 Just in time for the cold front. I'm Phillip Ingram and I am the Voter Services Director for the League of Voters San Antonio Area. I would like to thank some people for helping to put this together today. May I share, please give a hand. Is the President of the Library of Congress Association. Charlotte Ingram. We have now cast S.A. here today who is going to be taping and then by Monday it will be up on their YouTube site. So if you know anybody who wanted to be here but couldn't they can see it that way. I would also like to thank Connect's IT and Networking for providing the sound system this morning. And the format was mailed out in advance to the candidates. They have agreed not to address comments to or about each other. All questions will come from the moderator who will be made. And they'll be written three by five hours. There are some in the back of the room. So if you'd like one just raise your hand and she'll bring it to you. I'd like to introduce Steve Ingram with the League of Women Voters who will be the timekeeper today. And Jean Aratenji with the League of Women Voters who will be sorting questions. And we don't sort to eliminate questions, we sort to eliminate duplications. So if your question has already been asked in one form or another they probably won't be repeated. So with that let me introduce the candidates that we have here with us today. All but two candidates have agreed to be here. And one is not here yet or two are not here yet. So we'll start with John Courage, Dr. David Cullen, Patty Gibbons, Nat Pina, Marco Boros. I think you've done a great job here. Mr. Bondon had indicated that he would be here if he's not here yet. Dr. Bert Ciccione, and last but not least, Barbara Martinez-Dermot. So we are going to start with a two-minute opening statement. When the speaker has 20 seconds remaining Steve will hold up a yellow folder to let them know that. And when their time has expired he will hold up a red folder. And I would ask that you be mindful of that so that we can get in as many questions as possible. So, this isn't going to be any challenge. The position of city council person in the non-partisan office. How can you separate your personal politics from the office and you ought to convince Grail for my grades. Yes, we'll start with two-minute opening statements. We'll start with Mr. Courage. I'm really pleased to see the legal component voters do this in districts all around San Antonio. I think they have. Thank you. I believe they have a great reputation at trying to help educate voters about the races that are going on. For those of you who don't know me, again my name is John Courage. I'm a 20-year resident of San Antonio District 9 over 40 years in San Antonio. I'm an Air Force veteran. I've been teaching for the last 27 years. I teach at Little Flower Capital School for years. I'm married and I have four grown children and they're all up with different things today. I have four grandchildren. Hopefully they're in from the cold. And I've been involved in San Antonio and involved in community activities all the years I've been here. I was elected to the Allen Community College this week for trustees and served there. It was on the committee that decided to build the first college on the south side of San Antonio Palo Alto College. I also served on the San Antonio Literacy Commission. As a teacher for many years I served on San Antonio Teachers Council Board. I've been involved in my community from being a referee, a softball, a baseball and basketball games to being a Boy Scout leader, to being a youth group leader at my church. And so to me community is everything. What I've done over the last few months is ask people in our district what they think are the important issues. Why they want to have somebody represent them who understands those issues. And so I believe I can do that as your name on the set of Just City Council. Thank you. I'm Dr. David Boyd and I'd also like to thank the women voters for inviting us here today and inviting you all and I'd like to thank you for your participation in our democratic process. I'm a native San Antonio born and raised here at MacArthur High School. I'm married to my wife Debbie who is here. We've been married for 40 years and have five sons. I am an Army veteran. I retired from Army after 20 years of active duty and 10 years that was her. I was a charm surgeon and a heart and lung surgeon in the Army Chief of Cardiothoracic Surgery and the Army Medical Center for many years. I'm also an engineer and have a background in bioengineering and research in that area. I've been an educator as well. My background for public office is I've been serving the community as a military officer for most of my life. I've served as a Brigadier General of the Texas State Guard. I've been involved in disaster management and planning out for San Antonio and South Texas and for the entire state of Texas. And I had earlier my life of a scholarship to the Kennedy School of Development at Harvard University and I have a Master's in Public Administration degree which has stimulated my interest in running for office and continuing to serve you on the Senate and the City Council. I believe that I bring a unique background to the City Council. It would be important that a city whose number one industry is healthcare and biotech and whose number two industry is the military. And I hope that you'll consider me for this important office. Thank you very much. Will that after condoing get speeded? I think we'll continue on with our two-minute openings. Ms. Gibbons. Good morning. I'm going to thank you for having me once here. But I do appreciate the breeze. I think it's a more mild, less look. I'm Patty Gibbons and I'm running for City Council here at District 9. I'm the President and CEO of Gibbons Surveying and Mapping, a land-surveying land development company. We've been in business here in San Antonio since 1991. Along with my husband, Gary, he's had nine of them married for 38 years. We have six children and seven grandchildren. My children are all grown and gone. Land development is big in San Antonio. If you think about it, we develop just about everything in the city. Sidewalks, curbs, streets, sewers, drainage ditches. Besides developing subdivisions like this. Multi-faceted subdivision, multi-use subdivisions. The city is always thinking big. And it's thinking about growing right now. So that means that I would like to bring to City Council the knowledge that we have learned over the last 26 years of how this development happened. What are the processes that it goes through? It goes down to the city councils where it gets improved. But behind the scenes, when it goes to city staff, where it gets reviewed. And how does it get reviewed? How does it get out here and get executed? Where are the politics behind that? Why do we center ourselves? Why are you tearing up my road when we just paint the road? Why are you saying to yourselves, why did they put the street there and not over here? And those are the things that happen behind the scenes that I'm very, very familiar with. And I want to bring that to City Council. How to facilitate our developments smartly, wisely, and keep the big thought in mind as well. I'm going to give this a thank you. My name's Matthew Hinton. I'm a long-term resident of District 9. In fact, I was raised here. So my elementary, middle, high school, they're all here at District 9. I'm a firefighter out of that. I think I definitely represent the values that this community has to hold. And I work hard. I've got my BAA in Social Science, and I definitely understand a little bit about policy. I think at this point, I can teach it that I should be able to do it, at least at a professional level. You know, I've worked with the East Asia Institute. That's something a lot of people talk about. I wanted to stand during the sister city. It was pretty multi-Japan. So I thought, let's bring them here and let them learn to love this city the way I have. I know the way you do. But I'll put it this way. This might have been... I'm never enough proud to be a member of this community that I am standing against these candidates. This has been quite an experience. I am more impressed because I wish a lot of our candidates would be spread out throughout the city instead of just living in this planned area. Actually, that is one thing I'd like to change. I would actually like to change the fact that I believe that we actually need more council seats. And it's because our voice goes unheard many times. In fact, our district is quite conservative and most of the times we're one of two or three votes on the city council. That happens, you know, and we ask ourselves, you know, what can we do? Especially at the city level, it's up. It's not about...it shouldn't be about politics. It shouldn't be more about money or what's going on. But it gets brought in there anyways. See, and that's where I think my strongest standpoint is because I definitely understand about how we can do a fair policy that treats everyone with respect and honor. And that's something that I want to pass on to you guys. Thank you. Good morning. My name is Michael Bowers. I appreciate the invitation, fellas, and the league and the neighbors. Looking about myself, I'm the resident of District Time for the past 30 years. I'm