♪♪♪ Support for Nevada Week is provided by Senator William H. Hernstadt.

Welcome to Nevada Week .

I'm Amber Renee Dixon.

Nevada Week is known for its in-depth conversations with newsmakers and community leaders.

But several months ago, we launched a new segment featuring those guests in a different light.

Nevada Week In Person is a more personal conversation.

And this week on Nevada Week , we're bringing you some highlights from those discussions starting with Erick Harper, UNLV's newest athletic director.

During our conversation in February, he talked about taking over for the former AD, Desiree Reed-Francois, and his future plans.

(Erick Harper) You know what this is?

This is a spot, and I knew Desiree had higher aspirations to go to a Power Five, and she she earned that opportunity to be at a Power Five.

And I was like, You know what?

Here's my chance.

So let's take a run at it.

-Do you have those aspirations, or are you waiting until your daughter-- -Absolutely not.

I am here through and through for UNLV.

I feel awesome about being here, awesome about having the opportunity, and I thank Jim Livengood for that opportunity.

And I'm committed to UNLV through and through, no ifs, ands, or buts about it.

My wife received her undergrad at UNLV, she earned her master's at UNLV, and she's currently working on her PhD at UNLV as well.

So we're a little bit-- We're pretty invested in UNLV.

-I'll say.

And on the way in here, you told me your wife dressed you today.

-Absolutely.

-I said she's got some style.

-She is absolutely phenomenal in that, and she puts different things-- -"Love you, Dad" on the inside?

-That's my father, Frank Harper.

So we put an embroidery on the inside.

The one I wore the other night had Erick loves Patrice-- or Patrice loves Erick.

But that's, you know, that's-- -That's your wife?

- --who we are as a family.

Yes, that's my wife.

That's who we are as a family.

And, again, it's important that I have a brand that is significant for UNLV and positive and great.

-Also in February, I talked to longtime Las Vegas Review-Journal Columnist John Katsilometes, also known as Johnny Kats, about meeting his idol, Steve Martin.

Will you rattle off for us some of the A-list celebrities that you have come to talk to and know.

(John Katsilometes) Well, the ones that I've known best over the years have been Wayne Newton and Jerry Lewis.

Those two I would say are probably the top of the crop all the way through.

I've known Celine Dion over the years.

Recently Carlos Santana over at the House of Blues I've gotten to know.

And then down the line, you know, I've just interviewed everybody who has performed in residency in Las Vegas.

That goes, you know, Shania Twain, John Fogarty, Ringo Starr.

We are having a conversation with Katy Perry next week.

Luke Bryan in the current horizon.

Gwen Stefani.

-Goes on and on.

-It goes on and on.

I interviewed Brad Paisley last week.

He's in-- He's in town.

It is pretty much everybody who's-- David Copperfield I've gotten to know pretty well over the recent years.

-From what I understand, though, you don't get nervous, except if it comes to Steve Martin.

Why is that?

-Steve Martin?

Yeah, that is true, because I grew up a huge Steve Martin fan.

In fact, my family tells me that my mannerisms still today are from Steve Martin's appearances on Saturday Night Live when I was a child.

I would watch it when I was a kid.

Hey, you know?

You know what I mean?

-Yes.

And I can see it.

I totally see it.

-And that is inherent.

I used to listen to Let's Get Small , the album, all the time.

And my verbal pattern, the cadence, the way I'm-- even the way I move.

So I got to the point in my career where I got to interview Steve Martin.

And I've interviewed him I think three times total now, and I met him in person.

And I got on the phone with him and Martin Short, and I just fell apart.

I mean, I couldn't-- I could not maintain my composure in that instance.

And that very rarely happens to me.

At least I'm able to, you know, you know you're talking to a famous person, and I'm a fan of a lot of entertainers, but Steve Martin for some reason, I was just like, I was hyperventilating.

-Speaking of entertainers, I got to sit down with Las Vegas Headliner and Ventriloquist Terry Fator, who brought with him one of the stars of his show, Winston the Impersonating Turtle.

Fator and Winston explained how the idea for his most recent show came to be.

You are almost a year into your new show at the New York, New York, Who's the Dummy Now?

