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January 23, 2025 36 mins

The Breakfast Club Sits Down With Newark Mayor Ras Baraka To Discuss Gov. Race, NJ Housing & Homelessness, Drones, Congestion Pricing. Listen For More!

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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Wake that ass up in the morning.

Speaker 2 (00:02):
Breakfast Club Morning, Everybody's DJ Envy, Jess hilarious, Charlamagne the guy.
We are the Breakfast Club long the roster filling in
for Jess. We got a special guest in the building,
Governor Baraka Hey is running for governor. Ladies and gentlemen,
Ross Baraka, welcome.

Speaker 1 (00:19):
Brother, thank you, thank you, glad to be here. How
you feeling good? Man? Good cold? But I'm good cold.

Speaker 2 (00:25):
So you're gonna put your hat in this race? And
what makes you want to run for governor?

Speaker 1 (00:29):
I already did. I think it's time, man, I mean,
we have a very short window. I don't think we
get an opportunity to do this anymore. There's a crowded feel.
It's an opportunity for African American kid from the city
of Nework to make New Jersey live up to its
democratic values, to build a broad based coalition to really
respond to the issues we deal with in the city
every day that I think are state wide issues. This

(00:50):
was a housing, unemployment, safety, uh, the affordability of the
state being too expensive for most folks in New Jersey.
We deal with those things every problem. New Jersey. We
got it twice in Newark. But whatever we grappling with
the state is doing it. And if we're mitigating those
problems in Newark, we can certainly do it in the state.
And if the state is better, Newark is better.

Speaker 3 (01:09):
So what are some things you'll be able to do,
is governor that you aren't right now capable of doing?

Speaker 1 (01:14):
A myth help build more affordable housing across the state
of New Jersey, which makes it easier for folks like
folks in Newark who are trying to get in housing.
So we started twenty percent affordability and all development in
the city. The state followed suit and did the same thing.
So now there's not one hundred people on the waiting list,
it's five thousand people on the waiting list because New
Jersey is in it. And now we can't discriminate against

(01:36):
where you come from across the state, which means we
need more affordable housing in a state we need workforce housing.
We can do that right. We can help reduce the violence,
not just in Newark, but also Camden and Trenton, right
in Jersey City and places like that. To begin to
create an environment in the city or in the state
that is conducive to business, conducive to growth, helping families
grow and be safe. We can do that, we can

(01:58):
bring more business to the state of New Jersey. We've
brought them to Newark, so we could bring them to
the state. You know, I think we uniquely qualified. Most
of these other folks that are running have never done,
have no receipts of doing anything except for being in
the Democratic Party. To them, I mean that gives them
the privilege. The party picks them and puts them in
front of people and say this is who you're supposed
to vote for. I'm tired of that. You know, we

(02:19):
got to mix it up.

Speaker 3 (02:21):
Yeah, I love Newark, Man, and you know you've done
some amazing things in Newark, Man, Baraka.

Speaker 4 (02:25):
One thing I want to talk about is Newark.

Speaker 3 (02:28):
They experienced a sixty percent decrease in violent crime, right
and a lot of times, you know they say that
in cities, but you don't see it in Newark compared
to where Newark was, you know, a decade ago. You
can see that Newark is. You know, it's a lot
safer than it was. Not saying it's perfect, but it's
a lot safer than it was. How did you do that?

Speaker 1 (02:49):
Well? We created an ecosystem Officer Violence Prevention, trum Recovery,
Brick City Peace Collective, and that's as we brought in
community based organizations to partner with the police. We the
police started doing really intelligence based policing, but we bought
ruckers on to kind of identify with crime, what's happening that,
with violence was happening that. For example, they told us

(03:09):
all the bodega's in the city where violence happened in
one hundred feet of and gave us some data point
that said if we turned the lights on this area,
it will reduced violent crime about thirty four percent if
we put lights on in this area. So we did
those things right. We put community people in those communities
to deal with high risk interventions, deal with folks that
were trying to retaliate kids that are getting out of jail,

(03:31):
meeting them immediately like yo, this, we need you to
get involved in this and do this, give them opportunity,
and we have a I want to thank like New Direction,
you know one hood organizations like that that work with
us in the city that do very very dangerous work
in these communities, trying to reduce the temperature, like they say,
reduce the temperature.

Speaker 2 (03:49):
I wanted to ask, you know, when it came to Newark,
how did you get your out? I want to say,
governing style? And the reason I ask is, We've met
a lot of Mays, We've seen a lot of Mays
and a lot of different cities, but I've never seen
a mayor do with some of the things that you do,
Like you go out there and touch to people, right,
you use everything that you have to bring people in.