both of my sons are now grown. My wife and I have been involved in community commitment here. We are involved in many aspects of the community. I've been serving on many city boards and commissions for the past 20 years over seven boards. The last board that I've still been involved is the Vice Chair for the San Antonio Airport, Vice Commission. So my focus is to improve the airline service to San Antonio, too, from San Antonio. So, being in District 9 for 30 years, I'm very familiar with the challenges, the streets, drainage, water, traffic, and public safety. Through the...my... I will talk about this, but one of my priorities is I have worked on public safety for many, many years. In my personal role of executive director for an organization, I've worked for 225 different companies. And one of the things I do every single day with restaurants and hotels, it's about safety, public safety, and I work for the San Antonio Police Department very, very close. In talking to a lot of neighborhood associations over 20 and so the residents with about 4,000 residents in District 9, public safety is the number one issue. We're ensuring police officers right now about 225, 240 defend who you ask. So we do have insurance both in the Fire Department, the Police Officer, and those are the things that we really need to face. So I know we'll talk more about this, but much about us. Thank you for attending this morning. You're welcome. My name is Patrick Bondo. My wife and I are happy. I'm at Texas A&M University in both class of 1992. My wife is from San Antonio, Churchill, class of 2008. I'm a fifth generation native Texan and proud to have as we celebrated the battle of San Jacinto yesterday and I muster my relative who was actually a physician in Gaulia who was taken from Gaulia to San Jacinto in slight despair and to work and help both sides of the Mexican Army and Texans to be healed. And so it was an important day in our Texas history the freedoms we enjoy today. We owe it to those people who fought and died for our freedoms and a great day to remember them. As I said, my wife and I met at Texas A&M University and after dating for a little bit we married in 1996 and moved to San Antonio in January of 1997 and we lived in the same area since. We've been blessed with nine children and so we have our own little city council. And I'm not sure who the mayor is but my wife would like to thank she's the mayor but I think my teenagers would like to take over. And in doing that I've been a financial planner for over 20 years and we're going to be a financial planner when we bring financial signs for our clients for A&M fee. One of the things that we've done I'm sorry I didn't get here with it today we created a, we went back and looked at the city budget since 1977. And up until 84 we had a balanced budget and until 84 we took part in that budget again findings here a budget in 2005 we had a huge tax burden rate acceleration. And if we pass the bond package in total it will put us on trajectory to surpass our total assets within the next 20 years in particular. So very concerned with the nature's perspective on what our city can do A&M County go forward. So Patrick Bondon, vote Patrick Ottow for more information, thank you for your attention. First of all it is great to be with you on a warm and sanatomial way that's to say anticipate. It's very reasonable in fact that it was kind of on chemical and I've been in business for about 25 years making titanium castings in plastic replacement teeth. I'd rather talk about myself or I'd rather talk about four issues that I think are very important for the city. Nine. Other than the budget. First is the king traffic moving. Often you think that any king traffic moving is to build more roads to get more cars showing better to begin to lay the groundwork of how we're going to keep the traffic moving that we have today. If we did it a couple of possible ways that we can begin is we can make Highway 130 that total road that goes from speed to Austin and nobody takes we can make it a designated truck route of which it's no toll for the truckers. We give them an offer that they can't pass up before some of my ancestors and we also know that the buses still most of the buses out here are rather empty and we can give our senior citizens and students the advantage to generate ridership and might look with bodies in those buses in those seats that you want on the city. Another important issue is that the service of the buses is helping safely and we on City Council create the policies that can directly affect public safety such as we should have a policy where we're going to fully stop our police officers and that will have a great impact for all of our neighborhoods off of the city and positively on that. Another issue that's very important for District 9 is we need to increase our number of districts. In 1951 when our charter was passed we were sitting about 400,000 and we covered less than 100 square miles and now we're four times larger and we still have only 10 districts. And one of the ones that we want to make is that we have too many elections if we were to consolidate that if we were to move our city elections from five to even numbers we would save about 1.2 million every other year and that very far is up and I have to stop because I almost just knew Thank you for your warm welcome this morning and I'd like to thank Phyllis for inviting me and of course thank you for coming out on this great day. I've just had a great day when everybody that is like-minded and civic-minded presents so that they can hear what we have to offer or say or promise I think that there is a level of sometimes a doubt of things that we say and to hear it to look at you in the eye and promise you something is very important it's important to you it's important to me to be authentic. My name is Sandra Morton and I'm the mom of my one kiddo who's my teen he's just a new baby and my son who's nine doesn't know what the baby is he just thinks it's a color at this point so he does circle with something called ospergers now it's on the autism spectrum he's just really intelligent so if you tell him like I fired my nanny he's like oh my god you set our nanny on fire but it's very liberal anyway so I was born and raised here in San Antonio my years were in France from Mexico we just loved to operate at the 90 custom anesthesia they were able to become 60 this great nation and I was able to educate myself I say myself because I'm here to see the money and so I went to UTSA I went to see Mary's and I currently hold a license and marriage and then a therapy for licensed professional cancer and also I committed a pharmacy cancer there are many issues that are very crossing and I do not want to take it any more time I think that we're going to get into the rest of the things here shortly so I do ask come with me for your vote and again my name is Sandra Martinez speaker thank you I apologize to all of you who don't have blankets so let me start our first question with Dr. Cullen so as a physician a city councilman as a non-partisan office how can you separate your personal politics from the office to represent all constituents even those who you may not agree with on a specific issue any examples of doing some of your past experiments for the next question first of all it's very easy for me to do that as a military officer my entire career has been spent being completely non-partisan and able to and that is an important part in one of the characteristics of our military that separate the United States military from those of dictatorships around the world so I am happy to be able to say that that would be an easy thing for me to do I said and plenty of I said I grew up here as a non-tradition of non-partisan city governments starting with a good government and when I grew up there were no Democrats or Republicans running for city office and in fact I think that's a great thing and it's the way it's supposed to be two previous recent mayors there Cisneros and there Castro have changed that and have injected partisan politics into the city health and their ambitions have run for thank you doctor Cisnero thank you doctor Cisneros I neglected to say at the start of this these answers are now long and long okay you know when you're a mother you and both six children are a large family you have to watch your politics you have to be sure and some are going to go this way and some are going to go that way when you're in business and you work with other clients there are they too have their own such a politics so I've always been one to be open minded always been one to listen to the other side bring it to the table I'm a leadership where I like a lot of voices at the table whenever I'm in committees or chair committee I like large committees because we get multiple voices I think when you go you will only hear the you only hear the small part and that's something about but I like large committees I like to hear a lot of outside voices not in the head okay how do you celebrate well here's the good thing for me it's out you know it's part of me understanding politics is our city for me one of my what that means is that it's not my voice it's a representative that matters it's yours at the end of the day it's your voice that matters and see what you do here is that you