And this is in and out, in and out.
So why aren't you taking her to find out what exactly is going on?
So we have a whole lot and we have to start living and we have to come together and stop trying to, you know, cut our black people down because of things we don't know.
And a lot of us are not in that medical field.
And like you say, the food, we eat this and that and that.
And then we're on this dialysis stuff.
So I just have to really start looking at all of them, look at every city that's headed out the same way.
And you'll see where it's coming from, your big corporations, the one that got the money
started
Absolutely.
100 percent.
Starve us out.
Starve us out.
We appreciate you, Miss Sandra, for always calling in and sharing some wisdom.
and prayers to you and your family with everything that you're going through to keep your daughter in our prayers as well and condolences to the passing of your husband.
We're talking about the food desert, y'all, the downfalls.
All right.
Honest complication.
We talked about the cardiovascular cardiovascular study found in chronic kidney disease.
This is what she's talking about.
Cardiovascular study similarly found chronic kidney disease risk was driven more by low individual income than by food desert status itself.
Reinforcing that poverty.
Not geography alone may be the deeper root cause.
Research keeps circling back to.
So many byproducts of poverty.
So many byproducts health implications just simple health implications Poverty living in poverty stress High blood pressure poor food poor environments environmental injustice all byproducts of poverty All byproducts of poverty y'all
So we don't want to oversimplify that no grocery store equals automatic diabetes.
All right.
Research finding is that food deserts and food insecurity travel together and compound each other.
Distance to healthy food matters, but it matters most for people who are also poor and also surrounded by more fast food slash convenience.
options than healthy ones.
The more that's more complete, harder to dismiss picture than the simple version.
When we come back, y'all, we're going to talk about gas stations, corner stores, and what's actually on the shelf.
All right.
Don't go anywhere.
Y'all, this is the award-winning one on one, seven the
truth.
I go by Mike
Welcome back.
doing?
It's your boy, Ray Nitty, holding it down on the award-winning 1017, The Truth Live from the American Family Insurance Studios.
We got a legend in the building.
Brother Earl.
The legend.
I was just telling I don't know.
You just walked in and I was telling the folks how I remember when Charlotte and Reggie Moore brought us on your show.
I feel like we was off of.
Was it capital?
Yeah, actually.
1290 WMC is there we Sherman and capital
So and I'm 72.
Well, it's you know, it's it's always good to have an opportunity to reconnect with.
Somebody from the past.
Yes, sir.
sir.
Man, so for folks that may not know, I don't know if it's many, may not know your history in the city and radio because I feel like you have a, it's two separate things.
You got some legendary stuff in the city and then you legendary on the radio.
Can you give the people a quick rundown of your history and tell them who we are speaking to, who we have the honor.
of speaking to today?
Well, so actually, I hate to talk about things in the past because what I am more than anything else is a servant.
And so I've served my entire, my entire life and I'm from the city and born and raised here.
I'm from a family of 13.
I spent 34 years at a place called A.L.
Smith.
34 years there.
Retired.
and wound up doing something different with my life.
I've been married to the same woman for 40 some odd years and we've been together since for 50 years.
And I'm a treatment foster parent.
My wife and I took in 100% disabled child 23 years ago who required 24 hour care.
He's now a 25 year old man who requires 24 hour care.
We still have him.
created the was the president of the neighborhood Children's Sports League.
If you ever saw all that football that you see in Lincoln Park,
for 20 years.
I built that not alone, but I was the president of that for over 20 years.
We had four young young boys who wound up playing pro football countless numbers of them who went on to major universities presently.
I founded something called Voices of the Elders about four years ago.
I spent 12 years volunteering in Milwaukee public schools.
And I realized young people are missing a whole lot of different things.
I've volunteered everywhere from North Division, Washington High School, Madison, Marshall, WCLL, you name it, I've been there.
And so what I found out more than anything else is
young
people are missing today.
Big mamas and pawpaws.
That's
what Voices of the Elders is.
It's pawpaws and big mamas.
It's people from my generation.
Young people don't have the advantage that my generation had where we could drink from the Elders.
And so I've organized those men.
We go inside the schools and
children.
elders.
And
I was blessed to have amazing elders around and still that I could call and ask a question and be humble enough to listen and receive the answer, right?
And then implement the wisdom that they give, right?
I feel like today we're seeing so many elders, right?
Or people that call themselves elders partying.
with the young people, right?
So tell me, how are you, how are you making sure that you have the right elders around and how are you bridging, how are you able to bridge that gap and have these conversations?
Because it's very important what you're doing.
So that's part of why it's so important when you have lived as long as I have in one place.
I'm born in Milwaukee, I'm gonna die in Milwaukee, I'm all right with that.
But I remember a time where Milwaukee had the highest standard of living in the nation for black people Most most young people don't know anything about that But in the early 70s Milwaukee had the highest standard of living for black people in the entire nation Yes, that included Atlanta and and in the other place.
That's what Milwaukee was.
It was one of the safest places
in the entire nation.
It was one of the cleanest places.
And so those of us who remember all of that realized just how blessed we were.
And so elders, we listened to.
Our elders came from the south.
And
so Big Mom and Paw Paw came up here for the jobs.
We were called the machine shop of the world.
That's what this place was.
