 Connecting the people to their government, all online. For the next few minutes, we'll discuss efforts in Fort Worth, Texas to make that city one of America's most connected. Hello, everyone, and welcome to Comcast. Newsmakers, I'm Robert Trenum. Joining me is Mayor Betsy Price of Fort Worth, Texas. Mayor, welcome to the program. Thank you for having me. So here we are on the 21st century. One would think that virtual town hall meetings, connecting the people to their government should be the norm, correct? They should be the norm, but you know, people are busy and people just don't think about it. So the standard town hall meetings where people show up and you kind of stand up and more lecture them is just doesn't work. Besides, people really want to tell you what they want. They don't want to hear so much just about what you're doing and what your opinion is. They really want to tell you what they think. So tell us about your best practices in terms of actually connecting with your constituents and following up on their concerns. Well, we started out during the campaign two years ago. I'm an Abbott cyclist, and I started out doing what we call rolling town halls. And we would invite people to come and talk to us about campaign issues. And we continued that and put it on a more formalized basis once I took office. And over the course of about nine months, we had probably 1600 people get on their bikes and come and talk to us and ride with us. And we averaged, you know, 40 or 50, having upwards of 200 at any given Wednesday. And people are funny. They'll reach in that back pocket and pull their notes out and say, Mary, I want you to know about my street. I want you to know about my potholes. Tell me about your garbage. And we always try to get, you know, if they give us a note, we say, be sure your name and phone number or your email is on there. We'll either, you know, text you back or email you or call you. And if we're not, then we give them a card and say, will you send us your contact information? And we just work backwards and follow up. And I think it makes people feel much more connected. You've got to be open and accessible in today's world because people are busy, single family parents, children, you got to go where they are. Well, I'm fascinated by this because just going back to the Rolling Town Hall example that you mentioned, it sounds like what you're doing is, is you're going to the people on their terms and their environment. And thus in the process, you're breaking down barriers because in my mind, when I view a town hall meeting, it's the mayor or the elected official behind a lectern coat and tie or perhaps, you know, very formal dress. And it's very formal. But this sounds to be very informal. This is very informal. I always tell them, you know, if you're stupid enough to put your spandex on and show up in public, people will tell you anything. Okay. Now we're, which we do on a regular basis, but not everybody cycles and not everybody wants to. So now we do walking town halls as well. We're out walking and talking to them. And, you know, the other piece is that helps get communities engaged. We've had parents who said, well, we got out and walked and we rode with our kids and suddenly we met our neighbors and we found out and it's economic development too because employers coming in will talk to you about the health of your community and the engagement. So here's a question and that is, what about senior citizens? What about individuals that perhaps may not have the ability to ride a bike or anything like that? How do you still connect with that generation or perhaps that segment of the population that quite frankly doesn't want to connect with you online? That's right. We try to go see them. You know, we still do standard town halls and we do neighborhood meetings. The other thing we do is coffee with the mayor and the council. And in every district we'll find a place, a restaurant or a coffee shop or the VFW hall or the senior citizen center. And we'll go out and talk to them usually on a Saturday morning, sometimes on a weekday, mid-morning and just invite them to come and have coffee. And that's, and this is casual. You know, it's not necessarily, it's definitely not coat and tie. It's coming to our... What are some response? They love it. I mean, the last one we did about a month ago, we had probably 120 or 30 people had an issue at the lake. They live on the lake and they came from age 85 down to 18 and some of them brought their kids and they just love coming and having a cup of coffee and talking to you. Madam Mayor, thank you very much for all that you do for your city. We really appreciate it. Thank you for having us. And of course, thank you for joining us for this edition of Comcast Newsmakers. I'm Robert Trenum. Have a great day, everybody. We'll see you next time. Take care. Bye-bye.