Episode 95: Red Tacos & Revitalization: Spicing Up Wichita Falls 🌮✨ with Michael Mitchell

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
You make this rather snappy,won't you?
I have some very heavythinking to do before 10:00.
Hey, welcome to Get It RightTech Soma with the trio, Mike Hendren,
Terry McAdams, Trey Sorala,back with you once again.
Thank you for joining us.
We do appreciate it.
We get together here toentertain and inform you.
Hopefully we managed to dothat and hopefully enlighten you

(00:23):
as well.
So thank you for being with us.
And even though we don't havean empty seat here, stay tuned because
we will have a special guest.
We do.
Mike Mitchell is going to join us.
Mike is a local mortgagelender but he's also involved in
a project about revitalizationin the city.
There's a particular area tobe here talk about.

(00:44):
Yeah.
So we're going to talk aboutthat here and city revitalization.
I have a feeling it's going tobe a very informative conversation.
I think you're probably right.
Knowing Mike as I do, he's avery informative guy.
The Magnificent the Days ofJohnny Carson.
Oh, yeah.
Oh yeah.
Oh, I love that.
I love that.
One of my, my all timefavorite one, Ed.

(01:07):
Ed hands Johnny the envelope.
Sis boom ba.
Name the sound a sheep makesbefore it explodes.
And they broke up.
Ed and Johnny got to laughingand couldn't stop for some reason.
That cracked them up and theyjust totally broke character and

(01:31):
just, and then the audience isroaring because they're laughing,
you know, but, you know, it's crazy.
Though, but by all accountsJohnny Carson was a miserable bastard
and it's amazing that a guycould be so funny and engaging on
tv.
Very, very private life.
Well, the story, the storyI've read about him was in particular,
he had a, he only had a one.
His home was massive, but itwas one bedroom because he didn't

(01:54):
want family and friendswanting to come over and stay over
and hang out.
No place for him.
So they had like a guest housefor family when they would visit.
But his main house had one bedroom.
I just always heard peopletalk about that he was a pretty miserable
dude in a lot of ways.
A curmudgeon, very quiet, veryprivate guy.

(02:16):
And I think when you're in theentertainment industry like that
and people are constantlyclamoring for your attention and
then you become what hebecame, you know, the king of late
night.
You know, you're the, yourshow is the show.
Everybody, if they, if theymake it on your show, they've made
it.
And, and Carson was big.
It was every comedian in theworld that Was their dream is Carson.

(02:37):
If you.
If you got an appearance on.
On the stage on the Tonightshow with Johnny Carson and Johnny
looked at.
You and went, yeah, you got the.
You got the nod, the wave tocome over.
You'd made it.
Yeah.
When you were on the couch, you.
Were in Steve Martin, RobinWilliams, a lot of.
I saw some old ones.
Jerry Seinfeld, I mean, all.
All the big ones that mademassive careers.
Robin Williams was.
God, incredible.

(02:59):
I would not be able to.
Been around that guy very long.
He.
That guy.
I've seen him on.
On stuff, interviewed.
He just.
He's so over the top andoutrageous and he won't shut up a
little bit.
Yeah, that.
I have no respect for that guy.
No, not at all.
He made people around him miserable.
You couldn't.
Can see how uncomfortable hemakes everybody around.

(03:20):
It's like, look, jackass,we're all here making a living, and
just because you're the star,you're screwing up everybody's deal.
I just think it's wrong.
And because he was the starand he had the power and authority,
I think it's.
I don't like people who dothat that way.
Well, good news was that I wasin love with Mindy on market.
And by the way, I didn't thinkRobin W.

(03:41):
Was that funny by the way, either.
I think most of his comedy wasstupid because it went.
It was beyond weird.
Now he did.
He was a good actor.
Like, good.
Not goodwill hunting.
What was the.
The Dead Poet Society.
The guy had acting chops.
He really did.
And he was a good actor.
But.
But I've just seen enough andheard enough where he was so outrageous

(04:03):
and so over the top and just.
Just made life miserable forpeople around him.
I think some people.
I think the guy had a lot ofinsecurities, and I think some people,
the way they deal with thoseinsecurities is they are over the
top.
They feel like they have toreally exude and their personality
has to be bigger than life.

(04:24):
And that's how they overcometheir shyness or their insecurities
or whatever.
But when it starts affectingeverybody around you, I think that's
a problem.
There are probably somechemical enhancements that.
Didn'T help much easier.
So anyway, hey, be sure tocheck out our website.
Get itrighttechsoma.com andvisit us on Facebook.
Facebook as well.
Be sure to like our Facebookpage and share it with everybody,

(04:47):
you know, because that's howwe grow.
The show is through you.
Let's talk about a couplethings happening here before we get
to our guest here.
Coming up, City Lights paradeis coming up on December 21, 7pm,
starts at 8th in Austin.
Winds through downtown.
Should be a fairly largeparade this year by all, Betty.

(05:08):
Unless the weather just turnsout really crappy.
Yeah, I think as long as theweather breaks good.
And it usually does.
And I think they're a little.
It seems like they're laterthis year having the parade than
they have been in the past.
It feels like it was earlier.
I think you're right.
I mean, you think about that.
We're talking about.
That's basically the Saturdaybefore Christmas.
Yeah.
And I feel like in years past,we've even had it closer to Thanksgiving

(05:29):
than Christmas.
Yeah.
It seemed like it's been aweek or so after Thanksgiving.
Yeah.
So anyway, that's gonna be onthe 21st.
Downtown Wichita Falls.
Do not miss out on that.
Fantasy of Lights is underwayat Midwestern State University.
I happen to serve on their.
On their executive committee.
Guys, I tell you what.
If you're new to the communityespecially, and you've never been
to the Fantasy of Lights atMidwestern State University, you
need to go see this.

(05:50):
You need to go park, get outof your car, walk through it, see
it all.
You can see all the exhibitsand really take them in in an hour.
Roughly the whole thing.
And it's just fascinating.
And the story behind it.
And I won't bore you with thewhole story, but the story behind
it.
Just watch shows.
We talked about it several times.
The story behind it is truly fascinating.

(06:10):
But some of these exhibitshave been around for 80 plus, and
it's fun for all ages.
Just get out.
Walk the thing.
Yes.
You'll get to see.
And just walk with your family.
Take a nice stroll out there.
It's beautiful.
It's well lit out there.
There's great parking.
It's a great place to go.
Yep.
And.
And make a donation.
Because all of this MidwesternState University pays for none of

(06:31):
this.
All of this is the.
The.
The maintenance, the upkeep,the storage, the.
The actual function of it.
The electricity is metered.
The committee that I serve on,we raise money and we pay for 100%
of this.
MSU pays nothing.
All they're doing is providingthe space for it to happen.
That's it.
They provide the lawn.
That's all.
But we pay for the rest of it.

(06:52):
So your donations, which thecommittee is very thankful for.
Oh, very much.
But, Mike, the point behindthat is it's not minimizing what
Midwestern State does.
It's simply saying that whenthey're out there collecting money,
they're not making theuniversity rich or whatever else.
All they're doing is trying tomaintain public university.
I say that because there's amisconception that MSU pays for all

(07:13):
of this and they don't.
Yeah.
It's not private money we pay for.
It's not.
Pays private dollars payingfor it.
Sponsorships and privatedonations that pay for it.
So cut a fat check or go sticksome cash in the boot.
Yeah, please do.
And again, and we do, wereally appreciate Midwestern State
University.
They've been a part of this now.
This is for 51 years.
They've been involved.
By the way, do you take cardsat the donation thing or is it just.

(07:36):
There's QR codes that you canscan with your phone as you're walking
around?
Okay.
You can donate on a card thatway or you can go to the website.
It's.
I think it's F O W L msw.
But anyway, look it up.
Fantasy of Lights.
Google it.
You'll find it.
Because I'm going to tell youwrong and you're going to end up
on some site where someone'shead is shaved or something.
I don't know.