Speaker 4 (04:08):
Why do you do that so much?

Speaker 2 (04:09):
I mean, Charlemagne has been part of the stuff that
you've done in Newark. I've been down there a million
and one times. I've seen you bring celebrities to come
down there and not just speak, but to actually help.
Why have you done it that way? And why don't
you think other mayors follow your way of doing it
because obviously it's successful.

Speaker 1 (04:24):
Well, I think I do it this way because it's
how I was raised. I'm from Newark for real, Like,
this is my community, and you know, I know these people.
I know these neighborhoods, these streets, the people on them,
good and bad, and I know we need them to
help solve these problems. And people that are closer to
the problem are closer to the solutions in my mind.
And you know, I don't feel like I'm special because

(04:47):
I'm the mayor of the City of Newark. I feel
like this God gave me opportunity to do more with
the resources that I have, and and I owe it
to a whole lot of people. When I was a kid,
at fifteen, sixteen years old, I could easily been in trouble.
I had good friends who make sure I wasn't trouble
when beef came. They walked me home, you know what
I mean. Kids that made sure I was in the
house when things went on, and they talked about it
the next morning. So I feel obligated to take care

(05:09):
of them now that they took care of me. When
I was a kid, you know, I was on my
way to college. My best friend was on his way
to Anadelle or the youth correctional facility. So I feel
like it's my job and duty to take care of
folks in my neighborhood. And that's just basically how we
govern and how I operate in the city.

Speaker 5 (05:24):
Yep, there's a lot of gentrification happening in Newark right
and I've only been in the area for about like
a year and I'm like, wow, it's a lot that's changed.
You're really from Newark, Like you said, how do you
balance working with people that are in the community and
then also bringing in these new partners who might not
have that same feeling or commitment to the city and
the people that are like what you said, because you

(05:45):
kind of need the outsiders at the same time, Well,
they don't.

Speaker 1 (05:48):
Have no choice. I'm the mayor, we in charge. We're
a city of ann you know. So if we didn't
do that, twenty five percent of the people in the
city pay taxes. They homeowners. So if we didn't have business,
if we didn't have the growing up in the city,
we wouldn't be able to hire the people we hire
would have the infrastructure we need. We need more people
to pay taxes, so you have to create opportunities. So
that's why we take Section eight vouchers and turn them

(06:10):
into mortgages so people could be homeowners so they could
pay taxes. Twenty percent of every building that goes up
in the city has to have twenty percent affordability in it.
You have to put affordable housing in every development. Hell,
you got to plant trees, you invest in community through
community based community benefits agreements. We force developers to do
very specific things in the city because we don't want

(06:32):
them to leave folks behind. We change the led service lines.
We made the folks who did that hire community based organizations,
people that work in the city, and bring on black
and brown businesses to help them.

Speaker 4 (06:45):
Did you break down the higher buy Live initiatives?

Speaker 1 (06:49):
Yeah, so we all of the corporations in the city,
we call them anchor institutions. We told them that. Actually
Prudential did the study for us. Showed us that all
of the business only spend three percent some of their
dollars in the city of Newark. If they lifted it
to ten percent, they would add fifty to sixty million
dollars to the economy. So based on that, we began
to bring people together and said, we need you to

(07:10):
lift the level of your procurement, your spend in the city.
We want you to hire Newark. Because deliberately we had
a goal of twenty and twenty people to hire, they
actually hired three thousand, and we wanted you to encourage
your employees to actually live in the city of Newark.
It went so far that Audible was paying the first
month's rent for folks who decided to live in the

(07:31):
city of Newark. I mean it got that you know,
deep with the corporations because they saw the success of
it and how the city was changing, so they leaned
into it. You know, Beth Israel leaned in, Rutgers Newark,
the university leaned in. They probably hired more people than
anybody in mid level, the high level staff than anybody
in the city. So we think that that model works,

(07:53):
not just in the city, that could be a statewide
model as well.

Speaker 3 (07:56):
The thing I love about Nework too is like the
political infrastructure is so black, and you know, the city
is just a beautiful black city.

Speaker 4 (08:03):
It makes you want to invest it.

Speaker 3 (08:04):
How important is it when people like Queen Latifa want
to build affordable housing? They are a shock wants to
build you know, affordable housing. Now, how important is that?

