Speaker 1: Welcome the Money and Wealth with John O'Bryant, a production
Speaker 1: of the Black Effect podcast network and iHeartRadio. Hello Alo Hello,
Speaker 1: And of course we also have our special guests of
Speaker 1: Operation Hope. John God, thank you so innovator in residence.
Speaker 1: Is that what it is that makes you a bad system? Uh?
Speaker 1: Hello Memphis, Hello, this is very cool. We've never done
Speaker 1: this before. By the way, I want to just acknowledge
Speaker 1: my friend Beth from First Horizon Bank who's here? And
Speaker 1: Keith from First Horizon Bank, my team from Operation Hope. Uh,
Speaker 1: that's here. And the heroes and heroes of this city.
Speaker 1: You know, Doctor King mayor doctor Ing only had seventy
Speaker 1: employees at his height, and his whole budget in his
Speaker 1: best year with six hundred thousand dollars. Think about now
Speaker 1: a department of the city, I mean small department, six
Speaker 1: hundred thousand, five undred thousand dollars. His whole budget in
Speaker 1: his best year was six hundred thousand dollars, and he
Speaker 1: with seventy employees, changed the world and did it without
Speaker 1: firing a shot. Indeed, and mayors are having to deal
Speaker 1: with popularity rates. If you're if you're a great mayor,
Speaker 1: you get a sixty five percent popularity rate. You're great.
Speaker 1: You're just absolutely killing it, which means at any give
Speaker 1: at the moment in time, thirty eight five percent of
Speaker 1: people actually hate your guts. I'm learning that. Yeah. But
Speaker 1: doctor King at his height, Nobel Peace Prize and all
Speaker 1: had twenty percent of the Black community support and twenty
Speaker 1: percent of the white community support, and half of the
Speaker 1: white community support was Jewish. That was at his height.
Speaker 1: Everybody else was either sitting on their hands minding their
Speaker 1: business saying it's not my business, or calling him a rebel, rouser,
Speaker 1: a troublemaker, and saying that he was a detriment to democracy. Sure,
Speaker 1: it's really hurt his feelings, you know, really, I mean
Speaker 1: I know it did because I can talk to bash
Speaker 1: Or Andrew Young was the last living lieutenant the Doctor King,
Speaker 1: my mentor who was on that balcony when Doctor King
Speaker 1: was assassinated here in Memphis, right, And I want you
Speaker 1: to be encouraged. No good d show go unpunished. Thank you,
Speaker 1: but do good anyway. I feel it. And you're looking
Speaker 1: good man, Thank you, thank you, thank you. I knew
Speaker 1: I was gonna be with you today, sir, and and
Speaker 1: and then when you when you have daus, just go
Speaker 1: and talk to your fine wife about how let her
Speaker 1: light you and say how smart you are you It's
Speaker 1: not like she does forgets. That's her job. Behind every
Speaker 1: successful man is an exhausted woman. And my wife knows
Speaker 1: your wife. You saw your wife recently and was bragging
Speaker 1: about her. And oddly enough, you know the day that
Speaker 1: you and I, I I called you by accident or
Speaker 1: texted you by accident about something, and it just so
Speaker 1: happened we were about to talk about about this tour.
Speaker 1: I'm sure you're like, what the heck is John talking about?
Speaker 1: I definitely didn't know what it was about. I didn't
Speaker 1: understand it, and and that and and within an hour
Speaker 1: my wife sent me a photo of her with your
Speaker 1: wife in Dallas. And coincidence is God's way, many anonymous.
Speaker 1: That's an Andrew Young quote. And if you want to
Speaker 1: make God laugh, tell him your plan. That's and so
Speaker 1: I just want I say all this to set up
Speaker 1: a conversation. What I love about this is I get
Speaker 1: to finally ask somebody else some questions because later on
Speaker 1: I'll be the one being, you know, I guess on
Speaker 1: the hot seat. And this is something I love unpacking
Speaker 1: on my podcast, and I want to commend give commendations
Speaker 1: to my friend Charlemagne and he is the owner of
Speaker 1: the Black Effect Network podcast series on iHeart. I serve
Speaker 1: on his board, but it's his company and as a
Speaker 1: board member, my job is just to help them run
Speaker 1: a good business and whatever. They're like, Dan, you know, John,
Speaker 1: actually you are like walking financial literacy. You know you are.
Speaker 1: You know people talk about being a financial influencer. You
Speaker 1: have financial influence, You've done this stuff. Can you just
Speaker 1: do a podcast yourself? And so I agreed to do it,
Speaker 1: and it's actually taken off this Money and Wealth podcast
Speaker 1: and hopefully you guys are subscribers already. It's growing month
Speaker 1: over a month or one hundred percent, and I'm unpacking
Speaker 1: how the economy works. I've done in this book financial
Speaker 1: literacy for all. We do it at operation, but I'm
Speaker 1: trying to reach as many people as possible, democratize opportunity.
Speaker 1: And so I thought it would be cool to unpack
Speaker 1: a city. And I thought that you'd be the ideal
Speaker 1: person as somebody who spent your entire life, your entire
Speaker 1: professional career, not as a professional politician, but as a
Speaker 1: professional public servant and twenty years working in the plumbing
Speaker 1: of a city Shelby County, and here in the city
Speaker 1: working most recently as CEO of a very important business coalition.
Speaker 1: I think that since twenty twenty one, and before that,
Speaker 1: I mean I met you working with Mayor Strickland. By
Speaker 1: the way, Mayor Strickland sent me a note a couple
Speaker 1: of week text messages in the way here. He was
Speaker 1: so proud of you and so proud of the work continuing,
Speaker 1: and so you could he was rooting for your continued success,
Speaker 1: which is nice to see. He's Denail. We're at the
Speaker 1: law school now, I guess across the street. And before
Speaker 1: that you had other roles, including being a planning director,
Speaker 1: but really almost an engineer for economic development. That's the
Speaker 1: way I would describe it. So you you know, and
Speaker 1: by the way, you remind me of I did that.
Speaker 1: We launched the American Aspiration Tour with my friend Mary
Speaker 1: Andrew Dickens in Atlanta, and he's got an engineering degree
Speaker 1: chemical engineering, and so he understands details and plumbing and this.
Speaker 1: So there's new generation of leaders are detailed people. You
Speaker 1: understand the architecture and how systems work. It's really important
Speaker 1: because you're now dealing with what I call the aspiration generation.
Speaker 1: This generation is the aspiration generation. Uh, these folks, young
Speaker 1: people come to me, stop me in airports. I mean,
Speaker 1: I go to an airport. I mentioned it earlier when
Speaker 1: I spoke at the first Horizon. TSA agents are calling it.
Speaker 1: They're calling out their credit score numbers to me, six
Speaker 1: seventy Yoh, what's up. That's an impact right there. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that people going to people going to clubs and asking
Speaker 1: ladies what their credit score is and asking to do
Speaker 1: what y'all got, A job you got and whether you
Speaker 1: have a good credit score. By the way, you're marrying
Speaker 1: your business partner for life, So it's a big deal.
Speaker 1: But my point is that we're trying to get from
Speaker 1: the streets to the c suites. We're trying to go
Speaker 1: from civil rights to silver rights. So having a person
Speaker 1: like you and Mayor Dickens who understand the details and
Speaker 1: who honor those details and who operationalize that it's really important.
Speaker 1: But that train moves slowly. It's not as exciting as
Speaker 1: some of the other stuff, right, and the problems are immediate,
Speaker 1: the solutions take time, so that means people need you
Speaker 1: to understand your vision. So I don't want campaign speeches.
Speaker 1: I don't want I don't want rhetoric. I don't don't
Speaker 1: use twenty words when two will do. I'm not a
Speaker 1: voter nor a campaign bitter. Actually I was, but uh,
Speaker 1: I mean you were. He was all over me like
Speaker 1: a chief suit like he was texting emails. I off
Speaker 1: his home when I was sleeping, I had he was
Speaker 1: in my ear airaising built a machine. Yeah you know,
Speaker 1: I'm I'm kidding. He did his job and garnered a
Speaker 1: lot of support. And I only don't support political offices.
Speaker 1: I can't because I've served Republican and Democratic President's Opera JOP.