(07:56):
Anyway, but you can makedonations by card online.
Good.
I was just making sure that,that Mike wasn't out there swiping
because I didn't know wherehe's going to keep that card reader.
Nowhere we want to talk about.
All right.
But anyway, it's a.
It's a great exhibit.
You'll love it.
Shove the card in Mike's mouthand pull it out fast.
Yeah.

(08:17):
Yep.
Fantasy a lot.
Yeah.
Sol dot.
Yeah.
That first link, you do it andthen you can go right here, make
a donation.
Boom.
It's exactly cool.
Awesome.
Do we want to move on herewith our local restaurant Focus?
Okay.
So each show we focus on alocally owned family, usually, usually
family owned restaurant.

(08:37):
This week we're going to betalking about, I think probably the
oldest existing restaurant inthe city.
I'm.
I'm 99 prines, maybe real close.
It's the oldest Mexicanrestaurant existing.
Mexican restaurant.
And all you have to say aroundhere is, I want to go get some red
tacos.
Red tacos.
And then, you know, everybody knows.
Yep.
Costa Mignon, Larry and VickyCarr own it.

(09:00):
The Car family has owned CasaManana, the original Costa Manana,
is it.
Most people refer to it.
They've owned it since, Ithink it was founded in 46 or 47,
something like that.
So primes might be A littlebit old.
Yeah.
Prime.
Primes is from the 20s.
Okay.
Okay.
So primes is older, but as faras Mexican restaurants, this is the
oldest one in town.

(09:21):
1947, it was founded.
Larry Carr's dad founded the restaurant.
And I don't think the recipeshave changed.
I'm not sure.
I'm sure they're not.
The food's great.
They're chips in queso.
They make their own chips.
You go buy a bag of chips and whatever.
Queso, yeah.
Their chips and queso are legendary.

(09:41):
They are legendary.
Tacos are absolutely.
I think they make their salsain house.
And the red tacos,everything's done fresh right there.
And hot comes out, man.
It's hot.
Yeah.
Oh, yeah.
Well, I mean, that's what you want.
Have you ever gone into aMexican restaurant and not been warned
about how hot the damn plate is?
Yeah, everywhere you go, careful.

(10:01):
This plate's very hot.
They put.
No kidding.
They put so much stuff in theSalamander because it's a lot of
it.
They melt that cheese at thevery end.
And that's why the plates aregenerally hot, because they've been
in the Salamander.
Yeah.
So anyway, cosmetic downtownon 8th Street.
And there.
I can't tell you the crossfrom the Holt.
Right.
Well, it's.
It's between.
Between.
It's between Iron Horse,India, Indiana, and.

(10:25):
And Scott.
Iron Horse Pub.
I can't talk.
Yeah, Iron Horse Pubs on one side.
The old Zales Building or the D.
Forge is on the other.
They're right next door.
Well, what's the.
But what's the.
The apartment that's the wholehotel to be.
The whole hotel?
Yeah, There's a whole.
Departments.
Yeah, it's right across thestreet from the whole department.

(10:45):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Which, by the way, we're goingto talk with Mike Mitchell about
revitalization.
One of the first downtownrevitalization projects that was
really done in earnest, Ithink, was the Holt people living
down there.
I took a tour in that building.
I was taking on a tour with agroup of people, a committee I was
on at the time and before theyever started working on it.

(11:07):
And, I mean, you walked inthat place and you felt like you
needed a tetanus shop when you left.
It was bad.
It was bad.
It was really bad.
And to see the transformationof that building from an old abandoned
hotel that sat there decayingfor decades turned into a completely
renovated, completelyconverted apartment complex.

(11:28):
And I think they're kind oflike luxury.
Luxury apartments.
Is there still a waiting list?
Yeah, there's always becauseyou have that one.
And then right down the streetis the Baron's Crossing or whatever.
Barron's Landing.
Barron's Landing, yeah, it's,it's, it's a luxury apartment as
well.
Well, the old mascot shrinebuilding downtown has now been turned
into a park.
And then also the Austinelementary and Alamo elementary apartments

(11:51):
as well.
So, you know, so great.
But, but hold happening.
The Holt, they did it firstand I'm telling you that you had
to see it before to really,truly appreciate the depth of the
after.
Oh my gosh.
Well, anyhow, Casa Mignana downtown.
Casa Mignana Red tacos.
If you've never had a redtaco, they're, they're mind blowingly

(12:12):
good, the food's great.
And also try their chips andchips in queso.
Like I said, they make theirown chips.
They're real thick and theyhold queso real well and all that.
Tell them we sent you.
They're not going to give youa discount on anything.
No, just tell them that.
They're going to look at yougo, who?
Who?
Yeah, anyway, although they dogive a military discount, just FYI.
Tip your waitress.

(12:33):
Yeah.
Yes, absolutely.
So Mike Mitchell's coming up.
We're going to interview himhere in a moment.
I want to jump into somethinghere real quick.
Joe Biden, back in June, Ibelieve it was, had said he was not
going to pardon his son.
Did Joe Biden pardon his son?
Shocking.

(12:55):
He.
He pardoned his son.
Oh shit.
Federal judge has alreadydismissed, I believe the gun, the
gun case that was pendingagainst him for the illegal possession
of a handgun.
That's already been dismissed now.
He did.
And even liberals, evenleftists, even people in the most
leftist reaches of the mediaout there in the evil empire even,

(13:19):
they're going, whoa, hold on, Joe.
I called this, I knew thatthis was going to happen.
Oh yeah.
But not only because it's hisson and quite frankly, I'll be honest
with you, I'm not going to sayI wouldn't have done the same thing.
Number one.
Number two, Joe Biden's alsopardoned himself with this.
Yes.
Oh, oh, you don't think ifthat, all that barisma stuff started

(13:41):
going through, that's why hepart if he pardoned Hunter Biden
10 a decade back then.
The information won't come out.
That's right, it can't come out.
So that's going to be there.
And then also somebody finallypicked up on this, if you remember,
I told you guys because we hada whole talk about this.
And I said his words were, Iwill abide by the jury's word or

(14:07):
whatever decision.
Abide by the jury's decision.
There never was a jury.
Oh, it's a judge.
So, so therefore he was, hewas hedging his bet on that.
But if you read it, he did.
Say he was right.
If you read the press release,though, it was very, it was, hey,

(14:29):
I was going to stay out ofthis, but you know, it was unfair.
And what, what, as I'm readingthis, I'm going, Trump, Trump, Trump.
Everything that Trump has gonethrough is exactly what he's claiming
happened.
The Trump Justice Departmentis going to come after his baby boy.
Is what, what he kept saying.
Yeah, but what I'm saying is,is that Trump has been run through

(14:51):
the gauntlet and the ringerand everything.
Well, guys, let me tell yousomething, okay?
The left learned absolutelynothing from Joe Biden in the 1980s.
In the 1988 presidential, theDemocratic nomination process, Joe
Biden was forced to walk awaybecause he got caught lying, plagiarizing,
just outright making crap up.

(15:13):
Not only that, it was notonly, if you guys remember, it was
a joke.
Like every comedian in Americawas talking about Joe Biden and then,
oh, he pulled a Joe Biden.
I mean, they were talkingabout plagiarism.
It was that well known and rampant.
Yeah, you fast forward andlook what they did to Gary Hart.
Gary Hart got caught having an affair.
His own party threw him underthe bus and then they backed the

(15:35):
bus up and ran over him againto make sure he was really gone.
And so you look at whatthey've done now, you fast forward
30 odd years later and JoeBiden gets elected President of the
United States.
And we're shocked.
People are shocked that he lied.
Come on, the guy's got alengthy history of being not only

(15:58):
not an intelligent man, butbeing a damn liar too.
And also just checking the wind.
Exactly.
But now, to be fair though,we're kind of in a different world.
Look, as time has gone on, wewent from Joe Biden and Gary Hart
and I mean, just any littlething could just derail your campaign
or whatever.
And then Bill Clinton gets,was in for eight years and he got

(16:21):
away with.
And it's like they impeachedhim and he didn't get it.
Bill Clinton got away with.
If you, if you boil this downto its essence, and if you were corporate
America, this would be, thiswould, you would be terminated.
Bill Clinton got away withtaking an underling, somebody who,
somebody was an underling whenit Comes to.

