 Hello, Columbia. I'm your host, Alicia Utsi, and welcome to City View, where we bring you an inside view of the City of Columbia. In our top story, Mayor Steve Benjamin delivered the 2019 State of the City Address to an audience of citizens, community leaders, and business leaders. You see, it's not more information, more innovation, or more ideology that's going to change our city, our state, our nation. It's building a culture of compassion. Compassion will be the fuel to the fire that burns with fervor to save this great democracy, a fire that allows those of us who've rarely or never taken into consideration how a law may impact someone's life in a tremendous way to do so, and do so thoughtfully. Compassionate cities will provide a platform for human potential to flourish, wear compassion, speak compassion, infusing in every conversation, every exchange you have with another individual. Allow compassion to not be a simple gesture each day, but to be a lifestyle for you and also share that impute that to your children. This focus will allow us to become the city that we aspire to be, to become those talented, educated entrepreneurial city in America. February 5th, 2019 marked 40 years of service for Fire Chief Aubrey D. Jenkins. He was honored by Columbia City Council and our city manager. This is an honor. I'm grateful and I'm thankful. The Lord has really blessed me here at the city for 40 years. I never thought that it would ever come to this. I remember when I first came, I never dreamed I'd be here that long. The city has really been good to me. It really has. City Manager Teresa Wilson has a special award called City Light, which is normally presented to an employee who has gone above and beyond the call of service. Recently, Corporal Justin Pogue with the Columbia Police Department received the City Light Award because of his life-saving efforts, which resulted in saving the life of a firefighter recruit, Brandon Zen, following a serious accident. February is Heart Health Month, and Mayor Pro Tem Tamika Iza-Divine hosts an annual Go Red Columbia Day here at City Hall. For many years, we at the City of Columbia have been recognizing in partnership with American Heart Association Go Red for Women and Heart Month as an opportunity for us to make sure that we are encouraging all of our citizens to know their status, understand risk factors, and do what they can to prevent heart disease. The City's Planning and Development Services staff continue to host Lunch with a Planner, where citizens can come out and have lunch with members of our planning staff and discuss Columbia Compass and other planning issues and initiatives here in the City of Columbia. We had a great conversation. We had about six people join us, chat about Columbia's cultural opportunities, our conversation ranged from what kind of arts events take place, what kind of festivals are happening, but also neighborhood issues and how arts and culture or cultural identity relates to housing or other things. So we had a wide-ranging conversation. It was a great opportunity, I think, for people to engage with the planning process. A great way for us to hear what on some people's minds. And speaking of lunch, the Office of Business Opportunities recently hosted a Lunch and Learn workshop for small business owners. The topic was accounting and tax liabilities. The Office of Business Opportunities also held a press conference recently to announce the Commercial Retention and Redevelopment Project in new areas in our City. The Commercial Retention and Redevelopment Program that we've historically known as the Facade Improvement Program has been focused on, on helping us take advantage of the beautiful historic nature of our buildings, helping us give life to historic commercial corridors by refreshing our buildings and helping the businesses that occupy them. It's been operational in some form since 2010 and in the last nine years our Office of Business Opportunities has completed over 70 small business improvement projects throughout the City. Each year the City of Columbia, the Martin Luther King Junior Memorial Foundation, and Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity work together to host a series of events on Martin Luther King Junior Day. City officials participated in a wreath-laying ceremony prior to the City's commemoration celebration. Councilman Edward McDowell spoke at the ceremony. Continue this fight. To continue the message growing every single year. Don't just let one day to remind us of MLK and his mission for freedom and equality. But let's just keep on fighting and keep on reminding all of us and everybody else how hard MLK has fought for freedom. Whether it's a local level, whether it's a federal level, I challenge you to continue that fight to remind our young children how hard it is to fight for what you want. But at the end, it's well worth it. Following the wreath-laying ceremony, the City's Dr. Martin Luther King Junior commemoration celebration was held at King Park. The guest speaker was Cassie Alia. Also, Mayor Steve Benjamin spoke, along with participation from local students for scholarships for our dream keepers, as well as performing music and other activities at the ceremony. If we want a different future, one filled with peace, we must start doing things differently. We must choose connection over division, empathy over blame. We must actively seek opportunities for learning and compassion and understanding with every fiber of our being. We must resist the urge to hide or shelter ourselves from the unknown and bravely chart a new united path together. And when others show up authentically and honestly, we must be willing to embrace them and listen to love them and to let love lead our own actions. Well, that wraps up this edition of CityView. We thank you for watching and stay tuned to CityTV for all the latest news and information about the City of Columbia. You may also visit our website at columnsc.net and make sure you follow us on our social media platforms on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.