Nothing to say, yet
Transcription
The Let's Talk Podcast, formerly the Low Vision Internet Radio Show, interviews Ms. Veronica Carajan, a candidate running for a special election in District 2. The podcast aims to educate voters and showcase candidates' platforms without endorsing them. Ms. Carajan discusses her background, including growing up in El Paso and her career as an attorney. She emphasizes the importance of limiting campaign contributions and the influence of big money in local politics. She also highlights her experience advocating for issues such as air pollution, housing, and animal services. She believes her legal expertise and knowledge of city programs make her the best candidate for District 2. You are listening to the Let's Talk Podcast, formerly the Low Vision Internet Radio Show. As previously we have done is bring on candidates running for local office, and our intention is to educate the voters to make the right decision. We cannot endorse any candidates, but merely showcase their platform. Today we interviewed Ms. Veronica Carajan that will be running for the special election scheduled for December the 9th for District 2. Just to let you know folks, the audio at the beginning of this podcast was kind of rough, but we fixed it, so just be mindful of that. Again, here is our interview with Ms. Carajan. Today we are very fortunate to be talking to Ms. Veronica Carajan. Just as part of me being transparent, I do know very well Ms. Carajan. She has done a lot for people with disabilities, so that's my input on that. Let's go ahead and talk to Ms. Carajan. How are you doing today, ma'am? I am great. Thank you so much for taking the time to do this and for being engaged with local politics, George. I really appreciate all the work that you do for the community. Thank you, ma'am. Also, other candidates, if you do want to come on, the email is letstalkstuff at mail.com. That's letstalkstuff at mail.com. Ms. Carajan, I know you've been on this show or the previous show, so can you give people a little feedback of your background or where you're from and how you became to be a prominent attorney? Yes. So I grew up in El Paso in the Ciudad Juarez. My great-grandparents actually came to El Paso in the early 1900s. My great-grandfather was undocumented, and he, through a friend's recommendation, got a job at the railroad, which helped him get his residency. But it was still Jim Crow El Paso, and so they could not buy a house. They could not get a loan. Those sorts of things outside of the Chamizal. And so they decided to move to Juarez. And so they bought a house. They bought land that they later gave to my grandfather. And so they taught me the power of building generational wealth through home ownership. And I grew up in a really nice neighborhood in Juarez, but then we had to commute. My mom came from a working-class family, and so four generations of us commuted to go to school and to go to work. And I went to Burgess High School. I graduated and went to Brown University. I got my degree in environmental studies and another degree in ethnic studies. I graduated with honors. I came home and did air pollution work and then realized that the community was always left out of those conversations. And so, you know, you would see a Starco, an El Paso Electric, and the Marathon. Or not Marathon, but at the time it was a Chevron refinery. Always getting what they wanted, and the blame was always put on Juarez. And so I decided to go to law school to figure out how to fight for justice in a different way. And right after I graduated, I worked through law school. I worked for a private firm doing environmental cases. And then when I graduated from law school, I was lucky enough to get hired by Texas Yo Grande Legal Aid. We provide free services to people who are low-income. And I've been there for 19 years, almost 20 years. I've had really big cases, and I've also had individual cases with large impact for families. I've been very successful in my career. In 2020, I ran for mayor. I was not successful, but I did succeed in other things, including encouraging young people to be involved in local politics and also showing the power of a grassroots campaign. I took an oath to not sell myself or my future constituents and limited the campaign contributions that I received and did not go to the oligarchs for any of their support. And so after I lost that race, I decided to build on the work that other groups have done, like the Community First Coalition, which did some research on campaign finance and the importance of El Paso having that, so that we can limit the influence of big money in local elections and local politics. And so we created a political action committee called Justicia Santeriza, which has been working for two years to get that passed in El Paso, where one of the last large cities, well, actually the last large city in Texas that doesn't have any kind of limit on city election contributions. So you can, if you're rich, you can buy, you can buy, you know, we say you can buy a candidate. And we've, we're very close. We collected signatures, and then we went before council, we got voted down, and then we kept at it. We've been lobbying council to make some changes, and we think we're very, very close to achieving that. Well, I'm going to ask, so people can know, and you kind of touched on it, why is it important not to take money from certain individuals? We'll say that. It's important for a number of things, right? The fact is that the citizens are not privy, we're not a part of conversations that happen behind closed doors. And so when, what we're trying to do is limit the possibility of people selling themselves out, whether it's quid pro quo, meaning that you get big money, and then the person who gave you money has business before the city. It could be that they have