(16:42):
I don't mean she was belowhim, but she was below him on the
power structure.
Yes.
Someone he had a lot of powerover and.
And at work on the clock.
Yep.
Committed adultery.
Yep.
That you.
I don't know if that a board,that a CEO of a company would.
Survive that even today.

(17:05):
No.
Well, especially today.
Yeah.
But I think that's where theyjumped the shark.
That's where the Democratsjumped the shark with Bill Clinton,
because like you said, theygot rid of Gary Hart, they got rid
of Joe Biden, and that was theDemocrats that did that, wasn't Republicans.
This was all during theDemocrat nomination process.
But once Clinton came in, itseemed like all of a sudden that's
when the Democrat Partystarted to change and they started

(17:25):
accepting a lot more of this crap.
And it was like, yeah, becausehe's good.
He's good for us.
He's good for us to win.
So therefore, we'll.
We'll put up with it.
But then what I'm saying,where I'm getting at to being, to
being fair is, is that, guess what?
Trump is not a clean, squeakyclean dude.

(17:45):
And so.
But at the same time, I thinkwhat's happened is, is that we're
now at unconventional thinking.
And I think on our side isthat for the most part, none of us,
I don't think the three of us, right.
None of us were initially aTrump fan at all.
I've been very clear,especially this time, I didn't want

(18:06):
Trump to run again.
Right.
Very clear.
But he is, and I think he hasresonated well enough with enough
people that obviously that are voters.
And it's like, hey, we gottahave that unconventional thinking.
Well, when he ran in 2016, Ididn't take him seriously initially.
I thought when he said he wasgonna run, I didn't know whether

(18:29):
to take him seriously or not,to be honest with you, because of
his history as not just abusinessman, but also as an entertainment
mogul.
Exactly.
Yeah.
A promoter.
He was a huge promoter.
Is this just Donald Trumpbeing Donald Trump and just Donald
Trump trying to promote Donald Trump?
He tried to go promote hisnext WrestleMania, but do you think
it might.
Have started that way?
Maybe.
But then he realized, oh, my gosh.
No, no, I think he was seriousfrom the very beginning.

(18:51):
I think when you look back, hehas some interviews, he's talked
about it before, but a lot ofpeople say, and Trump is, I think,
has alluded to this or said itoutright, that that White House was
it the press pool, the pressthing that they had where, where
Barack Obama basically satthere and trashed Trump.

(19:12):
Oh, yeah, the press dinner,what it's called the National Press
center or whatever.
Yeah.
And Trump was there just as aguest and Barack Obama stood up there
and talked about, you know,you wanted to be president.
And, and a lot of it wasBarack Obama did have some sour grapes.
And I don't blame Barack Obamafor having sour grapes because Trump
was the one who was pushinghard for the, the birth, birth certificate
thing and all that for Barack Obama.

(19:33):
So I don't believe, I don't, Idon't blame Barack Obama for throwing
some bombs at him and going,hey, you know, f you, you know, you,
you made my life uncomfortable.
Now I'm gonna make your life uncomfortable.
But there's a lot of peoplethat say that was the turning point
for Trump when he goes, youknow what?
Screw this guy, screw everybody.
I'm gonna do this.
Well, anyway, that's just interesting.
Turned out to be a really goodfirst president, first term president.

(19:55):
I believe he was a really goodfirst term president, policy wise
and everything.
I just didn't like all theantics and all the other bs.
Therefore, I didn't want himto run again once he, once he decided
to run.
Hey, he's, I think, I think alot of lessons hopefully have been
learned from the first term.
I.
You're already seeing it.
We're already seeing it.
And I think the second term isgoing to be a different story.
Well, he, in those respects,he knew.

(20:18):
In the first term, this guydidn't know.
He knew a lot of players, buthe didn't know Washington.
Right.
I didn't know what it wasabout in the machine that Washington
is.
And then he hired these peoplethat he's like going, okay, well,
you've been around, you know this.
But they turned out a lot ofthem started up be part of the machine.
Yeah.
Whereas now you have, you havethe Trump people who have been around

(20:39):
him.
They've seen the Washington machine.
They go, we don't like this,this and this.
Now we're going to get peoplein from all over and we're going
to create this pirate ship here.
And well, the two, the twopeople that are a part of this that
I'm really going to want tokeep a close eye on.
One is Tulsi Gabbard.
We'll see how she, how she performs.
And Christy Noem, currentlythe governor of South Dakota, I want

(20:59):
to see how she does because Ithink one of those two could be elevated
to a vice presidential role.
Totally agree in the future, I think.
One and eventually president.
And eventually president.
I just, I got a feeling thatone of the, one of the two is going
to, is going to end up beingin that position of all the people

(21:21):
that are out, depending on howthis goes.
Yeah.
All the people that are outthere in the, in the, in the pool
on either side of the aisle.
You know, Gretchen Whitmer, Iwould say is probably about, in that,
about that same level with,with them where looks like for there's
a possibility that she couldbecome a president or could become
a presidential nominee as well.
But I totally agree with you.

(21:42):
Yeah, we'll see.
All right, we're going to takea quick break here.
When we come back, MikeMitchell is going to join us.
We got a lot of things to talkabout concerning Wichita Falls revitalization.
We'll talk with Mike coming uphere next on Get It Right Texoma.
Stay tuned.

(22:08):
Hey, guys.
Welcome back to Get It RightTech Selma.
As promised, we have a specialguest in the studio with us.
Mike Mitchell is with us here.
Mike, how you doing, man?
I'm fantastic.
Just happy to be here.
Glad to have you.
So, Mike, just full disclosure here.
Victory Home Loans is acompany you work for.
Yes, sir.
That's kind of our associationin a way, me being in real estate

(22:30):
and you being in the lendingbusiness and.
Absolutely.
We do talk frequently in that vein.
But the reason you're heretoday with us is to talk about city
revitalization.
Absolutely.
Yeah.
I'm City of Wichita Falls City.
Wichita Falls.
Yeah.
Yeah, specifically.
So I am the chair for theWichita City View or.
Yeah, well, I mean, whatever.

(22:51):
We'll help them all out, I'm sure.
But yeah.
Now this is specifically Cityof Wichita Falls City Revitalization
Committee.
The area is called the Heartof the Falls.
Heart of the Falls.
I like that.
Yeah.
Well, we, we talk a lot onthis podcast about, you know, the
city and some of the thingsthat are that are coming back and

(23:11):
trying to come back.
We've talked a lot aboutdowntown and all the stuff that's
happening.
And I'm sure that's big focusof your group is kind of, you know,
what's happening downtown.
I'm sure that comes up atleast, does it not?
So so actually, no.
So we're very specific to an area.
So I mean, for those of y'allout there that are from Wichita Falls,
it's basically Seymour highwayto Kell Brook to Kemp.

(23:33):
So basically all that areaaround Old High.
I see.
Okay.
Yeah.
And so that's, it's the mostdensely populated area of Wichita
Falls.
It is.
And the avenues, basically alot of it's in the.
The avenue.
A lot of it's the avenue,stuff like that.
It's about 60% rentalproperty, lots of derelict or delinquent

(23:54):
homes.
But it's a great place.
And to be clear, we want to dorevitalization, not gentrification.
Gentrification is basicallywhere they come in.
They fix it up so much thatthat's where all the people with
lots of money want to come inand they push everybody out.
We want this to be a greatarea for first time home buyers.
You know, maybe people thatare on the lower income that can't

(24:17):
afford the bigger, nicerhouses, but they also can't afford
a project.
Well, and I will, I will saythis, I think a lot of people would
make the argument that that's wonderful.
But how do you fix some of themore egregious issues in that area
that have developed over the years?
Obviously, you know, you'vegot, you know, crime issues to deal

(24:40):
with.
You've got, you said, youknow, derelict structures.
You've got, unfortunately,like I said, 60% rentals.
And a lot of those propertieshave fallen into some serious disrepair
over the years.
You can drive by them and seeif they have.
How do you fix all of this?
Obviously you got to throwsome money at it, but where does
the money come from if notinvestors, where does it come from?
Absolutely.
So my, I mean, and that is agreat question.

