 Hello everyone. Thank you for tuning in to the Straight Talk Vermont show. I have an incredible guest with me and we will talk about it in a minute, but first I want to announce what we're doing. So, Straight Talk Vermont and all our other programs, we have a new art gallery or in the University Mall. It's a re-grant, we just did a re-grant opening on May 20th. And it's incredible. It's called Art So Wonderful Gallery and Performing Center. And it's 8,000 square feet. We have a performing stage. We have like hip-hop, rock shows, open mic, poetry slabs. Vermont Youth Symphony Orchestra is going to perform there. And I'm so excited and we have like 400 pieces of art in there. And when I sit there, oh God, I'm so excited to look at all this art. I'm not an artist, but I'm an old musician. But I just have the passion for both so I open the place up. But I'll tell you, you got to come there. And the University Mall right next to Target is across from IHOP. So, that's what we have going on. Oh, no, we have a Fight for Kids Foundation. I'm on the Board of Directors. We built a youth center in Winnowsky. It's the only youth center there. And I'm so proud. King James is our executive director. We have incredible board members. And we're doing our first Fridays every month. July 7th in Rotary Park. And when we see all these providers and vendors that are going to be there, live entertainment. And it's helped raise funds for the Fight for Kids Foundation. So, if you've got time, step out there. So, now, everyone, I'm so excited. Every time I see Senator Roms Hinsdale, I always get excited. I don't care where I'm at. Where we are, we're always way to each other, acknowledge each other. And we go way back, like, 15 years. So, right now, I want to introduce you to Senator Roms Hinsdale. So, take it away. Thanks so much, Bruce. I'm Senator Keisha Roms Hinsdale. And before I say anything else about me, I'm just remembering, since it is July 5th, it was three years ago, on the 4th of July, that it was just after the murder of George Floyd. And we had the kids from Art So Wonderful do chalk art at AO Glass in the south end of Burlington. And they made beautiful images of hands of all different colors and complexions holding each other. They wrote Black Lives Matter. They did an amazing job. And so, I just want to thank you for giving young people that opportunity. Yeah. So, a little bit about me. Senator Keisha Roms Hinsdale. I'll start with the titles. And the most important one for me right now is Mom. I'm a new mother. And I'm here with my baby Mira. She's two and a half months old now. And she was supposed to arrive the last day of the legislative session. But of course, my first lesson as a parent was that babies make the rules. So she decided to come early and I reported and passed a lot of my legislation from the hospital this year. And in addition to that, I passed legislation as the chair of the Senate Economic Development Housing and General Affairs Committee in the state Senate. I've served for 11 years now in the legislature since I was 22. So if you're young and thinking about running for office, I'm always free to talk. No doubt about it. No doubt about it. So, and I'm just going to talk to the boom right now. So, Senator, wow. So, Mira is here. Right. Well, let's get a shot of Mira, bro. Travis, our cameraman and incredible guy from CCTV. Nice, right? So, I just want to say thank you to CCTV and our camera person, production person, Travis. We are in the lovely Battery Park where we always be. We have our cable show. This is our second time with Senator Keith Ram. And here we did this before right here in the same park. I don't know how many years ago that was maybe. It's before the pandemic. Yeah, yeah, definitely, definitely, definitely. But so, wow. Well, I keep saying wow because you have an incredible history of all the wonderful things. You met some incredible people, you know, like Obama and, you know, I always say that. You know, and like, let's start from when you graduated from probably why you was in the UVM when you went to the legislature, I think. I started my campaign for the State House of Representatives representing Burlington when I was a senior at the University of Vermont. I was student body president and really a lot of, a lot of my mentors, people like Governor Madeline Cunin and Rachel Weston, who is a young legislator self, the only legislator in her 20s at the time. You know, they basically said to me, your student body president, the district is very young. So you represent over half of the people who live in the district. They just don't tend to vote because they're young and they're not registered. So I registered a couple thousand young people to vote, memorize the Freeman's Oath when you had to administer that. You know, when people were registering to vote now, you don't have to do that anymore. And I won by the largest margin of any challenger to incumbents in the state that year. That was 2008. It was another time when we needed hope and to feel like young people, you know, millennials at the time were the young people graduating college wanting to live on the cusp of change. Gen Z, stepping up, rising up, you know, that this is an important time to think about what your future looks like and take control, you know, get the torch, the torch passed to you respectfully, you know, but make sure that you're there to receive it with respect and with courage. No doubt. And like, wow, you was like a senior to 2008 at UVM. Isn't that something? And legislator, yes, exactly what we need and still need today because you voiced a lot of opinions and ideas and usually youth ideas and suggestions on how we can get better in the state of Vermont. And you've, I keep saying it because I can't think of, you do so much that my brain is like growing in circles right now. But was you registered 2000 students, man, to be registered to vote, you know, how important was that? You know, that was so important. Yeah, I mean, Bruce, you and I share a real passion for the voices of young people. You know, they, I always say they're not the future. They're the present. They're not going to inherit this country and this planet. We're borrowing it from them. So we have to be thinking, not like we're entitled to the present, but that we are here to take care of it for future generations and make sure that, you know, I often say to them, too, you don't