Speaker 1: It was a big tent. But he was a friend
Speaker 1: and and I wanted to show support, uh to him.
Speaker 1: And I think thought he I thought he'd be a
Speaker 1: good mayor before he was mayor, and I think he
Speaker 1: will be a good mayor for your city. You got
Speaker 1: to give him a shot, You got to. You gotta
Speaker 1: cut him some gotta cut him some slack. He just
Speaker 1: got here. Yeah, So I'm gonna ask you some questions.
Speaker 1: And I want to, like, imagine that you're reading the
Speaker 1: Wall Street Journal, but you lived in the country, your
Speaker 1: whole life, and but you got to translate the Wall
Speaker 1: Street Journal for them. I want you to translate government
Speaker 1: speak in a way that has you just chilling and
Speaker 1: talking to people and is planning to link English as
Speaker 1: you can. And I'm gonna I'm gonna try to help
Speaker 1: help you to unpack it a bit. But the one
Speaker 1: thing I'm gonna say now and I'm gonna say a
Speaker 1: little later, I've heard. I've heard from a number of
Speaker 1: people who whispered my ear because they thought I could
Speaker 1: whisper in your ear. One person, I asked, how's the
Speaker 1: mayor doing? But other people I didn't even ask their opinion.
Speaker 1: They just gave it to me. And oh, the mayor
Speaker 1: is paying a lot of attention to folks with money.
Speaker 1: Uh huh. Oh, the mayor is uh is really uh
Speaker 1: talking to these business people.
Speaker 2: Uh huh.
Speaker 1: Let me tell you what the mayor is. Mayor is
Speaker 1: a salesman or saleswoman. I mean this look and Maastor
Speaker 1: Young who really turned Atlanta into the international city. Now,
Speaker 1: there are other mayors in Atlanta who did other things
Speaker 1: that were really important. Keisha he Sha did suff is important.
Speaker 1: And you know other mayors fixed the plumbing issues, literally
Speaker 1: the plumbing issues, santation issues. Maynard Jackson created black wealth. Uh,
Speaker 1: that's his legacy, created black wealth. And bass Young doesn't
Speaker 1: touch that, doesn't claim that that was him. But the
Speaker 1: guy who turned Atlanta into the international city of the
Speaker 1: traditional South without question, Ambassador Andrew Young, who's ninety two
Speaker 1: years young. And so we had this opportunity to have
Speaker 1: this six billion dollar investment coming to Atlanta through Centennial Yards,
Speaker 1: the biggest investment in Atlanta since Atlanta. And this is
Speaker 1: there was this debate going back and forth at the
Speaker 1: city Council and it was raucous and dah da da da,
Speaker 1: and Bassie Young was asked, what do you think about this?
Speaker 1: He said, wait a minute, somebody, some private billionaire pause,
Speaker 1: who don't live in your city. Pause, it's how about
Speaker 1: bringing pause billions of dollars in New York southern city.
Speaker 1: And it's not mafia money, is you know? It's not
Speaker 1: booky and them your answer, your answers will say yes.
Speaker 1: You say yes before they go to another city. And
Speaker 1: you figure that stuff out and you figure out how
Speaker 1: to wrestle out of the ground and make it beneficial
Speaker 1: to your people, and you negotiate the details of it.
Speaker 1: But you don't sit there in noodle with somebody trying
Speaker 1: to get if it's something, if it has to be
Speaker 1: in front of it, as in billion, the answer is yes.
Speaker 1: And sometimes people forget the role they're in. It's easy
Speaker 1: to say no, I guess and hard to say yes.
Speaker 1: Now you've got actually execute. But as a mayor of
Speaker 1: a city, your job is to be a salesman for
Speaker 1: for in this case from Memphis, chief sales officer. Now
Speaker 1: you can to be chief I got punked officer, but
Speaker 1: you got to be chief sales officer. And this is
Speaker 1: a capitalist game. Even if you want to ship again
Speaker 1: I can say it, he can't. Even if you want
Speaker 1: to distribute money like a socialist, you have to first
Speaker 1: collect it like a capitalist. His job, every mayor's job
Speaker 1: is to bring as many resources as you can into
Speaker 1: that city, mobilize and restle to them to the ground,
Speaker 1: and then redeploy them to help all of God's children.
Speaker 1: And if you don't understand that about your mayor, you
Speaker 1: don't understand what the mayor's job is. And he can't
Speaker 1: just talk to broke people. Am I missing something I
Speaker 1: said earlier? I say it again, you hang around nine
Speaker 1: bro people, you'll be the tenth. So that's not political,
Speaker 1: but that's the truth. And so if you don't do
Speaker 1: what I frankly what the criticism that I've been to,
Speaker 1: the critique that wasn't the critiques I've heard from you,
Speaker 1: I applied. Now if you don't do good stuff with
Speaker 1: the resources you collect, then we got another conversation. But
Speaker 1: again I started out by telling you the man's been
Speaker 1: in economic development planning for twenty plus years. He knows
Speaker 1: what he's doing. So what I want you to do
Speaker 1: is to unpack the mysteries here because people have reason
Speaker 1: to be suspicious as a big money and be suspicious
Speaker 1: of corporate My my friend's gonna hate me saying this,
Speaker 1: because I'm sure you'd prefer to keep his nose. I
Speaker 1: think Brian Jordan is a great human being. Like First
Speaker 1: Horizon Dingy, and he talked to you about he hates
Speaker 1: the crime. He hates turning on TV and just seeing
Speaker 1: crime bad for business, is bad for morale, bad for
Speaker 1: the soul of the city is as bad. Of course.
Speaker 1: The part of that is you need opportunity to offset it,
Speaker 1: which we're going to talk about it during our town
Speaker 1: hall meeting, and he's right about being bad at crime
Speaker 1: is bad for business, and so he tried to help.
Speaker 1: He talk to somebody of another city encourage him to
Speaker 1: come here. The city couldn't afford to pay for it,
Speaker 1: so he and some other people put some money up,
Speaker 1: and then somebody criticized him about putting the money up,
Speaker 1: as if it's some agenda. No, this is how things happen,
Speaker 1: and you want somebody else to pay for it?
Speaker 2: And what am I missing here? I've heard a little bit.
Speaker 2: I haven't heard much critique. I've heard praise for paying
Speaker 2: for it. You know, safety is something just business leaders
Speaker 2: are asking for, but every resident in our community is
Speaker 2: asking for safety, and so you know, when it comes
Speaker 2: to safety and economic development. My goal is to make
Speaker 2: sure that I'm doing everything that I can from this
Speaker 2: seat to turn the trajectory of our city. Memphis is
Speaker 2: the largest majority African American city in America. And when
Speaker 2: I give that stat I say it in any room.
Speaker 2: It doesn't matter if the room is predominantly black or
Speaker 2: white or Hispanic or whatever it is. It's a statement
Speaker 2: of fact. And what I want us to do is
Speaker 2: turn that into a positive because for far too long.
Speaker 2: When you hear that, there's a negative connotation that comes
Speaker 2: with it. You think about poverty, you think about crime,
Speaker 2: you think about health disparities, and I want Memphis to
Speaker 2: be the city that's reversing that. And in order to
Speaker 2: do that, we're going to have to attack it from
Speaker 2: all levels. We're gonna have to make sure that we're
Speaker 2: locking folks up that's out here terrorizing people on the streets.
Speaker 2: We're gonna make sure have to make sure that we're
Speaker 2: giving opportunities to our young people so that they can
Speaker 2: make a better choice. And we got to make sure
Speaker 2: that there's job opportunities that our people can grow into
Speaker 2: and business opportunity and business opportunity so that you can
Speaker 2: be entrepreneurs and start the next FedEx and AutoZone and
Speaker 2: all of these homegrown companies that we have in our city.
Speaker 2: We need more, and we need our young people to
Speaker 2: see that they can be the ones to do it,
Speaker 2: because for far too many, it seems like a distant reality,
Speaker 2: like that's not even possible for me, and that's what
Speaker 2: people believe. And so what we have to do, and
Speaker 2: you know what, it's in your name, but you have
Speaker 2: to give people hope hope that they can get to
Speaker 2: another place in their lives. And you know, we're I
Speaker 2: think we are. It's a big ship that we're shifting,
Speaker 2: but I think we are starting to turn the ship.
