From our State House studio in Montgomery, I'm Todd Stacy.

Welcome to Capital Journal.

All eyes were on Washington this week as Congress has struggled to pass a stopgap funding bil to avoid a government shutdown.

The high drama on Capitol Hill started earlier in the week as a continuing resolution negotiated by House Speaker Mike Johnson was unveiled.

The expansive plan included a lot of priorities for Democrats, given that their votes would be necessary to pass the bill.

But that drew the ire of President elect Donald Trump and Elon Musk, who successfully scuttled the bill.

The Hous then took up a more scaled down version of the funding bill, put it to a vote only to have that vote fail.

The scaled down versio would have funded the government at current spending levels until March, suspended the debt ceiling, which was one of Trump's demands, provided relief to hurricane victims in Tennessee, North Carolina and Georgia and provided aid to struggling farmers.

That vote wasn't very close 174 to 235.

Every Democrat voted against it, along with 38 Republicans.

None of the Republicans in Alabama' delegation were among that 38.

But the House got one more try Friday night and successfully passed a continuing resolution that includes funding the government through March 14th, hurricane relief and the farm package with a one year extension of federal farm programs and around 30 billio in economic relief for farmers.

Alabama Agriculture Commissioner Rick Pate has been urging Alabama's congressional delegation to see to it that that farm package is passed.

He says the state's rogue crop farmers are struggling and many may go out of business soon.

Farmers as whole sort of pull miles a lot.

But I mean, I see the numbers.

I know what's going on.

And these last two years have been bad.

And I'm afraid I've talked to some pretty large farmers who got large canning farming 7000 acres, saying he's not planting next year or the bank is not going to let him plant next year.

And so, you know, it's not like these people leave the field of business and, you know, you don't have another 55 year old man, which means to come back in.

And I'm just I thought we saw i as a as a nation during COVID.

How important food security is to national security.

And I'm just real concern to you, the man facing not everybody now, but, you know, cattle prices are good, poultry is doing well.

But our road crop farmers regard planting cotton, corn, soybeans.

We those people are really taking it on the chin.

These things only kick in when things are so terribly wrong.

And so I really had hope that this last couple of days they'd get something passe because, yeah, we need certainty and of course the nation doe anyway for paying its bills, but certainly was hoping we could get something, some to a relief to some o those farmers before too late.

Each of Alabama's seven members of members of Congress voted in favor of that stopgap funding bill.

It is expected to be taken up by the Senate tonight and passed in tim to avoid a government shutdown.

Congress also this week passed the National Defense Authorization Act, the annual bill that sets funding and policy framewor for the Department of Defense.

The bill included many provisions supporting Alabama's military installations and industries, including $300 million for Redstone, Arsenal, Fort Nova XL and the Army's Anniston Army Depot.

725 million for Alabama based missile defense systems and increased funding for submarine industrial base as the Port of Mobile and pursues a submarine shipyard.

It also included a pay raise for service members, which was a priority of Alabama Congressman Mike Rogers, who helped craft the bill as chairman of the House Armed Services Committee.

No service member should hav to live in squalid conditions.

No military families should have to rely on food stamps to feed their children.

And no one serving in the military should have to wait to see a doctor.

But that's exactly what many of our service members are experiencing, especially junior enlisted personnel.

This bill goes a long way to fixing that.

It includes a 15% pay raise for the junior enlisted.

It expands allowances for housing and food.

The bill significantly increases funding to improve existing barracks and build new ones.

It encourages the services to pursue public private partnership, hopes to provide better unaccompanied housing.

The building reduce dangerous health care wait times by waiving referral requirements for specialty care and expanding the number of DOD doctors and nurses with new special recruitment and pay incentives.

I actually spent last week in Washington, D.C., meeting with our congressional delegation.

We have some exciting plans for expanding our coverage of the delegation, which we'll talk about later in the show.

Back home to Alabama this week, the state's electors gathered to officially cast their ballots in the presidential election.

Capital Journal's Rand Scott was on hand for the event and has that story.

Normally, Rick Pate has his hands full as the state agriculture commissioner.

Today, he's wearing another hat as one of nine state electors casting their ballots for the 2024 election.

Just a fan.

Founding Fathers setting up this whole system, which I guess we were more o a republic style of government where they elected people and send them up there and expect them to make the right decision.

The old House chamber in the Capitol is the base for today's event, and it's a full house on hand to see the ballots cast for the office of President and other post.

They're looking for a shifting government.

They want a smaller government a more conservative government, a government that lives within its means that cuts wasteful spending and once again, that protects the individual members of state leadership are also on hand for what they call a historic moment.

So it's a monumental day.

It's a great day to be here.

Great to watch our doors cast their vote for President Trump and Vice President Vance.

And I believe there's great things coming for our future as we see some things change.

More conservative ideas come back to our country and focusing on the things that are really important.

Alabama Secretary of State Wes Allen says he's pleased of the work his office put into making this event happen.

I mean, you think about 1787 when they first set up the electoral process.

I mean, how important that is and is so it's important for the people of Alabam to see how this process works.

Allen says it gives citizens a look into the system working for them.

Those probate judges, circuit clerks, sheriffs, boards of registrars, poll workers.

So much work goes in you know, prior to Election Day.

And so it's really important.

And a lot of work goes in afterwards and preparing for an event just like today, the electoral process.

Elector Rick Pate agrees.