have to have somebody in office that's willing to facilitate great roles that can actually make their voices more because we know that eventually you end up with someone in power who ends up being a decision that you just it's not listening to the community at all and that's a part about understanding the roles how to change them and that's what's so great about having that good understanding is that I know I can facilitate those things for you guys thank you very good question by the way I've been doing this for 20 years so I've been experienced about working with all 10 council members in different projects in the city the best that somebody can give you the council in my mind although they some of the missions are based at closer to the districts 3, 4 and 5 I've worked on the world characters designation with the 12 different organizations I've brought them all together and the key to all this is working together in partnerships so we all benefit when we work together because remember you have to have six roles in city council to pass any city ordinance so you really have to create those alliances thoroughly and work with all the 10 districts so as one of my advisors told me years ago there are things that are politics and opinionable and political and things that are intrinsic and so once are the decisions we can make we have to represent the citizens of district 9 because there are things that cannot be the district 9 has to pass the other part that are the gear and gear that are intrinsic above politics and and then there's those things and we can determine what's good for the city I'm the only one of the candidates here who has actually passed an ordinance in December 17, 2015 there was a highly politically sensitive issue or maybe for a circuit center we've been next door to dream all states and they have a 2040 backup and seven votes and one of those set the four across the aisle and to to help protect residential neighborhoods so that you wouldn't have majoring since used businesses move in next door that would hotly would impact and devastate the local community thank you very much that's right I'd like it better when you're standing up and walk the wind why why criteria on city housing would be very simple first we want to know what is best for it through the citizens of the district line and what is second what is best for the city and that is what I would go on regardless of what my personal opinions may be or the personal opinions of any of the colleagues very good questions I am so fortunate that I took a great course took a couple of days to naturally be certified and what I am is a core women a mitigator between parents their acronyms and what their best about and those are very challenging and if I could be five years of that I am definitely good at or the skill set that I bring to the table has more to do with meeting and bringing people together I also am very fortunate to be a woman and I have something called a conversation that some people may have that is not beneficial for our community they just make a target for their own pockets and so one my friend they say the Jewish in very very large parties and thank you for this great question it's it's a it's a question I I do think it's good I've been there many months I've taught thousands of people thousands of homes and once in a while I have someone say well you're a Democratic Republican what is it and this is what I'm telling people before I answer that question let me ask you a question is there a conservative of filling the pop hole in their street or replacing the light at the corner. And most people realize they're really business. I've been asking people what their concerns are because I want to be your neighbor on the city council who understands the concerns in your neighborhood and in our district and will respond to those, not to special interests or particular interests. I believe I can work with any mayor. I believe I can work with any city council person. We have to work together. We need to collaborate. We need to work together because I also believe this. A city council member for any district is truly a city council member for the whole city because the decisions that are made by city council affect the lives of everybody in San Antonio. Thank you. Next question with Patty Evans. Do you know of any plans for the expansion, widening of 16 and 4? What initiatives would you support to ease traffic in the stretch of 281, 16 and 4 to IH 10 and 16 and 4? 21 just had its groundbreaking ceremony for its new expansion. Yay! I don't know how many were here about 15 years ago. We were talking about the 281 expansion and then we did not have the tolls and we sat aside for 15 years. And I think it was a disservice to this district for what they did. But that's going to start here. It will take about 30, 40, 40 months. However, the company will be developing that. And I think that opens up district 9 to a lot of opportunities. Once that's 12, 9, 9, 8, it's built, I think it opens it up to 16 and 4. When that's built up, we're going to see some changes here in district 9. And it's going to affect our neighborhoods and affect us as well. Our lifestyle is generally development of this size does. So I want to be there to help facilitate it through in a timely way but help our neighborhoods stay connected and stay strong. Don't lose who you are because this development is spoiling around you. Okay, for me, the roads are always going to have problems. In fact, the city is growing exponentially. The real issue here is not whether we have roads, it's our economic policies. Right now, the city has even tried to incentivize people for how many, you know, staggering businesses to open up a different kind. So what can we do to get people to work more closer at home, things along these lines? It's a bigger picture you have to look at. And yes, we can try to solve the roads, and why not? Or we can grow a monorail system, but it's never going to solve the problem. It's the end of the day. What you need is somebody who has the ability to work and start businesses and be going home. It's something that we do not do anymore. Before you say anything, why don't I want that? But think about the companies that have started, Microsoft, Apple, all those things started in the garage. People really were able to facilitate, communicate, and work together, especially very smart children, like what we have here at District 9. That's what they did. That's how we innovate as a community. And that's how we resolve that problem. The good news is that the funding for 2160.04 is there for the connectors and for five overpasses all the way through TBC. So all we've got to do right now is vacation for about almost three years for the construction. The challenge is going to be, like Phil said, how are we going to get funding for the rest of 16.04 and all that? I don't know if many of you know that the only funding that the Texas Department of Transportation gets out of the 38 cents that you pay for every time you buy gas, 20 cents so that goes to the federal government for other projects outside of the state. And the state of Texas only keeps 18 cents. So somehow we've got to figure out with all of you here in this room eventually to figure out how to increase the funding out of the gas tax so that we can complete all these projects on 16.04 and 19 and 151. Well, as you live out here, you experience the traffic every day. And as I was at the clear lanes press conference with Governor Abbott a few Fridays ago and when he made a comment four years prior and he was out there and it was pretty sad. A sad day for Texas when a man in a wheelchair could do fast traffic and very humbly on his part. And to say that and how true it is, and we find out on 16.04 every day, with the expansion of the 16.04 timing and planned, we need to make sure we think further and not just have those passes, but we need to make sure we have Texas turn around, we need to make sure we have new turns. We need to make sure we have right turn lanes. We need to make sure that while we have heritage going down 16.04, we need places where police can still turn around and pursue people that they need to pursue. And so those varities in the middle of 16.04 are great to help protect traffic at the same time we need police to help get through. One thing to do is we've never told a tax lane that 16.04 has been paid for. We've never done that and we need to stay in the state where it's not cold. Thank you, President. Just short term, we need to keep our traffic moving because all those who don't move on concrete alone can't build no roads and no roads. We think that will solve your traffic problems in the moment until you solve your immediate problems and finally make the traffic moving. And long term, I think perhaps at District 9, I think at 16.04, it would be perfect for the feasibility of being able to connect Keepner with 410 in the south and place them on the park. We need a lot of traffic after 16.04. We're just going to stop for 410 to message you because it's the only other east-west foodway going from 35 to be short-term planning and long-term planning. A good question and a question that we've been through across this district, during the long road that's been up and down of this great election. I will say this. It's going to take teamwork. I