Speaker 1: Well again, I think it's too early. It's you know,
Speaker 1: someone say the credit is too new to rate, but
Speaker 1: I know you've been doing this for a long time,
Speaker 1: years now, executing on it in the way that people
Speaker 1: can see it. I would just encourage you to own it.
Speaker 1: Don't let people talk about and make up stuff about
Speaker 1: what role this prompt own it?
Speaker 2: Now?
Speaker 1: This is me, I'm the mayor. Is my initiative. Yes,
Speaker 1: I didn't want this on the city's balance sheet. We
Speaker 1: got enough things we're paying for. If X, Y and
Speaker 1: Z corporations, legal companies want to pay for it, I
Speaker 1: want them to pay for it. Next subject. I mean, so,
Speaker 1: I think it's brilliant that you got somebody else to
Speaker 1: pay for it, and it just happens to be the
Speaker 1: largest bank in Tennessee and others hopefully, and they benefit
Speaker 1: if it's successful. On the one hand, they're paying, frankly
Speaker 1: indirectly to lock up criminals, but also they'd love to
Speaker 1: fund businesses from people who turn their life around and
Speaker 1: want to go and start a business. They love to
Speaker 1: fund those loans too. You get benefits on both sides.
Speaker 1: So look, I want you to unpack what it's like
Speaker 1: to be CEO of a city. Do you have a
Speaker 1: balance sheet?
Speaker 2: Yeah, we definitely have a balance sheet, and we have
Speaker 2: a big budget. I mean, our city budget is eight
Speaker 2: hundred million dollars eight hundred fifty million dollars roughly.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 2: And this year we had a pretty challenging year because
Speaker 2: as a first time mayor, first time politician period, I
Speaker 2: had to come to the people of Memphis and ask
Speaker 2: for a tax increase. And it's because our revenues didn't
Speaker 2: match our expenses. We had more in expenses than we
Speaker 2: had in recurring revenues, and we we didn't have a
Speaker 2: strong fund balance, meaning we were taking from our reserves
Speaker 2: every year and in order to so slow that down, Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: you just cought a whole bunch of stuff. Fun balance
Speaker 2: isn't So I just asked you one you did. He's smart,
Speaker 2: he's making smart sexy, I asked him. I asked We've
Speaker 2: been making dumb sex even way too long.
Speaker 1: We've dumb down and celebrated making smart sexy again, I
Speaker 1: asked him one question. He just went off on a
Speaker 1: whole situation. Do you have a balance sheet? Yes, yes,
Speaker 1: you have. You had a fun balance, meaning you had
Speaker 1: more money, You had a surplus of money in your fund,
Speaker 1: your reserves. But that reserves was going down because people
Speaker 1: were trying to do the right thing and trying not
Speaker 1: to raise taxes, which we hadn't done in twelve years, right,
Speaker 1: and so you had to be a bit of the
Speaker 1: bad guy and raise the taxes in order to balance
Speaker 1: the ship. Now, in the short term, capitalists are going
Speaker 1: to say, well, that's a discouragement. It's a discouragement. They
Speaker 1: definitely said. So I'm sure you're going to get to
Speaker 1: that in a minute. I'm sure you have a plan, right,
Speaker 1: But the first thing I want you to make it
Speaker 1: clear is that you just like your household. He's got
Speaker 1: a budget. You say, yours is injured million dollars a year,
Speaker 1: and you've got income and expenses. I want to get
Speaker 1: this in a minute, But you also have some reserves,
Speaker 1: a savings account that's fund balance, and you guys have
Speaker 1: done pretty good to have a surplus. Lot of cities
Speaker 1: don't have a surplusing it just issue debt, right, And
Speaker 1: in order to protect your credit rating, the ability your
Speaker 1: credit score for a city, in order to take your
Speaker 1: credit rating, you can't just keep reducing your fund balance, right.
Speaker 2: So, and that's exactly why we had to do what
Speaker 2: we had to do, and it was approved. And you
Speaker 2: know what I would say in return to the people
Speaker 2: that brought up the point that if you raise taxes,
Speaker 2: you're going to force businesses out because they don't want
Speaker 2: to pay taxes and they're going to leave. And my
Speaker 2: response was, we can't afford not to. We can't afford
Speaker 2: not to add more value to this community. And the
Speaker 2: job that I now have is to give them return value.
Speaker 2: They need to see return on their increased investment, which
Speaker 2: means a safer city, means that we have to be
Speaker 2: more aggressive and attacking blight, which is ripping our city apart.
Speaker 2: We have to be more aggressive in promoting the good
Speaker 2: in Memphis because Memphis is an amazing city. Like the
Speaker 2: people of Memphis have so much soul, so much energy, and.
Speaker 1: We're just cool.
Speaker 2: It's just a cool place to be and we have
Speaker 2: to find ways to lean into it and let the
Speaker 2: world know who we are. Lean into our arts and
Speaker 2: culture and so you know, part of our strategy is
Speaker 2: to just make sure that we're making those investments that
Speaker 2: really uplift our whole community.
Speaker 1: So, uh, infrastructure, infrastructure, Yeah, get rid of the potholes. Yeah,
Speaker 1: make sure that you're in Atlanta. This pothole is big
Speaker 1: enough to take your whole car. Yeah, where's Joe Ane go?
Speaker 1: I don't know was the freeway? She just disappeared. So,
Speaker 1: I mean, I love I hear him. My custom rims
Speaker 1: driving over a dang on pothole. Oh, you know, you know,
Speaker 1: you know this is when it's when it hits with
Speaker 1: that food. You know, you go to the wheels the wheelshop.
Speaker 1: You don't got too much experience with this topic. So
Speaker 1: you're solving potholes, you're solving infrastructure issues. With the tax
Speaker 1: base was just a way to balance your budget. You're
Speaker 1: trying to free up some resources to do things like
Speaker 1: what what are some of your big moonshots?
Speaker 2: Moonshots? You know I talked about blight. Right now, we
Speaker 2: are doing some aggressive actions where we're going into communities
Speaker 2: that have been starving for attention. You know, grass that's
Speaker 2: taller than me and you put together. In some instances,
Speaker 2: we are attacking those communities aggressively where we have all
Speaker 2: of our divisions of city government coming together and cleaning
Speaker 2: them up, and ultimately the moonshot goal is to have
Speaker 2: private investment come into those communities.
Speaker 1: You hire minority landscaping companies and women all landscaping companies
Speaker 1: to do that to fix the blight.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, that's positive, exactly, that's a part of our strategy
Speaker 2: when we went to city council. That was actually what
Speaker 2: we were promoting that we would hire community development corporations
Speaker 2: to get neighborhood groups to come together to be contractors
Speaker 2: for the city to own particular corridors. So if you
Speaker 2: think about a major corridor, I'll say Poplar Popular, even
Speaker 2: though it's a state highway, you would see individuals from
Speaker 2: that community going out and actually cutting the grass, actually
Speaker 2: picking up trash and litter, and those are things that
Speaker 2: are going to impact.
Speaker 1: The psyche of Memphis. Memphians.
Speaker 2: When you see people out there getting engaged cleaning up,
Speaker 2: it makes you want to be a part of it.
Speaker 2: It makes you want to get get into the get
Speaker 2: into the mix. And so what we're trying to do
Speaker 2: is get everybody to own their block. And when you
Speaker 2: think about the big moon shot. The big moon shot
Speaker 2: for me is for Memphis to be the next city
Speaker 2: in the South. And what I mean by that is
Speaker 2: every few years. Yeah, it's another itch city in Atlanta,
Speaker 2: had it, Nashville, Austin, Dallas, Charlotte. All of these cities
Speaker 2: have been the id city for a period of time,
Speaker 2: and it's time for the next one in the South.
Speaker 2: And there is absolutely no reason that it shouldn't be Memphis.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I heard that this one of your your chamber
Speaker 1: leader was coming this later on this evening for the
Speaker 1: other public session. Uh Ted thing is his name, A
Speaker 1: very nice guy. He'd mentioned that there was a six
Speaker 1: billion dollar startup uh in Ai. Uh that's coming to Memphis.