give me hope because that means I'm sort of giving up and handing it over to you. You give me courage and you give me the courage to speak up and make space so that you have an easier time when you're leading. So, you know, as you can imagine, it's still really important to me to talk to young people, engage with young people, but importantly, too, they have their own agenda and their own needs in Vermont. And, you know, I read recently that young people, especially children, you know, when you look at the difference in how much money government gives to children versus seniors, in European countries it might be three times more money, three times more wealth and more benefit goes to seniors. In the United States it's about 30 times more. So, you know, it's important that we share resources with everyone, but it's really, really important that we recognize that children and young people are really underrepresented and they need housing, they need affordable higher education, they need safety, they need their rights secured, and they're highly underrepresented in government. Thank you for saying that. Well, one thing that I admire you so much, I've seen your growth for many years and you just keep getting smarter and smarter and more wisdom, you got your wisdom getting larger because all the incredible people you know and met in your mentors. But, you know, like everything works in divine order not before, you know what I'm saying, we already know that. And so, because of you, you know, like the inspiration you always empower you, if you always say, you know, when you started, you know, even today you said it, please look at me, you can do this too. And I'll help you, you know what I'm saying? How important is that for young people to hear high school and college age students and even graduates, you know, students, who have all this aspiration and ambitions to help want to change something in the world or Vermont or their community, right? For it's Chittenden, right? Chittenden County used to be the whole county and we cut the representation in half so that there's three senators in each chunk of the county, just because six, it was daunting for a lot of people to run, right, if you're a young person, that might be hard for you. And your district is, I mean, what's your neighborhood, what's that, you are, what district is that? So I'm Chittenden Southeast, we just made these districts in the last biennium of the legislature, the last from 2020 to 2022, so this was the first election that people elected separate senators in different parts of the county. My district is Burlington South End, South Burlington, and then most of what I would call the little towns in Chittenden County, the little compared to the rest of the state might not be so little, but, you know, Shelburne, Charla, Hinesburg, Richmond, Jericho, Underhill, so we kind of horseshoe around all the little towns in the county. I think it's really nice because then there's not just one community's voice that's heard, we go to all the little communities and connect with people. That's so important because since you said that, one or another thing I admire about you is that, you know, it's like our friend Senator Bernie Sanders, you know what I mean, we both work and I work for him for many years as a congressman, you know, when I see him here. And so we still, I still work with him mentally and whatever he's trying to do, I'll help him based on what I can do. But you, like him, he like you, will go, if you say such a such a person said something to you, Sally said this to me in our district and that we need to do this that another, you know, when you say that publicly, you mean it. You know what I'm saying? Because you really talk to Sally, you know what I'm saying? You ain't no joke. You know, okay, you be there, you travel around your community, you find out what the needs are, needs and assessments are, you come back and you work on them and that's how important is that. Guys, listen to the people who you serve, right? You serve them, they don't serve you, you know what I'm saying? So you gotta listen to them. Well, I think Bernie and President Obama, for example, they really modeled what it looks like to be effective because you have the people behind you. And so, you know, one way you can lead is by sheer force or by doing things in secrecy or whatever the case may be, but the best way to lead, the way that no one can argue with you is if you're co-governing with the people and you're hearing directly from them and you're saying, you know, I'm out there talking to majority people and this is what I'm hearing. That happened with housing this year. I chair the committee that deals with housing and everywhere you go, people would say, I'm, you know, I can't even find a place to rent. I'm living in a motel, you know, I'm struggling to find a place that I can buy. We have a family and we're outgrowing our space and, you know, we started this housing bill and we were working on it for six weeks, you know, non-stop and people kept saying, well, you still have to deal with other issues and then a poll came out and an opinion poll said, what's the number one issue in the state? And 39% of Vermont who said housing. The second top thing was like 12% or something. Everyone was saying housing. So, you know, it's like we knew that by intuition and by listening to people and then, you know, you get backed up by information down the road but you can't wait and put your finger to the wind to lead. You have to start the work and then, you know, lead where others can follow. And so, also, since you said you're talking about housing, I'm on Chinden County Planning Commission and I sit on the Board of Directors for Social Economics and Housing. And, of course, as housing, as you said, so much, wow, do we even have a place to build more housing? So, you voted on, did you, maybe you did vote on it. You wrote the bill. Yeah, you wrote that bill. The home bill. Right. So, did you guys vote to keep the hotels? Yes, yes. So, a lot has happened and I plan to do more communicating with the public and taking feedback to discuss these issues. You know, what can be frustrating and bear with me here is my committee deals with housing in terms of building the housing for people to live in. When someone doesn't have a home, that's the Human Services Committee. And I think for much of the session, we were both asking the administration