And so the opportunities to come up
to Milwaukee and to the north, whether you had a high school diploma or no degree or couldn't read or write, you could come up to the city of Milwaukee and get a job at A.L.
Smith, Allen Bradley, Alex Thomas, Litz Miller, Pabst, Condendale can, American can, on and on and
on.
And so you could walk into a place as I did as an 18 year old snotty nose kid right out of high school and stay there for 34 years.
One job.
and be able to live the American dream, to buy a home, to raise your kids, send them to college, and then get something called a pension, which I still have to this day.
And so it was a wonderful, wonderful time.
Well, people don't know about that.
You hear people talk about five, three, two, or six.
We're zip code in the nation, five, three, two, or six.
Well, I always like to say to people,
grew up in five three two or six and many like me did it was a wonderful wonderful strong middle-class reality and so I say to people who say five three two or six is the worst zip code in the nation I say to people if you only knew the question should be not that it's the worst zip code in the nation
It should be, how did it get
way?
Because if we don't understand how it got that way from one of the safest places and the best places in the nation for black people to live to where it is now, then we're not going to be able to stop other zip codes from following the same path that five, three, two, or six wound up following.
is at its lowest.
But go ahead.
Well, the answer is there.
And the answer is there because all over the Midwest, again, Milwaukee was called the machine shop of the world.
And so we produced everything that we needed in America.
Coming out of World War II, America was the number one manufacturer of everything.
In America, we produced sewing machines, washing machines,
automobiles, I don't care what it is, you need it.
America produced it inside of America.
And so these opportunities were there for everybody.
It didn't matter what job you had.
There was there was insurance.
There
was a pension at the end of it.
So so not just Milwaukee, Chicago, Detroit, it in Flint, Michigan.
It didn't matter Cincinnati.
Pittsburgh, the same pitfall happened.
And that's when they decided to take the industrial base out of this nation.
It was an organized effort that was done by both Democrats and Republicans because those with money were greedy.
And so the average American didn't matter anymore.
We saw that transformation in our lives.
And so why is so critically important that that my generation has these dialogues and conversations with young people is because they don't know.
They don't know what happened and they need to understand because it's not our world anymore.
It's your world and you guys need to understand how it happened so we can correct it as I'm organizing guys from my generation.
The purpose of it is that we owe.
something during the time that we have left.
We need to make sure that young people get the opportunities that we had, right?
We have to do that.
When I was a young boy, we had something called paper routes.
And so even though I'm from the family of 13 and my parents couldn't do things for us, at 12 years old, we could make our own money.
We learned work ethic at very young ages.
Why so critically important that what we are
Putting together with these with the elders is because we've got to catch young people while they're young And we've got to guide them what I've learned so much in those 12 to 13 years that I've been in Milwaukee public schools is It's just how far young people Have to go it alone.
We didn't have to do that.
Okay.
This was a safe place
but we could leave the house at 9 a.m.
or 8 a.m.
in the morning, go to the playground, five blocks away, and don't come back home until eight o'clock, and mama didn't have to worry about it.
Because
you certainly weren't going to get out of line because we were a real community.
Absolutely.
right.
Absolutely.
When we come back, we will have more with Brother Earl Ingram, the legendary Earl Ingram right here on 1017, the truth.
I want to ask you about pensions.
OK.
Because something happened in 2000, year 2000, and I think Milwaukee is paying Milwaukee and Milwaukee County is paying the ultimate cost today as we try to figure out this pension crisis.
Don't go anywhere, y'all.
We'll be back right after these messages.
Welcome back.
Welcome back.
Welcome back.
How y'all feeling?
Live on the award winning one on one seven the truth from the American Family Insurance Studios.
This is the lunch break the extended lunch Extended lunch man.
We got the legendary Earl Ingram Bringing us a wealth of wisdom a wealth of wisdom.
Thank you for joining us once again, brother error
on an improvement.
As you were sharing this history with us and this knowledge with us, you kept saying this word pension.
Talked about the pension from A.O.
Smith and even the amazing pensions that was in Chicago, all from all these industrial jobs, right?
And I feel like I would be doing myself and our listeners a disservice if I didn't ask you this question, right?
Milwaukee is struggling to balance our budget.
Every year comes out, we got a hundred million dollar gap that we now got to cut more resources from in order to fill this gap, right?
And it's a common line that I see every year is like, oh, we got to figure out our pension crisis.
We got to use this extra money to go to our pension crisis.
We raised our taxes.
We generated, I want to say it was roughly over a hundred million offer taxes.
All of it.
went to cover these pension payments.
What can you share with us that happened with this pension crisis?
How did we get here?
I did some research because it provoked me to want, like, okay, why we got to keep paying this pension?
What happened?
Where did this stem from?
So I want to know if you were familiar and if you could share any information on what that was.
So Milwaukee County is the issue as it relates to pensions.
You have to understand that in America,
in the good old days.
It didn't matter what job you were on.
The society understood that people are going to age.
And so the wisdom that the people in the past had to think about, listen, we gotta make sure that when people age that they're not homeless, that they're not struggling.
And so they created pension systems, and almost every job had a pension.
And so what they did was put away a little money out of your checks that was matched by the corporations, and that would carry you for the rest of your life.
And so many, many people, man, if they didn't have anything else, they had social security and a pension.