used to think that you're trying to stick in some of the COA in downtown. All the way because there's not a whole lot going on around and it seems like all the money is at this time we're actually going to stick together. I think it required our teamwork. Not only by the city, also, we have commissioners for it. We've got legislators. We've got Congress. And we need someone that is able to have those much-needed skill sets to be able to have those afforded lines for coalitions so that we can better our roads. So it starts with the leadership of the individual that is going to represent you in city council. That's why I still ask you for your vote. It is important and important very much. I think the next city council person needs to make sure that we're involved with traffic planning by being part of the Metropolitan Planning Organization and the Regional Mobility Agency. Both of those are very involved in getting the funds necessary to improve our roads. We need to widen 16.04. We need to put some high-accuracy vehicle lanes on 16.04 which will allow people with more people in it to get in those lanes, but also will allow our bus transportation to expand and put express buses around, which will give opportunities for people to travel more. We need to really get behind it through the vehicle. We want to have the kind of service that you can take to go downtown or to go from one part of the town to the other. And the city has neglected the over the last 20 years. So I think that's another important part. Also, we just need to go ahead and stop the tremendous growth all over the North Side that's adding so much. We need to have smart planning where we have more development in other areas of town where there's better transportation facilities available roads that aren't being used. That's a long-term plan. A short-term help with MDO and R&M. I've got to say, I completely agree with what John has just said. The city council puts the numbers of eight-year burden eased to the better quality of planning organization. Despite community opposition, they keep coming back with the same recommendation hoping and hoping that they will put total lanes first on 281, which we've now defeated and now on Lou 1604. Total lanes will not solve the problem for several reasons. Number one is people don't want to use them. We're just talking about the fact that we have this billion-dollar road going from Sigeem to Austin. If you ever driven on it, there are almost no vehicles on it. Yet Interstate 35 remains congested. So it's a huge amount of money that has been wasted. Secondly, it is unfair. Why should people in one part of town pay tolls who have worked, schooled, or shopping and people who pay the same gasoline tax which is supposed to go for road construction and maintenance? Pay no tolls. Increase the gasoline tax if necessary and build more free lanes on 1604. Okay, next question. We will start with Nafpenia. Will you fight to protect the San Antonio ordinance for prohibiting discrimination against LGBT people? So for two years, my advice was once, I do not think government should be making rules or regulations for businesses or people in general. That's when it stands on it. It's very much a nonpartisan stance because they put this bill as a way to both see their control of what the public does and control what businesses do. I think people are better at solving that issue and setting up their own rules and their own stores. They're just better at it. If you have somebody who doesn't like the LVG community inside their store, well, that's up to them. If you want somebody who's the opposite wants them in the store, that should be up to them. That's what it means to be nonpartisan. That's what it means to make it fair. That also means to make sure to protect the businesses that are there as well. I have a feeling that this CDO ordinance, like many others, we're going to come back with a fall again. But I can tell you personally, I would probably favor a non-discrimination CDO ordinance. I think that we need to treat all of the cities in the same way, man-to-man movement. Every human being deserves to be treated with a legal respect in particular. In baseline, city government in any form of any community is duty-bound and responsible for protecting the family. And so it's important that we make sure that in enacting laws that in major city ordinances like that we take to the will of people. And to do that, I personally worked against the non-discrimination ordinance for numerous reasons that I don't have time to explain here today. But one of those things is government has a cleanness to help support and uphold marriage between one man and one, hopefully to life. And it produces a family and has a group so that we have a future. Without that, we do not have a future. But every person needs to be treated and protected and respected and have dignity to live life and get on government interference. But however it goes about, dealing with that needs to be done very carefully. Thank you. I think that we all of our citizens need to be treated with respect and be under the law. Thank you. Hello, I'm a woman of faith. And so the God that I know doesn't discriminate. He loves everyone the same. And as a small business owner, it would hurt me financially to have to hear some of these laws. We'll see what happens down the line with the Texas legislature. There was a bill and the bill is still morphing or amendments are being pushed. Still so. Until that happens in the city council convention and other than that, I will say that everyone matters. Every vote matters. Doesn't matter what color or where you're from or what gender you associate yourself with. I ask you again for your vote. Come away. Thank you. I supported the NDO. I believe that it rarely represents civil rights for everybody and human rights for everybody. And so I will be opposed to any changes to our non-discrimination ordinance. Thank you. My view is that the NDO was really about a city issue. The non-discrimination ordinance and what it's in is really more appropriately what federal law of state is being determined as we speak both in the Congress and the United States and the state legislature and other courts. It was introduced in the city. The city council is a red issue to provide people. And I think that my view is that we follow federal law of state in terms of non-discrimination whether it's non-discrimination or marriage or recognition same sex marriage or whatever I don't believe in discriminating against anybody but I believe in following federal and state law and I don't believe in this from this situation. As a business owner when I go to employ someone to look at their application making it a discriminate I have to look at their skills that they bring to my business. As a city council woman I can discriminate. I have to look at every individual that comes and has an issue to the district. I do oppose the NDO in this regard the words gender identity. I think we're all new to that term and it's very fluid so anybody can identify with anything at any time, anywhere at any place and have some concerns about that in the NDO. What is gender identity? And that's the concern as the value goes well. That is fluid you can determine at any time you want and honestly I have some questions and concerns about that one. When I started with Marco Aros a new issue that has come up the reimagined Elmo Plaza there is lots of outrage online not only about themselves but about the cost involved and lack of citizen input for big projects like this how would you want to see city council approach them and do you have an opinion about this project? That is another question that could be a two hour answer but there have been two public meetings so far and to my understanding I have talked to Becky who works for the Elmo that there will be additional meetings coming up one next week and I think there can be more public human meetings so I have been hearing a lot and a very good listener about this now that the plans have been presented you can follow this by the way on their website that we imagine the Elmo there are some issues personally that I disagreed with I don't think that we should go to any of those streets in front of the Elmo because I will tell you I go through there meetings in that area and if you eliminate the trees there is no shade and I will tell you in July it is very very hot so there are some areas that I disagree there are some concerns about traffic so I would welcome all your input because I think your input is more valuable than anyone else's and there are also some issues about funding they do not have all the funding well this is the topic we discussed a lot I think you must have last night and I think it is a travesty to decimate the Elmo that has a historic nature now this is being both equal to the individual issue so we don't need to honor our past and by having somebody that is a designer out of Philadelphia who down here has no appreciation of the historic nature of Texas and its independence and its vital independence to come and want to straight out all the grass to remove all the trees to put a clear box around the Elmo that regulates how you can see it is deplorable deplorable and the suspensions for the BPC and the city's money is to place money to move the syntax where it is at