And you said-- You've been quoted as saying it's a little bit different than what you've done in the past.

"It's kind of a whimsical origin story delving into the psychiatry of a ventriloquist."

And that's what I would like you to expand upon.

I mean, who are these puppets to you?

(Terry Fator) Well, as I was assessing what I wanted my next show to be after I moved from the Mirage over to New York, New York, I thought it might be kind of fun to look at the psychological aspect of what a ventriloquist is.

And I started looking at all my characters and realizing that all of those characters were kind of created out of a-- out of my psyche.

And I realized, like Winston-- (Winston) I'm his inner child.

-Right.

So he gets to be the little kid that-- -Sometimes I'm a little confused.

-Yeah.

Like, for example, I'll say, Do you like it in Vegas?

-Oh, yeah.

They're so nice.

Just for me, they made turtle soup.

-Right.

So he doesn't understand what turtle soup is.

He thinks it was an honor.

And little things like that.

But he's the childlikeness.

You know, I have a country singer who is a-- who's been divorced 10 times or 12 times.

Well, I've had two divorces, so I created a puppet that's had more divorces than me.

You know, I've got a sexy puppet.

I've never considered myself sexy, but it's kind of that-- You know, any guy wants to be considered sexy.

And I've never thought of myself as sexy.

So what did I do?

I created the sexiest puppet ever, you know?

So as I began to look at the different characters that I had created, I realized I was doing this out of my psyche.

And I think-- I think a lot of-- Well, I think the best ventriloquists do that.

I think the best ventriloquists pick part of themselves and turn it into a character.

-Wait.

You don't think women find you sexy?

-Well, my wife does.

And that's really all that matters.

But I have never thought of myself as sexy.

But she makes sure I know that.

-I don't think he's sexy.

-Well, I hope you don't.

-Yeah.

Considering where his hand is, he's right.

-I also spoke with Gerome Sapp.

He's a former NFL safety who earned his MBA from Harvard in the offseason.

Now he calls Southern Nevada home and runs his own company that offers investments in high-end sneakers.

Sapp shared how he first became interested in finance.

We did a show about women's financial literacy not too long ago, and we talked about money not being taught in schools.

So what was your introduction to money and at such a young age?

(Gerome Sapp) You know, sadly, my father was in prison, you know?

And he was a drug dealer.

So I would go visit him in prison, and he would teach me principles of financial markets.

He essentially used his knowledge of an illegal activity to start to teach me principles of a legal activity in terms of financial markets.

So I started learning about assets and supply and demand since I was seven or eight years old, visiting my father in prison.

Nothing-- He didn't teach me anything about the illegal stuff he did, but he wanted to show me that if you use your mind for a positive thing, you can accomplish more things than he had ever accomplished.

So I started learning principles of finance from seven, eight years old from my father who was in prison.

And then fortunate for me, I went to a magnet high school that focused in business.

So I was taking econ and micro and macro econ and accounting and finance from my freshman sophomore year on.

So I already had principles of finance in me, and my grandfather was actually a finance professor at the University of Houston too.

So it was kind of one of those things that I think I was destined to do to some degree.

-There are several people in need in Southern Nevada, but one area of need that's often overlooked is period supplies.

Wendi Schweigart, is working to change that while providing some dignity to the subject.

Notice how I'm just struggling to say products, tampons, or pads.

There's this taboo that surrounds menstruation.

Why?

(Wendi Schweigart) I'm not really sure why, where it started.

But it is true that it is extremely taboo.

I've had donors say, If you stop talking, we'll make you a donation.

And the facts are that the more we talk about periods-- And I tend to say "period supplies," not necessarily feminine hygiene because that cues to, What is that?

Is that deodorant?

Is that toothpaste?

No, we're talking about your period.

I want to get to the point.

And the more we talk about this issue-- I think because it's always been private, you know, and some people still feel that way.

And we want to be respectful always of people's comfort levels, but the more we talk about it is the only way that the issue is going to be resolved.

-And this is named after your mother?

-It is.

It's named after my mother, Marilyn.

We lost her to cancer in 2011.

So our logo is actually her face.