And that made sure that as people aged, whether or not they were able to save some money or any of those things, everybody is not able to save money.
Everybody doesn't understand the inner workings of a complex system that is this nation.
And so what happened was about 20 years ago, I was still working and my pension was pretty secure.
No, I guess I was just about getting ready to retire and they took away the pensions and they came in with something called, uh, 401k.
Okay.
A 401k where they said, uh, you put the first amount of money and we'll match it.
But the, but the problem with that is it's a gamble because when you put your money in the 401k.
It can either go up or down.
It's at the whim of the stock market.
The pensions, you never gamble with that money.
That money was set, is put away in safe investments and just like Social Security, safe investments.
And so there's no way you're ever gonna lose the money for your pensions.
And you said a lot of different things.
The county pensions,
were where we are struggling because there were some nefarious things that were done with people on the pension board for the county and many people got away like bandits with hundreds of thousands of dollars millions and well I'm yeah millions actually a few got millions a few of them I got
too well I know I know a few that came close and even as a county supervisor there are people who walked away with half a million dollar
Pensions
so
that was some some hustling that was done, but I'll say this For the most part pensions have been a lifesaver and they and when they did away with those pensions they basically Set young a lot of people up man for for homelessness
or
despair Our nation has done some horrible things taking away the pensions.
It was one of them, but here's the deal
They took away the pensions from private companies because public police, fire, educators, those people still get pensions, right?
And they continue to get the raises that keeps up with inflation, but all the other private sectors, I think it's somewhere around 8% or 6% are only receiving pensions.
It's one of the reasons why people are financially struggling the way that they are.
It's why I call these things politics.
Because politics created that environment.
Elected officials voted these things in.
And people aren't aware of how government works.
And so because they're not aware of how, and I get it, government is pretty complex.
And yet people aren't aware and they trust people that they elect to do their bidding.
And it's so unfortunate that you can't always trust the people who are in office.
I don't care on what level.
I don't care what this Democrat or Republican It's it's a difficult difficult proposition
You know, I've got some guys, man, everybody from judges to business leaders to educators to rank and file men because the story is not about what your title is.
The story is about, listen, we benefited.
Those of us from my generation were able to realize we were the civil rights struggle, okay?
We witnessed, okay, I was 12 years old when Dr. Martin Luther King got assassinated, okay?
Malcolm X, H. Rep Brown, Stokely Carmichael, Eldridge Cleaver, Hugh P. Newton, Fred Hampton, Bobby Seals, Megan.
We had black men.
who in leadership, who were willing to put it on the line for what was taking place in the country at that time, racism and bigotry.
And so it was horrible.
And yet those men stood up, Dr. King, and fought against insurmountable odds.
And so those of us who have become successful in life,
We didn't do it because we were so smart and bright.
There was something that the sacrifices that were made by those people who opened the door for someone out, organized men.
It's to make them understand.
You didn't get that by yourself.
I don't care how talented you are.
There was a time when that did not matter and you wouldn't have gotten the opportunity.
So as we watch what is taking place and transpiring in the nation right now,
as all of those levers that were there for us with the civil rights are being taken away by Donald Trump and the Republicans.
They're taking away all of the benefits, anything that has to do with black people and people of color moving forward is being taken away.
And so we can't sit here and watch that happen and then expect the younger generation who can't fight this battle alone.
So I'm organizing men.
Got to be the right kind of man.
If you can't take a 13 year old cussing you out and drawing up on you, you're the wrong man.
I don't care how many letters you have behind your name.
You got to understand exactly what time it is and what must be done.
Oh, absolutely.
Be a voice.
Please let me know.
Let our listeners know.
I am yearning for knowledge, yearning for community where we can bridge the gap.
We literally, before you walked in, we were talking about how important it is to have messaging and creating content that is healthy for our young people.
But I think what this is is a step even further.
It's not just content.
It's a guide.
Well, I would say this as well, because after I'm kind of done cultivating the men, you got to cultivate the women.
Because if you've been in the schools, you'll realize any educator will tell you it's worse with girls than it is with boys.
Our girls have been molested.
They don't know the value of their bodies.
And so there's nobody to stand up and fight for them.
So we got to organize women as well.
Because to do all the things we're doing for men, and then everybody's doing something for boys and men, it is the women who wind up having the boys and raising them alone.
So it's so critical that we spend that time with them as well.
Without safety.
Think she really she blew up during the pandemic or like right after the pandemic because her parents were Trying to find something educational like on YouTube or online essentially for their daughter Gracie and they couldn't find anything especially for a child of color at that that had other Quote-quote stars of the show that you know the child could look up to so
with the dad having the musical background that he has.
And I think her mom has some type of musical background as well.
They created this and have their daughter being the actual voice.
So they're definitely legends for
Hey, I'm living and glad to be alive.
Amen.
Amen,
it's just self and health as well.
So we got to be careful about, you know, things coming out with these beats because we're exposing our kids.
I mean, big Frida.
And then your kids ask the question, ma, dad.
Why does that man look like a woman?
And why are we saying, oh, what next?
He did he doing, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh.
No, no, no, no, no, no.
have to give you that.
I'm not disputing you whatsoever.
Nursery rhymes.
Because African, as Africans, way before all that was.
communicated.
That's
least, however.
However, the message is getting lost by the people that you are teaming up with.