a contract as a vendor, or a construction contract, or that they have a zoning request that they want to get passed to the city, and you as a council member then have to vote on that, right? So it's problematic that the people who gave you money are doing so in some occasions, because they expect something from you, and it's not just your values, it's actually your city business. Exactly. So that's one problem, and then the other too, that maybe that doesn't happen, but you're doing it because you understand that once you leave public office, you will be employed by those people that gave you lots of money. So if anything comes up, it could be other things as well. It could be inspections, right? Maybe they just have business that requires a lot of inspections, and they have a fast-through path because they're friendly with council or the city manager. Those sorts of things, I think we need to try to limit as much as we possibly can, and one way is by limiting the influence of big money. It also democratizes our elections. People have more faith when they think, okay, there is a small possibility of someone selling themselves out because we have limits, so I will trust that the system is going to work for me as a regular person. And then it also forces candidates to work a lot harder, because then you have to reach a lot more people in order to get the amount of money that you would want to run a big campaign. So let me ask you this. I know there's other candidates that are running for the current position. So this is your opportunity to tell the voters why you would be the best candidate for District 2. I have been an attorney. I've been an advocate. I've done things on my own time. I've been engaged with city issues since I came back in 2005. At the time, the city of El Paso was stealing a sarco, and not stealing a sarco, but it was contesting the air permit in the hopes of pushing a sarco to not reopen, and that was the copper smelter that we had for hundreds of years that polluted our community and really hurt a lot of the workers. And so that was my first interaction really with the city, working alongside them, because we also had – we represented the ex-sarco workers at Trolla, and so we were part of the litigation team with the city. And then we had the flood in 2006, and I saw how the city sees people who are poor. They wanted to take over a neighborhood in San Osillo, and they were going to give people almost nothing for their homes until we got involved. And we pushed the city through a lawsuit and also through our advocacy to treat both homeowners and renters in a better way. And then after that, it was like, you know, I served on the Fair Housing Commission, I served on the Renewable Energy Advisory Council for the city, and I've been familiar with their programs, whether it's the First-Time Homebuyer Program for my clients or the Home Repair Program, again, for my clients. I've been – you know, I've submitted comments on, like, their housing trust fund, affordable housing issues, things like that. And then with the mass shooting, we had to also engage. And it just – time and again, I've seen, especially in the most recent administration, that there's a huge disconnect between the city and the community, right? They don't know how to do outreach, for the most part. They don't know how to talk to people. And I don't want to generalize, but the vast majority of the programs that I think are crafted for constituents really haven't been that robust as they used to be. And then, as you all know, in 2016, the city announced that it was going to demolish Duranguito, so we got involved again. Now we have saved the building through politics, right? But our lawsuits helped us to get to this point. And in the course of that, seeing how the city was willing to just displace people, including tenants, very aggressively, and we had to, again, step in and empower people with information. Even so, most of the tenants left because they were scared of the process. I've also worked on animal service issues on my own time. Just most recently, last week, we met with the interim city manager. My friend, Ruby Montana, from Bridgecook Rescue in Rocamo, invited me to be a part of this conversation with the city manager. And if you go to my social media, you'll see that we posted some very practical recommendations for how to address the severe problems we have with animal services and the large number of stray cats and dogs in our community, as well as dangerous dogs. And so, going back to the question, why am I the best candidate? I think it's a number of things. One, that I'm a lawyer, and so I will defend myself in executive session when it's just the city attorney and council. I know how to go through contracts. I know what things to look for. Two, I've been an advocate, and that means that I'm very well connected in the community when it comes to nonprofits and to businesses as well, right? So, understanding, like, if there's an issue in a community, who do we bring in? We had one constituent complain about stash houses and drug use, and so I called people I know and said, to the community, you know, in terms of drug recovery, and they said yes. And so, I mean, those are the kinds of things that I can do quickly because I have, you know, friendly and unfriendly relationships with EPISC, with the housing authority, with the county, with so many nonprofits in our community that I know how to bring those resources into the community to address the needs. And lastly, you know, in terms of my personal, I think, qualities, I'm very reasonable. My clients will say that. My opposing council will say that. I'm not looking to win. I'm looking to win the best outcome, right? And so, I tell my clients, sometimes winning in court isn't the best. Maybe it's better for us to fail because the thing that you