And that's actually her signature that I kept off her driver's license after she passed away.

She always wore false eyelashes and nude lipsticks.

So if you look at our logo, those were her trademarks.

And periods weren't her thing; menstruation was not her cause, but she definitely was-- she was an amazing woman who had a tough life and pulled herself up by her bootstraps and was a boss babe before that was really a thing.

And so she taught us to give back to the community, to treat people with dignity, and that's what we do in her honor.

We give people dignity with their period.

-In early May, we talked with Tina Quigley, President and CEO of the Las Vegas Global Economic Alliance.

Here she talked about the future of Las Vegas' economy and about her first job in Las Vegas leading development for a large expansion program at Harry Reid International Airport.

You oversaw a $1 billion capital expansion program.

I believe that was the D Gates satellite concourse.

(Tina Quigley) So the D Gates was part of it.

But we also had runways and taxiways and a garage associated with that project.

So again, I was young, but I had great mentors and leaders at the airport.

And that's that optimism that I'm talking about that there was so much opportunity for career growth and to get involved in projects that you otherwise wouldn't have had you been in any other community.

And again, I know I've talked to so many hundreds of thousands of people.

I know they moved here, same thing, their careers and their opportunities to get involved in the community and do things was unparalleled with other communities.

-What do you think it is about Las Vegas that has those opportunities you're talking about that other places don't?

-At the time, we were growing significantly.

We had, just in the early '90s when the Mirage had opened, the Strip was reinventing itself.

We were imploding things.

Businesses were moving here.

People were moving here for jobs.

The cost of living was tremendous compared to, you know, we had wages and cost of living.

Again, unparalleled with other regions in the United States.

So great place to start to set up for your career.

-Well, how does it compare to now?

I mean, I feel it's kinda in the same situation.

-I would agree with you.

I think that we are at a period where we're starting to recognize-- jumping in economic development-- we're starting to realize the importance of growing beyond just gaming and hospitality.

Gaming and hospitality will always be our primary, I'm going to call it "spigot" of money, that's flowing into our economy's bucket.

But growing off of that industry, growing into other industries that are related.

So advanced manufacturing, providing the resources and supplies for gaming is an industry that we are tapping into.

Sports and entertainment, technology type businesses, clean energy type businesses, these are growing and you're starting to feel it.

There is a mass exodus from other states, primarily California.

And so I do think you're starting to feel this sense of "We can be more," and people wanting to be a part of that We can be more.

I'm excited to be a part of this next "We can be more" phase.

-And we can be more by working together.

In June, PBS legend Chef Martin Yan spoke with us on location of the Great Vegas Recipe virtual cooking demonstration and said food can serve as a bridge between cultures.

If you think about the idea that because you have educated so many Americans about food and thus culture, perhaps promoting acceptance and tolerance of the Asian culture, do you believe that you have helped in that aspect?

And then-- Well, answer that first.

(Martin Yan) I hope so.

Because as I said, food has no national or international boundary.

The more people understand, through food we understand each other's culture, heritage, and lifestyle.

Then we accept each other.

We respect each other.

Because when you know somebody-- Just like your neighbor.

You don't know your neighbor, you don't know how to get closer to them, but you, once you get to know them, then you become good friends.

And I hope through food, we bring all the people that I reach, all the people I touch, bring them together for delicious food, healthy, delicious, fresh food.

-Because of how high profile you are and well known you are, what kind of responsibility did you feel, if any, when there was a rise in anti-Asian sentiment because of COVID?

-I truly believe-- -To help in combating it.

-Right.

To combat that, first of all, I raised my words and tell them, Hey, look, first of all, this country is a melting pot.

People are from all over the world together here.

There is very few native people, except the Native American, right?

Indian.

They were here first, but everybody else come from all over the world.

And let us learn to respect and accept each other.

And food is about sharing.

So through food, I tell people, Hey, look, I use food.

I use a cheese.

I use all kinds of ingredients.

Let us sit down at the dining table.

We never fight; we're all friends.

-Also, in June, we talked with BMX Rider and Olympic Gold Medalist Conner Fields about his recovery from a horrific accident that nearly took his life at the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo.