Speaker 1 (08:13):
That's very dope. Shack is on his building number three, Wow,
and his buildings are going up very quickly. You know,
I'm excited about it makes other people excited about it.
It makes more importantly, it makes people black and brown
folks that are you know, small to missiles developers feel
like I got a shot. So when you bring them together.
We feel like because a lot of people don't want
to take the risk, or they don't want to go

(08:34):
through all the bureaucracy or the patience that it takes
to get knocked down to get back up, because it's
not a simple and easy thing. I make people understand
this is hard what we asking you to do. It's
not easy, but it makes people feel like it's possible,
it's plausible. Let's get let's do this. So when all
of you guys, when other folks come in and invest
in the city. That's why I bring people around them
so they can see folks that look like them, have

(08:55):
similar backgrounds in them, that they did it, that you
can do it as well.

Speaker 2 (08:58):
I was gonna ask congestion pricing.

Speaker 1 (09:01):
What's your take on congestion pricing?

Speaker 4 (09:03):
Does it help?

Speaker 1 (09:03):
Does it hurt? How does it affect? Especially in New Jersey,
bunch of rich bureaucrats fighting with each other about things
that work in people have no knowledge of the reality
is I think the objective is right that obviously the
environment and congestion is a problem. I think going at
it this way is an issue, and that's usually what
the problem is. In the state House and governments because

(09:26):
most of these people making these decisions make decisions based
on a small frame of reference, make on a small circle,
and they're not bringing people in, regular working folks in
to weigh in and on what they're trying to do.
You're not bringing the fire guy in who lives in
the outer boroughs, who gotta work in Manhattan every single day,
that's gonna have to pay that. You're not you know,

(09:47):
working class people in New Jersey you have to drive
here to go to work, who don't make a whole
lot of money that you're at. You're hitting them over
the head again and again and again. You're driving people
away from the party, dripping away from government. They're becoming
more cynical because they think that these guys are making
decisions that are hurting them. They don't care about all
of the big issues you're talking about because you're hurting
my pockets. I don't got no money as it is,

(10:08):
ain't gonna take more of my money. This doesn't make sense,
so we have to figure it out. Now they say, oh,
we need to reverse congestion. That yeah, I think it's ridiculous, right.
I think these are just political people throwing volleys at
each other in the newspaper, trying to get video and
in airtime, you know, trying to get earned media about
this stuff. The reality is none of that it's going
to fix the problem. Like if you want to deal

(10:28):
with congestion, you want to deal with the issues people have,
and you need to get on the ground and talk
to folks about how to really solve this problem. You know.
And if you're raising money for MTA off the backs
of working class people, I think that's wrong and we
need to figure out how to do that in a
better way, right doesn't hurt working class folks.

Speaker 4 (10:45):
I want you to expand on that.

Speaker 3 (10:47):
That's a problem that I feel like just Democrats have
is with their messaging.

Speaker 4 (10:50):
But you say you got something that you say.

Speaker 3 (10:52):
You say politicians can't make policy for people they can't see.
They can't solve problems they don't know exist. And I
say that all the time in regard to the politicians
because they talk about people they never talk too.

Speaker 4 (11:03):
So how can politicians do a better job of it?

Speaker 1 (11:05):
They got to get out of there, go to the barbershop,
the beauty parlor, the thrift store, the lounge, the bar.
They got to talk to folks where they at. You know,
right now people are picking people for people, and you know,
surrogates are running out convincing people to vote for you,
and you're not going in front of people talking and
having conversations with them. And that's the real problem, Like
you don't know these people, Like you don't know the

(11:27):
parent that has an eight year old, seven year old
and a four year old, gotta go to work, leave
them home at the house, try to get the neighbors
to check on them because she can't afford childcare. Right,
and then you know, the child finds a gun and
shoots himself, and everybody talking bad about her, but not
about the economy that's the richest in the world that
does not allow folks to find childcare that they can afford.
So now she has to make a decision, right, Or

(11:47):
the fact that I can't pay my rent because I'm
buying Christmas gifts and I wait for my income tax
to come in, so suck a level up on my rent,
but I want to buy Christmas gifts. I don't know
these people. I don't have conversations with these people. So
the policies I'm I'm not going to address them. For example,
New Jersey fighting over a policy for five hundred for
seniors that make five hundred thousand dollars, you know, to

(12:08):
give them tax breaks. You know, my grandmother is in
a nursing home, trying to figure out how to pay
the nursing home, how to pay medicine right, how to
do all the very specific things. She don't got a
home here in a home in the Hamptons, and a
home in Florida. But we don't see these people, so
you can't make policy for them. So those people get
pissed out. And the problem is those are the majority
of the people that's.

Speaker 5 (12:26):
Right, and for you, somebody that is with the people right,
even when something like the congestive pricing happens with the
tolls and stuff, when people are talking to you, how
do you what are you instantly trying to do to
help them? Because a lot of people I know that
are in Jersey or like well, especially us that aren't
from there, and we moved there thinking it was better
for us to commute. We like, dang, we might as
well move into New York now. But then that goes

(12:47):
against what you're trying to do with bringing people to
Jersey and getting these companies to invest in that, Like,
how do you start to solve that problem before us
leaving Jersey becomes a problem.