(25:01):
So first and foremost, we dida lot of property, not property,
people surveying.
Surveying the neighborhood.
Safety is the biggest issue.
Yes, obviously.
I mean, there is amisconception that this is the extremely
high crime area.
And it's not.
No, it's not.
Realistically, everywherearound town, I mean, the crime is
really pretty close.
Statistically.

(25:22):
You know, that perception exists.
That perception.
At one time there, there weresome gang activity there, which,
which that's, you know, thatis going.
A lot of it basically isworking poor.
Yeah, a lot of those peoplethat do do work, that have jobs,
but they're, but they're lowerincome workers.
So first and foremost was a safety.

(25:44):
When you look at the crimestatistics for the area, a lot of
it's theft or burglary andit's all small stuff.
You know, somebody breaks intoyour car, which sucks, don't get
me wrong.
But it's, it's nothing likethey're coming in stealing, you know,
gold bars and stuff.
You know, it's not milliondollar thefts.
It's.
It's all small stuff, petty crime.
So a lot of it has to do withhomelessness in the area.

(26:05):
But they found and researchshows that you can cut down crime.
Most of the crime happens atnight under the COVID of darkness
right in this area.
A lot of people don't havefront porch lights.
Front porch lights can cutlike burglary, you know, home burglary
or burglary of a car by like70% by just having porch lights.

(26:25):
Because lit up, they don'twant to be lit up.
And so that's one of theprograms we're looking at is to help
people, you know, eitherrepair, fix their electrical, whatever,
to come in and put porchlights in.
It's it.
And it's a simple fix.
I got a question on that.
A ring has a program now asidefrom privacy and some other things
that.

(26:45):
That are going on with Amazon,but I know you're a ring fan.
Yep, I am a ring fan.
They had a.
There's.
There was a program and Idon't know if Wichita Falls.
I think it was subsidized by alocal police department.
And basically they subsidizedlike doorbell cameras and things
like that in order to reducecrime in a particular neighborhood.

(27:08):
Because if you've got a numberof people have the ring doorbells
in a particular neighborhood,then there's kind of some continuity
along of what you saw theperson here and here and here and
all that.
I don't know how that worksthat up.
I remember seeing that night.
We ought to look into that.

(27:28):
Well, you think about.
It creates a little bit of a dragnet.
You know, you've got all thesecameras from different angles that
are.
That are photographing, youknow, whatever happened or taking
video of whatever happened.
And through compiling thatinformation, perhaps the police can
track down who did it.
You know, part of it is youwant to prevent it in the first place.

(27:49):
Cameras are great, but.
But it's somebody.
If somebody steals from youand you caught them.
But it's a deterrent effect as well.
It is if you get it lit up.
Right.
I think the lighting it up isa part.
Yeah, absolutely.
Because.
Because it's not the stealth mode.
The other thing that isavailable out there that solar powered
lights have become.
Yes, very good.
There are some good solar power.

(28:10):
I.
My mother has a couple in herbackyard that are solar powered just
because it didn't have powerout to where she.
Yeah, absolutely.
Yeah, we've got some out at my.
Folks place and they work great.
So that.
That's another option.
Lower cost option because IImagine that some of those houses,
the electoral system isprobably suspect aged.
Yeah, yeah.
Well, another big thing thatwe're working on is what we're calling

(28:30):
a neighborhood empowermentzone, a nez.
And so the NEZ focuses a lotaround code and code enforcement.
Now, Texas, obviously is a big property.
Right.
State, and rightly so, prettymuch, for the most part, you can
kind of do just about whateveryou want to on your property, you
know, within reason.
But you can have a tiger, bythe way.

(28:51):
Yeah, yeah.
But you can't have a wallabythat's actually in Wichita College.
Can't have a wallaby.
That was part of the citycouncil discussion not too long ago.
But so code.
And y'all may not know this,we didn't actually have set, like,
property code up until themid-80s and when stuff.
It was just kind of the wild,wild west.

(29:11):
Yeah.
They'd kind of tried to dothat, and then the city just kind
of boomed and it went.
And then by the time it wasthere, it was like.
And we kind of missed our opportunity.
No zoning.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So there wasn't a whole lot of zoning.
And so what the NEZ does nowthat we do have zoning, one good,
for instance is setbacks.
So in Wichita Falls, you gotto be set back from the property
line 25ft.

(29:33):
And then if you're on a corner.
When you lost your job orsomething, you had to sit back.
Yeah, yeah.
Well, that's a short, youknow, small setback, too.
But.
But a lot of these lots inthis area are not your typical 10,000
square foot lots.
Right.
Most of them are 7,500 or even5,000 square foot lots.
Well, the problem is, youstart implementing these setbacks.
I mean, if a house burns downor something like that, you.

(29:55):
You literally cannot rebuild.
Right.
And so we're looking at someof that to be able to say, okay,
you know, basically we'regoing to exclude.
Not exclude.
That's a terrible word.
But basically have someexceptions in this area because of
how things were built.
Well, grandfathered in.
I mean, if your lot isgrandfathered in or something.
Yeah, kind of.
But I mean, you got toremember if.

(30:16):
If a house is, you know, burnsdown, that burning down is really
probably the biggest issue.
And so if a house burns down,it's hard to come back in and rebuild
something of similar sizebecause of current code.
Right.
And so especially on cornerlots, I mean, if you're on a corner
lot, you're kind of stuck.
Yeah.
So.
And then the other big issueis what we call ADUs or accessory

(30:37):
units.
So the mother in law suites or the.
The rear garage with garage apartments.
And so that's actually theprocess we're working through right
now is code and zoning to kindof redefine some of those for.
For our area to make it worthwhile.
Obviously, we don't want a.
A barndominium coming in there.
Not that we're againstbarndominiums, but it doesn't fit
with the neighborhood.

(30:57):
Right, right.
I mean, we've got a lot of the1940s, you know, 30s, 40s, 50s, cookie
cutter, you know, houses.
Most of them are gingerbread houses.
What about 1100 square foot?
Thousand square foot?
Yeah.
11 to 1500.
Yeah.
They're pretty decent size.
1500 square foot home in thatera was a large home.
Yeah, it was a lot of house.
That was a lot of house.
Yeah.

(31:18):
You mentioned the lighting,and I thought of something, so I
think it's still this way.
In Texas, there are only twocities that manage their own street
lighting systems.
Wichita Falls and Victoria.
I did not know that.
I believe that's still the case.
Everyone else, like I live inBurt Burnett.
Well, Burt Burnett doesn'tmanage its own street lights.

(31:39):
Encore does.
If we have a streetlightissue, we call Encore.
We don't call the city of Burt Burnett.
And then I think it's stillthat way across the state.
So Wichita Falls and Victoria,Texas, you know, two top totally
opposite ends.
What about the street lightsat your house?
I pay for that.
Yeah, yeah.
And I go through Jacob.
So in a situation like in thisneighborhood, street lighting obviously

(32:03):
could go a long way towardhelping as a crime deterrent itself.
What's the feedback or hasthere been any feedback from the
city on improving orincreasing the amount of street lighting
in those areas?
Because I know some of thosestreets get pretty dark at night.
They can.
There's no lighting.
So that's kind of a little bitaddressed by money, obviously.

(32:24):
Sure.
Of course.
City revitalization is not amagic wand.
Oh, no, it's not the silverbullet that's going to, you know,
take care of everything overnight.
But there's nothing happens overnight.
Right.
Especially with government.
But I mean, there's lots ofthings that we're trying to address
and make a plan.
I mean.
Right.
You know, lighting isobviously one of them.
Road conditions.
Sure.
There hasn't been a whole lotof improvement, especially in that

(32:45):
area for a long time.
Interestingly enough, in the1920s, they had a great, great plan
for underground stormwater drainage.
They had a plan.
It was a great plan.
They never Implemented.
Well, we're growing so damnfast, we gotta, you know, we gotta
do something.
So we're just gonna do surfacelevel and let the streets handle

(33:07):
it.
Well, obviously, I mean,things have changed, you know, climate
change or whatever else.
I mean, seems like the rainswe get here are a whole lot more
intense, you know, right now.
And we're not getting the softrains, you know, over longer periods
time.
So our streets are flooding awhole lot more.
You get that street floodingthat's causing problems with the
streets.
And so.