I could respect that, right?
I could respect that.
But at what point in society?
Now, I could agree with you, right?
We could dilute the message because of the messenger that's chosen.
I could give you that black conscious, right?
My question is, at what point do we say, OK, these.
Folks that are turning a corner that still have influence if they're changing their message and their narrative.
Like, is that not something that we should elevate?
Because somebody who was possibly putting like you brought up big freedom, right?
Like somebody who is change.
I'm not saying big freedom is changing her whole tune to make Miss Gracie music.
So I'm not trying to say that.
But do you think they're still not?
a place for where people of influence can put positive messages behind these type of sounds and help, you know, these young people not listen to the raw version of a P. Diddy song or a big free to song.
Absolutely.
But I also believe we don't need to expose our children to certain adult type things in order for them to catch.
Because then that's going to make awareness on other stuff that they don't need to be exposed with I mean its exposure is going to be regardless in our presence or outside of our presence But unfortunately with this computer technology and things like that.
They're way more advanced than we ever was coming up as kids And then exposed to things way more way more than what we were supposed to as kids So we can we can put a lock on there They can go into the room and watch something else and still have that exposure
Absolutely, there's ways.
There's a lot of creative ways to do that.
I just don't think Paul Wall, Frida and others of that caliber should be the ones called upon, but they are.
And here's what we are now.
And I don't want us to get lost in the beat because it's Paul Wall, whatever, you know.
I want to make sure I'm listening to understand and I respond.
Right.
You're saying it doesn't sound like you're saying.
You have a problem with the beat and the sound or even the messaging.
You're worried about, OK, now Gracie's Corner has now put these kids onto a big Frida.
They may go and YouTube more of Big Frida's music that is not Gracie's Corner related.
Is that what you say?
Producer, give me a ding.
Say that one more time.
I'm actually for the, there you go.
Okay, gotcha.
I can understand that.
I can understand that.
You're saying it opens the door.
It's like, yes.
It's an educational song, yes, for this moment, but you're like, we don't know what door or path they might go down and want to see more Paul Wall.
And now they listening to lean sipping and syrup sipping.
And
those rhymes are at an age level that they're not able to comprehend and understand what's being put on them or
is exposing them at that time.
They just hearing this rhythm, but yet still in their spirit, this is also being absorbed.
Because if they do go to that and watch other film of Paul Wall and
Exactly.
about the nursery
I could respect that, right?
I would hope, and I'm not saying that this is true, I would hope because I know it's still a possibility.
That they would go and research more of Gracie than they would of Paul wall But I get what you're saying we can't count on that that would be the outcome all the time I get that a hundred percent brother conscious black conscious
because it Because I'm gonna leave you with this it wouldn't be Gracie would be the hook But Paul wall there would be the real that real demand To other exposures
you.
But I could also say on the same hand, Gracie could be what reels them into other exposures as well.
Because just like they have the opportunity to go research more Paul Wall or Big Freedia, they also have that chance to say I want to hear more Gracie's corner.
So I agree with you.
I agree with you 100% brother black conscious.
I see what you're saying with it.
At first I was like, what is going with this?
But I understand what you're going with it and I appreciate you sharing that knowledge with us.
And, um, it would
make me
man.
Hold on, hold on, hold on.
But I know Ray Neity would do it in a form that's, that's respectful and educational and on something righteousness.
So they might see some yams.
But that might be you holding up yams and shaking them.
Candy yams.
You see how that goes?
Candy yams.
Yes, sir.
Yes, sir.
Yes, sir.
You got two actually yams in your hand
plan on a
leave you with that.
Peace, Milwaukee.
Hey, that was good.
I appreciate you, Black Conscious.
That was good.
That was good, man.
I can respect what Brother Black Conscious just said.
I can respect that.
I could respect that a hundred percent because at first he was losing me a little bit at first, you know, because it's easy for us to want to be like, man, we finally got something that, you know, kids could listen to that sound good.
And it's not poisonous lyrics attached to the sound.
Right.
Yeah.
When I screamed to me, he called it demonic.
Yeah.
See.
So I was like, all right, hold on.
So and he's talking about.
the gateway that it opens to what those artists that are featured are could possibly lead to.
Which is understandable.
Super understandable.
Super understandable.
But then again, it's
not like she's doing whole albums, you know,
artists.
Like they're making a guest appearance in a episode that's, you know, on YouTube.
And these songs are two minutes, you know, a minute and a half of a 15 or 20 minute
educational show about, you know, the countries of Africa about the alphabet about the consonants about, you know, just like in reading like about everything else.
So
because it's like, wait, what?
Lil' John.
Let me go see
Because now it's something for the parents and for the kids.
It's something that the parents don't mind listening to 24-7 because they know the artist.
And
You see, I was just getting up here, jigging like I was down in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
First time hearing it.
First time hearing it.
But it was a sound that was
memorable to me.
I'm very familiar with Big Freedia and the New Orleans bounce sound.
So it just felt now I can't like I wish my kids was younger.
So I could be like, let's go listen to some Gracie's corner.
Like one may not hurt.
So I agree with him.
I would I would challenge our brother Black conscious to think exactly what he said.
Right.
But just add a little bullet point and he say Gracie is the hook.
to get the kids in, and maybe the Paul Walls and the Big Freeders is the hook to get the parents in.