the monument that honors all of the warriors and is unconscionable to me it needs to be in front of the center where it is to stay there we need to make sure whatever things we do honors our veterans honors our people who will fall and die for the freedom we enjoy today my definition of a good question is one that I can answer and presently I can't answer the question about the Elmo because I don't have enough information on it so what we're going to do is question information is what I would want to talk about in additional times then after I get involved and are on my decision it's going to look like it's in a Petrie dish that is absolutely unacceptable I was born and grew up here and visited the Elmo several times I do not believe they have the money at this time to fund a project again it's premature to think about it but my position is I do not like the plan at all at this time again it looks like a Petrie dish and it's not and it just does not resemble what we stand for what the Elmo stands for and so it's absolutely an inappropriate master plan and again they do not have the money for it if they did bring up the money it's most likely for special interest groups they just want to make a lot of money and pouring concrete it just goes on and on and on has no benefit to us we may pursue the fundable opinion I would oppose to doing anything else to the Elmo other than maintenance to keep it clean and well taken care of the Elmo is the number one tourist attraction in Texas it has been for years it will continue to be for years so I don't think we need to be investing millions of dollars to try and recreate the history from almost 200 years ago so I would be opposed to that let the Elmo remain what it is the civil expense has been very good for the United States of Texas I want to know about the project I just want to read the news paper but I have a picture of it on the last wall mimicking what was supposed to be the wealth and fortifications relative to the Elmo it's not really the way it felt moving the Senate to have which is basically the cemetery and burial monument to the defenders of the Elmo to me would be a travesty when I go to Gettysburg I'm not offended by the fact that there are monuments around the Gettysburg battlefield showing more different units were deployed as people died and that doesn't detract from the envisaged battlefield it actually makes it better I think that we can do better things with some of the buildings that have a history of their own opposite the Elmo remove some of the junk Ripley's believe there are not type things that make those venues for historical exhibits and all and there's a lot of other things that we need to reconsider the project for improving Elmo and the last one I'll clear the board how many times are we going to re-create downtown a hemispheric pleasant it's just not through another recreation we're going to have a street now that goes where the play around us a hemispheric pleasant so now we go to the convention center we have no parking down to not anymore so now we're going to go over it today which by the way your money is already consented by the way you were never told the redesign was even being talked about now you're being told come to the public meeting but the public meeting is only to show you what they already want to do and the convention is a great thing to do totally against the process totally against the project and this is where District 9 has the muscle to start to push back because our tax dollars we spend most here are going down to these projects that are just brainstormed in somebody's bad room office totally against that process totally against the project for me it's actually a personal issue I had a family who thought me out of mine I was related to Jose Machaka and for me when I look at that size of that thing I think it's supposed to give you a reflection that you have a small group see that whole idea behind this project is because people come here they go that's it so tiny, yeah that's it because you have a small group of men who came to their lives from their community and that's what Machaka he was animated by William Travis right before the seat really started with this family because he knew Santa Ana killed him and his wife was fat that was the theory they were dealing with and see it's supposed to represent that this idea that here's us we're small our businesses matter we're willing to give our lives for that and that's what I think that animal represents to me and I wanted to continue and I can't do it the way it's with this project thank you okay when we started the next question with Mr. Gondola do you support the bond issue why or why not in total I do not support the bond package there are pieces of the bond package which are very important in two our safe thoroughfares to run the school and work to get back home safely officially we've done a poor job we've done the job of planning and we can do better it's important we do better in our planning ahead for streets, drainage and so we can live safely have a safe environment and have plenty of public safety that's present we can run then and help our family members to need the running situation first comments if we pass the bond package to potentially exceed our total assets and be insolvent in the next 20 years so we need to focus on things that we need to have not on things that are nice to have there's a lot of nice to have and a lot of special interest like $350 million dollars especially projects like over where the parkway where the animals are crossing underneath and that's what I don't think you know, whenever you get money that's the question you know, I don't like this the law issue is not related to the service whenever you have to close the base you don't ask the individual politicians the individual committee and then that committee makes the recommendations and you either vote up or down when you look at any large project which is bond issues you could always find things you don't like things that could be better things that could be better but all in all I think it's a very good it's a very good bond issues for the city that benefit the economics for the city and the the jobs for the city and so therefore I support it I cannot support it I said this is great and it appeared to be great until I started really digging and digging there are propositions in there so you can vote for yes vote yes for some and vote for others unfortunately the way that it is put together it's kind of tricky like public art is here and there and some other proposals and along with EMS I just think it's in properly places in my opinion I think they put the same together and in haste and it needed to have a lot more excitement but by the public and what is best for the public I don't think this happened I do agree on some of the things like the senior CSN senate that we will be facing in district 9U I support the bond issue I support it because I looked at I've had people helping in my campaign who have helped me do the research and basically for district 9 the overall benefit is going to be about 90 million dollars over 60 million is directly into district 9 through a lot of different projects the other 25 or so million is in projects on district 8 and district 10 but the benefit the people who live in district 9 because we drive through those streets we get on human we get on land we get on San Pedro we use 1604 so a lot of the projects in that bond issue are in district 8 district 10 but the people who live in the North Central part of San Antonio will benefit by about 90 million dollars worth of improvements in this bond issue many of you may not be aware that you spent the whole month of July working on the city budget and priority for the years so there was no city council meetings in the month of July because you actually spent all the time working on the city budgets on reviewing over 21 city departments so my number one priority is to really look at the details of budget and number two public safety I think that we only have two classes right now that's the main reason why we're very short and we're going on police officers we've got to figure out with the help of Chief McManus and Anthony Trevino the assistant director on how to increase the number of classes that the police are having and number three is look at public safety from the party department the response time we're short ambulances and EMS and a few heart tracks so we've got to do something about that the foremost is we have appointed citizen task force to address crime and public safety and those are the citizen task force to address development services department and make sure that the rules they abide by are very objective and compliance of business owners and third is we prioritize city spending and the budget will be upon us also we look at things like the Alamo area of Plaza except when Chief McManus is going to go to reconstructing the Alamo how we can work to protect the Alamo from that but third is transparency so we're quick citizen task force on crime and public safety as we look at crime districts we need to look at increasing and publicizing and making more people aware of what's so prior implemented in car reports, citizen action reports where you can be responsive by the district office and make sure that the development