(33:27):
But I will tell you about asfar as money.
It that's something that we'regoing to be working on is getting
that stuff built into the citybudget, which is tough.
I mean, you know, everybodywants a piece.
Yeah.
Even on your own smallpersonal budget, it's tough to get
stuff worked in there.
And so.
But that's something thatwe're working on.
The city.
You know, when I say the city,I'm talking about the folks we're
working with, which is mostlyFabian and Terry, planning and zoning.

(33:49):
Crystal.
But we've heard from alldepartments, you know, code enforcement.
I, I had kind of a love haterelationship with code enforcement.
You know, I thought they werepretty much out there to ruin our
lives.
But after hearing, you know,and speaking to these guys and really
hearing their purpose, youknow, man, what a thankless job.
It's kind of like being on theschool board.
We know anybody like that.

(34:12):
But, you know, it's, it's avery thankful job.
That's a glorious.
You didn't realize that schoolboard yet brings you fame and fortune.
Yeah.
That's how you retired, right?
Yeah, exactly.
But, yeah, it's a verythankless job.
But they're really there to,to keep us safe, to make sure things
are right.
And also, you know, they don'twant to go out and find people.
They really do a good job.
You know, legally, by thebylaws, they're able to just come

(34:33):
in and find you.
But they do work very hard togive notices on violations and they
want to work with the people.
And if it's a money issue,they, they help point them in the
right direction, you know,like tree trimming or something,
you know.
But one of the coolest thingsthat we've got going on is we just
did a, of all things, an EPA grant.
I say we, we weren't reallythat involved with it because, man,

(34:56):
a federal grant is just awhole animal in and of itself.
But Fabian and Crystal and thewhole team down there just really
stepped up.
It's about a $23 million grantthat we applied to through the EPA.
And so I would say the biggestportion of it that I'm excited about
is we're supposed to turnthose off.
Yeah.
Okay.

(35:16):
Well, I guess you're on the.
You're on the show.
Don't, don't.
Don't have any.
Don't have your rules on that.
Do we need to answer it?
No.
Okay.
All right.
I don't mind.
No, we're good.
But the biggest chunk of thegrant is rehabbing homes.
And so the intent is there areso many derelict and delinquent homes
over there.
It obviously causes a problemwith the homeless.
That's why there's lots offire there.

(35:36):
Because they get in, they'recold, they don't have a lot of places
to go here in Wichita Falls.
So they.
We literally tore just real quickly.
When I was on the schoolboard, we had a church that was a
church that used to be across.
We actually took that downbecause of that reason.
Yep.
It was a.
Say it was a safety issue.
A lot of homeless people.
And then you had a church withhomeless people in it.

(35:56):
Literally our building,because it was no longer a church
with homeless people.
Right there where yourstudents are.
Yeah.
And that's why we demolished that.
It's a problem.
But so we want to be able togo in.
There's lots of people thatare out of state that own houses
there that, I mean, they don'tdo fixing up.
They're vacant.
And so we, you know, we, asthe city, because I am an official

(36:18):
member, you know, of thiscommittee and the chair.
And so we want to go in andidentify 25 to 40 of these properties
and do full rehabs on them.
And of course, a lot of folkshave said, well, what does that have
to do with epa?
Well, we're gonna make themefficient, you know, so, I mean,
things like insulation andlighting, you know, electrical and
all this stuff, really makethem good, efficient homes and fix

(36:40):
them up to make them nice again.
But the other issue is lots offirst time homebuyers.
Again, they don't have moneyfor fixer uppers.
They don't have money for alot of repairs.
They need a good home to live in.
And so really, if you buy anew home, really, you shouldn't have
to do a whole lot of repairsin the first 10 to 15.
Well, and you can attest tothis being on the lending side of

(37:01):
that issue.
A lot of times, you know, afirst time home buyer, it's going
to be an fha situation.
Absolutely.
It might be a VA situation.
And there are rules as tosafety conditions and things.
And a lot of these houseswouldn't qualify.
Yeah, not right now,currently, for an.
FHA loan or so you're going to.
Get them up to spec where theywould qualify for FHA or VA loan.

(37:24):
And here's the caveat.
Because the city doesn't wantto be.
They don't want to be landlords.
Part of the deal, like withthe lake lots and stuff, you know,
they don't want to be rentingstuff out anymore.
They don't want to be owners.
And we get it.
We shouldn't want the city tobe owners.
And so the idea is, and we'renot looking to make money off of
this, that's not the purposeof the grant.
Right, right.
And so these homes, if we getthe grant, the intent is that the

(37:48):
homes would be turned over toHabitat for Humanity, which is a
community partner on thegrant, because they have more qualified
people for homes.
Like they know how to do stuff.
Like that, plus they have theinfrastructure of doing it.
They've already got the process.
Right.
Well, they've got the experience.
I mean, they've done this.
They've built homes fromliterally from the ground up for
so long.
And quite a few in Wichita Falls.

(38:09):
There's a lot of habitat and they.
Do a great job.
I mean, I'm telling you,Habitat for Humanity and I've been
a big fan of what they do fora long time.
Just wonderful organization.
But in this case, they've gotthe whole process.
They've got all that.
It's not the big bad city.
They're approving or denying people.
If we had 40 houses donetoday, they'd have people to fill
them.

(38:29):
I volunteered on a couple oftheir builds years ago.
They already have greatworking partnerships with contractors
and people that specialize inexactly what you want to do.
Absolutely.
Their specialty is rehabs,rebuilds, new construction, all of
it.
And so that's a, that's agreat partnership to have.

(38:49):
It's going to be a very strong partnership.
I'm super excited.
So when do you find out aboutthis grant?
So we're supposed to find outin like a 30 day time frame.
And so November, I think theysaid they turned it in right before
Thanksgiving.
And so, and remember, I mean,it's a federal grant, so it was like
800 pages of stuff.

(39:10):
It was a lot.
Hundreds of man hours wentinto this.
Yeah.
Eyeballs deep in paperwork.
Yeah.
And I can't, I mean, I can'tDote on the city staff enough.
I mean, there are lots of people.
Part of the reason that I gotinvolved with this was because I
was tired of being.
There's a lot of people thatcomplain about, you know, the big
bad city or the county orwhatever, but they never get involved.

(39:30):
Nope.
And so I, you know, TeddyRoosevelt was one of the ones.
He said something along thelines of, you know, complaining without
a story or without griping orcomplaining without a solution is
just griping or somethingalong those lines.
I love Teddy Roosevelt, but,you know, and so I wanted to be part
of the solution and so lovehim so much.
You could quote him exactly.
Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Verbatim.

(39:51):
Something along those lines.
But yeah, but I wanted to get involved.
Got elected as chair for this.
I've started going to citycouncil meetings.
So I try to.
I've made everyone just aboutfor the last three months, and I
just can't.
You know, even code enforcement.
Code enforcement or planningand zoning.
If you have questions orthoughts or whatever, go talk to

(40:12):
these people.
That's their job.
They are the professionalslocally and they're.
They're great people.
They're really not here toruin your life.
They want.
I mean, Fabian has beenwonderful to work with, and he's
one of those guys that, youknow, if a new business or somebody's
wanting to.
I mean, what have we all heardabout new businesses coming to town?
Oh, yeah, they complain.
The city is not.
It's not business friendly.

(40:32):
They're not business friendly.
They're so hard to work with.
Yeah, there's.
There's something I was gonna say.
Yeah.
The communication needs to.
Needs to agree.
100.
But I will tell you, Fabian isone of those, you know, part of the
issue is like, in thisparticular neighborhood, zoning is
a problem.
Yes.
Business.
It's tough for them to come inbecause of parking.

