 Hello Columbia and welcome to CityView where we give you an inside view of the City of Columbia. In our top story, recently Mayor Daniel J. Rickerman along with City Council members and City officials as well as staff from Columbia Water, Public Works and our Customer Care Center held a press conference to announce a new customer response plan. All of this is about trying to make a difference for our community and our staff and we committed as a council that we're going to do everything we can internally to improve the quality of customer service, investing in our staff through technology, through training and innovation, looking at things from a different angle to improve the quality of service that affects everybody in our community. Our three new City Council members, Council members Aditi Bussells, Tina Herbert and Jill Taylor were recently featured doing a forum sponsored by the Columbia Chamber of Commerce. I thought it was really important in a time that we need to make critical decisions to advance our city, make it more competitive, keep young people here and most importantly ensure that we are a city that is safe and is a city that's a destination for everyone. And I think that I'm in tune to the issues that are in our community and between my private sector experience and working for the city in the OBO office and community development and learning how to leverage city dollars to bring private dollars to certain areas I think is very critical and is an asset that we need particularly in District 1. I long felt that the business community just, we weren't business friendly as we should. I think we've missed a lot of the growth that we've seen in our state over the last 10 years and I think it came to the conclusion that local governments probably affect your day-to-day life more than about any other level of government. Mayor Daniel J. Rickerman, the City of Columbia and the American Red Cross, recently hosted the annual Columbia Lifesavers Blood Drive, which was an ultimate success. We're in a national blood crisis, great shortage, worst in a decade, so having this blood drive today is just going to help the community and area hospitals in the area and nationwide. It can provide life-saving blood for a patient, whether it be from a surgery, maybe a mother that needs blood after childbirth, it can also help cancer patients as well, let alone traumas and things like that. So if someone that's been in a bad accident and they might need 30, 40 pints of blood, we need to have it on the shelves for them or if there's a disaster, we need to have blood on the shelves. Well Columbia is definitely open for business and so is Five Points. Five Points recently has seen a surge of new businesses entering that hospitality and entertainment district. Very excited that we have wonderful small businesses that we've recruited and recruiting is what we need to continue to do. To Mr. Mike Edwards and his team at Wilson Kibbler, keep going out there and recruiting wonderful businesses like Jack Browns, tell the story of who Columbia is, what our economy wants to be and where we're at, and that we are, as the Mayor says, and we are thankful, open for business. This new business, of course, represents all that is going to happen in Five Points. So welcome to the city, welcome to Five Points. And may your trip and may your clothing be synonymous with Swift Brand. As everybody knows, Five Points is a special place in my heart and always has been because this is where I first started working when I came to the University of South Carolina. But it is an iconic neighborhood and one of our most important neighborhoods and it's great to see people making investments. So thank you very much and anything we can do, just remember Columbia is open. Well, we're excited about all the new businesses and speaking of being open, the City of Columbia is open for opportunities. We are currently hiring for multiple vacancies in all departments. Please join us on April 26th for a career fair where all departments will be posted with positions and at the Columbia Metropolitan Convention Center to help you find a new career. Also, every Wednesday, don't forget, it's open interviews at Public Works. They have multiple positions open and they are having open interviews every Wednesday morning at 2910 Colonial Drive from 9 a.m. until 11 a.m. For more information about hiring, please contact the City of Columbia or visit our website at columbiasc.gov. Okay, Columbia, thank you for joining us for this edition of City View. This wraps up our edition and we want you to stay connected. Please follow us on our social media platforms, on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Also you stay connected with us through our website at columbiasc.gov as well as our multiple City TV platforms, Spectrum Channel 1301 as well as Amazon Fire TV and Roku. And as always, remember we are Columbia and we are here for you.