want, you're not going to be able to get in court. So, I'm always looking for the most creative but just solution for people's problems and understanding that there are limits. In terms of the issue that I think I'd love to work on, both at the city and at the district level, at the district level, we have a lot of needs. We have, you know, District 2 runs from Hondo Pass down to Delta. On the east side, it's, like, railroad down to, you know, the Bassett Center area down to Escarate. And then on the west side, it's Scopia and then Alabama. And so, it has some of the oldest housing stocks in the community. It has the refinery. It has a lot of abandoned buildings flooding because of the topography coming off the mountain. So, we have really – and speeding that's related to that as well. And so, there are a lot of needs that are very specific to the district that I want to address, including, again, the large number of stray dogs and cats and lack of lighting, parts that need a lot of work. And the way that we do that is by really bringing back the city dollars to the neighborhoods. We need to stop, at the city level, subsidizing the original pestilence at the expense of residential property tax owners. We need to make sure that everyone is paying their fair share of taxes, including the refinery. We need to collaborate with other entities, including the county, the school district, the housing authority, but especially the taxing entities, including UNC, to really make sure that all of us are making the best use of the things that are most expensive, primarily buildings, and when possible, personnel and programs. The issue with the migrants, for instance, the city was the only entity to not receive an award from Las Americas because it was not part of the collaboration. It just did not know how to collaborate with people. And that was one instance where we really needed to be working together in a compassionate way, but also in a financially responsible way. And collaboration tends to do that, right? We save money when we're not duplicating effort. And I think in terms of one of my true and committed passions, the environment. We have the hottest summer on record for alpaca. Hot weather affects people with disabilities. It affects people who are elderly and on a fixed income and who are too scared to turn on the lights or to turn on the AC. It's a quality of life issue. It's a quality of work issue for construction workers. And it contributes to air pollution because hotter days equal more ozone pollution. And so we need to combat that in different ways. One of the things that I'm currently working on is the Bridge of the Americas expansion, but also the ICANN Connect project. And if people drive off of ICANN to get into U.S. 54, either going to Havadish or going north on 54, they will see bottlenecking, right? It is commonplace now. $156 million in ICANN Connect that was supposed to make the traffic easier, and it actually has made it much worse. I've never in my entire 47 years of life have seen the traffic be that bad heading into Havadish. We've had car accidents, et cetera. But for us, as we've thought about this, talked to clients, talked to residents, the solution is to remove the 18 wheelers from ICANN Connect going into Havadish and from the Bridge of the Americas. That is one way that we can alleviate the pollution that's right next to houses, right next to homes, houses and to Havadish Elementary. And that's my perspective. I think that overall, the thing that I bring the most to this community is that I've always had eyes and ears. You know, as an environmentalist, I was just raised and trained to always be on the lookout for people. So when I'm on the highway, I look, I always look down like, oh, there's houses there. Like when we, you know, when I go to places with more industrial settings, I look for the houses. I look for the schools, because those are the folks that we need to take care of. Often, you know, they have often been forgotten. So that, that's in a nutshell. The thing that, you know, I want to say, too, about the animals. My wife, she wanted to volunteer at an animal shelter. I knew because she would bring home strays right away. But anyway, so your campaign is very positive, Ms. Cavanaugh. But there are some things that I do want to talk about. Like I said, an educated voter, for me, is a better voter. It's an informed voter. Yes. So two things that I want to talk about is Proposition K and also the UMC. And I know the voters want to see what your perspective was, what actions you took, and why you did it. Absolutely. So with Prop K, there's actually an opinion piece that came out in the El Paso Times. I've asked them to correct it because the person who wrote it said that I was the brains behind Prop K. And that implies that I wrote it, that I pushed it, that I led the campaign. And that is actually absolutely 100% wrong. I was supportive of Prop K, and I'll explain why. But I did not write it. Sunrise, El Paso, and Ground Game, Texas wrote it, and they took the lead on the campaign and did the messaging on it. And so I want to make that clear, and I think that might even be defamation to say that I wrote something that I didn't. And I have proof that I didn't. Because I would have done it differently. Prop K focused primarily on the generation of electricity. And for me, having worked on air quality issues for as long as I have and understanding how climate change works in our community, yes, that is a problem, but also transportation. So for me, the environmental issues here are related to the refinery, they're related to El Paso Electric, and transportation, as well as other smaller, what we call point emission places, right, facilities that are emitting. So, you know, I want to just make sure that people understand that. In terms of my support for Prop