(40:53):
Zoning rules.
Well, there's no possible,like, I own a building over there
that, that I'm about to sell.
So if y'all know anybody.
But it literally only has twoparking spots.
Well, based on current zoning,it should have like nine parking
spots.
There's nowhere for me to putnine parking spots.
But there's also a variance.
That's why there's a variancetoo, that, that you work city and

(41:15):
hopefully apply and justifyvariance because.
And that's where I think acommittee like yourself, the one
you're on is that.
That you can.
If.
If you've got somecommunication going on among all
the players, then maybe therecan be a creative solution that involves
a variance.
Of certain things and thenmaybe there's another, there's other

(41:35):
things you can do.
Absolutely.
Well, what it comes down to, Ithink common sense has got to take
hold.
You've got to have some commonsense approaches and some common
sense solutions to issues like this.
And I think where WichitaFalls benefits is, I think we now
are, it's starting to congeal.
We're putting together a citycouncil and leadership in city government

(41:59):
that's truly interested inseeing things like this move forward
and seeing the city moveforward in seeing us do things that
will help us grow our population.
Because the more of thosehomes you can rehab and the more
of those homes that can befixed up and turned into livable,
financeable structures, thenyou can start to bring new people

(42:21):
into the community, hopefully.
And when you're bringing firsttime homebuyers in a lot of times
you're bringing younger peoplewho are going to take, have roots
here, have families, kids are.
Going to school, propertyvalues, which taxes go up and all
that, you know, so it just,it's a great thing.
And you're right on city council.
So I was actually highlyencouraged and I, I really explored

(42:42):
it this year.
I think I even talked to Treyabout it a little bit.
I seriously considered runningfor city council.
Place two looked into it,talked to a lot of folks about it.
Everybody really encouraged me.
Mike, you're the right guy.
I mean, you be great to be oncity council.
I, I ended up deciding not todo it just because of timing really

(43:02):
for me and my life personally.
I mean, trying to build up thebusiness with, you know, victory
home loans.
I've still got lots of things.
I'm doing the cityrevitalization committee.
I've got two daughters in highschool, a son in junior high.
And so it just, things weren'tright for me.
However, another guy was kindof recruited to run and there was
another lady that ran too.
Both of them would have been excellent.

(43:23):
But Robert Brooks ended upgetting the vote.
He is the father of Talia Brooks.
Yeah, we talked about that.
Super nice guy.
I think he's going to do great things.
But we also got Whitney Flackin who replaced Michael Smith in
District 1.
And now we have the runoffgoing between Austin Cobb and Sam
Pack, who are both.
I mean, I'm sure you, you guys all.

(43:47):
And then they did a Rock,Paper, Scissors and.
Oh, did they.
Check it out.
Check it out on our YouTube page.
I'll do that.
Yeah, they sit here.
Right here.
Harry officiated Rock, Paper,Scissors and I thought.
And I'VE told those guys those.
Either one of those guys willbe great city council.
And I've made a prediction.
My prediction is both of thosemen will serve on city council at
some point.

(44:07):
Oh, eventually, yeah.
Whether.
Whether one of them is goingto be on now.
One of them may be on the next cycle.
It may be five years from nowor 10 years from whatever it is.
I predict that.
That Austin Cobb and sampacwill both be city councilors in Wichita
Falls.
Yeah.
And it's crazy, too.
The.
The rumors and stuff that flyaround the.
You know, Austin's not fromhere and all that.
That's not true.
He grew up here.

(44:27):
I mean, you talk to the guy.
He's an amazing guy.
And then there's.
I've actually had people tellme, you know, well, Sam Pack, like,
he's not really involved inthe community.
Oh, my God.
Have you followed Facebook?
Show up at anything?
Yeah.
Show up at any sort offundraising, any nonprofit, anything.
Sam and his wife Pam are there.
Like, I don't know how they do it.
I guess they must sleep forabout 30 minutes during the day and

(44:49):
the rest time there.
But you don't have kids at home.
It does.
That's true.
But really, I mean, and you're right.
Austin and Sam, I mean, nomatter who wins, are going to be
absolutely amazing.
They're gonna be good.
And then Michael Battle, youknow, on the council, like, I just,
you know, we have good people.
I think the formula is comingtogether to have to have working

(45:09):
relationships within citygovernment that can work with people
outside of city governmentlike yourself, serving on a committee
here to get these things done.
That's the best communication.
The communication.
I just recruited some friends to.
There's an aviation.
Gosh, I forget the name of theboard, but it's aviation something
something board.
This board hasn't met.
And don't quote me on the numbers.

(45:31):
It was either, like, 2012 or 2016.
They haven't met.
Yeah, write this down.
They haven't.
But anyway, regardless, theyhaven't met in a long time.
And so I was talking to one ofmy buddies about it, and he was like,
we really need to protectKickapoo a little more.
And.
And of course, city revitalization.
I'm not over Kickapoo.
That's.
Nothing has to do with whatI'm doing, but obviously it's a vital
part of the community.

(45:51):
Well, this board has met anddone a lot of stuff for Shepherd
Municipal, which we all agree.
I mean, if shepherd leaveswere, you know, is Wichita Falls
sunk?
You know, it's debatable, butit'll still exist.
We love Shepherd.
We need, you know, but, but itwould be really bad.
Yeah, it bad.
Yeah, it's.
We want to do everything wecan do to protect it.

(46:12):
And what they've done is theydid a lot of zoning and code and
everything else aroundShepherd Municipal.
And then they kind of said,well, and we're going to add this
height restriction on Kickapooand that.
That's about it.
And so I guess, you know,there's just, there's been some developments
and stuff around Kickapoothat, you know, could.
The federal grants and stuffthat we get, could get kicked out.

(46:33):
And so it appeared, I don'twant to say there was nobody watching
that, but it appeared thatnobody was kind of keeping a pulse
on that.
And another friend of mine sawthat and said, hey, we need to be
watching this.
And so then they said, well,we don't even know who's on the board.
Oh, we can look that up.
We don't know when they roll off.
We can look that up.
And it turned out like that day.

(46:53):
I was like, well, if you'reinterested, you need to put your
application in today.
And so, you know, there's just.
You're right.
There's some forward thinking people.
It's not just the old guard.
There's nothing bad with theold guard.
But if we want to see WichitaFalls grow, I mean, we are one of
the cities in Texas as a wholethat really didn't grow in the last
census.
Yeah, exactly.

(47:14):
Well, one of the.
And compared to abilene sincethe 90s, they have grown a significant
amount.
We have been flat.
Yeah.
And why flat since 1960?
Well, and again, we've talkedabout this with some other on the
show.
Is that problem.
And part of that problem comesdown to also a marketing issue.

(47:35):
Absolutely.
We've done a horrible job as acommunity marketing ourselves, our
city.
When you're in citygovernment, salesmanship sometimes
is not in your wheelhouse.
So you need to couple yourselfwith people who it is in their wheelhouse
who do know how to market, whodo know how to sell, who do know

(47:55):
how to promote.
And I think that they've gotto do that.
But we've done a lousy job ofpromoting our community.
We've done a lousy job ofpromoting the relationship between
the city and for example,Midwestern State University.
Oh yeah.
It drives me nuts that someonecan drive through this city, go from
north to south or south tonorth and not one time ever know
that there's a 646500 studentbody university in this city.

(48:20):
And an amazing university too.
Part of the Texas Tech system now.
Yes.
I mean what an amazing place.
And you can drive completelythrough this town and never realize
it's there.
We could also not know thatShepherd Air Force is based here.
Exactly.
So.
So we don't.
We don't do.
We don't do a good job ofpromoting ourselves.
And we've got to do a betterjob of doing that.
And I say we.
No, I don't live here anymore.

(48:40):
I don't.
I don't pay taxes in the cityof Wichita Falls anymore.
I do work here.
Wichita Falls adjacent.
Yeah, well, I'm from here.
Well, but.
But this brings me to Burke.
I mean Burke.
I mean it's in the WichitaFalls metro.
Yes.
And it.
But it brings me to this point.
All of us.
Burke, Burnett, Iowa Park,Electra Holiday, Archer City, Henrietta.