And once we get them in, I would like to believe that good intentions will come behind it.
And that goes back to parents playing a more important role, like, okay, we gotta be involved and figure out what our kids are listening to.
If we could bring them to Gracie's Corner, don't just leave them there on their own so they could go figure out what's on the next corner.
Let's keep them.
Let's keep narrating, navigating them on where they should go.
Don't go anywhere, y'all.
When we come back, when we come back, we'll keep this conversation going.
We're talking about food deserts.
We're talking about Gracie's Corner and just really the influence sounds.
and music and messaging has over our community and young people.
So don't go anywhere, y'all.
We'll be back on the award-winning 10170
Truth.
Now sing with
Happy.
Gracie a little Caribbean vibe.
Hey, man, I'm sorry.
I love it.
I love it, man.
I love it.
I think that's very special what they doing.
And I don't think people realize how much money it is in creating.
Healthy content for kids and young people.
Look at Miss Rachel.
She was eating in the pandemic.
Look at Miss Rachel.
I don't think we realize how important it is or how vital it is.
To create healthy, relatable content.
for our young kids.
One of my favorite shows as a parent that I used to watch with my kids was Backyardigans.
The Backyardigans had some slaps on it.
You hear me?
You'll back your friends now back yardigans.
They have some slaps.
Yep.
Yep.
Yep.
Yep.
Dance to the worm in polka.
Back yard against has some slaps, man.
But let's go back to this.
The grocery store we got on this conversation, by the way, if you just joining us, we got to this point because we were talking about food deserts.
You know, the the unavailability of healthy foods.
Okay.
The unavailability of healthy foods.
We was talking about that.
And then Brother Z put me up on this song.
Takis and hot, what is it?
Hot fries, hot food.
Whatever.
Hot chips and takis.
But it was a whole song and it was song with slapper.
The song was slapping and it brought us to Gracie's Corner.
Brought us to Gracie's Corner.
And then I was like, hey, how to make me some children slaps, man.
Make me some slaps for the kids.
We got.
Earl Ingram, that's going to be joining us.
a little bit later today, y'all.
We got Brother Earl Ingram that's going to be joining us.
It's going to be a very, very dope conversation.
I remember Brother Earl was on his show and I was super young, if I'm not mistaken, either fresh out of urban underground or fresh in urban underground.
And we was just talking about, you know, young people and and.
the rights that they have and so forth.
I can't remember.
Some other folks on there with me.
Some other folks on there with me.
Some other folks from over in underground, if I can, if I'm not mistaken.
But we are talking about why our grocery stores actually leaving.
All right.
We talked about Kroger, which is the parent company of Pickett Save said they pointed to theft.
All right, but then we talked about what the data actually shows so it genuinely complicated the story Call I see you calling What's brother Z get here we'll get you right there you go right there that boy always on time So the data actually showed that the
Stores that pick and save closed down.
Thief actually declined by 13% from 2019 to 2024.
And found more theft was happening in the suburban stores than the closed urban stores.
So it directly contradicted the theft driven narrative.
For them specific closures.
For those specific closures, I'm sorry, it is not Earl Ingram.
I said I had Earl Ingram.
We got Kelly Melton.
Earl's supposed to be a two.
Got Kelly at three.
I apologize, truth, family.
We'll be talking to Kelly.
Not brother Earl.
All right.
So we're talking about what the data actually showed y'all now.
We're at the more complex less friendly headline and real factors.
All right.
Says stamper and big time reporting.
Points to operation struggling to find and retain quality employees and competing with a merchandise mix of urban stores where many essential high demand goods simply carry lower profit margins than suburban locations with more discretionary spending.
Sherman Park grocery store owner.
We talked about this.
All right.
And then we'll say this, the mirror, this mirror is a national retail pattern.
The National Retail Federation reports 112 billion in total US inventory losses in the most recent year measured up from 94 billion in 2021.
Meaning theft slash shrinkage is real.
Rising industry wide pressure.
even where it isn't the specific reason for a given Milwaukee closure.
We got Miss Sandra on the line.
Miss Sandra, how you doing?
I am just fine.
How are you doing today?
I can't complain.
I'm alive and well.
Yeah, that's good.
That's excellent.
ma'am.
Yes, but I was listening to what you were talking about, and I was listening to what Sherwin was talking about, too, about the 10-year-old boy.
There's a little piece that happened in the city here.
and the rules and the laws and stuff.
But the content that you are on is about the food deserts and the money not, the city not being able to have money to sponsor the services we need.
And to me, every time it's there, it's all systemically done.
Because we've been going through this, if you go back to history, we've been going through this for years when they moved the white people out of the city.
And it built up 43.
of the best way to get them out.
They gave them money to go out.
They got loans and everything.
So this has been years.
You see, I'm 77.
So I watched it, but we never talked politics.
My parents never talked.
They're from the South.
And I guess they were afraid to say anything.
So we didn't talk politics.
So we really didn't know what was going on, but we saw the signs saying the white people would say we're not moving to Siberia.
We like it here.
The next minute you saw those signs go down and they moved.
But anyways, what my point is,
When they talk about blue deserts, I look at every central city where black people are.
go through the whole city and go through the whole routine, and it's all systemically done, and it's done to black, not only black, poor people.
