Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, Joel Malcolm Ford WJNO dot com. My election spotlight
(00:03):
on the village of Royal Palm Beach and there are
two elections there, Village Council Group three, which is an
open seat, and the mayoral election, sadly brought on by
the untimely death of longtime Mayor Fred Pinto. Three candidates
running for this seat, Selina Samuos being one of those.
(00:23):
Thank you for joining me, Thank you, Joel.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
For having me. I appreciate the opportunity.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
Let's get some background on you. First of all, I
know you and I have spoken before. I want to
say when you were first running for Royal Palm Beach,
but I don't remember exactly when that was. So how
long have you been on the village council.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
I've been on the council for eight years, as I
was running for reelection at the time when we spoke.
We have two year terms, but we're not term limited.
Speaker 1 (00:51):
Okay, all right, all right, So let's get some background,
don you for folks. You know, we always have we
always have folks moving to South Florida, to Florida and
General Palm Beach County, Royal Palm Beach specifically, so folks
who aren't aware, let us know some background on you.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
Absolutely. I'm Selena Samuels. I spent fifteen years in the
sports and entertainment field. So I had the opportunity to
work with mister Heisinger when he owned the three teams
in Miami, so I was with the Marlins and the
Panthers when they went to their first playoffs. I spent
eight years in Milwaukee working up for the teams up
there and in a little bit in radio, and then
(01:30):
came back down to South Florida to help my family
open up a family business and then from there ended
up becoming the through Change Events. I am currently now
the executive director of the Women's Chamber of Commerce. So
I've always stayed in the business field and helping others.
And I'm currently the vice mayor of Royal Palm Beach.
Speaker 1 (01:53):
Yes, I meant to mention that vice mayor currently and
running for the seat of mayor. So let's talk about
you know what I've been asking, and I don't do
this with every municipality, but I've been asking the candidates
in Royal Palm Beach to answer this question, what is
the thing you love most about Royal Palm Beach.
Speaker 2 (02:18):
I'll tell you. When we decided to start a family
and buy our first home, we looked at several areas,
and Palmage County is absolutely beautifully. It is very different
from the east part of it to the west part
of it. But we drove through the area. I was
involved in the Chamber of Commerce locally here at the
time and just fell in love with the area. The
homes are beautiful. It's an A rated school district. We're
(02:40):
twelve square miles with twenty three parks that have every
type of amenity you can think of in them. We
do multiple events. We have the Commons Park with we
do four major events a year there that are free
to the public, so you can come out and hear
music we do. We just did Shakespeare by the Palms.
(03:01):
There's just so many activities and cultural events, the different
things out here in the village. It's very family oriented.
We live in a beautiful community and there's just a
lot to offer. It gives you that sense of security
and safety, so I just love that feeling you get
when you come through. You can know your local pharmacist.
(03:21):
When you go to the grocery store, it's the same
checkout person that helps you. When you go into the restaurants,
the owner's children or grandchildren are in the restaurant as well,
So it just gives you that sense of security, and
we say we have a hometown feel. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (03:38):
Somebody one of the candidates, either in this race or
the Group three council race, mentioned this and I couldn't
believe it. There are, first of all, forty about forty
thousand or so residents of Royal Palm Beach. Obviously some
people considered this area Royal Palm, but specifically the village
(03:58):
limits for thousand or so. You could correct me if
I'm wrong there, but twenty something parks within the village limits.
Is that correct?
Speaker 2 (04:08):
Yep, So we are just shy of forty thousand residents,
we're about thirty nine and change. We are twelve square miles,
we have twenty three parks. And what I love is
that whenever a area is being developed in the village,
for every thousand residents that it's going to create, they
have to donate a portion of land back to the
(04:28):
village for public use. So, for instance, we just had
Bellisara a couple of years ago being built in what
was a treatment area, so they came developed the land
and then gave back five acres that we could then
develop into whatever we wanted. So we did a research
with our residents. We have them to come out to
(04:49):
a forum to find out what amenities that they liked
or wanted to see in the park, and then we
created the park to fit their needs. So there's basketball,
pick a ball, we have a fishing dot that was
something somebody wanted. There's open space so you can play soccer,
tag football over there. So yes, we do have that.