services department has the capacity to not follow objective guidelines but we need to make sure that we have responsible development and responsible development thank you very much okay Mr. Martinez do we have the Alamo? the Alamo sorry there are three very similar questions here and some of you just touched on this as your priorities but maybe this will give you an opportunity to expand on it what can we do to reduce our violent crime rate that is up by 9% the San Antonio FBI rates number 5 and the county property crime and inner city San Antonio violent crime rate grows just shy of 10% 2015-16 so if we can address your positions on crime absolutely I think that one of the things that I'm seeing in this bond is a lot of thought and foresight of helping intervention and prevention from the health care needs I think that there's a very large or influx of domestic violence issues that have not been addressed from the mental health standpoint to say there's not a lot of money for that so I'd like to see that change in the future it would benefit us all now if you ask another question now as far as the FBI is concerned poverty does drive criminal activities so we're going to have a lot we have a lot of great responsibility as city council members to make sure that we are in a way of powering our citizens to be able to have team jobs and that I do agree with Mayor Ivey's plan and also a living wage so that Mr. Medina's plan so I respectfully thank you as I mentioned we need to expand the training programs that we have in Canada as pointed out by one of our other board members earlier SAAC has a law enforcement training program that we can take advantage of so I think that's one aspect of it also I think that we need to go ahead and help our citizens recognize that they can take some more responsibility by getting involved on citizens on patrol in their neighborhood I think that's a good program I've been involved in it in my neighborhood too I think that we can go ahead and help better educate our police department to work better with the different communities that we have in the city we also have a SAAC program where we have specific police officers who work with neighborhoods to help the communication between the community and the police department we need to expand the number of SAAC officers that we have so that we don't have so many a SAAC officer handling 20 or 30 different neighborhoods so that we have better communication between the people in the neighborhood and the police department I hate following John there are two aspects to the increase in crime one is to increase police presence and police patrols and as numerous people mentioned we are shorter police we're over 200 short we've had a policy that San Antonio Police Department will only hire people trained through its own police academy I mean even though we have a San Antonio College or a San Antonio Community College a law enforcement program in which our police department won't hire people I know that because my nurse's son went through that program and was not considered for hiring we also do not hire police that are trained by other cities and municipalities secondly we have judges that are not anymore so they can be called to jail for non-violent points which includes death or grief and so we need to get back to the idea that we actually bring the most to catch their concerns I'm in favor of this recess and that is the state starting to declare these sanctuary cities so I would propose that the city of San Antonio have an ordinance or resolution that declares itself a non-sexual city sorry I saw that in the back studies have shown that when you declare yourself non-sanctuary you're crime leased and we know we know McManus plays this little game of having informants protected because they're illegal and apparently he gets some information on how to go track the gay people who are here even though they themselves are lawbreakers San Bernardino declared themselves a non-sanctuary city where you would know a lot of this crime going on and they saw that crime leave we have a crime not because you and I are doing anything wrong but because our police chief is not making a statement our mayor is not making a statement that we are a non-sanctuary city a personal experience of being a victim of crime especially as a resident of Michigan I would just share that with you I've been robbed at gunpoint at the apartment where I was at where I'm now because of gang initiation I've had two friends murder here at my store, backed into a by a truck and I've wandered twice so this is just becoming very very common for my age generation especially here in San Diego and it's going to get probably more common it's an economic issue to talk about jobs creating jobs we will do that but there's no focus on it whatsoever it's about development, about growth or about acceleration how are we going to attract businesses how are businesses going to develop that's going to be your major issue the second is personal responsibility belonging to those communities we need to be more active as a community not just in our own areas but going to those areas where they do not have good role models that is in fact that they do not have people around them showing them hey if you work hard you can make yourself some police crime it's going to take all of us in this room I can tell you that we're short police officers there's one reason but the response time with all the six sub stations in town and the north side keeps growing growing growing on 21 I can tell you that I've had lots of conversations with a lot of neighbors from District 9 that probably in the next couple of years we will meet another police sub station near and seen a park on Oak in that area because the response time right now from Brute Road to here is more than 20 minutes from John Smallsburg to here could take 15-17 minutes so we've got to be more proactive and it's going to take all of us to do that the recruitment of police officers is very very important I think we also need to look at retired military people that have that kind of background as I mentioned before I was looking at citizen task force to address crime in your neighborhoods but let's start with the city we are under man, under staff we're on police and we make sure that we address and encourage our police chief to get the business in training and utilize of the military programs to come into the workforce one of the very things my son has been on part of the explorers program with the safe office and John Smallsburg and I'm going to encourage that young people to consider police work in an honorable profession we need to make sure that we don't continue annexing outside of the city where we extend our core services out of the stretch to any one business or where it slows down response time to your local with this district standpoint we look at crime districts we look at how do we utilize hiding off duty policemen to patrol the neighborhoods we look at personal responsibility and license to carry and encourage people to act responsibly back in my good position a couple of things can be done first we have the policy of fully staffing fully training and fully equipping our police department and the other thing we can do is have a policy that we have a position to do until we are absolutely certain that our existing districts are adequately recovered Mr. Curge we're going to start this question with you is there any possibility that the school tax portion of our property taxes may be reduced we understand that the school tax is the largest portion of our property tax bill do you anticipate that retirees can begin in any property tax relief so I'm pretty close to being an retiree myself I think that the problem that we have with our taxes in this area are twofold one is that we continue to grow and the more we grow the more they're going to be building more schools and the more you're going to be paying higher school taxes that's inevitable as long as we have the unbridled, uncontrolled growth along the north side that we've had for the last 20 years that's why I support smart growth and incentivizing growth for other areas of the city that are under development also when it comes to taxes we find that a lot of private interests, a lot of commercial property, a lot of apartment complexes are sold but we don't know what the prices are because they're sold for one dollar another valuable consideration and so their undervalued when it comes to paying their share of the tax base and who makes up that difference you and I, the residential owner the city needs to fight with the state to improve the laws that will have full disclosure of prices and properties sold in the commercial area the city council has very little input in school district taxes they're an independent taxing entity the state legislature sets levels that they can tax and we do have lobbyists that work for the city that work with the state legislature to try to influence on that influence it on that level the property taxes in general are high and I think that property taxes have two components one is the tax rate and the other is the appraised value and one of the things that I feel strongly about is that for your primary residence your house should be appraised with a sales price and only re-appraise with a return on resale or