K, again, it was, I'm an environmentalist, and I had to get behind a proposal that was, for the first time, really pushing the city to use its power over El Paso Electric. I know that there are concerns. The workers were concerned about losing their jobs, and they're not being a just transition. I 100% sympathize with that. We saw that with the circle. And so we always wanted to take care of the workers. And in terms of the proposition itself, I mean, people were scared about it having a calling for us to take over El Paso Electric. I think that would have been challenging, because it would still have to go through council. It wasn't automatic, right? It would still have to go through council. You would have to understand the cost of that. And it would have to be a real cost. But to me, the greater issue is the city has not really, I mean, until Sunrise showed up in 2019, before that, the city really was not pushing back on El Paso Electric. We are in the state of Texas. We have limits on what we can do in terms of renewable energy and getting rid of natural gas. But if we look over at what they're doing in New Mexico, you will see that they are going green. They are doing solar panels. They are investing because they have to, because the state of New Mexico will not let them generate polluting, water-consuming electricity. And El Paso hasn't done that, right? Not even incentivizing a switch. Not even pushing the, what we have is a franchise agreement with them, which is basically a contract where they can use our streets and sidewalks for their posts and infrastructure. And it's a very, the agreement is pretty weak. And so, you know, the city does not push back on utility rate hikes consistently. All of these things, right, that I think have really been to the detriment of our community, both in terms of our pocketbook, because we're paying for water twice. We pay for the water in our water bill. And then we also pay for the water that El Paso Electric is consuming. They're one of the largest consumers of water in the city, in the desert, right? And we pay for the electricity as well. And then we're paying for the pollution and for the health effects. And the more we know about air pollution, the more we know that it could even cause things like colon cancer, body weight increase, heart attacks, as well as respiratory problems. And so that was my support of Prop K. And I love that it was led by young El Pasoans, most of them African American, that it was homegrown and that, you know, they mobilized and that people signed that petition knowing that it was for climate action. And so it's disappointing. People didn't approve it at the polls, but the movement is there, right? There is a desire from people. And when we talk to people at the door, people, you know, are concerned about their utility bills. And they don't always understand the connection between some of their health problems and the pollution that's in our community and the consumption of fossil fuels. But ultimately, I supported Prop K because it was time for El Paso Electric to be held to account. And this was one way to do it. But, you know, I knew that buying the facility was going to be a huge impediment. So it wasn't as if we were voting for that. Also, the language wasn't clear on whether it would be an outright purchase, right, of the company. So I hope that answers your questions about Prop K. If not, I can answer more. How about the UN? I know you're short on time, so we'll be just quick. How about the UN? Yeah. So I served on the board of the University Medical Center, which is one of our taxing entities. And during the course of my service, the board received a lot of information about the need for buildings. If you all remember during COVID, UNC really stepped up. It provided life-saving care for people in our community. We had people in, you know, makeshift tents outside in the parking lot. All of the things, right. UNC has stepped up after, you know, during the hot spots. And then also with the vaccine, it also stepped up. And it's a counting hospital, right. It is a hospital of people who don't have health insurance or are underinsured. And it's becoming a hospital of people like me who do have health insurance because the quality of the services has improved so much in the last couple of decades. So when we, for many, many months, the board was getting updates about the need for these, for additional buildings. A cancer center, a geriatric or, you know, elder services clinics. And so we decided, we voted on it after about, I think, a year of them talking to us about the need. And we voted to approve it. I thought the amount was too big, but I still approved it because I believe in universal health care. And the other really important thing for me was that this was not a sports arena, right. This was not going to be something that we would have to subsidize forever, even after the Certificates of Obligation passed. If you all think about the baseball stadium, we were told that we would never have to pay for the baseball stadium, that the hotel occupancy tax would pay for it. And in fact, we pay anywhere from $300,000 to more per year to subsidize the baseball stadium while MountainStar Sports gets all of the profits for the team and concessions and stuff. And so unlike that scenario, with UMC, we saw the numbers. Their clinics are actually doing well every single year. They're generating money. They're generating full-time jobs, unlike the baseball stadium. And they're saving lives. And so I supported the CO with the concern that it was too much. That said, there were two things that I need to clarify. I was not a commissioner. We knew that this vote would go to the commissioners, and they would have the ultimate say. We were just a board making a recommendation, so I didn't pass the CO. I didn't try to pass the