Speaker 1: And I'm not gonna mention the name of the person
Speaker 1: doing the startup, but I do believe that the start
Speaker 1: of itself is very in the media already. Yes, but
Speaker 1: it's a really it's a really smart move for the city.
Speaker 1: And I thought about a theme for you uh uh
Speaker 1: blues bones and backbone. Uh blues bones, barbecue and and
Speaker 1: technology backbone, like if you can have it's really not
Speaker 1: a very elegant theme, but but but if you can
Speaker 1: have certain things that you rally around that people know
Speaker 1: you about. I mean Nashville's country music and Atlanta is
Speaker 1: urban music. And I think you guys can own the
Speaker 1: whole blues. You got Elvish, you got, of course that
Speaker 1: was inspired by black arts. You've got the food backbone,
Speaker 1: and you've got now I think this technology backbone, amongst
Speaker 1: others that you've specialized in. Again, let's go back now
Speaker 1: to the basics. You have a balance sheet, you had
Speaker 1: a savings account, you have an income statement. Then the
Speaker 1: simplest language possible, do you have a balanced budget. Do
Speaker 1: you have as much income coming in as you have
Speaker 1: going out or do you have a deficit. Do you
Speaker 1: have more income, do you have more expenses out? Then
Speaker 1: you have income coming in on an annualized basis, without
Speaker 1: savings without This year.
Speaker 2: We have a balanced budget. We have actually more revenues
Speaker 2: coming in, and we'll contribute ten million dollars to fund balance.
Speaker 1: And so come on, now, you guys get to give
Speaker 1: us some love of that. We're reversing the trend. You're
Speaker 1: a positive revenue, Yeah, positive revenue.
Speaker 2: We're contributing ten million dollars to fund balance as long
Speaker 2: as things go as planned, and so that's the trend
Speaker 2: that we want our city to be on. And as
Speaker 2: we continue to get more economic development wins, projects like
Speaker 2: the one you just mentioned are going to help our
Speaker 2: tax roles. That's not one that we were counted on
Speaker 2: in terms of paying taxes this year. So that's going
Speaker 2: to be an even added.
Speaker 1: Should be net revenue a few million dollars a year
Speaker 1: once I get going. Yeah, definitely, definitely.
Speaker 2: So you know, those things are going to contribute to
Speaker 2: our bottom line and allow us to continue to do
Speaker 2: more and add more value, bring more development, bring more growth,
Speaker 2: and bring more taxes into our city.
Speaker 1: Gofers. So balanced budget negative I mean sorry negative positive
Speaker 1: income cash flow? Uh. And you're not living from paycheck
Speaker 1: to paycheck. Uh, you're not living on borrowing. Uh. This
Speaker 1: tax Uh, this tax rate was designed to level out
Speaker 1: everything we weren't pulling from from surplus. And uh, you're
Speaker 1: you're going to make some moonshot investments, uh, some of
Speaker 1: what you've already mentioned. And how's your credit rating? We're
Speaker 1: double A.
Speaker 2: And we recently got some news that we have we
Speaker 2: had a positive outlook. Now we have a negative outlo
Speaker 2: because of some of the things that had happened in
Speaker 2: the past, but we are confident that our recent actions
Speaker 2: are going to change that to a positive outlook.
Speaker 1: And what are your sources of revenue?
Speaker 2: Property taxes, sales taxes from the state. There are some fees,
Speaker 2: but you know, there's probably you know, ten fifteen million dollars,
Speaker 2: so not a significant amount. The large portion of our
Speaker 2: revenues come from property taxes and sales taxes.
Speaker 1: Okay, everybody listen now, anybody listen to this podcast in Memphis.
Speaker 1: Listen now. The homeownership rate in the zip code I
Speaker 1: pulled up when I was at first rising early and
Speaker 1: I'm pulled up when we do our town hall. The
Speaker 1: zip code I pulled up showed a twenty eight percent
Speaker 1: homeownership rate. I don't know anybody, anybody know what that
Speaker 1: zip code was I pulled up earlier. One two six, Yeah,
Speaker 1: was it ritten? Yeah? Three eight one two six, just
Speaker 1: on the other side of downtown. So see, my man
Speaker 1: knows what the zip code is. I'm talking a lot.
Speaker 1: That's my kind of mayor. So uh. I love math
Speaker 1: because it doesn't have an opinion. I just love data.
Speaker 1: You can, guys can go to my whole financial Wellness index,
Speaker 1: pull in your zip code and I'll tell you how
Speaker 1: you live it you're put in your zip code, it'll
Speaker 1: tell you what your credit score is. And so this
Speaker 1: area has a very low credit score and it has
Speaker 1: a twenty eight percent home ownership rate. Why is that important?
Speaker 1: What did he tell you? What is the number one
Speaker 1: way they produce income? Property taxes? If you have low
Speaker 1: ownership home ownership levels, you're going to have low property
Speaker 1: tax levels. And if that home ownership is dilapidated because
Speaker 1: you have non owner occupants, you have a bunch of
Speaker 1: tow up properties that nobody claims tax defaulted property. So
Speaker 1: what you want to do is encourage people. The number
Speaker 1: one way you build wealth in America the number This
Speaker 1: is a win win for the citizens and the mayor
Speaker 1: and the city. The number one way you build wealth
Speaker 1: in America is home ownership. Without question. So the mainstream
Speaker 1: homeowners or break in America is seventy five percent. Now
Speaker 1: just study that for a minute. If your rate is
Speaker 1: twenty eight percent and the national average is seventy five percent,
Speaker 1: the easiest thing you can do, and if it costs
Speaker 1: is same a cost save amount basically to rent as
Speaker 1: it does to own. The smartest thing you can do
Speaker 1: is as soon as possible become a homeowner. Real estate
Speaker 1: values have never gone down the history of America. In
Speaker 1: the history of America. Now they go up, and then
Speaker 1: they there's a recession and they recede. Or you can
Speaker 1: have an environment and a neighborhood that is receded by
Speaker 1: the way, so they may stay there for a minute,
Speaker 1: but then once that neighborhood has been is received attention
Speaker 1: and revitalization, or the neighbor the area has have economic energy,
Speaker 1: it corrects above the line and keeps going up because
Speaker 1: there's no they aren't buying any more land, you are
Speaker 1: making any more land. So and you get tax breaks
Speaker 1: from being a home ow owner. You get right off,
Speaker 1: you get all kind of business being a homeowner. And
Speaker 1: you get that mortgage from one of the banks here,
Speaker 1: and you could be able to write off that mortgage
Speaker 1: for twenty of the thirty years and get that money
Speaker 1: back in the tax refund. There's lots of benefits. The
Speaker 1: tax code is essentially designed to benefit homeowners, so that
Speaker 1: would help you definitely significantly. And what we dribed is
Speaker 1: what we want from Memphis neighborhoods. I was in Hyde
Speaker 1: Park this morning and we did one of our blight attacks.
Speaker 1: Where we were going after all of the blight that
Speaker 1: we saw in the community, and there's so much opportunity,
Speaker 1: so many vacant lots, so many homes that are unoccupied,
Speaker 1: and there are so many people in our community that
Speaker 1: need quality housing. And I want to be able to
Speaker 1: pair those individuals families that are looking for housing with
Speaker 1: those opportunities in our community. And I want to pair.
Speaker 2: Those opportunities with our aspiring developers, those those people that
Speaker 2: are starting in the development space and they may not
Speaker 2: have enough to do a one hundred unit apartment complex,
Speaker 2: but they can do two single family homes in Hyde Park.
Speaker 2: That has to be a part of the economic formula
Speaker 2: for what we do for our city to revive our neighborhoods.
Speaker 1: And I want Methits to be a place.
Speaker 2: Where the individuals that were able to live in those
Speaker 2: communities during the down years when the economy had turned
Speaker 2: and nobody was paying attention.
Speaker 1: I want them to be able to thrive.
Speaker 2: In those communities as they revive, as they come back.
Speaker 2: And we have an opportunity to do that because there's
Speaker 2: enough vacancy in those neighborhoods where you don't have to
Speaker 2: put people out. You can provide resources for them to
Speaker 2: be able to do home repair programs while you're taking
Speaker 2: these vacant, blighted properties and you're turning those into assets
Speaker 2: that people can build wealth from.
