Newsmakers with khambrel Marshall and
welcome to Houston newsmakers and this week’s special guest state Senator
John Whitmire, good morning sir.
Anything going on in your life,
very busy, very busy, but
very
Aging and interesting and I’m enjoying it.
Well you know what it last month you made it official
the you made it unofficial you made an announcement about a
year ago but yeah just last month he made it official with it official announcement
that you were indeed running for the top job, the
city of Houston.
What was it that made? You want to take that step to
make a difference in Houston to fix problems to
make Houston work better.
I was asked to consider running for mayor
my constituents houstonians that I respect and love.
Listen to
and after going over the issues, that they felt that were important, I
shared those concerns. I
live in Houston,
I drive the streets of Houston and everyday
eyewitness, things that can be done better.
We’re a great City
and we can become greater. If we fix today’s problems,
was
it something that was going on in the Senate that you lost interest
in doing it? Or it was, it was just about that fact, that it was
another tug to do something. No, no, I love the Senate, but I love
Houston more.
So I’m a public servant. I
Go where problems are
and quite frankly I think I can use my experience better more
effectively in Houston today
than in Austin. I’ve been fighting Houston’s issues in Austin
for 50 years.
I was a chair of the committee that dealt with city and county issues.
So
I’ve worked with nine mayor’s,
I understand Public Safety.
So city services are in critical disrepair.
You
know, you shouldn’t put your garbage can out and cross your fingers
that it’s going to
to be picked up that day.
Our streets are in horrible condition.
You take six months to get a permit. If you want to open a business
in Houston, I just know we can do better.
I want us to continue to progress and be a great
City, a greater City, I can spend all morning talking about our assets.
The
medicine of the port NASA our diversity,
but if we don’t concentrate on today’s problems,
we’re not going to remain a great City
and of course, crime is a major concern and I understand
crime is Chairman of
Justice.
I know for a fact, I can make a difference
for Public Safety.
We have 87 police agencies in Harris County
13,000 Law Enforcement Officers
but they don’t talk to each other.
We never invite the state troopers to come in and help us with traffic
enforcement.
Why that would free up our HPD officers to spend time
in our neighbor
so I’m responding to my neighbors.
We have traffic issues. We’ve done very little
for flood control. The city’s drainage
Some is in dire need of Maintenance
and just two weeks ago. Two weeks ago, we had miss school and
work because of the concerns
for our quality of our water.
So
I’m ready to go to work. I’m fired up, I’ve gotten a lot of encouragement
and a lot of diverse support
and
it would be a sin for me to waste that experience in context.
We need somebody that can work with Austin.
When we have a crisis, we need someone that can pick up the phone and get
immediate attention in Austin.
The new land commissioner that
Controls the Harvey, funding is axenic colleague of mine, Don
Buckingham and I’ve already visited how we can make certain
that Houston gets its fair share of Harvey funding.
So I noticed that when you major announcement, there was a
serious bipartisan flavor in the room big
room. Lot of people in that room, people
with Deep Pockets to your political, your
Finance guy, is somebody who is somebody
who’s well known. And as a guy,
Is
you know
you see the
diverse pictures there of the
your state senator Keller care Alvarado, yet
his
Houston councilmember
Chief Acevedo president of the University of Houston your alma mater there.
What
is it about that group? Because you’re such a diverse
group of folk there
and City of Houston is bipartisan typically as a race
but it really isn’t
and but in that crowd it was a bipartisan where Houston is bipartisan
and
trash pickup is not a Republican or
A Critic issue,
bad streets, are not Republican or Democratic issues.
We need to bring everyone together and I have the ability to do that. I have a
record
of working across the aisle.
I believe there’s a time to campaign
in November,
you put the politics
on the sidelines
and then you sit down at the table
and be collaborative and solve our problems and I can do
it, have done it and there’s actually no one in the race that can pick
up the phone and get immediate response during a crisis,
which we will so badly. Need
in Austin and Washington. So you will talk
more about that as well. Here, I’m going up but you said you know, criminal justice
committee, your chair of that at it and so
the crime was going to be one of the issues you’re going to tackle. No question. What kind
of things do you see right now they’re not being done that. You would like to see done
that. We make a difference. First of all, we’ve got to let our
police agencies talk with one. Another
Metro has 300 officers,
they protect the transit lines.
We need to talk to them about working with HPD about getting into the
neighborhood.
HST has over 200 officers.
What do they do? When schools are closed?
We need to have them work with HPD in their neighborhood.
TSU, uh, the med center,
they’re not even on a radio system where they can talk to one another.
So
I want a chief of police that brings everyone together. We
have a surge to fight crime
and let the bad guys. Know if I’m elected mayor, you better
relocate because you’re not going to like what’s going to happen to you.
I have a record of being very reasonable,
but tough
on crime.
Well, Justice, I believe you lock up. The people that you’re afraid of
not those that you’re mad at which would get us to the homeless issue.
The homeless issue has to be addressed
more, effectively,
many candidates can come before you and talk about the problems,
but I’ve been public service. Long enough to have Solutions,
The
Haven for Hope. And San Antonio is a model for how to
get homeless people
off the streets.
We must do that. I know for a fact corporations in downtown
Houston,
trying to encourage your workers to come.
From home,
one of the polling data shows, they do not want to engage
the homeless.
So if we’re going to continue to be as great as we are
and go forward,
we’ve got to solve today’s problems. What kind of things do you
have
been done in the Austin situation over
the programs that you saw working? Well, that’s not being done here in
Houston.
Well, it’s
well,
quite frankly, I don’t think Austin is dealing effectively with their
homeless issue. In fact, they allowed
it to take over downtown,
San Antonio.
Because it’s a tourist
location, a destination, the Riverwalk, they can’t have
a homeless problem.
So they’ve gotten the private sector, which I will be able to work with
and collaborate with the city and the county. We’ve got to have city
and county cooperation,
and
quite frankly, get the state involved.
We have a surplus. Let’s spend some of that money
on flood control,
the homeless condition,
Public Safety,
our infrastructure,
you know, I’ll emphasize again, we can’t afford
in a great City to take off.
Two days of school.
You know how many kids
thousands in Houston missed the only meals they get
in a day, a free lunch in a free breakfast because
they didn’t go to school
families. Couldn’t find someone to supervise the children.
Last two weeks ago, we had six year olds being supervised
by eleven year olds
because of our infrastructure and quite frankly, I think the incompetence
of
people that run our East Side, water plant. So I’m here
to make a difference. The
I’m not here to start a political career.
I’ve had a very
English career,
I’m here to fix things and I’m known as a fixer. Well we got
to talk more
with Senator with Meyer after the break and went to talk to you about what you can
do, better in a number of different areas including
you know, the past eight years in Houston.
You’ve been doing a great work in the legislature. Now, the legislative
session is starting to come up again,
we’re going to talk to you about your priorities there and how you can do both of those while
you’re running
for the City of Houston. Hold that thought,
we’ll do that after the break already.