I think they will be surprised we still do this and sign all these documents.

I mean, I know the first time I did i I was kind of out, but how did.

But yeah, I think the American system works.

I mean, this old thing they set up 253 years ago still works.

And it worked pretty doggone well in Montgomery.

Randi Scott Capital-Journal, the Alabama Veterans Mental Health Steering Committee, met this week here in the state House, continuing its efforts on suicide and substance abuse prevention and mental health recovery.

Members heard alarming testimony that showed opioid misuse among Alabama veterans is mor than ten times the national rate per capita.

We have lot more vets than other states, and so really trying to address their health and behavioral health needs is really important.

There are significantly higher rates of mental health and substance use disorder among veterans than non-veterans in our state, and that they're really disparitie in terms of geographic location in our state and just an overall lack of enough services.

There's 3 million opioid settlement funds allocated to veterans pilot projects.

And so the actual legislation says that that RFP has to be informed by the comprehensive plan.

And so what we'll be doin is taking a look at those gaps and issuing an RFP that is designed to address those gaps and for pilot programs who are interested in trying to figure out how to fill those gaps.

You know, veterans don't know how to access some of the services that are available to them.

They don't necessarily know that those services are even out there.

And so I think there's a ton of work that we can do just to get the word out to make sure that people know how to get to services and where those services are located.

The Reentry Alabama Commission met this week and heard from judges, educators and other experts about how to work together to prevent the formerly incarcerated from reoffending.

The last two years, the Reentry Commission has been meeting with multiple stakeholders in state governmen and private sector to talk about what we can do to improve reentry efforts in Alabama.

And as part of our reentry 2030 goal, which is to reduce recidivism in half by the end of this decade.

And so part of the things we heard from today were various stakeholder who are currently doing programs and kind of asking why we can' combine programs or share data and share resources to make our programing even better.

This is a venue for us to talk about how we can collaborate and improve reentry services.

You heard the two gentlemen toward the end there.

They talked about services they received when they were at the rate of incarceration.

And the first thing they talked about was they talked about thre or four agencies in that room.

They were getting services for them that helped them succeed in life.

So I think we've got to use that model and figure out how we collaborate more together, work together and provide better read from services and reduce recidivism in Alabama.

And that's what I heard from stakeholders in there today.

We've reported about the change in leadership in the state Senate as Republicans have selected State Senator Garland Gudger to be the new Senate president pro tem.

He'll replace Greg Reid, who is going to the Ivey administration.

We caught up with Democratic leader Bobby Singleton to get his perspective on the leadership change.

Well, first of all, I hate to lose Cynthia Reid's and the reason I had a great working relationship, I think it was a relationship that that was incumbent of what we should be doing here in the state, where we were able to work across the aisle together on those issues to come together.

Garland Virtue.

I have no problem with Garland goes.

I think that Gurjit and I are.

We have a great relationship.

We're working relationship.

I look forward to working with him.

I think that he's going to b good for the state of Alabama.

I don't think any one of m caucus have a problem with God and I will will vote for Garland.

I'm going to encourage my caucus and each individual have their own right to vote.

However, I would encourage my caucus to do that, give him the opportunity.

His caucu has given him the opportunity.

But I do expect some of the sam things in terms of the ability for us to sit down and talk like men and women and be able to get things solved.

I do expect that from God.

I don't think I don't expect anything different than what I was getting from reorg deal March.

I expect that same thing from Garland to how we move through that is something different.

But I do expect us to be able to have that opportunity.

The Alabama Law Enforcement Agency is launching its annual 12 Days of safety campaign this Saturday running through New Year's Day.

The initiative aims to promote safe driving habits during one of the busiest times of the year.

ALEA officials are focusing on key risky behavior like speeding, impaired driving, distracted driving and not wearing seatbelts.

Last year alone, there were nearly 500 traffic fatalities across Alabama.

Throughout the campaign, Alea will share safety tips on social media, host community events and remind drivers to stay alert, especially around larger vehicles.

Officials are urging everyone to prioritize safety, whether traveling to a holiday gathering or heading out and home after a night out.

The state continues to mak strides in bringing high speed Internet access to more communities, and leaders are confident that they're on track to meet federal deadlines for major broadband expansion projects.

Capital Journal's Jeff Sanders has more.

At a recent meeting of the Alabama Digital Expansion Authority and the Rule of Broadban Oversight, committee officials shared updates on the state's broadband initiatives.

The Alabama Department of Economic and Community Affairs, or DECA, is responsible for spending ove $400 million from the American Rescue Plan Act or ARPA on broadband expansion.

A DECA commissioner, Kenneth Boswell, says the agency has already met it first deadline to allocate funds and is making steady progress towards completing projects by the end of 2026.

We're working at a feverish pace to stay up with everything that's going on.

You can only imagine what that would mean to dollars and how tedious that it can become at times.

One ke initiative is a statewide middle mile project funded with $85 million from ARPA.

This will aid nearly 3000 miles of fiber to link Internet providers to local networks.

Another 245 million is being used to add over 4200 more miles of middle mile infrastructure connecting schools, hospitals and government buildings.

There's also been growing application for support that would make preparations to get out to those awardees.

But, you know, it's our goal to get them out at and before Christmas.

I'm a wee bit bro o regarding a lot of you know moving past.

State Senator Bobby Singleton, whose district includes much of rural West Alabama, says broadband expansion is a game changer for those underserved areas.