Speaker 1: Just like you're talking about, are there city programs, city, county, state,
Speaker 1: federal programs that people can access to help them become
Speaker 1: a homeowner or a developer of these neighborhoods. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, We certainly have down payment assistance programs that are
Speaker 2: offered through the city. We have development programs through our
Speaker 2: Department of Housing and Community Development where you can get
Speaker 2: grants and loans to support private development. And you know,
Speaker 2: we have other organizations THHDA and others, other the bank
Speaker 2: programs that allow people to be able to access capital.
Speaker 1: And so you've got you got. I mean, you have
Speaker 1: major banks in town, like what Wells, Fargo Truists first
Speaker 1: arise in regions I know off the top of my
Speaker 1: head there's a couple more. All of them have down
Speaker 1: payment assistance programs and prime mortgages for folks who meet
Speaker 1: certain criteria in underserved neighborhoods. And that could be combined
Speaker 1: with your city programs you just mentioned, right, and they
Speaker 1: use it a lot.
Speaker 2: They use those programs to help families in our community,
Speaker 2: and you know, we want to continue to double down
Speaker 2: on those initiatives. We have some creative ideas around how
Speaker 2: to support families with you know, uh guaranteed income programs
Speaker 2: that we're trying to get off the ground, But we
Speaker 2: want to be creative to support families in our city
Speaker 2: and really allow them to achieve their dreams.
Speaker 1: And we talked a little bit about the revenue side,
Speaker 1: and we've talked a little bit about how to enhance
Speaker 1: the revenue side. And one of the reasons I'm doing
Speaker 1: this in this way like I want to I want
Speaker 1: this mystery to be gone. Like people when they don't
Speaker 1: know what's going on, they think, okay, there's some shenanigans, right.
Speaker 1: You know, people say things to me that are crazy,
Speaker 1: Like this is one thing that people say to me
Speaker 1: just drives me. That's Oh, you know, John, I hate
Speaker 1: rich people. You don't you hate rich people to you
Speaker 1: become rich. What you hate is a game system. You
Speaker 1: just think the system is rigged and there's no way
Speaker 1: that you can fix it or participate it in it,
Speaker 1: So you hate it. And people who might be hating
Speaker 1: on you or hating on the city. They're like, there's
Speaker 1: some fishy going on, Like I don't understand where the
Speaker 1: money's going. I want to unpack that transparency. He just
Speaker 1: told you whether the revenue is coming from, right, he
Speaker 1: told you it's sales tax, right, property tax, sales sales
Speaker 1: tax and fees fees, And then you get some grants
Speaker 1: and some stuff, you know, manner from Heaven's sinde of stuff.
Speaker 1: But that's essentially where eight hundred and fifty million comes
Speaker 1: from a year. Right. Then you got this surplus because
Speaker 1: you've brought in more than you spent some one time
Speaker 1: COVID money and things like that. Okay, and now let's
Speaker 1: talk about the expense side of the balance sheet. Where
Speaker 1: are you spending your money.
Speaker 2: At a lot of areas paving roads? We spend money
Speaker 2: on solid waste. Police, right, police, fire? Public safety takes
Speaker 2: up about seventy percent of our budget. Whoa, yeah, about
Speaker 2: seventy percent of seventy percent seventy law enforcement is seventy percent.
Speaker 1: Seventy percent of our budget? Is law enforcement? Slow down?
Speaker 1: Wait a minute, ye, So if Memphis citizens decided to
Speaker 1: do block clubs for crime, that if Memphis citizens decided
Speaker 1: block by block that they're going to put together a
Speaker 1: community policing situation to identify problems in people, to turning
Speaker 1: the bad people, to support the young people, to neutralize
Speaker 1: the negative, to discourage people from having crime in their community,
Speaker 1: and that brought down crime. So you can redeploy some
Speaker 1: of that money to possibilities versus problems. I mean, just
Speaker 1: that seventy percent number, If you can just manage that
Speaker 1: down or or use someone's resources to even to get
Speaker 1: people more engaged in the uplifting their community, that's one
Speaker 1: big lever that the community can help you with.
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, definitely. I mean, the reduction in crime is
Speaker 2: something that we're all striving for. And we actually did
Speaker 2: reduce the police budget some this year by removing some
Speaker 2: of the vacant positions. That was actually how we reduced
Speaker 2: a lot of the gap that we had when we
Speaker 2: were working on our budget. But still, you know, we
Speaker 2: spend a lot of money on it, and you know,
Speaker 2: when we have decisions to make with regards to what
Speaker 2: do we cut, you know, public safety is usually the
Speaker 2: sacred col Like, you can't really touch that one.
Speaker 1: Seventy cents of every dollar. Yeah, what are the other
Speaker 1: areas you spend money on.
Speaker 2: Public works, you know, fixing up the streets and the roads, engineering,
Speaker 2: planning and development, housing parks, parks gets a good portion
Speaker 2: of our budget. Our community centers and those are really
Speaker 2: the basic libraries. Amazing libraries like where we're sitting in
Speaker 2: right now. This is a newly renovated historic library.
Speaker 1: I like to get my book in this library. I'd
Speaker 1: love to have my finish a letacire for all book
Speaker 1: on the shelves over there. Yeah, I think we can
Speaker 1: make that. Heaven I appreciate that. So and then you
Speaker 1: get some federal money.
Speaker 2: Then we get federal money for transportation, for housing, instructure, infrastructure. Yeah,
Speaker 2: so you know, and then some state dollars. We also
Speaker 2: get money from the state. So we spend it in
Speaker 2: a lot of different ways, and certainly there are more
Speaker 2: needs than we have revenues, but we try to be
Speaker 2: as efficient as we can in supporting our city.
Speaker 1: Little known fact most mayors don't control their airport.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so we have a airport authority where the city
Speaker 2: mayor and the county mayor. We have county mayors in Tennessee,
Speaker 2: accounty mayor. We appoint the board members the airport. So
Speaker 2: we definitely have a relationship with the airport influence, but
Speaker 2: not power. Yeah, I guess that's you can't tell them
Speaker 2: exactly what to do. You can suggest encourage exactly. Is
Speaker 2: a school district in your under your purview?
Speaker 1: Now?
Speaker 2: The school district is the independent body that is funded
Speaker 2: by the county government, So it's Memphians pay city taxes
Speaker 2: and county taxes, and the county tax pays for the schools.
Speaker 1: I just like that he has the answers. I've been
Speaker 1: doing this for a while. You mean, amazed how many
Speaker 1: people in this position don't have a clue. And what
Speaker 1: would be afraid of me sitting across from them asking
Speaker 1: them actually precise questions. We just can't wait till the
Speaker 1: interview is over because all they got is, you know,
Speaker 1: platitudes and slogans and generalities. I just love I'm saying
Speaker 1: this intentionally. I know, you know the answers. How is
Speaker 1: the short term your short term things? There's good debt
Speaker 1: and bad debt. So and if you're taxing people and
Speaker 1: not giving a return on an investment, well that's just
Speaker 1: a bad that's just a bad expense from an investor's perspective.
Speaker 1: But if you're turning that if you're taking that money
Speaker 1: and investing it and things that appreciate in value, then
Speaker 1: that's actually because because it could be considered a good
Speaker 1: debt or good obligation. You have short term needs against
Speaker 1: long term needs. So short term two years, long term,
Speaker 1: twenty years, ten twenty years. Give us some sense of
Speaker 1: how you're taking the gains you've got right now and
Speaker 1: you're going to convert them into some short and long
Speaker 1: term wins.
Speaker 2: What do those things look like? I mean short term wins.
Speaker 2: What we're looking at. We're making investments in our technology fiber.
Speaker 2: We have a fiber network that's being installed, and we
Speaker 2: are working to upgrade the camera network that we have
Speaker 2: around the city. That's a short term that'll help with crime, definitely,
Speaker 2: it's gonna help with crime and quality of life. So
Speaker 2: imagine that we well it's not imagine. We have five
Speaker 2: hundred and fifty intersections that currently have a fiber network
Speaker 2: connection and we're going to be connecting HD cameras to
Speaker 2: those intersections, and those HD cameras will allow us to
Speaker 2: have AI layered on. We're not using it for facial recognition,
Speaker 2: but object recognition. So if somebody's throwing trash on the road.
