Speaker 1: On the record is presented by launch essay, San Antonio, small business owners.

San Antonio is a fast growing fast moving community with something new happening every day.

And that's why each week we go on the record with the Newsmakers are driving this change.

Then we gather at the reporters round table to talk about the latest news stories with the journalist behind those stories.

Join us now as we go.

Welcome Speaker 2: Two on the record.

I'm Michael Taylor.

Over the past few months, San Antonio has seen a record freeze that has resulted in power company lawsuits.

We fought the governor on the mask mandate for COVID-19 and we are dealing with increased homelessness, a devastated tourism industry and economic fallout from the pandemic.

That's a lot on the plate of the city's leader.

Mayor Ron Nuremberg joins us now.

Great.

So Michael, let's start with COVID news this week is that the state rules have changed and that folks over 16 are going to be eligible for a vaccine.

What messages have changed for you this week with respect to that or COVID?

Speaker 1: Well, you know, our message really hasn't changed and that is if you are eligible for the vaccine, go get a vaccine at your first opportunity.

The vaccination process is long awaited, but it's a critically important part of our fight against this pandemic.

And finally, once we do have, you know, the vast majority of the folks in our community vaccinated, we can finally say this pandemic is behind us, but it's going to be some time till we can do that.

The challenge for us right now is that as the different tiers of eligibility have opened up and as of Monday, no more tears everyone's eligible.

We simply have not matched the supply with the demand for the vaccine.

And that's not a challenge that we can solve here.

Locally requires federal partnership, as well as distribution and channels through our state government.

And to this point, the supply of the vaccine to our local communities here in San Antonio, especially have not nearly matched the demand.

Speaker 2: So we still have a problem in terms of it's not over yet.

Don't, don't relax vigilance Speaker 1: That's right.

And the projections are that it's not going to be over in terms of herd immunity through natural immunity, um, you know, getting the infection or through, uh, the vaccination process for several more months, probably into the early parts of the summer.

So it behooves us, uh, to remember that if you, even, if you are vaccinated, that there are, you know, many people on the community who are vulnerable, who are not vaccinated, who require you to do your part to protect yourself and others from this disease.

So we ask, uh, please continue to mask up, practice, social distancing, proper hygiene.

It is going to require all of us to work together vaccinated or not to put this to an end.

So that struggle Speaker 2: Continues.

We have another struggle from just over a month ago, the winter storm, which is still in top of our mind, we had Reed Williams who you put on a commission to investigate what happened.

Um, can you tell us what we're doing as a city to prevent this from happening again?

Speaker 1: Yeah.

So Reid is chairing a select committee that I put together to investigate.

Um, the, the process, um, saw a CPS emergency response to the city, look at the preparation, the communications and the response to the entire event.

Uh, Reid in particular has, uh, ex uh, just an immense depth of understanding of how the utilities work and is in a unique position to lead this effort because of his work that he's also done at the city.

Uh, so we're going to examine that we're going to, you know, uh, look at where the gaps were in our own local response, but we're also working on establishing a response to the state.

Uh, and, and again, um, CPS energy was forced to shut down into what they called rolling blackouts, which is really more of a sustained blackout for several periods of time, uh, several, uh, days at a time, uh, that caused extreme hardship.

And, and we saw that, um, it was a, an outrageous failure of energy, uh, grid management, the state level.

And it was also an outrageous failure of the energy markets as you've seen, uh, profiteering and price gouging.

The CPS energy is now seeking a remediation through the courts to recover some of those expenses.

So the people who in our community who have been suffering through this crisis rate payers, residents are not also saddled with the bills.

Okay.

Speaker 2: I mean, ultimately that's the thing.

We, we suffered from the freeze and the difficulties of losing electricity, but from a pocket book perspective, people want to know, am I going to pay up for this?

Am I in my rates are going to go up Speaker 1: That's right.

And again, it shouldn't fall to the rate payers of Texas and here in San Antonio, especially to pay for the failure of management of the energy grid at the state level.

Of course, there, uh, our own local, uh, uh, analysis is going to look at the things that we can do from a response standpoint.

Uh, we want to make sure that we have, uh, backup energy and weatherization, uh, and generators if necessary available to us.

But again, uh, there is going to be quite a reckoning at the state level, uh, with regard to how ERCOT managed, uh, during the storm, as well as how the regulators perform their function over.

Speaker 2: So this is gonna be an ongoing story, um, with respect to emergencies and emergency responders has been a multi-year negotiation between folks in the city and elected officials.