As a state, we've don a great job of what we're doing.

We are, you know, have mapped out and we are playing I think we're playing this better than any state of th of the 50 states in the union.

Singleton says rural areas face unique challenges like higher cost and slower timelines.

But progress is visible.

I'm beginning to see fiber being laid in the district, and whether it's the middle mile or some of these programs coming from the other federal programs are going to the last mile.

I am beginning to see more in my district and so I feel hopeful where we are.

For Capital-Journal, I'm Jeff Sanders reporting.

Coming up next, I'll sit down with Alabam Congressman elect Samari figures to talk about his plans for assuming office in less than two weeks after that, State Senator Andrew Jones and Stat Representative Ed Oliver join me to discuss the state's efforts to improve mental health outcomes for veterans.

Just in time for the holidays, state Senator April Weaver will be in studio to talk about her bil cracking down on porch pirates.

And finally, I'll introduc the newest member of our team, AP Washington correspondent Alex Engle, who will be covering our congressional delegation from Capitol Hill.

Exciting stuff.

We'll be right back.

You can watch past episodes of Capitol Journal Online, an ad video DOD app Tbe Dawg Capitol Journal episodes are also available on AP TV's Free Mobile app.

You can also connect with Capitol Journal and link to past episodes on Capitol Journal's Facebook page, and you can listen to past episodes of Capitol Journal when you're driving or on the Go with Capitol Journal podcast.

Keep up with what's happening with Capitol Journal.

Welcome back to Capitol Journal.

In just two weeks, Alabama's newest member of Congress will take the oath of office.

And joining m now is Congressman elect Shemar.

Figures.

Thank you, Dad.

Well, thanks for coming back to the show.

I feel like I think you were saying off air, it was like a year ago when we first interviewed, as you were in that really large group of candidates running for the second District nomination.

And here here we are.

You're about to tak the oath of office in two weeks.

How's that feel?

Absolutely, man.

It's a true blessing.

Just just fortunate to be here blessed to have the opportunity we got in this race at the end of the day, not to win an election, but to be able to go and do the work on behalf of the people and places that mean the most to me.

And we're blesse to have that opportunity to do just that and looking forward to getting there.

Well, you know you're now in transition, right?

I was just in Washington last week meeting with the delegation and introducing our new reporter.

So you've got to g through setting up your office without actuall having a physical help with it.

How are you all going about that?

I know you hire staff, you make preparations.

Tell me about that process.

Yeah.

So I'll look at it.

I think the big part of it is, is trying to get your your sort of office senior leadership in place, as well as in taking all of the help and resources that they offer you there in Washington.

We hired our chief of staff already.

So that's been able that's been very helpful because he's been able to come in and sort of help help manage the process.

But other than that, man, we it seems like we're out there for orientation about every other week for a different part of it.

But it's been good.

We've selected our office already will be in the Cannon Building 225 there in D.C. And so when I was going to ask you, that's great.

That's a that's a nice haul.

Yeah.

No, it's great, man.

A very stately building and some some very architecturally appealing features to it.

And so we're we're excited to be the one that we would have been happy going in the basement.

And at the end of the day, Matthew, you you get to call yourself a member of Congress and be there to work o behalf of the people in Alabama.

So we're just happy to have any place in the building.

I imagine you'll hav a lot of visitors on January 3rd when you all take the oath of office and are sworn in.

May I ask you about that?

It was a wild week in Washington.

I mean, the continuing resolution, th stopgap spending bill, you know, it was existing and then Trum and he almost kind of killed it.

I mean, it's you're not in office yet.

You know, I guess thankfully for you, you didn't have to worry about voting on that or anything like that.

But observing all that this week and really just the continued dysfunction, especially in the House.

What is your perspective on on how that can change in this new Congress coming up?

Yeah, I think it really amplifies the need for people to get back to the basics.

And what I mean by that is getting back to representin the people who sent you there, because at the end of the day, like people in Mobile and Montgomery and Evergreen and Phenix City, they don't get the luxury of just shutting down the government, right?

They don't get the luxury of just shutting down life if they can't agree to how to spend money.

And so Congress needs t we need to get our act together.

We do, because people are really relying on on government to be there for them.

And so we, you know, being in this situatio now, I think it's unfortunate.

What's more unfortunate is that this seems to be a cyclical occurrence.

Every three months, it seems every 3 to 6 months.

And so it's my hope that they can come to a measure that extends at least the sort of status quo, at least until March, I think is the sort of time frame that we're realistically looking at.

And then we'll have the opportunity, you know, once the new administration is in place, for the to have more of an influence on on government spending.

But right now, I think we need to focus on making sure that we're protecting the people that call America home and getting the spending bill done.

Yeah, it's on the spending.

It really is wher the train runs off the tracks.

And so I'm really intereste in how that might change with, you know, Republicans having, you know, control over those, you know, both houses and the presidency, but by a very slim margin.

I want to ask you about that.

So you will be in the minority, but just by a little bit I mean, I don't even remember.

It's like two or three seats less, depending on if somebody is out of town or whatever.

So what have you all talked about in terms of the Democratic caucus, of what your strategy will be?

Because I'm sure tha with a margin that close, it's different than it would b if there was 2030 seat margin.

What would be your strategy in trying to be successful legislatively?