We're talking about traumatic brain injury, but these kinds of experiences have to be traumatic in and of themselves, knowing that your brain is not working like it should.

(Conner Fields) Totally.

And it's weird.

When we were talking about this a moment ago, before we started rolling, it's like your brain is thinking about the fact that it's not working right.

So it's like this constant, like, cycle of your brain thinking about itself and analyzing itself and judging itself.

And as I got better, I could kind of tell that it wasn't working right.

And that was the hardest part.

In the first month, I didn't know.

I had no idea what was happening.

I was pretty much just clueless.

But as I began to recover and things started to get better, I was very hyperaware that it wasn't working properly.

That was the hardest part because I would look at a riddle, which was part of my therapy is I would have to solve problems.

And it would be like a third-grade level riddle, and I should be able to (snapping fingers) just figure it out, but I could not figure it out.

And it would be really frustrating because my brain just wouldn't connect.

And so I learned all about neuro pathways in the brain, and what happens is part of the injury I had was called brain shearing, which is just as horrible as it sounds.

You're literally shearing the connections in your brain.

So when they say, you know, It's like riding a bike, you never forget.

When you ride a bike, you create a pathway in your brain that you know how to ride that bike.

If you learn how to juggle, you create a pathway in your brain that you know how to juggle.

Even if you don't juggle for a couple of years, when you pick it back up, it's easier to relearn because that pathway exists.

You're just having to kind of dust off the cobwebs of that pathway.

So when I sheared my brain, I destroyed those connections.

So had I learned how to juggle or known how to juggle, I wouldn't know anymore, and I'd have to completely relearn it.

So I was essentially having to relearn all the stuff that I should already know.

And thankfully, I was able to relearn it all, but it was really scary when I couldn't do it.

-In July, Nevada Week In Person featured Imam Fateen Seifullah.

He is the Imam of Las Vegas' oldest mosque, but it was his time as a local drug dealer that helped him improve the city's Historic Westside.

That strength and also that empathy, you took that into the Historic Westside.

Is that where you originally moved with your mom from LA?

(Imam fateen Seifullah) No, we moved into North Las Vegas.

I went to Rancho High School.

As I was mentioning earlier, it was probably-- There were only nine high schools then.

So we knew everybody.

My brother who's a year older than me, the preacher, he was a dancer; my younger brother was an athlete; and I was a cool guy, you might say.

So it allowed us to get to know many of the people in the city.

And that helped when I started to worship in West Las Vegas area and was able to interact with the gangs and the drug dealers in that area.

I knew many of them.

-That interaction with the drug dealers and the gangs, did that happen through the mosque, Masjid As-Sabur?

-It happened as a result of an initiative.

Imam Mujahid Ramadan who was the Imam there when I first got to the community started an initiative, Enough is Enough, in 1992, and it was pushing drugs out of the community.

We would protest in front of drug houses.

And so I saw that I knew many of the drug dealers or the gang members, and that helped eventually in having conversations with them to move further away from the mosque.

-What would be the initial reasoning you used with them?

-You know, There are kids here.

We're trying to clean the neighborhood up.

Help us.

There was negotiation going on then.

Many of the elder drug dealers, or gangsters you might say-- I was one of them.

So we were able to say, Can you help me out?

Can you move this further down?

We didn't-- We shut down the ones that we could.

Others we just asked them to push their business further back.

And when that didn't work, we had friends who were still in the life, and we would ask them to go and talk to them.

And it worked in many instances, but the problem was in many of those places, the housing.

You move one group out, another group comes in.

Thus the birth of the Muslim Village, the idea that we have to start buying some of the property if we want to see a change.

-Change in the cannabis industry is what A'esha Goins is after.

Ahead of cannabis lounges opening in Nevada, the marijuana advocate and lobbyist wanted to address the inequities that exist.

She began work in this area shortly after recreational marijuana was legalized in the state.

How did you get involved in lobbying?

(A'esha Goins) That's funny.

I really helped with Yes on 2.

I helped with the Yes on 2 campaign.

And then afterwards I was like-- -Which was?

Yes on 2 was?