CO. I made a recommendation to those in power who could then decide whether or not they agreed. And they could have modified it if they wanted to. The second thing is that there is the – sorry, I lost my train of thought. But there is the – well, I didn't realize this at the time because when I was on the board, we started off doing Zoom meetings so that people could participate, everyone, right, including us, were participating virtually. When that ended and we had to do in-person meetings, which is when we took this vote, I was not aware – and that was completely my fault – that the public was not as easily able to access our meetings. Our meetings were not being streamed live, so you would have to be there in person. And our meetings were not recorded so that you could watch them later. So people who – the public did not get exposed to the conversations that we had about the need for the certificate of obligation. So the public was in the dark. So when there was backlash, I was like, well, why are these – like, we've been talking about this for so long. And then it turned out that it was like, well, the public had a right to be upset because they weren't exposed to any of that information. And as you know, George, I'm high – you know, one of my priorities is transparency. There's no need to hide these things from the taxpayers. So I actually made a motion that we go back to doing these things, that we stream it live, that we have the recordings, that we provide the minutes, that they'd be easy to find on the website. And they got dwindled down. So it was an improvement, but not what I wanted. And so that's what happened with the CO at UNC, and I'm happy to answer more questions related to that. No, I mean, you pretty much covered it. As myself, as an assistive technology consultant – I'm going – I'm making a point here. I went to your website, and it is accessible, just so that you know, Ms. Cavalajad, for those who are visually impaired or blind. As part of this discussion, I also encouraged campaigns to make the printed materials accessible via QR codes. But with that being said, Ms. Cavalajad, and I know the answer, but I'm going to ask this. Why is it important for you to have accessibility for people with disabilities? You know, I've been an advocate for people with disabilities for a very long time. It's been primarily – well, with mental health, it's been my family. And it's challenging when you love someone who is going through dementia or Alzheimer's or bipolar disorder or schizophrenia. It's very – so I've been a constituent, right? I've had to call emergency health care. I've had to call 911. I've had to do – you know, for clients, I've had to do what are called emergency orders when they were suicidal. So those mental health issues are very important to me. And I've seen some improvements with the crisis intervention team. A few months ago, I was – you know, waited for hours to get help from a police officer who had that kind of training. And then a few months later, in September, I had to also make some calls, and the response was much better. So I hope that it's consistent, right? It also depends on the time of day sometimes. If it happens to be in crisis during the day, then you're lucky. If it happens at night, then you're not lucky. And, you know, these things cannot be predicted or scheduled. So in terms of physical disabilities, I think that I – you know, the first clients I had at Legal Aid were farm workers. It was a farm worker husband and wife. They walked in, and I remember looking at them and thinking they were probably in their 60s. But because of our intake, you know, we had to find out the age. And they were in their early 40s, and they had young kids. And they were farm workers, and so the work had physically aged them, had physically disabled them. And both of them were like, we wish we could go back to work, but we can't. The husband had problems with his hands because of the repetitive nature of the work. His wife had problems with her back. And so they were just – they had a child who was deaf. And they were just the most loving family, but they were struggling financially to just make ends meet. And all they wanted to do was work. And so for me, at Legal Aid, my clients who have been disabled have been primarily people who left their health at work, you know, whose bodies were broken by the kind of work that they were given and the lack of protections in their workplaces. And then with the historical workers, you know, they were exposed to toxic chemicals without their knowledge or consent. So the exploitation of people, right, that results in disability is very close to my heart. But in addition to that, you know, disability happens to all of us. It happens to all of us. We're all subject to, right, being physically or mentally disabled, you know, a car accident, a back fall, an illness that debilitates you. And so I just – I have it front and center. And I've been very lucky that I've been, you know, I've met people like you and other advocates through the Civil Rights Project and ADAPT and others locally that are just so powerful. You know, you all organize. You speak truth to power. And you share your experiences and your need with the community. I'm always just grateful to have my eyes open to how things could be better. I think our campaign could always be better in terms of language access and having things in Spanish. But also, as you said, making it accessible to people who cannot hear or who cannot see. And, you know, whatever we can do, I think, to help people who have disabilities access a city that is also theirs. I think we need to be working towards that. And like I said before, from my perspective as a disability rights advocate, I've been doing it for two years. And I can say, you know, thank you for what you've done in the backgrounds. You