Well, look, I think as a as a caucus leader, Jeffries has made it clear that we have to find ways to work together to bring positive outcomes for the American people.

More subjectively, for myself, the sort of dynamics of who's in control of the White House or in either branch of the legislature, that doesn't change the mission or the objective.

We got there to go out there and work for issue to better life and life outcomes here in the state of Alabama, here in District two.

And that's what we're going to do.

Certainly it changes the pathways to which we will have leverage to do that.

But at the end of the day, we have to get there and get to work because people here that need those hospitals bac open in Union Springs, Alabama, they don't care if you're a Democrat or a Republican.

They don't care who' the president they care about.

Am I going to be able to have a doctor to go see if I need emergency care?

Are we going to be able to recruit businesses here without the impediment of having to disclose to them that we don't have a hospital in our county?

And so, you know, s it doesn't change what we are, what we're going up there to do.

But we have to look to build bridges.

We have to look to find those representatives, many of whom that I've had the opportunity to meet in my incoming class, who have some of the same issues that we have in our district, such as rural health care challenges, such as the failure to expand Medicaid, such as economic growth challenges.

And we have to find what we can work together on and put our heads together, roll up our sleeves and get it done.

Mm hmm.

Yeah.

You know, on these especially on spending bills, we've got, you know, a handful of Republicans.

It number changes year to year.

Who are really just going to be a no on it, on just about any spending measure.

Right.

And so with the margin that close in orde to pass something the speaker, the Republican leadership pretty much have to go across the aisle and say, what can you know, how many votes can we get on the Democrats?

Because they're going to they're going to find they're going to have trouble passing bills only with Republican votes.

And that's the way it should be.

Does that give you a little more leverage?

Yeah, Well, I think it I mean, certainly it gives you some leverage.

I mean, they have a five seat.

Well, I guess when we start with the mat, eight seats being being unfilled, they'll have a four seat majority and possibly it goes down to maybe to 18, depending on some other administration appointment of sitting members of Congress.

But at the end of the day, they'll have the majority.

And, you know, I think, you know, government should work in a way we are not that different in terms of what the needs are in our communities, in terms of what we can leverage government to do.

We're not that different as people.

And so we should be in an environment where you need both Democrat and Republicans and independents to support a spending measure.

Right?

That's going to impact lives in every single state and every single community in this nation.

But I think wha this process also shows us now is that we also have to have the courage, um, both on the Democratic side and on the Republican side to tune out the extreme voices that are impediments to progress.

Because at the end of the day, we've got to get things done.

All right.

There are people out here that are relying on Social Security.

There are people out here that are relying on Medicare.

Their veterans out here that are relying on their benefits.

There are federal employees that are relying on their benefits, their communities out here that are relying on infrastructure spending.

And so we have to we have to get it done, man.

And we can't let extreme voices on either side of the aisle stan in the way of that consistently.

Committees have there been decisions made on and I know they're starting to trickle out some of the decisions made.

Have you been assigned your committees yet?

We have not.

We have not.

We've had some recent leadership votes as it pertains to some committees.

But so that comes first and then that comes firs and then leadership ultimately decides the placements.

But look, we're we're going after I think we had discussed this, you know, several months back when I was here.

We're going after transportation, infrastructure, agriculture, armed services, all committees that that that have a significant impact and significant presence in terms of what they support in this district.

And so that's our hope.

We are an incoming freshman, though, and so at the end of the day we're going to we're going to go where where they where they tell us that we that we have to go.

What we're going to look to do, go for the district no matter where we land, can't be too picky as a as a freshman on the armed services would be significant because Congressman strong coming off of armed services to go to Appropriations.

Yeah, it'd be nice to have another, you know, kind of feel tha that seat you know.

Absolutely.

And and obviously Congresswoman Sall is on Armed Services and Mike Rogers is the chair.

So the status is definitely covered.

But I but we need to have that representation here in this district as well.

And so on.

Transportation and infrastructure.

I can think of several infrastructure projects in Alabam that that would be significant.

Absolutely.

Absolutely.

And it's big.

It's big for mobility.

Montgomery to even in our rural communities, we need infrastructure investments.

We need infrastructure priority in terms of the voices in Congress that are arguing for what we need in our communities.

And so I am looking to be that vesse and hopefully we'll get there.

But we're going to do what we can to to make sure whereve we get well, good luck on that.

We'll keep everybody updated as those decisions are made.

I wanted to ask you, you've been a congressional staffer.

I don't know how many years you served as congressional staffer, worked at DOJ.

So then you you're no stranger to this.

It kind of reminds me of Katie Brit when she was elected senator and she had been a chief of staff She had been worked on the Hill.

So what's the what's that like?

Is there a vibe difference between you used to be a staffer, now your name is going to be on the door.

Now.

Now it's now it's you.

What's that?

What's that been like?

It's been it's been a unique feeling in several respects, especially like when you run into former colleagues, they no longer call you by your first name and you're like, No, call me.

Well, first name.

But at the end of the day, I think being a staffer, I think it helps a lot.

It's almost like being a you know, bein someone that works in whatever field you're in and being that sort of worker on the ground before us into management, you can understand, you know, the the challenges, you can understand what they're going through.

You can understand the thought process.

You can understand what they need.

You can understand the gripes that they normally have about a member to tr to avoid those sort of pitfalls.

But so I think it helps.