What they want to do is give it a services, you know, like the welfare of the health people.
Stuff like that, you know, they want to give it a service, it's where we got kind of a chance.
they want to do everything yourself.
They want to privatize everything, the post office.
And they want you to pay even more.
So we think it's bad.
Now it's going to go up even higher and higher and higher.
And it's so wrong when you just took one city, you steal the money.
They say we pay the most in taxes in the city of Milwaukee.
They take all the money and put it where they want.
So Robin Garth had a million dollar staff.
He had health care, he had a heart attack.
He got a chance to go to other doctors, right?
Mm-hmm.
And we have to fight.
Now, they're talking about we got to do this.
I'm dealing with it, not myself and my family.
My husband just died of kidney disease.
My daughter is taking my dialysis.
Now, I'm finding it even harder for us to get the right kind of health that we need.
We have to stay on top of those people to keep from seeing you in and out the hospital.
So that's what they do.
And one time they sent her out and she's about to die.
They call me three times, tell me she's coming
back.
And this is in and out, in and out.
So why aren't you taking her to find out what exactly is going on?
So we have a whole lot and we have to start living and we have to come together and stop trying to, you know, cut our black people down because of things we don't know.
And a lot of us are not in that medical field.
And like you say, the food, we eat this and that and that.
And then we're on this dialysis stuff.
So I just have to really start looking at all of them, look at every city that's headed out the same way.
And you'll see where it's coming from, your big corporations, the one that got the money
started
Absolutely.
100 percent.
Starve us out.
Starve us out.
We appreciate you, Miss Sandra, for always calling in and sharing some wisdom.
and prayers to you and your family with everything that you're going through to keep your daughter in our prayers as well and condolences to the passing of your husband.
We're talking about the food desert, y'all, the downfalls.
All right.
Honest complication.
We talked about the cardiovascular cardiovascular study found in chronic kidney disease.
This is what she's talking about.
Cardiovascular study similarly found chronic kidney disease risk was driven more by low individual income than by food desert status itself.
Reinforcing that poverty.
Not geography alone may be the deeper root cause.
Research keeps circling back to.
So many byproducts of poverty.
So many byproducts health implications just simple health implications Poverty living in poverty stress High blood pressure poor food poor environments environmental injustice all byproducts of poverty All byproducts of poverty y'all
So we don't want to oversimplify that no grocery store equals automatic diabetes.
All right.
Research finding is that food deserts and food insecurity travel together and compound each other.
Distance to healthy food matters, but it matters most for people who are also poor and also surrounded by more fast food slash convenience.
options than healthy ones.
The more that's more complete, harder to dismiss picture than the simple version.
When we come back, y'all, we're going to talk about gas stations, corner stores, and what's actually on the shelf.
All right.
Don't go anywhere.
Y'all, this is the award-winning one on one, seven the
truth.
I go by Mike
Welcome back.
doing?
It's your boy, Ray Nitty, holding it down on the award-winning 1017, The Truth Live from the American Family Insurance Studios.
We got a legend in the building.
Brother Earl.
The legend.
I was just telling I don't know.
You just walked in and I was telling the folks how I remember when Charlotte and Reggie Moore brought us on your show.
I feel like we was off of.
Was it capital?
Yeah, actually.
1290 WMC is there we Sherman and capital
So and I'm 72.
Well, it's you know, it's it's always good to have an opportunity to reconnect with.
Somebody from the past.
Yes, sir.
sir.
Man, so for folks that may not know, I don't know if it's many, may not know your history in the city and radio because I feel like you have a, it's two separate things.
You got some legendary stuff in the city and then you legendary on the radio.
Can you give the people a quick rundown of your history and tell them who we are speaking to, who we have the honor.
of speaking to today?
Well, so actually, I hate to talk about things in the past because what I am more than anything else is a servant.
And so I've served my entire, my entire life and I'm from the city and born and raised here.
I'm from a family of 13.
I spent 34 years at a place called A.L.
Smith.
34 years there.
Retired.
and wound up doing something different with my life.
I've been married to the same woman for 40 some odd years and we've been together since for 50 years.
And I'm a treatment foster parent.
My wife and I took in 100% disabled child 23 years ago who required 24 hour care.
He's now a 25 year old man who requires 24 hour care.
We still have him.
created the was the president of the neighborhood Children's Sports League.
If you ever saw all that football that you see in Lincoln Park,
for 20 years.
I built that not alone, but I was the president of that for over 20 years.
We had four young young boys who wound up playing pro football countless numbers of them who went on to major universities presently.
I founded something called Voices of the Elders about four years ago.
I spent 12 years volunteering in Milwaukee public schools.
And I realized young people are missing a whole lot of different things.
I've volunteered everywhere from North Division, Washington High School, Madison, Marshall, WCLL, you name it, I've been there.
And so what I found out more than anything else is
young
people are missing today.
Big mamas and pawpaws.
That's
what Voices of the Elders is.
It's pawpaws and big mamas.
It's people from my generation.
Young people don't have the advantage that my generation had where we could drink from the Elders.
And so I've organized those men.
We go inside the schools and
children.
elders.
And
I was blessed to have amazing elders around and still that I could call and ask a question and be humble enough to listen and receive the answer, right?
And then implement the wisdom that they give, right?
I feel like today we're seeing so many elders, right?