what's going on, what do you need. And, you know, certainly my committee was hearing we need more housing to be built. That's what we did. We focused on every type of housing, senior housing. I mean, you have people in the motels who are on oxygen, who can't get out of bed. They need to be somewhere else and we need to make sure that they have that place to be a skilled nursing facility or assisted living. You know, we need more recovery housing where people are safe as they try to, you know, deal with substance use disorder. So, you know, we had all kinds of things we were hearing and we were trying to build that as fast as we could. What we weren't hearing is that there was no data and no plan for where these folks would go when they were exited. You know, some people say, oh, but other people were telling you, well, we try to trust the administration and all of a sudden it felt like the administration realized they didn't have a plan. You know, they didn't have shelters for people to go to. They didn't, they hadn't built the capacity up for emergency housing. And so we passed an emergency amendment during the veto session so that we could ensure, you know, people were able to stay who need the housing the most in the motels, keep the program alive until next April. Now, what I want to say is, you know, we're... That was for 700 people. That was for 700 people. No, this is for about 2,200 people. The number of people that were exited at 700, they were exited, you know, before we were able to get back into session. And, you know, we might not know a whole lot about them, but, you know, we tried to make sure that if you have kids, you can stay. If you have a disability, you can stay. If you're a senior, you can stay. Any vulnerable population. We have tried to make other options available for people who, frankly, you know, we're living in the motels for a long time and are still able-bodied. It might be a single person. There's a couple reasons I want to highlight this. I don't want to shy away from it. I know it's hard for people to swallow. We don't want anyone to be on the streets. But number one, it's about $150 a night to keep them in those motels. Those motels don't belong to us, you know. So if they're getting, you know, used up and there's a lot of wear and tear, you know, costing a lot for us to keep people in motels. We don't have infinite amounts of money. So we need to use that money to build permanent housing for people. So we couldn't keep paying, you know, millions and millions of dollars. The second thing I want to say is if someone's in a motel room, they're a finite resource and someone else can't get in a motel room. So if the motel is full in Chittenden County, then somebody else is sleeping in their car with their kids. And so, you know, we have to, that was happening a lot during the pandemic. We need to be able to keep some of those motel rooms available and open for people who are in a really bad situation. So that's using for tourism. So that's the other, that's the third thing, really. And you know, one thing I said on VPR recently was that one of the groups nobody was talking to was the motel owners, right? A lot of them are Indian community members. I see them at holiday events. And they have been housing providers, right? They have been knowing who can't get out of bed, who needs oxygen, who, you know, where they should consolidate people who have similar care needs. And so they've been trying to communicate to the state as well. Some of them have wanted to do a rent-to-own agreement. You know, we're not going to be able to turn this back into a tourism spot. So why don't, if you keep paying all this money, why don't you just buy it at some point? Many of them are ready to sell those buildings, and we've put aside millions and millions of dollars to buy those motels. The other thing is, you know, if they don't want to sell the motel and they want to do tourism again, they really can't do both at the same time. You know, you can't have people detoxing or, you know, people who need a high level of care right next to the family that's, you know, here to visit for the fall leaves. It's just not the same use, and it's really tough on their management to make that all work. So some of the motel owners have talked about consolidating people who need care into certain motels and then transferring those to the state. They have creative ideas, and we need to start listening by April. Okay. Is that 2024? Yes, April of 2024 is when, and even then, it's, there's off-ramps because these people all have to have somewhere to go. Everyone can be exited as long as we have a affordable option with their name on it because you do have a lot of people in the motels who are saying, I literally can pay rent. I just can't find a place to live in Vermont. That's what we're dealing with, and it's not going to happen without us transferring those resources to permanent housing and getting those regulations out of the way so we can build housing where we think we need it, which the Regional Planning Commission has been designating for us, you know, in core downtowns, in walkable communities. Yeah, well, it's tough because I'm, I thank you for working hard and you're in the building, working hard to keep individuals in safe places off the streets, I mean, where they can be with them for themselves and their family, you know. It's so important to the system. That's part of our systemic need. I mean, it's not like one of our systemic needs is not to be a billionaire, you know what I'm saying? But for, you need food, you need transportation, you need water, you need somewhere, you know, the safe place, right? That's systemically what we all need. I always say, you know, people care about the crisis in our democracy. They care about the crisis in our, can't really address those crises if they're having a crisis in their family or their personal life. You can only deal with one crisis at a time and the personal really consumes you. Yeah, no doubt. So let us say in April of 2024, that's how that's your amended, that term, right? And so for some dumb reason it fails, everything fails. So why are people going to go? What are they going to do? What are we going to do? It's going to be an influx of individuals in the woods, on the streets, you know, doing the best they can to survive, you know, in probably an unhealthy environment in, you know, where there's