You know, I think the biggest changes like the decisions they fall to, you know, at the end of the day, you go from being the person preparing someone to make the decisions to you being prepared to make the decisions.

And so it kind o you know, that's that's strange, especially in such a short timeframe, because I was just that guy a year and a half ago.

But it is a but but it's a it's a unique feeling.

But at the same time, man is one that we're blessed to be in the position to be able to make those decisions.

And so we're looking forward to it certainly would rather be in that situation than new to Congress completely.

And yes, yes it has certainly helped a lot.

In terms of the staffing.

Yeah, an enormous amount.

So many new members are spending, you know, so much time staffing up and trying to find people that they can trust and that are experienced in balancing out all of the equities and interest that they have to consider.

But having been up ther helps a lot with that process.

Staff so important to the success of a congressional office?

Absolutely.

Well, Mr.

Congressman elect, congratulations again.

Two weeks it'll be Congressman, and thank you for your time.

We'll look forward to having you back.

Well, thank you, man.

I'm happy to be here.

And I would be remiss not to say my and the delegation, the Alabama delegation in its entirety has been incredibly grateful for the most part in its entirety, has been incredibly helpful and really looking forward to working with them.

Yeah.

And actually, just to add this, when we were up there introducing Alex Englander DC reporter to the delegation, your name kept came up in every meeting with our delegation saying, Have you met Shamar yet?

You know, all that kind of stuff.

So I think that's reciprocal.

They're excited to have yo as a member of the delegation.

Yeah, they've been great, man.

Rob Aderholt pulled me aside on the, on the front steps when we were taking the the class photo.

Jerry Carl has been great.

I mean it's Katie reached out.

I had lunch with Katie shortly after we got up there.

And so it's it's it's been great.

Well, all right.

Well, we'll look forward to watching your swearing in and seeing you progress as it goes.

Thank you, man.

We'll be right back.

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You're watching Alabama Public Television and welcome back to Capital Journal.

This week in the State House was a meeting of the Alabama Veterans Mental Health Steering Committee.

And joining me next to talk about it is our members of that committee, State Representative Ed Olive and State Senator Andrew Jones.

Gentlemen thanks for coming on the show.

Thank you, John.

I should have mentioned you're also chairman, each chairman in the Senate of the Veterans Affairs Committee, the Veterans and Military and Veterans Affairs Committee in the House.

So, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Chairman thanks for coming on the show.

I wanted to talk about this meeting today.

There's a report that came out.

Each of you have copies of that.

But I wanted to start with maybe backing up and telling us ho this steering committee that's working on mental healt for veterans really got started.

How did we get here?

Well, mental health has been a huge focus for the legislature for the last several years.

But Representative Chip Brown and I, when we were looking at this issue, we quickly realized that, you know, veterans and military members and their immediate family make up about 25% of the state's population.

Actually we have the highest percentage of veterans per capita of any state in the United States.

So we didn't feel like that.

You know if you think of one out of four or military or immediate famil of military members or veterans, we didn't feel like one out of four.

You know, we're 25% of the resources were going for mental health toward those veterans communities.

We felt like that needed to be addressed.

We needed to look at a solution.

And thus the Veterans Mental Health Steering Committee was born.

And we're tasked with developing a comprehensive plan for the specific treatment needs of veterans as a state.

Mm hmm.

And there's a timeline involved here.

I know that you all met today.

You heard some testimony from physicians.

There was that incredible video that they showed.

What were some of your takeaways from today's meeting?

Well, I've been doing this fo a long time, and I am a veteran, so I look at it a little differently than some other people might.

But I think the biggest takeaway is that we're going to be ready when the legislature goes into session to make to pass legislation based on the recommendation that come from this committee.

Mm hmm.

Well, I know that you've got the report that was passed out today.

I know you haven't had time to read it yet, but what may, through what a timeline might be, what can we expect?

I know there's another meeting in January.

You said, you know, by session, that's only, you know, about 45 days away.

So y'all are moving fast.

Can we expect for the report to be publi by then or what's the timeline?

So I would commend Commissioner Boswell for kind of having an aggressive timeline of meetings.

The legislation that Senator Brown that pass does kind of specify a timeline of which we would get a report to the governor for her feedback and then the plan would be adopted.

And so that would be summertime at the latest.

But obviously, we have a lot of work to do between now and then.

We're kind of pulling all the pieces together.

And my takeaway from today is that, you know, we're finally starting to wrap our hands around all of this dat and all of the various services and the demographics and all the things that are out there which you have to do to develop that comprehensive plan.

So that would be the next step.

After we complete it, we get a draft and we submit it to the governor for for her adoption.

Mm hmm.

Well, that makes sense.

You can't adequately address a problem like mental health veterans suicide, things like that.

If you don't have good data and a comprehensive plan.

So I get the need for that.

I'm curious, though, you always have heard that when it comes to veterans mental health, you know many veterans are or could be, you know, proud individuals, maybe not the type that would seek help on their own if they are facing a crisis.

How do we address that reality?

Veterans like anybody else, if you work in an environment, you become very used to it over a long period of time and then suddenly you're taken away from that environment and you're sort of left in a no man's land.

You're you're not comfortable in this world.

You can't go back to where you were before.

That leaves people in a very unique situation.

And once you're in a unifor service, you just can't quit it and go to do something else and feel the same way.

Can't just flip a switch.

No, no It just doesn't work that way.