We have an amazing park and w rec department. And
(05:10):
there are even some little sub visions that we have
throughout the village that have their own walkable park so
you can go from your house, walk to the park
planner and come back home anytime you want.
Speaker 1 (05:24):
What is one issue that if elected to mayor? And
I know it's more of a soft I don't like
the term weak mayor, but I know it's more of
a stuff. It's not like a West Palm Beach, you know,
where it's or Boca Ratone where that's a quote unquote
strong mayor. So you're, you know, kind of on par
(05:47):
You guys are peers and you could correct me if
I'm wrong on that with you and the other council members.
That being said, is there one issue that you really
want to tackle as mayor?
Speaker 2 (06:01):
You are correct, Joel, that we do all work together.
You know, it takes three of us to move the needle,
so all five of us don't have to agree, but
we do work together. Each of us have our own
priorities or things that we want to work on and
go from. There've been a strong advocate of home ownership
and single family homes being built in the village. So
(06:22):
we always talk about overcrowding, which causes traffic issues and
things like that. So I have fought not to have
so many multifamily home units, but single family homes. I've
also fought for our green spaces to make sure that
when developers come in that they just can't buy out
of the portion where they want to mediate either wetlands
(06:47):
or environmental areas throughout the village. So those are things
that we work on. With affordable housing, we have the
lowest military in the county for any municipality of more
than two thousand people, so we're doing our part to
make sure that we do have affordable housing. I was
able to go up to Tallahassee last year and I
(07:08):
spoke with Tasha Campbell, who works with the consumer advocacy
for Insurance homeowners insurance, so to let her know homeowner's
insurance is a huge expense that has to go with
home ownership. That's something that we can do is fight
with legislation to make sure that we have options for
our residents giving them the opportunities that they have. The
(07:29):
other thing is traffic, and that's everywhere and with the
growth around us, I say, we can't control what happens
around us, but we can control what happens with us.
So just making sure there's smart traffic solutions in place
that we're not creating more traffic. That when one municipality
wants to advocate for cutting through the village, that we
(07:49):
fight that and say no, we don't want you. You know,
the traffic coming through the village like that. There's spaces,
for instance, to the south, we're lucky we have Southern
and on the north we have North Lake, So if
you want to go east and west, you can hit
one of those and go and go through the county
that way. You don't need to cut through and use
it like that. So there's some things that we're tackling
(08:09):
between home ownership and affordability and traffic concerns.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
Yeah, Royal Palm Beach Boulevard is the one that commons
park is the entrance is located off of AM I correct.
Speaker 2 (08:21):
Correct, yes, And that one goes north and south.
Speaker 1 (08:23):
And there's still just two lanes there, right, the one
in each direction?
Speaker 2 (08:27):
There are there are no it's one lane, and I get.
Speaker 1 (08:30):
Really backed up. I used to drive.
Speaker 2 (08:35):
I'm sorry, yeah, So what happened was at the I'm sorry,
go ahead, No, I.
Speaker 1 (08:39):
Was I didn't know if you said something, Yeah, I was.
That was something I used to you know, and and
certain times a day you could be forever. I mean,
but but I don't see where they could ever where
they could ever expand it to more lanes based on
where the houses are. Is that even a possibility?
Speaker 2 (08:57):
Correct? No? And because the owners at the home ownership
at the time and the council at the time said
we want to make this one lane in either direction
and that's it, and then they developed the area around
it based on that. Unfortunately it was short sighted. They
didn't even add a turning lane in the middle. So
if you live in any of those developments, which happened
to be our fifty five plus community areas on Royal
(09:20):
Palm Beach Boulevard. It's very difficult to navigate either in
or out of them because of the traffic. I was
actually able to work with our village engineer, so we
changed the timing of the light on Okachobee and Royal
Palm Beach Boulevard just to give a little bit more
of a delay for the traffic heading southbound, so that
if you do live in those communities, you are able
(09:41):
to exit without having to worry about being blocked or
traffic coming through. So there's some great options that are
out there. We just need to explore them to make
sure that we're finding out the best opportunity for our residents.
Speaker 1 (09:56):
Selena eight years as a council member. Be REMISSI if
I didn't ask you if you'd like to talk about
you just mentioned one of the things, but any other
what you want to toeut as accomplishments you know during
that time, all.