meeting their systemic needs and where are they going to go? What are they going to do? I mean, I don't think you can build no place from now to, like, you need a skyscraper travel, you know, to build a place where people can live, you know what I'm saying, for your timeline or something. You're right. Or I'll just add to what you're saying. Those motels, we want to buy them, but we also want to make sure that they're livable for people. A lot of them don't have kitchens. A lot of them, you know, people are living in a motel. That's not a great option for them either because they might have a whole family. No kitchen, no privacy. So we're trying to buy those motels and transfer them into permanent housing with kitchens, with partitions, as much as we can. So I hear exactly what you're saying. I'm not saying we can't fail. And we have created, like I said, a lot of contingencies, a lot of ways to say, if we are failing at this, you know, we are still keeping those folks housed at this expensive rate, which is not a great option for them either just because of the, like I said, the lack of privacy, the one-room motel. But we are keeping them housed. That's why the governor is now on the hook to move a little faster to get housing developed. And that's why the governor asked us to expedite the provisions of my bill as well. And what I will say is the provisions of my bill, the home bill, are also similar to what's happening all over the country. We are not alone in this housing and homelessness crisis. We, you know, and I'm not saying we shouldn't welcome them as Vermonters, but we do have people coming from other states. This is a regional crisis and a national crisis. And all of our states, especially in the north are figuring out that what we had for a long time was polite segregation. Was the idea that we would say, you know, if you build duplexes and fourplexes, then you invite those people into the neighborhood. Those people whose food smells different, who fixes their car in the driveway, who bring problems to our neighborhood. And those people I'm using in quotes to say that a lot of discrimination has happened when it comes to what starter housing looks like for people. Listen, I started in a duplex. The governor started in a duplex. Many Vermonters couldn't afford to live here if they didn't start with something that they owned where they could rent another piece out or have a family member live with them and another piece of their home. And now we're saying that housing is, you know, undesirable. So we've zoned it out of a lot of communities. Our bill, as of July 1, so four days ago, our bill made sure that you can create a duplex anywhere in Vermont by right. Anywhere that you can create a single family home, you can create a duplex. So ending discrimination against multi-family housing is something that's going to get housing built the way Vermonters want to see it. You know, cottages, duplexes, things that look like a barn as a fourplex, you know, they can look really nice. Exactly. But, you know, the rest of the country's doing the same thing. The same year we passed an end to single family zoning, so did Washington, Montana, New Hampshire, Maine. So every state is saying we haven't built enough housing and especially housing that the average person can afford as their first home. So in addition, we're creating first generation home buyer grants. We're doing all kinds of things to tackle the vast need for housing that people have. And like I said, I think one of the most critical forms of housing we need to create is senior housing. You know, Cathedral Square is right behind us. They have a waiting list of three years for people to get in. And those are people who've committed their life to Vermont. Folks who are on that waiting list want to get out of their huge homes that they can't afford to heat, that they can't afford to take care of their yard and get into assisted living. So those homes can be available to Vermont families. Well, across probably the world, individuals who come to a situation where they have to live in hotels are probably economically challenged. And I think that just, you know, some of the people who live in these hotels can just find a place, as you said. But economically challenged means that you have to live in a place that it could be in the woods or it could be any couch to couch, you know. And usually that tends to high risk. High risk, because that's what happens when you're in an economically challenged neighborhood. If you're living in the ghetto, guarantee you're going to see some gangsters, you're going to see drug dealers, you're going to hear some shootings, you know. So when you put, and I worked with these individuals for many years, and if you put people all together, there's economically challenged who's been living in these high risk environments, then how does that, what does that do? You got a lot of people in the same place. There's economically challenged that's coming from the woods in high risk environments. How's that going to work? Yeah, well Bruce, what you're doing is giving me the opportunity to go back and just say so that people know why I'm so passionate about this. You know, my family home was foreclosed when I was a kid. My sister struggles with bipolar disorder, and she was homeless for a while in Los Angeles. You know, just feeling, she just felt re-traumatized and unsafe at home and chose instead to live on the streets that was really painful for our family. You know, but of course what we wanted more than anything was for her to be safe. So, you know, many families have experienced housing insecurity, and the divide between whether or not you've experienced housing insecurity or not is so huge, and it's growing, right? Because if you own your home right now, you've basically won the lottery without doing very much. Home prices have never been higher, and they've never climbed as quickly as they have in this pandemic with the housing crisis we have. So, renters are now facing, you know, a higher and higher burden, and then all the rungs on the ladder get more and more stuck, you know. You can't afford a place to rent, you can't find a place to even get shelter, you can't find a motel room, you're on the streets, or, you know, gain new traumas you didn't have before. What you're talking about is congregate housing, which a lot of folks are moving away from. You know, big open shelter