You had a meeting this week with police union officials that they responded well to.

They thought it went well.

Can you tell us about what the topic is there and how that went from your first?

Speaker 1: Sure.

Yeah, I, you know, first of all, I think it's, it's incredibly important that if the city is going to function well that the public safety departments and the city are working together.

And so the, the meeting that I had, uh, the new, uh, police officers association, president Danny Diaz, uh, was, uh, again, uh, an introductory meeting, uh, to, uh, establish lines of communications put the past aside and make sure that we also could work together on shared goals, uh, for keeping our community safe.

When the police officers association is functioning.

Well, they're looking out on behalf of the rank and file.

Uh, that's what we want to do as a city as well.

Uh, and we need to move forward to Speaker 2: You.

Got it.

The issue of collective bargaining is on the ballot upcoming, but is collective bargaining a financial issue.

They want to make sure they're paid well, or is it a, uh, when things go wrong and people need discipline, is that have to do with that?

Can you just explain that issue a little bit Speaker 1: For both?

Uh, I mean, for them it's for it's both and for any, uh, union or, or labor organization, it would be, uh, all encompassing worker safety it's, uh, et cetera.

We have very clearly defined goals for the negotiation that have to do with ensuring that our police chief has the executive authority to remove cops, uh, who have been, uh, found for misconduct.

And that has been well-documented, there's no surprises there, uh, what we're going to do, and what we are doing right now is operating in good faith to establish collective bargaining and, and try to achieve an agreement based on those objectives.

Uh, we will continue to do that if the voters change the rules of the road with regard to collective bargaining on these contracts, and we'll have to abide by them, but for what we are doing right now is what we are obligated to doing.

And that is to bargain in good faith to try to achieve our objectives at the negotiating table.

Speaker 2: Collective bargaining is on the ballot called proposition to be my understanding is you've said, I'm not going to weigh in one side or the other, leave it to voters.

Speaker 1: That's right.

And again, that's because as mayor, my chief obligation is to ensure an environment for good faith, collective bargaining.

We have a collective bargaining, a contract with, with the police officers association, we're in the midst of that bargaining right now, my job is to make sure that that is being conducted in good faith and that we achieve the objectives that the community wants us to achieve.

And we're going to continue to move forward into the rules, uh, that have been established Speaker 2: Marijuana, wrap it up, but this has clearly been a challenging year.

COVID isn't the hardest year of, of your elected office?

Speaker 1: Well, um, I guess I'd be hard pressed to say no, but, um, it has been a challenging year in every respect, uh, every year has its own challenges.

But what I will say, Michael, is that I talked to my peers around the country every single day, and it is very clear, the work that we've done together as a community here in San Antonio, San Antonio is on as strong a foundation as any, to have a recovery and come back even stronger and more resilient because of this Speaker 2: NIR.

I appreciate you coming on the record.

Thanks, Michael.

joining me now in the studio is Councilwoman Melissa QBO.

Havruta district six, Councilman.

Thanks for coming into the conversation.

Thanks so much for having me, Michael we're in the middle of a campaign called equal pay essay and you were wearing red.

Can you tell me a little bit about what the campaign is?

Well, the campaign is equal pay for women I'm wearing red because it's the symbolic color for, for us to, to show that we support equal pay for women.

I'm very grateful and honored to be part of the first elected majority women council seven out of 10, right?

That's six out of 10, six out of 10.

Yes, sir.

Um, and I'm number six.

So I'm very grateful to be representing district six on this council.

And, you know, we, unfortunately, you know, with the, the, in the last year over two and a half billion women have left the workforce and it's not traditional industries like manufacturing that we've seen in other recessions it's, uh, as a matter of fact, economists are calling it the Xi session because it's women, um, industries where women are overrepresented, retail, tourism, um, hospitality, childcare, things like that.

So the problem is that once a woman leaves the, or really anybody leaves the workforce, and however long they're gone from that workforce, it's a lot harder to get back into the workforce.

So I think, you know, part of recovery and resilience of COVID has to include equal pay for women.

We have to get everybody back on track and including women and back on track means not where we left off, but, you know, um, a step forward and making sure that we have equal pay for women To that point.

Once we get past the Xi session, the statistics that your group has cited is that women are paid 70 cents on the dollar across the average demographic, 70 cents on the dollar is simply unfair.

Okay.

Is there something that the city can do or that private employers should be doing, or is this on the onus on women to advocate for themselves?