when you've done extensive renovation or modification otherwise people will be taxed out of their primary residence and I think that will be a trap I do think that we need to move from an appointed appraised board to an elected appraised board I'm not sure who they're working for right now they're working against me and you change a bathroom put in a new window and you will be appraised your value is going to be appraised higher and they know that because they look through your window to make sure what you're doing so I would go from an elected, from an appointed to an elected I'm not more opening up what you sold your property for it's private property and it's your transaction it's private I don't think it needs to be public out there although you can't find a private property for it not that hard to do right now okay for me you kind of have to look globally and see what other countries have done around the world for us we pay those property taxes and then we bear the burden of educating the kids in other places across the world what we do is that the businesses already realize the incentive and without being taxed they automatically pay for those things well because they realize they need an educated populist to pay for those schools it's not a question whether they need it they know it especially when you think about our global market they know that best is something we have to do for us property tax just in general is very aggressive even though it's considered very fair because people who are uneducated lack the ability to know what their house has worked and somebody who comes in with all these rules, regulations, we go up to them and go oh no this is what has worked down which is okay and that's what they really could think that is because they don't know and I think that's the type of things which is kind of have to stop you have to make it fair for them you have to let them have good financial incentives I just want to make sure I know that for well tax increases for many short property taxes or school tax and all that unfortunately this is an issue that has to be solved at the state level by your state representatives and your state senators so those are the people that really have a lot more input than the city council nowadays I do agree though that eventually you know you go out and fight under the bracelet value in your home and unfortunately we don't have a lot of solutions and options so I do agree that eventually we need to really push our city officials to have elected members of the racial board this goes through an overarching issue with the city of San Antonio and rightly prioritizing its spending because if we were not spending things that are nice to have and focus on things that are needed to have or basic necessities, core services, infrastructure and not on special interest projects we wouldn't have a burden that was placed on property tax owners or particularly residential owners so partly because it's reprioritizing the city's spending second is we need to get the city manager to adjust her compensation at bare minimum and where we tie any bonus compensation to her balancing budget we will leave property tax pressure we do need to lobby as a city to have Bear County the county appraisal district change towards elected members and we also need to make sure that commercial properties are properly assessed to leave that burden and the process for appealing your property tax increases needs to be $500 P to go to the state to appeal to the state and to make the burden less the last part is that we need to make sure that citizens are knowing that projects like this our special interest projects do have potential to increase your tax rates so we need to make sure to be purchase of and how we're voting and supporting special interest projects I'm not an expert on tax money but I would be very interested in pursuing if there were some way we could stabilize the property tax for those who reach retirement age I don't know if that would be possible to determine something about it this issue is not an issue that city council has too much power control over this is a legislative issue we will as a city council member as a whole city council and mayor need to learn how to work hand in hand with Texas legislators so that they could be apprised of how San Antonio is doing business and how it is affecting our constituents especially District 9 earlier we talked about the bond and 12% of the bond that is at state $850 million is coming back $850 million is coming back I don't encourage if he's ranked for several offices before as working for or trying to get into these positions we have to really learn not to speak ill of our Texas legislators or the city council members which we need to think and if you would hold on to that microphone because we are soon going to do the closing statements just out of mercy for the candidates I know we were supposed to go 12 but we've gotten in most of our questions I'm going to read this one last question because I think it's important and I'm going to ask you to just think about this as you're doing your closing remarks and we will have the closing remarks be two minutes since we are going to stop in the morning but before I do that I do want to thank again the sponsors who have helped us out here today the Vineyard Homeowners Association we have Lucas from the Mt. Cal State for taking this certainly thank you to the candidates who have come out here and shivered through about this so something to think about and councilman's job is basically a full time commitment they have to be at council meetings Tuesday and Wednesday Thursday of each week there are a multitude of meetings day and evenings appointments with constituents etc are you prepared for the position you are wanting to be voted for as a full time job it's not just a few hours a day so if you want to think about maybe incorporating that in your closing statements it's up to you so we are going to start two minutes with you we go to the reverse order of opening well thank you again for having me here giving me this opportunity and I definitely have to say that I am privileged to have been raised in San Antonio and the city council as it stands at this time is in need it's in need of leadership that has never been seen before I think an integrated approach such as docking reference to having different folks in our city council with different skill sets would make this a much more influential city council can I pray for that I hope that's what happens not just a launching board for some young folks so they can help us in the next congressional election or what not it's very disconcerting to find that's what's happening here I do not plan when elected I do not plan to further mine political career I'd like to stay by a tiny mall somewhere I have to sunset this that's where I would like to be I would say this as a licensed professional councilor I have a license to uphold ethics that I need to follow very good in public accountable so I read those same ethics to the city of San Antonio as a victim of domestic violence as a victim of non-invasion but specifically as a victim of domestic violence I am here actually to publicly apologize for not voting in the last several years I was relocated and I was not able to because I was afraid but I'm back and I am not afraid to vote and I'm not afraid to be here but we try to live here in San Antonio and I'm back it was again great to be with you and you people should be commended to sit here and listen to us give our spills because you were that big and I also want to comment on my full candidates because they're an outstanding group no matter which you choose you are going to be representing and I can assure you in summary I would like to mention the issues again that I think are important for District 9 and that we need to get our traffic flowing we need to get proper staffing of our police, fire departments and our EMS we need to get more districts because these districts have been stretched out they're too large and population and lastly I think we need to consolidate our elections so we have our city elections even though we're years and we save a couple of million every other year it's always the pleasure to be the folks that will come out and listen and make excellent choices and I wanted to know that if I if you would like me to be your representative it would be an honor to be your voice on City Hall and I will be there full time thank you and I have a major act of charity for the week and I'm very each of us that also we have the breeze and the coolness and thank you Phillip thank you all the sponsors when I go down to University of Carton where all the fellow's retire sisters live I give them chance to see they always have Lincoln women voters guys out there and great numbers I was glad to be a part of this my name is Patrick Bondo I did get permission from my wife I think it's a permission from my business partner that the two people in my lives are integral and to do that I have been blessed to be as a private business owner, to have a success enough to go to dedicate full time and to address your issues that are important to you to help you. Maybe values common sense in a conservative independent voice is what I intend to bring to you and one that is always approachable, that's responsive, that