complexes, places where you don't have the dignity of a door you can close and lock, and maybe, you know, a window of your own. I mean, we're moving away from that type of housing where people are all mushed together in one big space. And what we need to do is let our housing ecosystem, our housing providers, do their work because they get it. No one's closer to the need and closer to the pain. You know, as you probably remember, earlier this year we had a young woman who was axed to death by someone in housing who, you know, I'm going to go ahead and guess is experiencing a lot of maybe trauma and delusional thinking, but, you know, ended up murdering someone else and is now on trial for that. And when you look at situations like that, we need to give the resources directly to those putting themselves in harm's way to try and provide housing to others and let them do their work. They are the ones asking for permit reform because they know that a majority of the community wants affordable housing, wants care rich, so, you know, service provision in those housing complexes. And then one neighbor can disagree with that and push that out of the way where people need it, push it out of downtowns, or they can, you know, stop the project altogether or make it a lot more expensive. So no one more than our housing provider said please get some of these permit, duplicative permit processes out of the way so we can afford to build more housing. And you look at, you know, the mayor talked about building a shelter in downtown Burlington, that should have happened years ago. We should already have a shelter in downtown Burlington. So part of our bill was that you can't regulate the hours or the timeline of those shelters. You might be able to, you know, make sure that they're professionally operated but you can't say it's pushed out of the neighborhood or it can't operate effectively at all because we're saying it can't operate for more than these hours. Wow. That's straight enough. So talking about the Elwood Street shelters, 35, I don't want to call it pods because people came to me and said that's a pod person. And that's pitiful. That's pitiful to call somebody a pod person because that's the way people were calling from upper levels were saying these pods they didn't want to call it like Burlington Elwood Street shelters. They was calling them pods too. And so I guess that's what the mayor put together. Him and his team put that together. That was their idea of using some of the federal funding to do that. And so for me and I told all of them you mayor and all of them CEDO and housing I didn't like the idea. I thought it was I almost said something but I but the reasons why for me, like you say all right first of all all these shelters over 30, 35 don't have outside to a unit that everybody got to use to use the bathroom, take a shower how safe is that first of all to me I don't like the idea and then another thing I don't like about it is that every place probably in the world like build projects you know I know all those tough projects I lived in a higher problem my cousin in the projects but anyways everybody in the world build these types of projects in the highest risk areas of the whole state the highest risk they started that project but you remember it was like the highest risk neighborhood old town states and king street and I don't know if it's still but they build right in the economically challenged high risk neighborhood right the first chance they got boom owner fed and then they spend 1.4 but temporary housing for three years all that work you gotta try to find something to keep it you can't build all that stuff and then not and drop it okay now we gotta pack up no way that's too much it's gonna cost you just as much to pack up but anyways my argument was my art so wonderful did the paintings on the shelters and we did that CETO asked us to do it but I agreed to do that because I wanted to make it feel like a whole place to live you know what I'm saying and that's why I did that I just want to make it feel like then I said to these people who central level people who got the you're a central level I'm a commissioner but who decided that we're gonna put these units out here I told them these individuals who are wonderful they went through some changes some situations they're coming from any housing but you know what they need some cognitive thinking they need to go over some thinking errors and patterns and what is conflict resolution how can we get better education so I said I wanted to bring my straight talk from my program which is about thinking errors and patterns conflict resolution, excitement, drug and alcohol evaluations and about how do you see yourself and how can we help you with our partners these people are coming in certain organizations you can sign up to go to housing you can sign up over sign up there's gotta be some commitment if you're gonna stay here you're gonna go through some thinking errors and patterns and help yourself with the thinking because you cannot change your thinking with the same thinking that puts you at risk you just can't do it you got new information to change I know that I got a degree in psychology and so they want to choose other people who know nothing about programs that I created thinking errors and patterns we all fall underneath them some people somebody said I never got arrested have you ever done a 40 and a 30 you broke the law you just didn't get caught you use some justification and even the police will minimize it you can probably do 40 but you can't do 45 they ain't got the thinking in the law say 30 so we all have used thinking errors and patterns there's a lot in what you're saying Bruce let me try to summarize number one those particular pods they were the hot new thing when CEDO and the city purchased them they might have been the only thing available in mass production but you've seen a lot of cities say this was not the right answer you look at Austin for example they have the old pods and white like you said they were trying to paint them trying to make them look like anything but a porta potty basically they are very unattractive and small and they don't work they came from California where we need something for cold weather so since then Austin right next to those pods has put these newer small modular homes that were designed by the Harvard Graduate School of Education they're colorful