-Yes on 2 was to legalize cannabis like alcohol, which is what we're living in the world now, right?

And when that campaign was over, I came back to the office-- because I was working in the dispensary at the time-- and I was like, Wait a minute.

There's no people that look like me in this industry.

And I was like, I'm gonna go and figure this out.

So I went-- This literally happened.

I went to session that next session.

It was, like, just hitting the streets.

How do I find out?

How do we change this so that there's more people looking like me.

And I just knocked on doors.

And people started helping me.

And they were like, You got to do this.

You got to do that.

And that's how I ended up lobbying.

-Knocking on doors at the legislature?

-Yes.

Because my parents always taught me that the government works for us; we don't work for it.

And that's been very constant in our household.

So I wasn't afraid to have my voice heard.

I just didn't know what avenue I should be going about doing it.

And to be honest, I didn't know I was lobbying.

I just knew that something needed to change, and I needed it to change.

It wasn't-- I think I was in my third week, and someone was like, You know you got to register as a lobbyist.

I was like, What?

I got to do what?

So yeah, I just did it because I knew something needed to change.

And if no one was going to do it, I was going to.

-In the local philanthropy landscape, there are few with a resume quite like Julie Murray's.

From the Agassi prep school to the mental health initiative, Hope Means Nevada, Murray says Three Square, Southern Nevada's largest food bank, has been the most special.

Of your accomplishments, anything that you are particularly proud of?

(Julie Murray) My children.

And then probably Three Square was the most impactful in that it reached the most number of people.

And food insecurity is something that we can all help with.

And it's beautiful to see young people, older folks, or everyone in between be able to help with backpack bags full of food or donate food or donate money and time.

So that one was very meaningful.

-And that was something you founded at your kitchen table?

-That's right.

-What does that show about how philanthropy can start?

-Absolutely.

It happens in the backyards and around dining room tables all over the country that when like-minded people get together and say, I'm upset about this, I want to do something about this, there's a will to act, and then putting the strategy to it can change the world.

-So launched Three Square Food Bank in 2006.

You had to endure the Great Recession with less donations, but an increase in need.

What did you learn from that experience?

-That volunteerism was so important during the Great Recession.

In those years, we had so many people that came in and volunteered because they said, I haven't worked for 67 days, and I needed to put on something nice, go out, and feel good.

And giving creates happiness.

By giving back, we've noticed that people feel better.

It gives them a purpose.

So during the Great Recession, lots of volunteerism to get through those very difficult years.

However, during COVID, we couldn't volunteer.

So the impact on our happiness was severe.

-And finally, every two years Clark County picks a new Poet Laureate who's tasked with promoting poetry as an art form and as a means to engage the community.

Right now Angela Brommel is embracing that role, much like how she's embraced Nevada.

Talking about image, setting is a literary device that is very important to you.

You have done well to capture what it looks like to live in Nevada, both from a nature perspective and when you talk about the neon lights of the Strip and Downtown.

Has that literary device always been important to you-- You're from Iowa-- or is that something maybe Nevada inspired?

(Angela Brommel) Thank you.

I think it's-- Oh, it's Nevada.

-Is it?

Okay.

-Yeah.

So before I went to graduate school at Antioch, I had gone to graduate school in theater.

So I would say there's always been an element of the visual in terms of my written work and my curating; that I'm always looking at frame, setting; that setting creates this mood and this character, you know, that sort of standpoint.

But Nevada sort of changed it because learning how to see what was really here was part of really making this my home.

So when you first move here, you often compare it to what it's not, you know?

Obviously, it's not the Mississippi and it's not cornfields or green, green lawn areas.

And so the best way was I just decided-- It started with hiking.

I started saying yes when people asked me to hike.

And I would say, If you don't mind, I'm really slow.

I'm always the last person, and I'm taking photos and writing.

And all of a sudden I realized that Nevada was not what I thought it was.

There were all these colors I hadn't seen and beautiful flowers and birds and animals.

And then it was brand new.

-A big thank you to our Nevada Week In Person guests and to you for watching.

To see more of Nevada Week In Person , go to our website, vegaspbs.org/nevadaweek.

And I'll see you next week on Nevada Week .

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