Speaker 2 (10:13):
Thanks I love. So I made a promise to our
residence when I ran in the first time that I
was working on our senior residence. So I was able
to create a senior citizen ad hoc where we had
our sixty five plus residents come out, spent a year
working with them, taking input from the other residents of
what they wanted to see, as well as transportation issues
(10:37):
because at certain times whether they stopped driving on their
own or for other reasons, making sure that they're still
able to remain involved. I do work on government transparency,
so ever since I was elected, I always push out
through various mediums the agenda how to participate in a
council meeting, whether in person or virtual, and then aloways
(10:57):
send a wrap up. Here's the wrap up of the meeting.
Is the link to watch the video in case you
missed it. And then we also hired a public information
specialist with the village to make sure that we're sending
out a unified, concise message with everything on in the village.
The other thing was our local businesses, so I was
able with staff. We have a new business guide link
(11:21):
up on our website and if you go on there,
it's Royal PALMBEACHFL dot gov. It is a step by
step process on how to open up a business in
the village, so it really expedites the process, takes away
the nervousness of trying to do it. It's scary when
you go out on your own and do that. Our
staff is amazing to help out with anybody who wants
(11:42):
to open a business in the village how to do
that and expedite the process. So I look forward to
continuing to help all different aspects of residents as well
as our business owners.
Speaker 1 (11:53):
There is a candidate running in this race for mayor
who essentially says that he would like to make it
easier for residents to have a say when it comes
to things topics that are bandied about issues by the
village council as a whole voting system that he would
(12:14):
implement for residents on what to should be brought to
the dais. Do you feel that there's not enough input
taken or maybe that it's not easy enough right now
for residents to be involved.
Speaker 2 (12:32):
I think it's I think it's easy for residents to
be involved. It's easy for them to have their voices heard.
We accept information all the time. You don't have to
come to a meeting. You can actually send our village
clerk any questions or concerns you have and they're read
into the record, or we address them there, whether you
were there or not. I love the opportunity of getting
(12:54):
more people involved. I think the main concern is that
people come out when there's something specific to them. So,
for instance, we had a neighborhood that wanted speed humps
put up in their neighborhood on one of the roads. Well,
they all came out to fight for that. That really
didn't concern anybody else. Then we've had people who've come
(13:16):
in regarding development issues. If it's developed around you, you'll
come out and have your voices heard. Otherwise, most people
are happy with that. But anytime there's an opportunity for
others to be involved, that's why I always have the
open platform. Here's the information, here's how you participate, whether
you're in person or virtual. Even during the meeting, we
(13:38):
allow everyone to watch virtually if they can't be there,
and they can always click on, have their hand raise,
and ask their question in the forum. So anyone is
always open to participate in meetings or to contact contact
all of us individually.
Speaker 1 (13:57):
So would you say that the what I'm describing wouldn't
be necessary?
Speaker 2 (14:04):
Not saying wouldn't be necessary. I think it's just another platform.
Maybe some people feel more comfortable with that platform than
ones that we have as options available. Just like when
you get your news, it's either from the radio, the
TV or print.
Speaker 1 (14:17):
It's only it's only from the radio.
Speaker 2 (14:19):
We'll like to use that, right, But even you know,
or social media. I know some people that don't listen
to the news and get all their information off of
social media. So it's you know, it's reaching the individual.
From a marketing perspective, I always say, is where do
you get your information from? And that's how I know
where to put it out.
Speaker 1 (14:38):
Well that that last option is a bad idea if
you're only getting your news from the social media, But
I digress. Okay, Well, final question. Three candidates in this
race right now it is an open seat. Why ultimately
should folks choose you.
Speaker 2 (14:56):
I'm Selena Samuels. I am running from mayor of Royal
palmb Each. I'm asking for residents to vote for me
on March eleven so I can continue to keep our
hometown feel and values while continuing to work on traffic
and housing concerns.
Speaker 1 (15:12):
All right, well, I appreciate you taking the time to
speak with the voters, the residents who are registered voters
of course living in Royal Palm Beach Selina Samuos, Vice
Mayor and candidate for Mayor in Royal Palm Beach.
Speaker 2 (15:26):
Thanks again, thank you very much joll for the opportunity