they're insulated and they're easy to put together yourself like you need two people and an Allen wrench you just need and what that alone does is give people agency because the other thing I hear you saying is there's been no agency in all of this there's no what do you like about where you live now in the woods and how do we recreate a place with nature a place where you can or maybe you want to be close to a certain community you know you want to be close to your favorite spot how do we understand why people are living where they are and how to recreate some of that agency in this different community then you know so I'm talking to a woman from Alaska she's really she's seen as a leader in creating what they call pallet shelters out there so that's another term another fancy term but they're basically building the shelters with the unhoused community and they're saying what do you want this to look like do you want a central gathering place do you want a pretty area to put your trash like if you give people agency and they've decided how they're going to keep themselves organized then you're much further along I'm thinking too we're right in battery park we had the battery park camp right we had an occupation of battery park and over time those folks who were here started to figure out okay we need some we need people to do trash pick up we need a meeting once a day you know where everyone gathers to talk about issues we need safety we need you know somebody had an AR-15 across from the encampment threatening people in the encampment because they didn't like you know racial justice conversation so that group had to evolve you know their what they did they had to get donations so that they had regular meals they did communal living that has some lessons in it you know and so we have to look at models that have worked that have given people shelter that's year-round and where they want to be or gives them some sense of well-being and that you know where they have some agency and they're given the tools they need to be successful and then you know services are available if they're ready for those but you know I come from Los Angeles originally where 75% of people who are unhoused are veterans they have PTSD they're really struggling with just living within four walls so you really have to go to the individual and make sure you're providing what they need we now have veteran based housing available in Winooski so you know it's really I think the governor said this I mean we've all said this we don't have so many homeless people unhoused people in Vermont that we can't wrap our arms around each one and figure out what they need and that also requires that we don't say we don't push them out of every neighborhood like you said but the ones that already have the most need and are most at risk and that's often what happens that's a total social justice issue yeah so you know Mayor Raul I like I like him a lot I know his whole family I like him on the personal side a lot of part of the business side I don't like a body you know what I'm saying and I let him know and so I said I met with him on February 24th or something and me and my equity manager and Nelson and I said to him I said you know I said you know this is you built this in the highest risk neighborhood and I said I can understand this is what you had because that's vacant parking parking lot or whatever and that's why you used it but I say the same thing I mentioned earlier that putting people high risk you know it's high risk when you're living in the woods it's not that you might be doing some high risk but it's high risk you're living down there because you can attack by a rabid raccoon or something you know what I'm saying it's high risk well and remember they bulldozed Sears Lane this property that was in a wealthier part of town you know that where people had been living where they had found you know that they were kind of left alone and they were close to nature so you know they did physically move where they said people could stay and live and I think that's where you get into conversations about you know the right to exist where you like and one of our basic goals in Vermont our principles is that you know in the local state when people can live in dignity where they prefer and you know that's the core of a lot of intersections of environmental and social justice you know Vermont is a beautiful place and everyone should have access to what makes it beautiful so one of the things I said to the mayor about the shelters on Elmwood Street was that wonderful individuals that are still living in high risk ways or new thinking or help ways to get out of betterment you know like the work you do and I said you know and then you move them in the high risk neighborhood and I said you know and then downtown City Hall Park they do all the shootings down that's all high risk they live in these right there all those shootings high risk sure enough they had some situation where the police had to be called up to those shelters and some lady got knocked over in her wheelchair in the head over camera that's another thing happening you know and so you know you know it's going to happen you know what I'm saying that's just going to happen they already moved in the high risk neighborhood to figure that people were shooting all downtown right in that area from City Hall Park right in that area and so I think what you're pointing to is that our housing provider a shambling housing trust Vermont Housing Conservation Board Cathedral Square what everyone's been saying is you can't just give us money to build and send mortar you have to give us the resources to have social workers in there to have the staff that can help with trauma informed care you know Harbor Place is a great example now there's going to be hundreds of units just a half a mile from where I live in Shelburne for people to have their own individual space that's a lot of people in one place on a transportation corridor who probably need help making sure they have the economic tools and the healthcare tools to stay where they want to be and in the situation that they want to be in and Shamblin Housing Trust our housing providers none of them can do it without the adequate amount of staff one of the things we did in our budget as well is increased pay for mental health care workers these are co-existing I mean my bias is housing that's the committee