Where do you, I think all those things, all those things, you know, we are women advocating for ourselves, you know?

Um, but, but the city absolutely, I think does a really good job of, of trying to level the playing field, as we're saying, um, private businesses, of course, you know, if, if you have a person who is qualified, a woman who is just as qualified as a man, there's no reason why they should get 70 cents on the dollar and Latinas get 61 cents on the dollar.

So it's between Different demographics, how you break down the numbers, Exactly.

Women of color make even less.

Um, and that to me is unconscionable.

You know, it's, and I can't explain exactly why that's happening, but it's time to correct it.

It's a long past time to correct it.

And right now, because we sort of, we have this opportunity and where we talking about recovery, we have to take advantage of it.

And we have to, uh, like you said, we have to make sure that the city is following these, this, this campaign.

And they're making sure that they're up to speed as much as we can ask private businesses to do that.

You know, they have autonomy and they, um, uh, small businesses, I think though, this is part of their recovery too, right?

Making sure that people are paid equally and they're inviting women, um, back to the workforce and, and making sure that those economies has hospitality, childcare, travel retail are coming back up to speed from before the, the, the, um, the pandemic.

And, and I think it's only going to benefit them, right.

Basic economics.

It helps everybody it's, um, you know, the, what's that saying about the water, lifting all, all the boats, right?

So I think it's really important that we, and we do also advocate for ourselves.

We're out there beating the bushes.

We're looking for, um, businesses to help us and support us, making sure that there's equal pay.

Um, we want to make the workforce better for everybody, women and men included, and then leveling that playing field is going to do that.

I want to say that I was super excited to talk to you because I, in my own personal life, this issue has come up in my own family about understanding suddenly, wow, I am underpaid.

I don't mean me, but in my family, uh, this issue has come up.

It's incredibly hard to, once you realize that first, it's hard to find out that you're underpaid.

And then when you do find out what do you do about it with respect to your own employer is a very hard conversation.

And it's from my perspective and super glad that this is a campaign, because to bring awareness to it, take some of the burden off the individual.

Obviously we all have to self-advocate, but it's a hard thing to do It is.

And, you know, I think unfortunately there's because there's, there's sort of a culture of being quiet about it.

Um, people don't understand, maybe some women don't understand, you can negotiate your salary, you know, you're talented and you're up for this job and it's not going to hurt you to negotiate your salary.

You may not get what you're asking for.

Right.

But I think that most men know that they can come into a job and they can negotiate that.

And women don't, um, we're sort of, you know, maybe taught to, to sort of just take what we can get, right.

And that's not the case, Gender norms, and a woman speaking up advocating for health, for self issue perceived differently than a man.

Right.

Right.

Are we looked, are we seen as women as being, um, I'm going to say the nice word for it, but very aggressive, right.

As opposed to a man asserting himself and trying to get what he wants.

Um, and I think it's, everybody should be able to do that.

I'm not saying that men should stop, right.

Not in any, in any regard, but all people should know that they can negotiate their salary.

Um, they should find out, do as much research as you can.

How much does a man make in this, in this industry?

Because you can make the same.

Um, and especially when the, you know, like the you're, you're just qualified.

Okay.

And ask you, how do people participate in the campaign and, and be supporters of it, men and women, as their best ways to do The YWC.

You can contact the YWC, they're big proponents of a equal wage for women.

And they've actually taught me that, um, if they, if, if we could have this equal pay for women over 18 billion, um, would be added to San Antonio's GDP, GDP.

How can that, how can that hurt anybody?

That's going to only help our in economics.

So YWC is, is who you should contact.

Um, and they're, they can link you into the campaign.

Um, if you want just information, you know, you're out there, you're a woman that's out of the workforce right now, and you want to know how to get back in YWC is, is a good resource Councilmen.

Thanks so much for joining us and working on this important camp.

Thank you so much.

I appreciate being here and joining us.

The studio is Jenna from the president of the San Antonio economic development foundation.

Jenna, thanks for joining me.

Thanks for having me of the, there was a headline in the San Antonio business journal this week that said you have a daunting task ahead of you, a $38.5 million raise over the next five years.

If you're the president, it's going to fall on you to do that.

Tell me about this daunting task.

That's right.

Well, first I think it starts with defining what we are and what we do as an organization.

And the economic development foundation is, is charged with diversifying and growing the economy.

And that's just fancy words for corporate recruitment, business retention and expansion and workforce development.