(49:01):
Every.
All the surrounding, somepeople might call bedroom communities.
Gody boat.
Yeah, don't forget about thatdamn gody boat, man.
Go, go.
Debauch pumpkin center.
You know, like nine people.
But it's to the benefit of allof those bedroom communities for
Wichita Falls to do.
Well, we all should want tosee Wichita fall because if Wichita
Falls is succeeding everyone else.

(49:24):
There's a reason.
There's a reason.
And you're so right.
I mean people that live here,the majority of people, not everybody,
but the majority of peoplethat live here love it here.
And they are so proud of our town.
They really come back.
There's a lot of people whogrow up here.
You are absolutely correct.
Yeah.
We love it and we tell each.
Other all the time who's notfrom here but came here because the

(49:47):
air.
Force has stayed and stayed.
Yeah.
So.
So real quickly as we kind ofneed to wrap up a little bit.
So let everybody know.
How do they get a hold of youor if they want to be involved in
this committee or have ideasor thoughts or any.
That sort of thing.
So that's great.
Look up Wichita Falls city revitalization.
We do have a Facebook group page.
We do post on there.
We do have official meetings,you know, minutes, the whole shooting

(50:08):
match.
I mean just like city council does.
We are an official board orcommittee under the city council.
Yeah.
Father Goddling.
You probably have to have topost the agenda.
It has to be on the agenda tobe spoken.
We do.
And I have to sign minutes andI had to swear in the whole bit.
And so we meet every other Tuesday.
So we actually just met this Tuesday.

(50:29):
We're gonna meet again on the 17th.
We're meeting right now.
We're meeting at 4:00 onTuesday down at the Wichita Falls
Travel center, which I knowyou've seen it.
If y'all haven't been by thereagain, that's another great facility.
Hardly anybody knows about thebus station.
The bus station, yeah.
Downtown.
Yeah, it's beautiful.
And there's a huge, nicemeeting conference room in there
and all kinds of stuff.

(50:50):
And the public.
And I'll kind of end.
I'll wrap up my part with this.
You know, the public.
We want the public to beinvolved, especially the folks that
live in the heart of the Falls area.
However, all the groundworkand the foundation that we're laying,
I think they've got.
It's either seven or nineareas of town that they intend to
take this to over the next,you know, whatever decade or so.

(51:12):
So we're laying all thegroundwork on how to create this.
I mean, neighborhoodempowerment zone.
We haven't done that here ever.
But Fort Worth and Abilene andother towns have.
And so we're creating that structure.
The next neighborhood that's,you know, in the pike is Eastside.
And they have some.
Some unique, obviouslyflooding issues and things like that.

(51:32):
They've got some very uniqueissues of their own.
There's a street called Flood.
So.
Yeah, yeah.
So that's the next area thatwe're going to go.
And our whole committee isn'tgoing to go.
It's probably going to be meor whoever the chair is at the time,
along with planning and zoning.
Go help them form a communityor a committee of their community,
folks that live there and say,here's our blueprint.

(51:56):
This is what we did.
This has already been implemented.
That's already been passed bycity council.
You guys can do the same thing here.
And so we're doing a lot ofthe hard work.
So, you know, 70% of the workwill be done for the next committee.
All right, just to be clear,on the Facebook, is it a group or
is it a page, or is it both in it?
What is it?
Because I found.
I googled just Wichita Falls.

(52:17):
Is it neighborhoodrevitalization or is that different
now?
Neighborhood revitalization is.
Let me see.
What is it?
Yeah, well.
Well, here.
Here's.
I just.
I did revitalization.
Pull that thing up so you can look.
Yeah, but I'll.
Yeah, but this page.
Just want to.
There.
Yeah, yeah, that's a group.
That's it.
Yeah.
Because, like, if you scrolldown a little bit, that's Right,

(52:38):
That's.
Yeah.
I thought that was Tim Shortand Michael Battolino, but that's
Michael Battolino and his son.
It's one of my favorite pictures.
His son's crying and this is actually.
Oh, my gosh.
James.
Shoot.
I forget James's last name,but he's the interim city manager
right now.
McKickney.
Super.
Yes.
J A McKechnie.
Yeah.
Super.
Nice guy.
Okay.
Bottom line is thatneighborhood revitalization, look

(52:59):
it up.
Great group.
Okay.
Lots of information goes out there.
But then also, I mean, justlike any other city committee meeting,
they're posted on the city website.
Okay.
You got to dig around and find it.
But yeah, please come.
We want people to know whatwe're doing.
We're putting a lot of timeand effort into this.
And not that I need pats onthe backs or thank you.
I don't need that.
I just want to make WichitaFalls continue to be a great place

(53:22):
to live.
Right.
And one of the things is justkind of back on what we first talked
about.
Money, you know.
Well, not everything needs tohave money thrown at needs.
It just needs somebody to pay attention.
To it and also plan the wayyou do.
Throw the money if you have money.
Yeah.
Get to that point.
Have a plan for it to be as efficient.

(53:43):
Well, it is Stu stuff.
Like a prime example, like,because we're going to continue going
once it's been handed over tous by the city, but like code enforcement,
we want, if.
If there's some sort ofviolation, whatever that may be,
and there's.
There's tons of them available.
These guys are just doingtheir job.
Right.
They're.
They're trying to do good things.
But I've asked, I said, well,hey, we as a committee, is there
any way that we could getcopies of those violations to go

(54:05):
out and talk somebody?
Maybe it's that 85 year oldlady who can't trim her trees or.
And doesn't have the money.
So neighbors helping neighbors.
We can go out and trim trees.
I mean, it doesn't take long.
Go get it done.
It's the same principle with me.
When I sell someone a house,you know, when I've got.
I'm working with a buyer, oneof the first things we do is we have
a professional inspection ofthe property done.

(54:27):
Absolutely.
And that report that comesback to us helps us create a punch
list of items that need to beaddressed either by the seller or
by the buyers when they takeover the property.
Absolutely.
But that's how you.
That's how you formulate thatplan is you get that inspection done.
That's how you come up.
And that's why you want a professional.
If you get the nonprofessional one, they go, then,
dude, this is a dump.
Yeah.
Yeah, exactly.

(54:50):
I'm sure I've known you long enough.
I'm sure you're the kind ofguy that, you know, as soon as you
sell somebody a house, youjust don't say, hey, thanks for the
commission, and walk awaylike, no, I'm the same way.
When I do a loan for somebody,I'm like, hey, just because we closed
on the house and we're donewith the loan, you know, and like.
And I'm ready yet, right?
Yeah, Like, I'm still your guy.
I've lived here a long time.
I'm the guy that knows people,you know, if you need anything on

(55:11):
your house or what, if youhave questions, holler at me.
And so I still have a verygood relationship with, you know,
all of my clients.
Yeah.
And, you know, it's important.
And so it's the same thingthrough city revitalization.
It's not, hey, we're justgoing to come, you know, trim your
trees, you know, nice little lady.
And then we just go away.
You know, she'll go on a listand we'll go buy and check and honor
and stuff like that again,neighbors helping neighbors and doing

(55:32):
what we're supposed to do.
All right, real quick onebefore you leave.
Now, you already talked aboutyour professional victory homeowners.
But then also there's anothergroup that you're involved in.
Improv.
Improv.
Well, I was wondering which one.
Improv Boy Scouts.

(55:52):
Congratulations on that.
Moved her project out to Fieldand Stream, so.
But we've been keeping up with.
We've been keeping up with andpromoting the.
The shows as they come up.
Oh, thank you.
That's great.
So this.
This season's over?
It is.
When will the calendar comeout for next season, Dina?
It's already out.
You can buy season tickets for it.
It's most fun you can have for12 bucks on a Friday or Saturday
night.