Speaker 2: We have a camera that's very clear that's going to
Speaker 2: allow us to catch them. If somebody has stolen a
Speaker 2: vehicle and it's a red mositor where they took off
Speaker 2: the license plate with a dint on the hood, we
Speaker 2: can actually see that car as it passes any of
Speaker 2: our major intersections throughout the city. And so that's a
Speaker 2: short term investment that we think is going to pay
Speaker 2: significant dividends when it comes to long term, like our
Speaker 2: capital budget CIP, that's what we call the Capital Improvement budget.
Speaker 2: We are you know, looking at things like you know,
Speaker 2: police cars, and one of the one of the things
Speaker 2: that got a lot of debate, it was only a
Speaker 2: million dollars out of like a ninety five million dollar budget.
Speaker 2: But we also invested in school facilities this year, which
Speaker 2: was the first time we have invested in schools in
Speaker 2: you know, twelve thirteen years, and it was important for
Speaker 2: me because of this one fact. I know, we're not
Speaker 2: in the education business, but one srees are our kids
Speaker 2: and they're walking in our communities, and if they're going
Speaker 2: to schools that look like nobody cares, then they behave
Speaker 2: as such. And our kids deserve to be in facilities
Speaker 2: that match what we're trying to grow them to be.
Speaker 1: And then the other thing is it allows us to have.
Speaker 2: An even stronger partnership with our school system because one
Speaker 2: of the things that we have in our core city neighborhoods,
Speaker 2: as we look at all the blight and vacancy in
Speaker 2: some of the communities, in those communities where you have
Speaker 2: the largest aggregated pieces of land that are opportunity for redevelopment,
Speaker 2: they are school sites. They are abandoned school buildings, And
Speaker 2: we want to be partners with the school system as
Speaker 2: we look to redevelop those neighborhoods and communities and turn
Speaker 2: those vacant structures that are generating no tax revenue into
Speaker 2: developments that are generating tax revenue that are supporting the
Speaker 2: school system and the City of Memphis.
Speaker 1: Fantastic. As you were saying that, I'm thinking imagine an
Speaker 1: AI are robotics are stem initiated certification school or programming
Speaker 1: institute that is funded by revenue from a I'm making
Speaker 1: this up now, as I'm talking a call center that
Speaker 1: Silicon Valley or a backbone center that Silicon Valley decides, well,
Speaker 1: this is a school site, former school site, I can
Speaker 1: put my backbone from my technology center for the Southeast
Speaker 1: and riffing here in Memphis, and I can offset it
Speaker 1: with I can and I can literally create jobs by
Speaker 1: training people to do the jobs in the center of
Speaker 1: creating goodwill in the area. I'll get some tax breaks
Speaker 1: maybe because I'm doing this with the city and it's
Speaker 1: some goodwill on the way, and it's what I need
Speaker 1: to do anyway, and it's less expensive as I'm doing
Speaker 1: it in Memphis versus doing it yeah San Francisco or where.
Speaker 1: And I mean, that'sh just all the time.
Speaker 2: I like the way you're thinking, because when you talked
Speaker 2: about the AI project, you know, for me, there's a
Speaker 2: lot of conversation around how many jobs will they create
Speaker 2: at that facility, And for me, it doesn't matter.
Speaker 1: That's right.
Speaker 2: What it is is a statement of innovation. We have
Speaker 2: the world's largest, strongest supercomputer right here in Memphis, Tennessee.
Speaker 1: That part that matters. And I just proved right there
Speaker 1: just statements things. But we want to build on that.
Speaker 2: And you know, I think I've had some early conversations
Speaker 2: with some you know, outside capital and they are definitely
Speaker 2: interested in our city.
Speaker 1: And we're going to keep pushing the narrative. So you know,
Speaker 1: I'm sure you wake up every day a little anxious
Speaker 1: and a little angry. Because an inner city in France
Speaker 1: is called Paris, where the Olympers are happening right now.
Speaker 1: Inner city in the UK is called London. Inner city
Speaker 1: in Turkey is called Istanbul. You know, I've traveled to
Speaker 1: one hundred countries. The people honor their inner cities. We don't.
Speaker 1: These are gold mines, and you're right next to the
Speaker 1: river and you go, you know, this is a gold mine.
Speaker 1: You got to reimagine it and it puts an energy
Speaker 1: into it. Give it a business plan and you got
Speaker 1: and you give the mayor some time to unpack this
Speaker 1: because none of this stuff, the problems took a long time,
Speaker 1: and this loser is gonna take a bit of time
Speaker 1: to to reimagine. I just think that what I've heard
Speaker 1: you say is directionally correct. Uh. The balance you just
Speaker 1: described and the income statement, is it on your website somewhere?
Speaker 1: Can people go to the City of Memphis website and
Speaker 1: see how this.
Speaker 2: In Memphisy and all the financial information is there. It
Speaker 2: may not be as simplified as we probably could be.
Speaker 2: We're working on that, but it's definitely there.
Speaker 1: And so one of the benefits of buying a share
Speaker 1: of any kind of stock is when you buy one
Speaker 1: share of stock, you become a shareholder, and that gives
Speaker 1: you the rights and privileges of every detail of that
Speaker 1: publicly traded company. H one share, one share of stock
Speaker 1: is you can own one share, you can own a
Speaker 1: million shares, doesn't matter. You have the same rights. And
Speaker 1: what he just said was as a taxpayer of a resident,
Speaker 1: even of the city of Memphis, you have a right
Speaker 1: to see everything they're doing. And he's saying it's already
Speaker 1: available for you on the website. And if somebody's talking
Speaker 1: mess I'd encourage them to go to the website and
Speaker 1: see if there are questions or answered first. It's so
Speaker 1: easy to be a critic. Yeah, and I like what
Speaker 1: you what you're doing much better than other people are not. Doing. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Well for me, I mean, you said you spoke about
Speaker 2: waking up every day. I wake up every day so
Speaker 2: inspired and I feel great every day because I the
Speaker 2: honor of serving as the mayor of the city.
Speaker 1: That I love.
Speaker 2: There you go, So I'm talking about for me, it's
Speaker 2: just about work. We just we just got to work it,
Speaker 2: and I think we're headed in the right direction. So
Speaker 2: what's your vision for twenty thirty. As we come to clothes,
Speaker 2: I want you to now we've unpacked the balance sheet,
Speaker 2: the income statement, the expense statement, We've put together a
Speaker 2: household budget. We talked about a couple of your moonshots,
Speaker 2: a couple of year priorities.
Speaker 1: Why do I give you an observation, by the way, yeah, please.
Speaker 1: My mom always said, don't offer advice. Wise, men don't
Speaker 1: need any fools don't listen. So it's just an observation
Speaker 1: after listening to folks complain and criticize and they care,
Speaker 1: by the way, this is why they're saying it's about
Speaker 1: the city of care. It seems to me that people
Speaker 1: are just sort of passing them. They're passing each other,
Speaker 1: they're not talking to each other. And I would encourage
Speaker 1: a what do you call a coalition of the willing
Speaker 1: and an operation who can help you with this if
Speaker 1: you like. But it's the private sector, the government, the
Speaker 1: community which includes academia and media, sitting at the same
Speaker 1: table on a regular basis, sharing information, brainstorming strategies coming up.
Speaker 1: Every problem has having a beginning and middle and an end.
Speaker 1: Put things that are on the docket, that are priorities
Speaker 1: right now on the table, and give people something constructive
Speaker 1: to do at our next session. I'm just I'm gonna
Speaker 1: lay out my ideas for some things that people can do.
Speaker 1: But I think you know, people don't attack themselves, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean I did this. As you know, I've advised
Speaker 1: Republican and Democratic presidents, and I've been recognized. Our work's
Speaker 1: been recognized by five presidents from both parties, and I
Speaker 1: have known nine presidents. One I won't mention. And I
Speaker 1: brought President Bush the Sun into South central LA two
Speaker 1: thousand and two, hit that aniversary of the Ritney King riots,
Speaker 1: and the city went crazy. The leaders of some of
Speaker 1: the leaders, what is John Bryan doing? This is crazy,
Speaker 1: This is ridiculous. Why why he's bringing this man in
Speaker 1: the South Central LA? So my pastor God rest is
Speaker 1: Soul was the unofficial mayor of l A's Reverend Doctor
Speaker 1: Cecil Chip Murray of the First AMM Church and uh
Speaker 1: in l A. And and then his dear friend was
Speaker 1: Bishop Blake of Kojik, which of course we know has
Speaker 1: a treat strong presence here. And Brett was Reverend was
Speaker 1: hosting the president the events on Monday. This is a Friday.