So bringing a company in bro, who we have, I don't know what workforce development is, Make sure we have the talent to fill the jobs.

And so the common denominator throughout his jobs, we exist to bring jobs, keep jobs, uh, and continue to focus on jobs for the community to do that though, we need a budget.

And as you mentioned, 38.5 million is daunting, but if you put it into perspective, it's a five-year fundraising goal.

Uh, we have incredible volunteer business community leader supporting us from behind the scenes.

And if you break it down into an annual budget today, our budget, uh, in totality sits at about 4 million.

We're looking for that to be about seven, the $4 million budget puts us on par with communities like Tupelo and Kalamazoo.

And we believe that if we want to compete and play in the big leagues, that we need budgets that are on par with communities like Denver and Austin and Nashville.

And so that's the goal.

We're confident we're going to get there.

And the business community certainly excited about, uh, standing behind us, standing behind us and fueling us.

You're raising this from private companies who have their own priorities specific to them, but you are going to the pitch with them or one of your allies and the business community.

If you're asking me for a quarter million dollars, what do I get?

Yeah, So 140,000 jobs over 200,000 professional certifications and degrees and EDF, won't do this alone.

We'll do this together.

Um, but if you put that into numbers, it's about $55 billion of annual economic impact over the five years.

And we can back that down and show you by industry what, uh, the growth will look like and what your market share as a specific company will look like as a part of it.

Can you get specific?

If I'm literally worried about my budget, I run a company.

You're looking for my dollars.

How, how do I benefit?

Show me, show me something concrete.

So I can show you out of this econometrics model and I will nerd out on it, but I can show you that within the 55 billion, that it'll mean X to the construction industry, and you can dive deeper and say, construction company, a, your market share is 30% of our local market, and you can do the math and I can show you what you will stand to earn from our efforts over the next five years.

And we're only asking for a measly a hundred thousand dollars a year, but that's the pitch, you know, and I can, I can make that pitch to the hospitality industry.

I can make that pitch to the real estate industry, and I can also make it to the nonprofit community.

If you think about the projects that we've worked at, the economic development foundation like Toyota, victory, capital Hulu, and E Y all of these different companies beyond employing thousands of San Antonians, they are giving philanthropically to our nonprofits.

And so this is, uh, certainly a team sport economic development that is, and we're all rowing in the same direction.

And we're hoping that by executing to these goals, we can impact the entire community Examples of companies that have come from outside and have joined the San Antonio community.

If I'm a San Antonio company that wants to grow, how do I get to do that?

I'm reluctant to give up my dollars.

I just want to see, as I want to be able to picture what I'm getting for my money.

Are you training the people that I'm going to hire?

Exactly.

So, um, I wouldn't say that we're in the programmatic efforts of training, but we are connecting the demand.

So the job needs right from the employer to the supply side.

And as you know, we have had a challenge.

In fact, essay works.

Our workforce arm was founded to address that.

So supply and demand gap, we had employers who couldn't find specific skillsets, but we had talented people in San Antonio.

They just weren't always sinking up specifically.

And of course COVID exacerbated that.

Um, so our efforts, your essay works are to connect those dots and to find transferable skillsets within the supply side, to connect them to the demand side.

And that's exactly what we do for local companies.

But beyond workforce, we have a business retention and expansion program where we provide other assists.

We have some companies that, uh, need strategic counsel and business development connections, but then some that just want a pothole fixed out in front of their exit of their office.

So the assists vary, but we're in the business of all things, helping companies.

Okay.

Okay.

Well, that's very challenging.

It sounds like you don't have to go out and knock on all the doors yourself.

You have a team of allies, how have you recruited them?

And what does that, who do those?

Who are those folks are going to help you make the ask?

Great question.

Well, I have an executive committee that's chaired by the president of HEB.

Um, and the CEO of USA, Wayne peacock is on our board and others.

Um, but our investment committee is made up of about 15 volunteers, uh, that are current investors of our organization, real estate community, um, folks like Cheryl Skelly, former city manager, who buys into economic development, what we do, uh, and so many others that just understand the value proposition and agree to tell the story.

So they'll actually be doing more of the selling than I will.

My job is to execute.

My job is to deliver to the plan so that we can hold ourselves accountable and look ourselves in the mirror as, as the same looking at all of our investors and say that we're making progress.

It sounds a little bit like you have a who's who of allies on your side, helping you knock on doors.

Great volunteers.