So I think it's very important that we find veterans where they are, particularly National Guard and Reserve troops that come off deployments and all of a sudden they're back at home in one day.

So there are some there are multiple components to figuring this out.

Part of what we did here with this document is we figured out what assets we we have for services, but we always figured out also had to figure out who are our target audience.

Who are these people and how d we get these services to them?

So that's part of the thing we're we're working on.

And you mentioned veteran to veteran care.

That's an interesting concept.

What does that mean?

Veterans respond better to veterans.

That's who understand what's going on with a veteran.

It it makes sense to me and I understand it.

But how do you talk to someone if you have were in the same shoes, in the same uniform?

That's difficult.

So it is important whenever it's possible to have veterans serving veterans.

I see.

Yeah.

Because if I'm if I'm, you know, a veteran, maybe I'm more comfortable going to, you know, a provider that someone who served themselves that kind of the idea.

What's your the fear is if you're a veteran, that nobody else will understand.

What's been the feedback from the veterans community as there's been a lot of news going on about this, about y'all's work on the steering committee.

What have you heard from back home around the state, from that veterans community about how they're responding to what y'all are doing?

I think there's an excitement among the veteran population that that we're finally starting to have some progress toward addressing these challenges.

You know, we've long known that veterans are more susceptible, more susceptible to mental health issues, to opioid and other substance abuse addiction just based on their life experiences and what they've seen.

So I think we have shown a spotlight, if you will, on the issue and on the lack of options and sometimes the lack of data.

It's been to kind of these these challenges.

And so now that the spotlight is there, I feel like folks are coming together in the veterans communities to help participate and help help us formulate the plan, because they recognize it is a challenge that we need to address.

Mm hmm.

You know, we had with a few months ago, we had this really unfortunate situation with the Department of Veterans Affairs where this dustup between former Commissioner Ken Davis and mental Health Department, the governor's office eventually led to his dismissal as commissioner and pretty big deal.

I think everybody agrees that was an unfortunate episode all around.

But I keep hearing that there could be legislation to more or less overhaul the Department of Veterans Affairs, the Stat Department of Veterans Affairs, to make some necessary changes if that came about, I'm assuming it would go through your committee.

So where are we on legislation, you know, addressing the Department of Veterans Affairs and how ho soon can we see a plan on that?

So I got an update from some of the governor's staff just yesterday that they're continuing to work through the process on developing the legislation.

And it is my understanding that that would go through both of our respective committees.

You know, I see this really as a way to elevate the Department of Veterans Affairs, bring them fully into the fold of state government and highlight the wor that's being done for veterans and kind of make that perso a member of the governor's team and the governor's cabinet.

You know, I think that's important.

I think we need to make sure that veterans have a seat at the table.

Everything that I'v heard is that all these veterans groups, the VSOs veterans service organizations, woul still have a seat at the table.

So I think it's a to me, it's a positive development because we're elevatin the status of the organization.

Well, I could see that because it has been, you know, ever since I guess it was created almost kind of quasi, you know, in the fold and not it's an executive branch thing, but it's not in the cabinet.

And so the accountability structure there is is weird.

So do you think making it more in line as a cabinet agency would would go toward I don't know what more you know.

Oh, sure.

And if we're we're responsibl for spending taxpayer dollars.

So it's absolutely imperative that we have some sort of accountability.

So elevating it to the executive branch does exactly that.

So I think that's important.

The organization is just different than it was when it was first organized.

You know, now there's five veterans homes, a multimillion dollar budget.

VSOs and almost every county veteran serves as officers and offices.

So it's a lot bigger than it was when it was first organized.

Absolutely.

And probably needs to wor very closely with mental health.

And in terms of, like you said, identifying those who are in need of of care and not just mental health.

Several state agencies need to be directly involved in what we have going on with veterans to to attack the problems that veterans are having.

MM.

So their ability to communicat as cabinet agencies is probably okay.

Definitely.

Well, if we will, we want to follow what you're doing on the steering committee.

It's very important work.

So I'll ask you to come on in January and maybe give an update.

Also be in touch with Commissioner Boswell, who's got an aggressive timeline.

And I think it's interesting that y'all are moving fast, but thanks again for coming on the show and we'll see you in January.

Thank you.

We'll be right back.

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Welcome back to Capital Journal.

Join me next is State Senator April Weaver.

Senator thanks for coming on the show.

Thanks for having me today.

Pleasure to be here.

Well, I want to have you on because you have legislation that is very timely her in the holiday season has to do with porch pirates those who go and steal people's packages off of their porc just, you know, a crazy thing.

What is your legislation do?

So this legislation is the same legislation that I brought last year and we did a lot of work on it and I'm bringing it back this year because I have a lot of constituents who have been affected by this this year, especially this time of year.

It's really bad.

It doesn't change the the thefts statute.

But what it does is it adds a component that does include packages that are mailed or shipped to you.

Okay.

So what does how does what does it look like now and what would your legislation change it to?

And again, it would just add the component of something being mailed or shipped to your home.

Okay.

If we implement this legislation, we will be the 12th state in the nation to have legislation specifically addressing porch piracy.

And again, you know, this time of the year, it's really, really bad.

I've had some calls in my in my district related to porch pirates and stealing of Christmas gifts and awful.

You know, this time of year is especially bad.

And I don't know how young your viewership is, but I'll be very careful in what how I say this.

You know the people that have called me are parents who have saved their money, bought their children's wish list, and here we are right at Christmas.