Or people that call themselves elders partying.
with the young people, right?
So tell me, how are you, how are you making sure that you have the right elders around and how are you bridging, how are you able to bridge that gap and have these conversations?
Because it's very important what you're doing.
So that's part of why it's so important when you have lived as long as I have in one place.
I'm born in Milwaukee, I'm gonna die in Milwaukee, I'm all right with that.
But I remember a time where Milwaukee had the highest standard of living in the nation for black people Most most young people don't know anything about that But in the early 70s Milwaukee had the highest standard of living for black people in the entire nation Yes, that included Atlanta and and in the other place.
That's what Milwaukee was.
It was one of the safest places
in the entire nation.
It was one of the cleanest places.
And so those of us who remember all of that realized just how blessed we were.
And so elders, we listened to.
Our elders came from the south.
And
so Big Mom and Paw Paw came up here for the jobs.
We were called the machine shop of the world.
That's what this place was.
And so the opportunities to come up
to Milwaukee and to the north, whether you had a high school diploma or no degree or couldn't read or write, you could come up to the city of Milwaukee and get a job at A.L.
Smith, Allen Bradley, Alex Thomas, Litz Miller, Pabst, Condendale can, American can, on and on and
on.
And so you could walk into a place as I did as an 18 year old snotty nose kid right out of high school and stay there for 34 years.
One job.
and be able to live the American dream, to buy a home, to raise your kids, send them to college, and then get something called a pension, which I still have to this day.
And so it was a wonderful, wonderful time.
Well, people don't know about that.
You hear people talk about five, three, two, or six.
We're zip code in the nation, five, three, two, or six.
Well, I always like to say to people,
grew up in five three two or six and many like me did it was a wonderful wonderful strong middle-class reality and so I say to people who say five three two or six is the worst zip code in the nation I say to people if you only knew the question should be not that it's the worst zip code in the nation
It should be, how did it get
way?
Because if we don't understand how it got that way from one of the safest places and the best places in the nation for black people to live to where it is now, then we're not going to be able to stop other zip codes from following the same path that five, three, two, or six wound up following.
is at its lowest.
But go ahead.
Well, the answer is there.
And the answer is there because all over the Midwest, again, Milwaukee was called the machine shop of the world.
And so we produced everything that we needed in America.
Coming out of World War II, America was the number one manufacturer of everything.
In America, we produced sewing machines, washing machines,
automobiles, I don't care what it is, you need it.
America produced it inside of America.
And so these opportunities were there for everybody.
It didn't matter what job you had.
There was there was insurance.
There
was a pension at the end of it.
So so not just Milwaukee, Chicago, Detroit, it in Flint, Michigan.
It didn't matter Cincinnati.
Pittsburgh, the same pitfall happened.
And that's when they decided to take the industrial base out of this nation.
It was an organized effort that was done by both Democrats and Republicans because those with money were greedy.
And so the average American didn't matter anymore.
We saw that transformation in our lives.
And so why is so critically important that that my generation has these dialogues and conversations with young people is because they don't know.
They don't know what happened and they need to understand because it's not our world anymore.
It's your world and you guys need to understand how it happened so we can correct it as I'm organizing guys from my generation.
The purpose of it is that we owe.
something during the time that we have left.
We need to make sure that young people get the opportunities that we had, right?
We have to do that.
When I was a young boy, we had something called paper routes.
And so even though I'm from the family of 13 and my parents couldn't do things for us, at 12 years old, we could make our own money.
We learned work ethic at very young ages.
Why so critically important that what we are
Putting together with these with the elders is because we've got to catch young people while they're young And we've got to guide them what I've learned so much in those 12 to 13 years that I've been in Milwaukee public schools is It's just how far young people Have to go it alone.
We didn't have to do that.
Okay.
This was a safe place
but we could leave the house at 9 a.m.
or 8 a.m.
in the morning, go to the playground, five blocks away, and don't come back home until eight o'clock, and mama didn't have to worry about it.
Because
you certainly weren't going to get out of line because we were a real community.
Absolutely.
right.
Absolutely.
When we come back, we will have more with Brother Earl Ingram, the legendary Earl Ingram right here on 1017, the truth.
I want to ask you about pensions.
OK.
Because something happened in 2000, year 2000, and I think Milwaukee is paying Milwaukee and Milwaukee County is paying the ultimate cost today as we try to figure out this pension crisis.
Don't go anywhere, y'all.
We'll be back right after these messages.
Welcome back.
Welcome back.
Welcome back.
How y'all feeling?
Live on the award winning one on one seven the truth from the American Family Insurance Studios.
This is the lunch break the extended lunch Extended lunch man.
We got the legendary Earl Ingram Bringing us a wealth of wisdom a wealth of wisdom.
Thank you for joining us once again, brother error
on an improvement.
As you were sharing this history with us and this knowledge with us, you kept saying this word pension.
Talked about the pension from A.O.
Smith and even the amazing pensions that was in Chicago, all from all these industrial jobs, right?
And I feel like I would be doing myself and our listeners a disservice if I didn't ask you this question, right?
Milwaukee is struggling to balance our budget.
Every year comes out, we got a hundred million dollar gap that we now got to cut more resources from in order to fill this gap, right?
And it's a common line that I see every year is like, oh, we got to figure out our pension crisis.