know, we won't go down that road because it will be a long story for that. But you've done a lot for us, too. When I say us, people with disabilities, especially the advocates. But let's do this. I know you have other appointments. If someone wants to volunteer, Ms. Carvajal, for your campaign or make contact with you, how can they do that? The easiest way, you know, I don't have my phone number published only for safety reasons. And it's a very short campaign. But the best way to do it is to go to the website. VeroCarvajalForDistrict2.com. And let me see if I can. That's the best way to reach us. I'm also on social media under Vero Carvajal for District 2 or for El Paso. And that's, yeah. So, Vero Carvajal is V-E-R-O-C-A-R-D-A-J-A-L-F-O-R-D-I-R-S-T-R-I-C-T-2.com. So, Vero Carvajal for District spelled out. The number 2.com is the best way to find me. And you can submit, you know, a request there or go to our e-mail and let us know. If you want to volunteer, we have volunteers who are block-blocking. We've been block-blocking since I am out in October 10th. And then we also have people doing phone banking and texting. So, as we close out this podcast, by the way, you're listening to Let's Talk Stuff Podcast, formerly the No Vision Internet Radio Show. We're talking to Ms. Veronica Carvajal, the candidate for District 2. So, Ms. Carvajal, as we leave, just what's your final thoughts or comments to the voters? We have a special election. November 27th to December 5th is early voting. We have December 9th as the last day to vote. I suspect that negative ads are going to be coming out against me by one of my opponents. We're in her support. A congressional committee was created for the sole purpose of supporting her and opposing me. So, it might get ugly, but I've asked my supporters, and if they're listening, to not follow that lead. Our job right now is to listen to constituents and to work towards plans that will address those needs. That's what we're focused on. We need to run a positive campaign. I will clarify why, but when it comes to just sticking to the issues, the voters deserve our attention. And I will not be distracted by those things. We need to just stay focused on reaching people with a message. And the message is bringing back the power to neighborhoods and crafting solutions that are neighborhood-based. And that's why we need to keep talking to people and making this city more beautiful than it is and taking care of it. Our community just has so much heart. We have so much heart, and we deserve better. And I hope to provide that. And you're right, empowering the people is very important. And this is just my personal view or comment regarding negative ads when it comes to campaigns. My thing has always been, when they have no content, they go negative. That's always been my perspective on that. I don't know why they do that, but it's just my personal opinion regarding that. But Ms. Carvajal, thank you for taking the time. I know you're a very, very busy person getting ready for the November 9th general or final election. Will you be at the polls on that or the voting locations on that day, ma'am? Absolutely, yes. It's a Saturday, December 9th. So, yes, I will be there. I've created, if you go to the website, you'll see we also have postcards that we're leaving at people's doors. The postcard will tell you where to vote and where to vote during early voting and the day of. It's the outreach worker in me from many years ago that still wants to make things accessible for people because I knew that we were going to get asked, like, where do I vote and what hours and things like that. Let's do a postcard. That's the easiest way for us to communicate that and encourage people to vote. And the other thing, I'm glad you said about the voting. So, I want people to understand that are watching or listening that when it comes to voting, folks, we need to come out. I mean, voting outcomes in the past have been very low. I mean, four point something or five point whatever it is. But there's options. So, what I say by that is, for example, like myself that is blind, there's ballots that are electronic. We have the talking voting booth. There's curbside voting. So, for example, if you have a mobility impediment, you can't get into the location. There is curbside. So, encourage those to go out and vote. That's why we want to bring you the information about the platforms for the candidates, and it's up to you to vote. And Ms. Carvajal, I wish you a lot of luck on December 9th. And if you become elected, don't forget about the little people like me. Oh, 100. Well, this is what I tell people at the door. And I tell this to my clients. It's not about me forgetting about you. It's about you letting me forget about you. Right? Very true. You don't let me forget about you. You hold me accountable. You show up. My plan is to have open hours in the neighborhoods. Right? Not at City Hall. But to be in the neighborhoods. You all will know when. So, you can stop by and talk to me in person. Hopefully, you know, we'll have to have some time limits for people. But to give everyone a fair chance. But so that I can meet with people in person and be able to respond to people's complaints quickly. But I really want to be able to. I need to be held accountable. All of us do. Right? And so. I think you've shown that. Ms. Carbajal, you've shown, you know, your availability. So, you know, that's something for other people to twist and whatnot. But I've seen that. So, you know, I can affirm that. But that's my personal opinion. So, Ms. Carbajal, thank you for coming and talking to us. The Best Talk podcast. Hopefully, you'll come back next time as a District 2 representative to the show. And, everyone, thank you, ma'am. And have yourself a great day, ma'am. Thank you. Thank you, George. Bye-bye. Bye-bye.