Speaker 1: So Reverendy called me, my son, I just got a
Speaker 1: call and there's a certain congress person that is very
Speaker 1: unhappy with you at the moment, and they wonder why
Speaker 1: you're bringing this man into the to to our community.
Speaker 1: I said, well, do you mean the president of the
Speaker 1: United States of America. Last time I checked, there's not
Speaker 1: six of them, that's not three of them. It's just
Speaker 1: one of them. And it's not like we've solved all
Speaker 1: the problems in this community before he got here, Like
Speaker 1: there's serious problems. So I said, I don't care whether
Speaker 1: you republic the Republican or Democrat. I want to be
Speaker 1: somebody from to get it done party. So after I
Speaker 1: said all that, he's like, okay, you finished, my son. Okay,
Speaker 1: this person has an The LA Times is writing a
Speaker 1: hit piece on you right now. It comes out tomorrow
Speaker 1: saying that this is despicable that you're bringing this man
Speaker 1: into south central LA. I had less than twenty four
Speaker 1: hours to respond, so I said, well, rever, right, Well
Speaker 1: did they call you know that? A community leader called me,
Speaker 1: very prominent community leader told me the name. Okay, that
Speaker 1: person okay, great, Look, please tell them and call them
Speaker 1: and say, I'm going to cancel the whole thing. Excuse me,
Speaker 1: my son, No, you're sick you no, no, I'm going
Speaker 1: to call the White House. See service is doing in
Speaker 1: sweeps right now. I'm just telling to cancel the whole thing.
Speaker 1: This person's think is a bad idea. Just canceled the
Speaker 1: whole thing. By the way, just tell the young lady
Speaker 1: who called you, who I know very well by reputation,
Speaker 1: I'll know her personally. Just tell her I'm really sorry
Speaker 1: to offend her. Because there was a private meeting with
Speaker 1: the President of United States and members of his cabin
Speaker 1: including HUD and Grant giving agencies, right before the public
Speaker 1: meeting with the President of United States on Monday. And
Speaker 1: I'm so apologetic. I'm sorry to offend I had her
Speaker 1: in a meeting of eighteen people with the President United States.
Speaker 1: She was sitting right next to the president in that meeting,
Speaker 1: and I'm so sorry I've been so unintentionally offensive. So
Speaker 1: just let her know I'm going to cancel that meeting too.
Speaker 1: And about twenty minutes later, I get a call back
Speaker 1: and they said, well, my son, They said, this has
Speaker 1: been a misunderstanding. They think this is a fabulous or
Speaker 1: idea that you're hosing in this meeting. What time is
Speaker 1: the private meeting? And so the meeting went forward. It
Speaker 1: was on a Monday. It was standing room only. All
Speaker 1: the people criticized were at the front of the line
Speaker 1: trying to get a picture. Uh where the private meeting happened.
Speaker 1: By the way, and the front page story in the
Speaker 1: La Times the next day was one hundred percent positive.
Speaker 1: I don't thing it's ever happened before since that a
Speaker 1: Republican president came into a committee like that and got
Speaker 1: that kind of positive praise. And it wasn't me. It
Speaker 1: was recognizing that people don't people don't attack themselves that
Speaker 1: as long as this meeting didn't include her, it must
Speaker 1: be a bad idea. The minute that it we incorporated her,
Speaker 1: it was a good idea. And nobody washes rental cars.
Speaker 1: You let you take the car for a week, you
Speaker 1: get it and you take it back to its owner.
Speaker 1: Everybody has to have an ownership in the problem and
Speaker 1: the solution. My suggestion is bring these people in, UH,
Speaker 1: make them stakeholders in the ideas and the thought process.
Speaker 1: You're going to get a lot of great ideas that
Speaker 1: are cheap. There's somebody else's and they're willing to pay
Speaker 1: for and uh and and let them do that, give
Speaker 1: her and give the credit away. I received that. So
Speaker 1: what is your vision that you want the young you?
Speaker 1: There's somebody out here listening to this who wants to
Speaker 1: be a mayor? What's your what's your thought for them?
Speaker 1: What's your vision for twenty years for Memphis? And what
Speaker 1: is it that you want people to know right now
Speaker 1: about being the mayor of other than you love it
Speaker 1: and it's a great thing. Yeah, you know, there's there's
Speaker 1: something that drives you absolutely out of your mind. What
Speaker 1: is that? A couple let's ask you three questions. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you asked me a lot.
Speaker 2: So in terms of what I say to the young person,
Speaker 2: I just got to say this real quick. I had
Speaker 2: one of the most rewarding experiences through throughout this whole
Speaker 2: process when I was on the campaign trail. I was
Speaker 2: in Fraser and I was just wrapping up a parade,
Speaker 2: putting all the stuff in the trunk, and these two
Speaker 2: little guys ran up. They had on band uniforms. I
Speaker 2: think they may went to Treadsman or something, but they
Speaker 2: were like where's Paul Young And where's Paul Young at?
Speaker 2: And I jumped off of the band. I'm like here
Speaker 2: I go, Man, what's up? And it's like, man, we
Speaker 2: just want to be just like you.
Speaker 1: Man.
Speaker 2: You look like us, Man, you got on jeines. Man,
Speaker 2: we just want to be like you man. And you know,
Speaker 2: for me, like, that's what it's about. It's showing our
Speaker 2: next generation that there's an opportunity, like I'm Memphis, Like
Speaker 2: I'm no better, no different than anybody else that's from
Speaker 2: the city. And so you know, I think that's the
Speaker 2: message to the next generation, is that I'm you, You're me,
Speaker 2: Like we can change the city together. I think in
Speaker 2: the next twenty thirty years, I want I'm already I'm
Speaker 2: always thinking of headlines. And the headline I want to
Speaker 2: see is Memphis fastest growing city in the South, Memphis
Speaker 2: the fastest to close well disparities in a community, incomes
Speaker 2: growing in the city of Memphis. And I want to
Speaker 2: see the demographic crime going down. Obviously that's a given
Speaker 2: because in order to do all those things, we got
Speaker 2: to get that. That's right, you know, those are the
Speaker 2: headlines that I that I want to manifest for this community.
Speaker 2: And you asked me a third one.
Speaker 1: But no, no, that that was that was pretty conference.
Speaker 1: That was pretty comprehensive. And uh, if I said to
Speaker 1: you in summary, uh, that we're living in a moment
Speaker 1: in history, this is the third reconstruction, that financial literacy
Speaker 1: is a civil rights issue of this generation, as important
Speaker 1: as the right to vote, That a seven hundred credit
Speaker 1: score is as important as a height as a college
Speaker 1: a college degree, and I want everybody to get a
Speaker 1: college degree, by the way. But if I said these
Speaker 1: sort of really sort of cut, you know, pushing the envelope,
Speaker 1: almost radical things to you, and said to you that
Speaker 1: I think is as important to breathe as breathing in
Speaker 1: a city like this, and we need it everywhere, We
Speaker 1: need incorporate it everywhere. And if doctor King was alive today,
Speaker 1: I believe this is the work that he would be doing.
Speaker 1: What would you say to that? And that and that
Speaker 1: the US mayor need to prioritize this financial literacy everywhere.
Speaker 1: What would you say to they think it's radical to that?
Speaker 1: Is that not on your to do list? Oh, It's
Speaker 1: definitely on our to do list. I mean, I think
Speaker 1: it's at the core of all the things that we're
Speaker 1: looking to do in our city. You have a statement,
Speaker 1: I take a lot of your bars man, a lot
Speaker 1: of the lines you say, I take one of them today.