We got to use this extra money to go to our pension crisis.
We raised our taxes.
We generated, I want to say it was roughly over a hundred million offer taxes.
All of it.
went to cover these pension payments.
What can you share with us that happened with this pension crisis?
How did we get here?
I did some research because it provoked me to want, like, okay, why we got to keep paying this pension?
What happened?
Where did this stem from?
So I want to know if you were familiar and if you could share any information on what that was.
So Milwaukee County is the issue as it relates to pensions.
You have to understand that in America,
in the good old days.
It didn't matter what job you were on.
The society understood that people are going to age.
And so the wisdom that the people in the past had to think about, listen, we gotta make sure that when people age that they're not homeless, that they're not struggling.
And so they created pension systems, and almost every job had a pension.
And so what they did was put away a little money out of your checks that was matched by the corporations, and that would carry you for the rest of your life.
And so many, many people, man, if they didn't have anything else, they had social security and a pension.
And that made sure that as people aged, whether or not they were able to save some money or any of those things, everybody is not able to save money.
Everybody doesn't understand the inner workings of a complex system that is this nation.
And so what happened was about 20 years ago, I was still working and my pension was pretty secure.
No, I guess I was just about getting ready to retire and they took away the pensions and they came in with something called, uh, 401k.
Okay.
A 401k where they said, uh, you put the first amount of money and we'll match it.
But the, but the problem with that is it's a gamble because when you put your money in the 401k.
It can either go up or down.
It's at the whim of the stock market.
The pensions, you never gamble with that money.
That money was set, is put away in safe investments and just like Social Security, safe investments.
And so there's no way you're ever gonna lose the money for your pensions.
And you said a lot of different things.
The county pensions,
were where we are struggling because there were some nefarious things that were done with people on the pension board for the county and many people got away like bandits with hundreds of thousands of dollars millions and well I'm yeah millions actually a few got millions a few of them I got
too well I know I know a few that came close and even as a county supervisor there are people who walked away with half a million dollar
Pensions
so
that was some some hustling that was done, but I'll say this For the most part pensions have been a lifesaver and they and when they did away with those pensions they basically Set young a lot of people up man for for homelessness
or
despair Our nation has done some horrible things taking away the pensions.
It was one of them, but here's the deal
They took away the pensions from private companies because public police, fire, educators, those people still get pensions, right?
And they continue to get the raises that keeps up with inflation, but all the other private sectors, I think it's somewhere around 8% or 6% are only receiving pensions.
It's one of the reasons why people are financially struggling the way that they are.
It's why I call these things politics.
Because politics created that environment.
Elected officials voted these things in.
And people aren't aware of how government works.
And so because they're not aware of how, and I get it, government is pretty complex.
And yet people aren't aware and they trust people that they elect to do their bidding.
And it's so unfortunate that you can't always trust the people who are in office.
I don't care on what level.
I don't care what this Democrat or Republican It's it's a difficult difficult proposition
You know, I've got some guys, man, everybody from judges to business leaders to educators to rank and file men because the story is not about what your title is.
The story is about, listen, we benefited.
Those of us from my generation were able to realize we were the civil rights struggle, okay?
We witnessed, okay, I was 12 years old when Dr. Martin Luther King got assassinated, okay?
Malcolm X, H. Rep Brown, Stokely Carmichael, Eldridge Cleaver, Hugh P. Newton, Fred Hampton, Bobby Seals, Megan.
We had black men.
who in leadership, who were willing to put it on the line for what was taking place in the country at that time, racism and bigotry.
And so it was horrible.
And yet those men stood up, Dr. King, and fought against insurmountable odds.
And so those of us who have become successful in life,
We didn't do it because we were so smart and bright.
There was something that the sacrifices that were made by those people who opened the door for someone out, organized men.
It's to make them understand.
You didn't get that by yourself.
I don't care how talented you are.
There was a time when that did not matter and you wouldn't have gotten the opportunity.
So as we watch what is taking place and transpiring in the nation right now,
as all of those levers that were there for us with the civil rights are being taken away by Donald Trump and the Republicans.
They're taking away all of the benefits, anything that has to do with black people and people of color moving forward is being taken away.
And so we can't sit here and watch that happen and then expect the younger generation who can't fight this battle alone.
So I'm organizing men.
Got to be the right kind of man.
If you can't take a 13 year old cussing you out and drawing up on you, you're the wrong man.
I don't care how many letters you have behind your name.
You got to understand exactly what time it is and what must be done.
Oh, absolutely.
Be a voice.
Please let me know.
Let our listeners know.
I am yearning for knowledge, yearning for community where we can bridge the gap.
We literally, before you walked in, we were talking about how important it is to have messaging and creating content that is healthy for our young people.
But I think what this is is a step even further.
It's not just content.
It's a guide.
Well, I would say this as well, because after I'm kind of done cultivating the men, you got to cultivate the women.
Because if you've been in the schools, you'll realize any educator will tell you it's worse with girls than it is with boys.
Our girls have been molested.
They don't know the value of their bodies.
And so there's nobody to stand up and fight for them.
So we got to organize women as well.
Because to do all the things we're doing for men, and then everybody's doing something for boys and men, it is the women who wind up having the boys and raising them alone.
So it's so critical that we spend that time with them as well.