Mayb the package has been delivered, but someone has stolen it off their porch or or from their property.

And so here they are, right?

Right at Christmas with no gifts for their children, which which makes it even more terrible this time of year.

It is awful.

That and that's and especially for parents that you know, or on a budget and that' maybe their only chance to write to give their kids a great Christmas.

So I'm guessing it would put some teeth into that really adds some stricter penalties for those who are who are caught.

Right.

And again, we're not changing the penalties.

The statute and th the variances of the penalties remain the same.

And it's based on it's based on the value of of what they steal.

Now, the thin about being a porch pirate is, you know, you don't know what's in the box when you steal it.

Or I would assume that most people don't.

They're just going to get the box because they know that people are buying gifts, especially this time of year.

Okay.

Well, Sessions coming up we're just a little over a month away, February 4th.

So I'll look forward to that Bill.

And that's it.

Yeah very timely this time of year.

Speaking of the session, we're coming right up on it and y'all are going to have a new president pro-tem in the Senate.

Your colleague, State Senator Garland Gudger, he's going to be voted in properly on the floor there, but he's going to be the pro-tem.

I know you him well.

What was that process like, knowing that, you know, Greg Reed was stepping down?

There was an election there in the caucus.

What we threw behind the scenes, what happened?

We know certainly our caucus has a process in place.

It's the same process that we used when Senator Scofield left and we elected Senator Livingston as the majority leader.

And we use that same process and caucus to do like the new the new pro tem.

You know, it's a fair process.

It's one that has worked well for our caucus, and that's the the the process that we used again this year.

I do know, Senator Gudger very, very well.

You know, upstairs we have pods with our offices and so my office pod has a pod of four.

And so I have shared an office space with him since I returned to the legislature in 2021.

So by virtue of that, I've spent a lot of time with him.

I've actually been his copilot as the vice chair of Fred, and he's the chairman of Fred.

So have had the opportunity work very closely with him during the time that I've been in the Senate.

And I'm looking forward to to where we go next session.

As you as you look at it I think it will be a different feel in the Senate.

I don't think just like Greg Reed did not lead like Bill Marsh, I don't think Garland Gudger will lead like Greg Reid or Del Mar.

He will lead like Garland Gudger.

And you know, it's going to be interesting to to see the new dynamic because, you know, he has very strong relationship probably one of the friendliest people here in the state house.

And I think it's going to be interesting to watch.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I'm looking forward to having him on the show in early January.

Last time you were here you had you and your colleagues had just returned from the southern border and you said you might be developing legislation dealing with the immigration situation.

What?

How is that going?

Might we see anything develop?

You know, certainly we have been working on that legislation related to immigration since our border trip, the new dynamic, and that is we have had an election since that time.

And, you know, not only is it going to change our immigration legislation, I think it changes a lot of what you see throughout the coming session as specificall for our immigration legislation.

You know, we were playing defense to a lot of the Biden policies when we first started talking about this.

Now, since the election, we'll be looking to see what what changes President Trump will make.

And I think it's more of a strategic process in now what can we do once we see what direction they're going?

What can we do to help help strengthen those federal processes that that President Trump will be putting in place related to immigration?

Yeah, certainly we can expect a different approach to immigration in the next administration.

Any other bills you're working on that we can anticipate?

We've got about a minute.

You know I do work with law enforcement.

A lot have been working with the DEA a lot.

I have a drug bill that will work on dealing with fentanyl specifically and how we deal wit some of the things that the law just needs to be tightened up a little bit on some more gas station drugs, as you call it, that children are getting involved in.

I'm working with law enforcement on how we we address some of that stuff.

I usually always have some health care bills.

I have one again this year looking at Royal Hospital tax credits and what we can do to help our rural hospitals become more viabl and provide that great service that they provide to our rural communities.

It's modeled after a program that has bee extremely successful in Georgia, and I'm looking forward to bringing it and seeing what we can do to get that done this year.

Well we will look forward to all of those in the upcoming session.

Senator, thanks again for comin on the show and for having me.

Merry Christmas.

Merry Christmas to you, too.

We'll be right back.

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Welcome back to Capital Journal.

Some exciting news here at Alabama Public Television.

Starting in January.

Alex Angle will come on boar as our Washington correspondent based on Capitol Hill covering Alabama's congressional delegation.

And joining me now is Alex Engle, Alabama public television's Washington correspondent.

Alex, welcome.

Thank you, Todd.

I am just so excited for this new opportunity and to be here in Alabama to tell people about it.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

So you're in town fo the meetings with the team here.

We're going to go to Birmingham, have some meetings with the team there.

So really excited.

But I was hoping to you you could share with our audience just a little bit about your background education professionally.

What led you to this job?

For sure.

I'm from Sugarland, Texas, outside of Houston, and then went to Missouri for their journalism school and focused on local TV news and telling the stories of communitie I thought was really important.

And I think TV news is such an important thing in our societies as it does breaking news and just really gets to the heart of what's going on.

And so I got to cover tornadoes to local government, to snowstorms, to everything in between.

So lots of great experience reporting, producing, anchoring in Arkansas.

After I went to Missouri I did a few years in northwest Arkansas covering all the news that happens in that area, which was quite a bit, as I said, and really enjoyed that love.

Local news.