(56:13):
Trey may not seem veryentertaining, but when he's up on
stage, he's hilarious.
You know, it's.
It's a lot of fun.
I will say it's.
It's adult ish.
It's not adult ish.
It is adult.
Yeah, yeah.
You're gonna hear some words around.
Yeah, yeah.
It can get raunchy, andthere's a lot of folks that say,
you know, geez, Mike, youknow, that just came out of your

(56:34):
mouth.
Hey, I like to be just assurprised as everybody else.
It's this.
It's.
It's.
Yeah, it.
It is what it is.
You put everything in the context.
Yeah.
You're not at church doing this.
I mean, this is.
This is a nighttime event withadults, and it's an adult only event.
Yep.
So put it in context.
So, yeah, check it out.
Realistically.
That's great.
Backdoor theater.
Check it out.

(56:55):
And his podcast.
Real quick.
Mention your podcast.
Oh, yeah, my podcast.
Once upon a time in Texas, Iwanted to do a podcast years ago.
Didn't know what I was goingto do it on.
And I thought, well, by God,I'll do it on mortgages.
I'm getting into the business.
Listen to four or five otherpodcasts about mortgages.
And it was terrible.
Like, who wants to listen to that.
Crap you were talking about?
You wonder how Sam and Pamelapack, how they get any sleep.

(57:15):
What about you, man?
You got all this stuff goingon, and you've got kids in school
and high schoolers at that,which, you know, that's a full time
and a half job in itself.
Just one, let alone two.
Well, you know, it just, it's a.
It's prioritizing your time,having a good calendar.
I mean, you prioritize timefor things that are important to
me, too.
Sure.
You know, I will say one thingrecently that was a little bit of

(57:39):
a downer, but it's turned intoa good thing.
My oldest daughter backed intoa guy's truck the other day at the
library.
And I said, see, that's whatbooks get you.
I always call her a nerdbecause she's like, I'm going to
the library.
I'm like, nerd.
But I said, see, if you hadn'tbeen at the library nerding out that
day, you would have neverbacked into this guy's truck.
And it turns out he's theowner of GNS Suzuki.
Toby Grace.

(58:01):
Super nice guy.
Like, I mean, we spent 30minutes in the library and, you know,
the 50 plus zone, trying tofind who it was because I was going
to make my daughter, you know,talk to the guy.
She backed in and it didn't doa lot of damage.
You know, it dented his bumperand kind of a tough deal.
But, you know, I told her oneof her friends had said, you know,
a couple of days later, wecould have just driven off.

(58:22):
And it's so true.
She could have just driven off.
Nobody would have ever knownbut her.
Yeah.
And, you know, but she wouldhave Known.
Yeah.
And she would have known.
And, you know, she's about tobe an Eagle Scout, and she's, you
know.
But, Dad, I felt like thatwasn't integrity.
Anyway, we did the right thing.
We left a note on his window.
We couldn't find him.
And he called about an hour later.
And, you know, he's been supercool to work with.

(58:44):
You know, we're just going totry to handle it between ourselves.
And, you know, but I'm alsokind of greasing the skids.
Like, hey, once we get allthis worked out, I'm going to have
my daughter call you, and youguys are going to have the conversation
because she doesn't know we'vegot this worked out yet.
I want her to handle it, andso she does.
You know, Daddy's greasing the skids.
Daddy's taking care of business.
But I want her to make, you know.
Well, don't.
Don't let her watch this.

(59:05):
Yeah.
Exactly.
But, you know, you're wrong.
You make priorities for, youknow, you make time for the priorities
you have in your life.
And, you know, one of thesedays, I may slow down, but I do love
Wichita Falls.
I love Boy Scouts, cityrevitalization, backdoor theater.
Everything we're doing, youguys, it's amazing.
Love the podcast.
Thank you.

(59:26):
Yeah.
And thank you for promoting mine.
The Once Upon a Time in Texas.
It's just random Texas history.
Just, you know, and it justcomes to me.
My grandfather was a preacher,and I'd say, man, how far out do
you plan your sermons and stuff?
He goes, I know.
I just let God inspire methroughout the week.
And that's kind of how most ofthe time, I don't know what I'm doing
until I sit down to do it.
Yeah.
And that's kind of how we'vedone this one.

(59:47):
You know, that's how it goes.
Real quickly.
The one thing.
And I've told all my kidsthis, and I try to give this advice
to any, especially younger people.
The only thing you can controlin this world is your integrity.
Yeah, absolutely.
You have 100 control over your integrity.
You don't have 100 controlover your body.
Your.
What happens around you.
Other people, those.

(01:00:08):
Those are so many things thatyou have no control over, but you
have 100% control over your integrity.
Yeah.
So always protect it.
Mike Mitchell, thank you verymuch for being with us to talk about
neighborhood revitalization.
Revitalization.
I'll get that out in the.
Yes, very much in the Hardwichstall falls.
And we look forward to havingyou back.
We'd like to get an updatefrom you somewhere here in the near

(01:00:30):
future.
Absolutely.
Yeah, I'd love to do that.
Thank you all for having me, guys.
Thank you enough for doingwhat you do.
Thank you.
Stay tuned.
We're going to take a quick break.
We'll come back.
Wrap it up.
It's Get It Right Texoma.
Back in a moment.

(01:00:51):
All right, guys, welcome backto Get It Right Tech Soma.
I want to thank Mike Mitchellfor joining us.
Great interview, great information.
Looking forward to having him back.
I really enjoyed doing.
I did improv with Mike for acouple years and he's, he's a lot
of fun.
And yeah, improv is one ofthose things I miss.
I got to get back into it.
It's just I'm stretched withmy time.
I had to let something go andunfortunately I had to.
But Mike's.
He's really smart.

(01:01:11):
He's a good person.
He's good to be around andgood people.
So I hope more people will getinvolved with their group and get
involved.
Absolutely.
Revitalization.
I think it's like I said inour interview, Wichita Falls is successful.
Everybody around us is successful.
Absolutely.
It all.

(01:01:32):
It all.
It helps everybody if WichitaFalls is successful.
So anything we can do toimprove the city, it's great for
all of us, I think.
Anyway, guys, we're going towrap it up here.
We're running way long today.
Well, thank you for joining us again.
Be sure to.
Be sure to subscribe.
Hit the subscribe button onour YouTube channel and be sure to

(01:01:52):
click the little bell so thatyou get the notifications.
Not only do we have the shows,we have shorts and stuff like that.
So you have some little oneminute clips or less than one minute
clips of kind of thehighlights of a lot of stuff.
So yeah, maybe we could sellour shorts.
No.
Yeah.
Okay.
Anyway, that was all that wasimprov ish there, right there.

(01:02:14):
Anyway, again, thank you forbeing with us.
Be sure to again go to our website.
Get it right techsomer.comfollow us on Facebook.
Be sure to share and like ourFacebook page as well.
Share over share.
Yes.
Everybody on the face demand, people.
Exactly.
You will respect our authority.
You will.
Anyway, be heavy.

(01:02:35):
That's right.
Anyway, thank you very muchfor being with us.
We appreciate it.
It's brought.
The show is sponsored in partby Eddie Hills Fun Cycles at 401
North Scott in downtownWichita Falls since 1966.
Eddie Hillsfund cycles.comMacTech Solutions 4020 Ray Road,
Suite 3B Finishing Touch Plazahere in Wichita Falls.

(01:02:56):
MacTech-solutions.comChristmas is just.
We're now down to days until Christmas.
And if you're looking for somegreat gift ideas, you want something
really unique, somethingreally special, something really
cool.
Either one of these guys, ifit's motorsports related, it's Eddie
Hill's Fun Cycles.
If it's tech related, MacTech solutions.

(01:03:18):
That's it.
I can't make it any simplerthan that.
There you go.
That's where you need to shop.
Really cool.
And also brought to you byLollipop Sweet Shop.
If you're looking fordesserts, we specialize in pecan
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(01:03:38):
I'm sure we're.
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Yeah.
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through the website or onFacebook and get your orders in.
Guys, thank you for being with us.
We appreciate it.
Have a great rest of your day,week, whatever.
And we hope you'll join us forthe next episode of Get It Right
Texoma.
Until then, y'all take takecare and we shall see you now.
And keep your shorts on, please.

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