I chair and so you can't do anything without housing but you can't help someone keep their housing unless they have health care and that includes mental health care and so we have really tried to look piece by piece in the budget at how we make sure that it's not just housing we're providing people but a helping hand somebody to extend their hand and say I'm here to make sure you're able to keep this housing and break any cycles that are going to affect your kids no doubt about it you always did have the plan execution is the thing you got to go to what you know for a fact is common sense and you got to go to all what you got to go to for some common sense it's like regular if you're an American you got to know what your ABC's and 1, 2, 3 and that's how basic you are saying this common sense stuff why do we have to go and these people are using the biggest words they can for common swerve for elementary school type we don't have to explain it to them like you're a scientist you can say we need to build more housing because these many hundreds of people a thousand are homeless I mean how simple is that I mean so one thing I have to remind myself all the time is that the two times that we've had the greatest income equality so the greatest equality among people and their well-being was after the black plague and World War II and I say that not to be a downer great upheaval and great crises unfortunately because of human nature are often what it takes for us to rebalance and remember our common sense you know not over complicate things not you know just make things more difficult than they need to be and put hurdles in people's way to have what they need and the pandemic has been you know one of those types of events it I mean frankly we should all stop and remember this was you know and still is an unfolding painful event for people some people and then you got to work from home and then you spend time with your kids or your dog but for a lot of people they lost a loved one they were sick themselves they're still dealing with the trauma of that and they're just too tired for us to run in circles they need us to engage in common sense thinking and so you know we I hate that we have these crises I hate that we have this immense loss but sometimes all you can do in that is try to make sure you're out of it you're stronger you have more common sense at the helm and I think that's what we did in the legislature this year is you know just say where is the money needed most put the money there Wow so so another thing too is like after the Floyd death and you put on that incredible event and thank you for letting our arts are wonderful be a part of it so after this death you know for some reason for some reasons you know I've been fighting for for since we know each other is we've been fighting for diversity, equity and inclusion justice diversity, equity and inclusion we've been fighting for that forever being people of color we've been fighting for BIPOC POC other individuals you know what I'm saying we've been fighting for that for years now all of a sudden across the world people need racial equity managers you know why is that? now all of a sudden it's about racial equity it's all about let's all sit in the back room or come out of the back room sit in the front room and make decisions together was this not happening I sit on so much stuff it's still the same way they just got policies and procedures written in there who they are about us and we hired an equity director oh yeah two of them the black ones that was here resigned you know Winnieski and Burlington they resigned why could they say they didn't have enough leadership from the higher up their mayors actually and so I hear you please I'm trying to say the good words so what this is reminding me of is something Taisha Green did one one time you know I'm trying to remember it was summer or something but you know at some point Taisha and her racial equity inclusion and belonging team in Burlington did an event just for people of color it was on zoom because it was early in the pandemic it was in the same year that George Floyd was murdered and instead of just us all sitting around and saying what can we do and how do we make ourselves feel comfortable again you know she went to people of color and said what are you looking for, what do you need it was really well facilitated and what even surprised me because you've heard me say over and over again we need representation we need more people of color in office we need people in leadership roles we need to just have critical mass of people of color in decision making capacity I thought that was my bias because that's what I do you know I thought people would say you know teen center or you know they want all those things but what came out of the meeting was the top vote getter for everything was we can't have these things until we are represented everywhere that decisions are made in big enough numbers that we don't have to put ourselves out you know on a limb in order to say something important and difficult for people to hear and so you know we still haven't achieved that even an isolated person in a role that's impossible for them to achieve success in and then wondered why they're having a breakdown or why they're not meeting the metrics that someone created so people are leaving those roles and those roles are being seen as potentially unsuccessful and I you know well I haven't changed what I've said either probably like you which is you can have that role but you can't put all of the work on that role if you see that person as the one who comes and let you go back to not thinking about equity not thinking about your own complicit way of trying to be comfortable again and not do the hard work then you are setting that person up to fail so that's what has happened in a lot of these contexts is people have been put in positions where they've been set up to fail and I almost want to create some kind of checklist where an organization has to say like here's the work we've done to get ready because we've done some of the work so they can feel a little safer when they come into this role because otherwise they're not even going to get people of color in any job and I keep trying to remind people we have a workforce shortage we have a workforce crisis essentially everywhere from you can't get a bagel now at the same hours because no one's working we don't have