will listen. And my life says that that's why she's still married to me after 20 years is that I do listen to her. In doing so and going forward it's important and crucial that we make sure that we focus on core services or infrastructure to make your life and improve our quality of life. We've done some good things but we can do better and with your help I'm going to do that as representing you. For over six years, over 20 years I've lived here in the same area and over six years I've been active as a private citizen and working engaged in the public square, downtown, property owners, business owners, primarily homeowners in the work that we've done downtown. And so I look forward to serving as your city councilman. Vote Patrick, I'll see you on social media. Thank you very much for your time. This is a full-time job. I can tell you that based on my 20 years of experience with working with a lot of city council members, you're appointed to about four committees, all those committee meetings take place on Tuesday. This session takes probably your entire Wednesday afternoon and so in cases and regular A session takes all day Thursday. So you're making a huge commitment. One of the things that I want to make more accessible based on the experience of working with team council members, the district office which is located on 1,000 oaks and 21 is really not fully accessible to everyone. One of the things that I will do for you as representing you and your voice and your concerns is open the district office on Saturday mornings and make it more accessible to people and hear your concerns. I'm a very good listener. If you read the Express News today, I've been endorsed by the San Antonio Express News because of my experience of doing this for over 20 years and living in the district for 30 years. I also have endorsement of the past four council members of district nine that represent you. Joe Pryor, Lisa Chen, Tim Bambo, Kevin Wall. So I've worked on their campaigns. I know what it takes and I know I've been involved in writing many of the city audits including state affairs. So I do have the experience to get all this done and represent you and work on your behalf. I'm a very good listener. I also know the time commitment that it takes and to visit all the homeowners and all the residents with any issues that come up. Thank you for your golden support. Phyllis, thank you for doing this. So to answer that question, how do you give away more than four plan? I do keep a normal job right now currently working eight to five and then when I go from there I then campaign to about two again every morning. I actually do go to the houses, I'll go out to the local bars, pubs, try to meet the young kids because they don't go. I mean they don't. They don't. They don't have to. They decide they don't think it's important. And sometimes I'm more surprised that somebody's actually going to go out there and go speak with them. I repeat this day in and day out, every single day. I give all my time for my community in regards to whether I get elected or not. I'm still going to be getting my time to communicate. That's what I want to school for because I care. I'm going to continue to care. It doesn't matter. You are going to hear my voice more and more often. You may get tired of it, I promise you. But if you support me, I guarantee you that I will make sure that your voices get better. You can go to GroteMapinia for social media and just go to www.mapinia.com. That's what I'll look for in my classes. Thank you. I have enjoyed sitting next to Matt since we're always laying down next to Matt. But I enjoyed his fresh approach. Bars and clubs. I had to try that one but there we go. It is a full-time job. But then it is 26 years. When you're self-employed, you're more of a full-time job. Especially when you raise a family. So that's nothing new to me. I like that. So I hope you know there are those meetings. But those meetings, they need to come outside those doors and out to you. I can sit in meeting after meeting after meeting after meeting. But if you know nothing of what I've been through for you, then have I really served you? Is it so hard for anybody of Orion Markets? Is it so hard for any of us here to get to know at least a Chan, Joe, Prior, Dan, Finn? We all know that. We all work with them to some capacity. But what we have done is taken what we know and given it out to you. That empowerment is what will make District 9 the muscle that it needs to be. With this many tax dollars going out of this district down to other districts, we should have a very solid and a very strong and a very loud voice at City Hall. Those ordinances should be in our favor, I think. Those meetings should be in our favor for District 9. Our tax dollars that are hard work and hard work. And that's what I represent. I'm fearless. That's one thing. I also say, you're fearless. I'm fearless. And I will work hard for you. I won't put in 80 hours. I do have a family and grandkids, but I will work very hard for you. Thank you, Phyllis. This has been the coldest in you. I've been too. I'm originally from Ohio. I didn't think I'd be used to this, but that's why I moved. And thank you as well. I've enjoyed working with you. And all of these candidates are just fun people. I think we'll all meet at a bar. Absolutely. I want to thank Phyllis and the League of Government voters for putting on this final debate of this campaign season. It's been a great learning experience, great, and been a lot of fun. And I'm proud to be on the desk with such a fine group of candidates. So whoever wins, I think District 9 will be well worth it. You asked about whether we can serve a full-time job. Well, I just retired from the Texas State Guard and I closed my thoracic surgery practice. And through acid surgery, we usually work about 100 hours a week or 120 hours a week, so this will be a vacation. So that would not be a problem. I woke this morning to read the San Antonio Express News and their endorsement. And they endorse their candidate based on living for three years in the district experience. And his unique ideas of improving traffic flow by synchronizing their lights and having better police reception. Every all 10 candidates have those same basic ideas. What I bring to this fight is a different background than experience. Background experience, disaster planning, state guard, background and experience in health care and biotech. And background and experience in the military and background and experience in leadership based on my education and on my professional career. I do not believe that we should have a city government based on cronyism, which we've had in the past. I promise you that we will elect it and it will be an honest, faithful, certain view of people, all of the people of San Antonio. I hope you'll vote for me by name of the last of the candidates because of the luck of the draw. So please go all the way down to the ballot and vote for Dan and Dr. Ford. I do want to thank the league and the vineyard organization for allowing us to be here. You've heard a lot from all of us today and many of us have a lot of the same ideas and that's good and I know it's a hard choice to make. I ask you to make the choice for me because I think I best represent you as just somebody who's been living in this neighborhood, who's been working in the neighborhood, who's been raising their family. I feel like I'm your neighbor. The guy on the other side of the fence that you talked with about what's going on on the street or the block or what has to be done in the neighborhood or what are the problems that you hear about down the street. And I will be your neighbor on San Antonio City Council. I've listened to people. I've knocked on thousands of doors over this campaign. I've actually had citizens to be heard in my office every week the last two months and people have come by either on Wednesday or Thursday to talk to me about their concerns. I'll spend Saturday mornings at coffee shops in this district just talking to people about what their concerns are. I'm already making this a full-time job. I'm a teacher. I'm retiring at the end of this year. There's nothing else I want to do other than represent you and your interests and do that in a way that the entire city will be improved by the decisions I make. As I said, a councilman for one district is really a councilman for all. The decisions a city council makes will affect you and your names and everyone else in the city. And we need to think about that. That's why I know I can do this full-time. I can cooperate. I can collaborate. I can be a leader that will be proud of. I hope you learn more about me. If you haven't made up your mind yet, I'm going to John Courage or CourageFrom9.com. Thank you very much. Chilly morning. Thank you to the parents who have their children here so that they can experience for themselves how our democracy works. I wish I had hot coffee for all of you, but I don't. Some of these candidates who did not respond in the printed voter guides were able to get their responses on vote411.org. So if you want to know more about any of the narrow candidates or other, I guess most of you respond. On behalf of the League of Women Voters, I really do thank you for coming out and for sharing with us your vision for our district and for our city.