Speaker 2: One of them I always take is one where you
Speaker 2: said history never feels like history when you sit in
Speaker 2: the it and it just feels like another day. And
Speaker 2: I really feel like we're in a historic moment from
Speaker 2: Memphis that we're going to look back at this time
Speaker 2: and say, this is when it's shifted. And in order
Speaker 2: to really get the shift that we want, the financial literacy,
Speaker 2: the capacity of our community to understand how important it
Speaker 2: is for them to be able to build wealth and
Speaker 2: have assets and pass those assets down to their next
Speaker 2: generation is so important to break the cycle of generational poverty,
Speaker 2: because that's what we're dealing.
Speaker 1: With in many instances.
Speaker 2: And you know, I can go into the depths of
Speaker 2: our city, but at the end of the day, it's
Speaker 2: generational poverty, and we want to break that cycle through
Speaker 2: financial literacy and to.
Speaker 1: To bring this full circle. Some people would say banks
Speaker 1: are racist and that's why they're not making loans. Banks
Speaker 1: are on racist people are racist, and some racist people
Speaker 1: work at banks. And now in nineteen twenty the bank
Speaker 1: was racist because the bank was owned by the Xyz family.
Speaker 1: An Xyz family was racist, and they actually looked at
Speaker 1: every own application and they said, I'm gonna give Keith
Speaker 1: the loan and I'm not gonna give Joeanne the loan.
Speaker 1: That was absolutely racist. Today a bank is publicly traded.
Speaker 1: The bank is so big, with sixty billion dollars just
Speaker 1: at this bank. First arison, you guys need to make
Speaker 1: every good loan you can. I mean, my rich friends
Speaker 1: think my poor friends do better if only to stay rich.
Speaker 1: I mean, even the racist needs black people to succeed
Speaker 1: because they need GDP to ride gross domestic product. And
Speaker 1: we're all in this thing together. And so what we
Speaker 1: need to do is what we made in Memphis. If
Speaker 1: the poverty rate is double the national average, if the
Speaker 1: credit average credit score is one hundred one hundred points
Speaker 1: below than that. By the way, this is true, Memphis
Speaker 1: credit score is one hundred points below the national average.
Speaker 1: National average national average is about six ninety five. Credit
Speaker 1: score Memphis is five ninety five. If I if I'm mistaken,
Speaker 1: not mistaken, yeah, five ninety five. So you're one hundred
Speaker 1: points below, which means when you wake up in the morning.
Speaker 1: Half the people or two thirds people in Memphis are
Speaker 1: locked out of the free enterprise system and you don't
Speaker 1: even know it. You can't get a decent car loan
Speaker 1: at a six hundred credit score, a five eighty credit score.
Speaker 1: You're not getting when you go to that secondary car
Speaker 1: lot and you get a Mercedes and they take you
Speaker 1: back to paper. You didn't get a Mercedes, you had mercy.
Speaker 1: These payments and an eighteen percent interest rate? Were they
Speaker 1: smiling at you and you're saying what's the payment? When
Speaker 1: you really should have asked what was the interest rate?
Speaker 1: You never asked the interest rate when there's a when
Speaker 1: there's a whenever asked what the payment is when it's
Speaker 1: an initial rate attached. That's a mobile bomb. That that
Speaker 1: car is gonna blow up on you. Is going to fail,
Speaker 1: I guarantee you, because the real business that they're in
Speaker 1: is maintenance. They're in a maintenance rip business. And they
Speaker 1: got they took you a little down payment. They wait
Speaker 1: for that for you to call and tell you to
Speaker 1: tell you that the car exploded. That you're gonna say,
Speaker 1: I can't afford the pay for the car. You guys,
Speaker 1: does this sound familiar? You gonna take the car back.
Speaker 1: They're gonna give you some threats. They really know that
Speaker 1: how this is gonna end. They're gonna take the car back.
Speaker 1: They're gonna take all your money, they take your deposit,
Speaker 1: your down payment. They gotta threaten your credit. You're gonna
Speaker 1: give them a couple more thousand dollars, then take a
Speaker 1: couple of thousand dollars repair of the car. They're gonna
Speaker 1: threaten you some more. They're gonna rent. They're gonna sell
Speaker 1: that car to the next person that comes through the door.
Speaker 1: It's a cycle right the way you saw all this.
Speaker 1: Because again, the bank can't give you a loan. I
Speaker 1: don't care. You can go to church every Sunday, be
Speaker 1: the nicest person on the planet, pay your taxes tied
Speaker 1: at church, I mean, kiss, pay the mayor on his
Speaker 1: forehead every time you see him. And the bank still
Speaker 1: can't give you a loan because your credit score is
Speaker 1: tow up from the flow up. It's five eighty. I
Speaker 1: wouldn't give you a loan, So you gotta get your
Speaker 1: credit score up to six fifty six eighty seven hundred.
Speaker 1: At seven hundred, key starts to sing and you go
Speaker 1: to the computer at night at seven hundred, the computer
Speaker 1: just says yes, yes, the homeownership, Yes, the small business ownership, Yes,
Speaker 1: the prime credit yes, seven to fifty credit card, Yes
Speaker 1: to small business ownership. You know, all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: capital access doors open up, and now you can you
Speaker 1: start to see economic activity and energy happening again. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna go in this to some detail, but if you
Speaker 1: raise credit score is one hundred points in Memphis, you
Speaker 1: change the city. Just that one thing goes down, opportunity
Speaker 1: goes up. You make his job a hell of a
Speaker 1: lot easier, and your children have a shot. Let me
Speaker 1: tell you, y'all just got him to quote jay Z,
Speaker 1: y'all just got a million dollars worth a game of
Speaker 1: nine ninety nine. But it didn't cost you nine ninety nine,
Speaker 1: just cost you your time. I'm a good, pretty good rapper,
Speaker 1: So I want you to do me a favor. And
Speaker 1: when you respond what I'm about to say, I need
Speaker 1: you to think about the worst day he's going to have,
Speaker 1: the most frustrating day he's going to have where he
Speaker 1: gets up and it's like hurting cats, Like no matter
Speaker 1: what you do, you just can't get You can't make
Speaker 1: people happy. People are just miserable and unhappy. They're blaming
Speaker 1: it on him because rainbows only follow storms. You cannot
Speaker 1: have a rainbow without a storm. First. I need you
Speaker 1: to be the rainbow. I need for you to give
Speaker 1: him some love so he remembers it on his toughest
Speaker 1: day and thank him for his public service because he
Speaker 1: could have done something else. Thank you, Mayor Paul Yoh,
Speaker 1: thank you, appreciate it, Thank you, say thank you. Is
Speaker 1: there anything else that you wanted to add for the
Speaker 1: sake of the podcast before we wrap?
Speaker 2: Nah Man, this was great, incredible. It's always good to
Speaker 2: sit down to me. It's hard for me to talk
Speaker 2: because I just like listening to you. So it was great, man,
Speaker 2: And really appreciate you being here and what you've been
Speaker 2: doing for our city for many years. So you've been invested,
Speaker 2: you've been deep in and our city appreciate you. There
Speaker 2: are so many families whose lives are better, and I
Speaker 2: look at this is like, how do you gauge a
Speaker 2: good life. You gauge a good life by how many
Speaker 2: other people's lives are better just because you were here.
Speaker 2: And there are people's lives who are better just because
Speaker 2: you were here.
Speaker 1: Man, So thank you brother. I appreciate that I'm not
Speaker 1: being raised short any like that. And I'm straight, by
Speaker 1: the way, I'm completely straight. But in the cool to
Speaker 1: see two black men up here loving on each other,
Speaker 1: and and you know, we need more of that, right
Speaker 1: you know, I'm securing myself. He secured himself. We got
Speaker 1: more enough that we need. We're about giving each other, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, trying to support each other. And that's what
Speaker 1: we needed this entire city. That's what we need in
Speaker 1: this entire country. You you you you look. I can't
Speaker 1: guarantee you that being positive is going to make you
Speaker 1: a success, but I absolutely guarantee you that being negative
Speaker 1: will make you fail. Have a great day. Money and
Speaker 1: Wealth with John O'Brien is a production of the Black
Speaker 1: Effect Podcast Network. For more podcasts from the Black Effect
Speaker 1: Podcast Network, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
Speaker 1: you listen to your favorite shows.