enough surgeons and who are those folks? they're people of color 90% of the population growth in Vermont coming into the state is people of color in the workplace you don't have a workforce so this is a selfish reason you need to get it together but you also need to do the work so that you're not setting someone up to fail and harming them and I, you know that's all the work I do is anti-racism and youth stuff I'm on the commissioner for human rights commission and other things but you know I knew it was for a fact when I came to Vermont it was the whitest state in America in 1989 when I got here and you cannot change about how things are done if you don't listen to both sides if I'm an equity director or manager or whatever I'm in the area you hire me as a company I just can't have a black I'm just like you all my staff is black people and so when I sit in my boardroom or my staff room when we talk about issues and concerns and then my team come up with you know what I'm saying is that disparities or you really don't know what white people think this is what black people think but you know you need some white people on your team too when you're doing racial justice right and equity because you know I know you've been through all these discussions before you're a white person you know you made me feel uncomfortable I feel stereotype when you say this and they say damn I didn't know that made you that's something my grandmother used to say and so yeah because this is just that because my grandma taught me just that and then white people say well you know you guys really I'm scared you make me feel this this way that way and so together they can come up with a real good answer you just can't it's the same damn thing if you got everybody's black on your team and you're making it in the white state in America and you're making a decision how things can get better white people you know how we can make live together better whatever the hell it is whatever you're trying to do you got to have white and black on your team you have to if you want real answers or you're just doing the same thing the white people have been doing for years and they just make their decisions on their own based on what they think and how are you going to think about how I feel and you know how you're going to make a decision how to get better with white people if you don't have to think if you don't hear what they think I mean I often often find myself returning stop harming us as black people and people of color he was saying what does it look like when you know our whole life isn't defined by this conflict and his vision of the beloved community reminds me of this quote that I've quoted in an article about the mayor frankly which is you know the absence of tension is not the same thing as the presence of peace and so often people say oh we want to you know remove this person or have this space only so that there's less tension that's not the same as us all being together and recognizing what do we need to be able to communicate in nonviolent ways and be in relationship in nonviolent ways and so much of this country was built on violence and subjugation of enslaved black people and indigenous people who were erased that you have to acknowledge that violence to begin to have a conversation that is truly rooted in peace and so we need a beloved community that means everybody diversity makes us stronger it's what makes this country great I used James Baldwin's quote yesterday for 4th of July I love America more than any other country in this world and it's for exactly this reason that I can criticize her we need to be critical and that doesn't mean we don't love someone or love this country and in fact the only thing that will make this country great is if we truly can achieve that beloved community and the closer we get the more there are people who get angry and uncomfortable who want to roll back progress so what we have to do like you're saying is just keep approaching people with love and a commitment to stay in conversation and in relationship so before we go before we go what else is there to say we gotta talk about Mira so here's the mic so there's some change with you you got a baby and every time I see you for the 15 years we've known each other oh this is a big deal it is a big deal here's Mira here's Mira sleeping peacefully she has been the whole show and that says a lot about me winning the baby lottery she's just a really good sweet little baby there's no bad babies in the world they're good like that she is traveling with me all over the state she's been to dairy farms she's been to the White House she is experiencing what I'm experiencing we went to a symphony concert last night at Shelburne Museum and she's first of all just reminding me what I'm fighting for but she's also reminding me what I'm living for that I want her to enjoy the culture of Vermont the kindness of everyone she's experienced so much of that from the day I got to the hospital people just looking out for me asking how I'm doing to just showering her with affection and good wishes she's a lucky baby we're lucky to live in Vermont and I just love her I love her more than anything so you got any last things you want to say senator how much I appreciate you bruce I just appreciate you because art shouldn't just be for some and you make it available for everyone feeling good about your contributions shouldn't just be for some it should be for everyone everyone deserves a second chance and a third chance and you make that available for our young people so they don't think of themselves as bad kids or bad people what you do is incredible in the community bruce I think you said just I appreciate it I've inherited a better Vermont because of you and it's always a privilege to talk to you thank you so much senator realms hensdale I got to ask the last name too how long have I been married that's a great question it's been two years in august I got you well congratulations I met your husband he's a nice guy definitely a man who's definitely daddy's girl he knew how to handle her I saw him grab his girl he went out with her outside and started crying and he was out there and he was talking and he came back in he was out there alone boom she was quiet and all cool cool calm and collective well so thank you for tuning in to our show today straight off of my show I'm bruce wilson and we'll see you on the next show