I wish you great success over the next five years, expanding your budget and expanding San Antonio.

Thank you, Jenna.

Thanks for joining us.

Appreciate your time.

Now for the reporters round table.

We welcome Scott Huddleston, the government and historic preservation reporter for the San Antonio express news.

Scott, thanks for joining us, Michael, you filed a couple of stories this week about the Alamo, always a concern for all of us.

The first one is deeply complex, a court case involving an indigenous nation top Balaam Cola will take a nation, which has brought a court case, which they lost.

Now they're raising it potentially the Supreme court.

Can you explain a little bit what they're concerned with?

Right.

Speaker 1: So the top column column take a nation has had an active lawsuit for about 18 months.

Um, it was, uh, dismissed by a federal judge here in San Antonio, and it's on appeal now with the fifth circuit court of appeals in new Orleans.

And, um, there's a possibility that it could end up in the U S Supreme court, but it relates to, um, issues of the free practice of religion and, uh, the, the groups access to the Alamo church for their annual remembrance ceremony.

But also, Speaker 2: So my understanding is they had, they had access.

They no longer have access, right?

Something that changed.

Speaker 1: That's, that's a long standing thing that they had had for about 25 years.

Um, first with the daughters of the Republic of Texas there at the Alamo.

And then in the early days after the land office took over as custodian.

Um, but the other issue is they want to be included in the human remains treatment protocol that was developed a couple of years ago.

And that, um, that involves a panel of federally recognized tribes, tribal representatives on an advisory committee.

Um, and top pylon is arguing that they basically have been legislated out of that process.

Speaker 2: Okay.

In simple terms, is this about who gets to tell history, which is a, quite a larger fight involving this group, but some other groups with respect to the focus on the day of the battle versus a multi-sensory storytelling is this right within that context.

Speaker 1: Um, and there's, there's kind of a subtext to it because, um, top Balaam supports the idea of DNA testing and the Alamo trust, and it's a advisory committee does not.

And so, um, Speaker 2: Maybe you could just explain what that means when they're supporting Speaker 1: Okay.

Um, when you take bone fragments and expose him to, um, a process that could actually, you know, damage or dispose of, of that, that human remain, um, that's very controversial, um, particularly in among native American groups, but, um, top Balaam and, and also there is a group called the Alamo defenders descendants association that is arguing that DNA testing should be allowed so that we can learn more about, um, those, those human remains and who they are Speaker 2: Actually work, whose ancestral remains are at the site to be honored by different groups.

Um, this is a very complex story, but thank you for coming in and explaining that there's another ongoing story this week.

Uh, Kate Rogers, former HEB executive has become the new executive director, right?

If you could contextualize for us what that means about the Alamo trusts priorities, how do they select her?

What is her mandate?

Right.

Speaker 1: It's one more new leading cast member in this new, new, uh, second phase of the process because, um, you know, there was that decision not to move the cenotaph.

And, um, so which means, Speaker 2: Well, it's some turnover of staff, right?

Yep.

Um, and mayor Nierenberg Speaker 1: Replaced, uh, Councilman treviño as the representative on the Alamo management committee.

Um, he appointed a council woman, Rebecca, via Iran in that place.

And so she also will be the tri chair of the Alamo citizen advisory committee, which will be meeting Monday.

And so there's talk about a redesign of the Plaza compared to what it had been before.

And so the Alamo trusts, um, hiring of Kate Rogers as the new executive director of the Alamo kind of follows up on that because it's, it's one more new, new person in leadership.

And she's got a strong background in public relations, um, education and fundraising for nonprofits.

So I think that the Al the Alamo trust board felt that she was just the right fit and the right person to carry the project forward.

Those are some of the strengths she's bringing.

Is there any controversy that comes with her or will certain groups be disappointed in her or, or is this a consensus choice that everybody's happy or, okay.

I don't know.

Um, the honeymoon has just begun, so we'll see how things are.

I think that she needs to have some time on the ground to, to figure things out, but I think that this project could move forward.

Um, if, if she takes the approach of winning hearts and minds, as opposed to winning arguments and lawsuits, Right?

The, the absence of controversies is good news.

It sounds like.

Absolutely.

I'm sure you would have heard it if people had them top of mind.

Right.

All right, Scott, I really appreciate you coming on the reporters round table today.

It's been a pleasure.

Thank you, Mike.

Thank you for being here for on the record.

You can watch this episode again, as well as past episodes and podcast.org.

We'll see you next time..