I think it's really importan to talk to certain communities and the people and what they care about, but also really am interested in covering politics and always wanted to be in D.C. so came to D.C. and just started graduate school at American doing journalism, got to be on the Hill, got to cover hearings and really just fell in love with covering politics and breaking down the important part and through the election season.

Got to cover some of the campaigns of the presidential campaigns and transcripts and just data and kind of diving into that.

And that was for the election season.

So I was looking for my new gig and found this one covering local news.

But on a DC angle I think is really unique and something that I thin is really important for Alabama.

And I'm excited to to do that.

Absolutely.

We've been excited about this for a long time and we were lucky to find you.

It's a perfect fit with your background in television news, so it's been a goal of ours for a long time to have someone based in Washington covering our delegation.

Because, you know, right now on Capitol Journal, we either do a lot of Zoom interviews with our members of Congress, right.

Or if they're that they happen to be in town, we can have them on set.

But that's not, you know, ideal, you being based there on Capitol Hill with the cameras going through the halls, I think is really, really going to be great for our ability to share with the public what their elected representatives are up to, how they're voting.

You know, wha how they care about the issues.

And so you and I spent some time up in D.C. last week trudging around Capitol Hill, meeting with the various members of Congress, also their staff members.

I'm curiou what your impressions were after meeting some of our senators and representatives.

Absolutely.

Well, we sure got our steps in going to all of the offices, all nine of the offices of Alabama.

But it was really sweet because everyone was just so eager to meet with us.

And obviously their time is super busy and invaluable this time of year.

But they were really willing to listen to our mission and just being the eyes and ears of Alabama there in the Capitol and in D.C., I think would be really beneficial.

And I think they saw that this was a partnership, that they could get their messages out to their constituents here in Alabama.

But I could also ask some questions on why they voted a certain way or why they're supporting this cause, but not another cause.

And those are questions that national reporters aren't always going to be asking lawmakers.

And so I want to be askin the questions that really matter to Alabama up on the Hill and really making sure that the people of Alabama know what their lawmakers are deciding on and what they're doing.

And so we got really great responses from all of the offices.

And so I'm really eager to continue to build those relationships up on the Hill.

And all the lawmakers have different personalities and different interests.

And so it'll be really fun to to dive into those, get to know them better, and just to really make sure that Alabama knows what the representatives and senators are doing there.

Yeah, those were great, great meetings.

And most of the delegation.

Yeah, I've known these folks for a while, but it was great that they spent time with you building that relationship because you're going to be, like I said, spending a lot of time covering them.

I'm curious, you know, based on those meetings, what issues do you think we should expect you to cover as it relates to Alabama?

Well, I think defense spending is obviously going to be a big one.

Space command.

All the Alabama member want space command to come back or I mean, to really especially be in Alabama.

That came up that came up a lot.

And so I know Alabama senators and representatives are very eager to make that happen.

And they're feeling relatively confiden with Trump coming into office.

So that came up a lot.

I think agriculture is obviously going to be a super important one.

Right now they're working on the farm bill, as in the farm, different stipulations, the end of year funding bills.

And so it'll be interesting what they decide on it here and then how that might affect funding decisions later on.

And so I think that is important.

And then appropriations and just how they're spending money and the government I know we have some members on appropriations committees and so it'll be interestin to see how they decide to fund what kind of things in this new year and how they kind of align with Trump's priorities.

Yeah, on the appropriations front, it was interesting because we met with Congressman Strong, Congressman Dale Strong, and they brought it up like the fact that he was pursuing appropriations.

And that decision happened like the next day when we were up there.

So that was really interesting, him going on appropriations to appropriators in the House, one in the Senate that that is a pretty big deal.

And, you know, so much of what happens in this building in the statehouse is dependent on Washingto right there, spending decisions really impact a lot of the budget decisions that happen here, foreign policy decisions that happen here.

And with so much of our audience being plugged in to th legislature, it's really great that we're going to have that reporting to make everybody aware on th front end of what's happening.

Well, look, Alex, I won't keep you any longer, but we're really excited to have you here at APT is our new Washington correspondent based in D.C. Good luck.

Thank you.

Very excited.

And I am just excite to get to know Alabama more and if people are coming up to D.C. for business or lobbying insuranc or even school groups, sometimes I would love to connect with them.

I think we're always looking for stories in the nation's capital that connect to Alabama.

And so I would love to make that happen.

My email is on the screen now, and so please reach out if you have any connections related to D.C. and Alabama stories and want to make sure tha that coverage happens And again, just be the eyes and ears of Alabama, they are in D.C. so I'm excited to get started in January.

Alabama's angle in D.C.. Great, Alex, thanks again.

Thank you.

We'll be right back.

Montgomery native Percio Juliet was an internationally acclaimed chemist, the third African-American to receive a Ph.D. in chemistry.

He specialized in the chemistry of natural products and their synthesis in the laboratory.

This technology is very important in medicines, food products, paints and firefighting foams, among other things.

Julianne received many awards, including Election to the National Academy of Sciences and the National Inventors Hall of Fame.

That's our show for this week.

Thanks for watching.

And this is our last Capital-Journal program for 2024.

On behalf of all of us at Capital Journal, thank you for joining us for what was quite an eventful year in state government and politics.

We are grateful for your trust and will endeavor to continue earning it every day for our Capitol Journal team.

I'm Todd Stacey.

Merry Christmas.

Happy New Year and we'll see you next time.