Speaker 1 (12:55):
Well, I mean, I think what the governor is trying
to do is he's still been in court trying to
raise the issue of it so it can be reversed.
I mean, he went as far as wrote a letter
to Donald Trump. I don't know how far this is
going to go, but ultimately we have to keep it
on people's mind that can continue to have the discussion
about it to see if we can repeal it in
some way. We can't just allow it to sit like that. Order,

(13:19):
MTA or somebody else has to figure out how to
compensate people or give them an opportunity to reduce the
what it's going to cost, the burden to go back
and forth to the city who were forced to go there,
not just going there because they trying to go shopping.

Speaker 4 (13:34):
Did you go to the inauguration?

Speaker 1 (13:35):
No?

Speaker 4 (13:36):
You did not go. No. We actually put out a
statement talking about Trump's first day.

Speaker 1 (13:40):
Yeah, yeah, I wouldn't have went there. Yeah. I mean
it was crazy. I mean, all all the things he did,
I mean he said he was going to do so,
I mean it's crazy. He attacked birthrights, citizenship, got rid
of diversity, equity and inclusion, fired everybody, got rid Office
of Violence Prevention. I went to the website. It's gone.
You know, just all of the things that we need
to continue to do what we're doing in the state

(14:02):
of New Jersey and Newark. He just attacked and got
rid of partnered all of those people, straight out white supremacist,
dangerous folks. Uh that that he let loose. I don't
know why anybody, they right mind thought it that he
wouldn't do any of these things. Uh, but but he
did it right. And Uh, you know, people tell you
who they are, like they said, believe them.

Speaker 3 (14:20):
How do you navigate that as a as a as
a politician like you because you know, like they say
that you have to be cordial with them, which I
completely don't understand because it confuses me as a voter,
Like if I hear you say somebody is a threat
to democracy, you call somebody a fascist, you liking them
to Hitler, But then as soon as the election is over,
you know, you at the funeral smiling with him, or
you're walking them back to the White House having tea

(14:42):
with him.

Speaker 4 (14:42):
How would you navigate that.

Speaker 1 (14:44):
Yeah, that's the problem that Democrats have. They you know,
they can't out Republican Republicans. And that's that's the reality one.
I mean, it's it's one thing about being respectful to people.
It's another thing about standing on your beliefs and your values.
You don't have to celebrate with these people. If somebody
come in the room, you be cordial to them. You
don't have to celebrate with them. You don't have to
rejoice with them. You don't have to pretend that there's

(15:04):
somebody that they're not right. You can't uphold us something
for the sake of the system that you know is wrong. Right,
you know, you shouldn't be in the room. You can't
go there and play with them, and you know, make
everybody think that this is okay, because it's not okay. Right,
And I believe that that we were right. I think
Kamala was right and the stuff that she was saying
was right, that the things that she was standing on

(15:27):
was right, and all those people were wrong, and we
have to stand with that. I think people like power,
so they want to stand close to power. The proximity
the power is what it is. They feel like they're
gonna be safe if they're next to power, because he's
going to destroy everybody but me. I think it's really
a coward move. And what it does is what you
say confuses everybody and makes them believe we really all
on the same side. We just try pretending so we

(15:49):
get elected.

Speaker 2 (15:49):
I wanted to ask, you know, we talked about congestion prices.
They say property tax is one of the highest in
the country as far as New Jersey is concerned. How
do we keep people in Jersey and people well not
wanting to leave Jersey.

Speaker 4 (16:01):
How do we do that?

Speaker 1 (16:02):
Well, we have to load the costs. Right. People tell
you they're going to load taxes. Most of the time
they lie in right, because the only people taxes get lowered,
like the super wealthy. Right. So you know, regular working
class and middle class families, because what's happening and like
what happens in this country, we take from poor people,
give to rich folks, and the middle class pay the bill. Right.
So if the bills, if health care costs are growing

(16:24):
and we don't get under control, you're paying for that. Right.
If housing costs keep growing, don't get under control, you're
paying for that. You can't if you go to a restaurant.
The bill is the bill, right, unless you take something
off the bill, that's what the bill is. So I'm
a lower taxes. The government pays for itself through taxes.
We ain't selling cars off the back of the city hall, right.
So at the end of the day, taxes is our revenue.

(16:47):
So if we can't get health care, hospitals in check,
insurance companies in check. If we don't get all these
insurance companies in check, then the bill is going to
continue to grow. Healthcare costs grow fifteen twenty people saying
arbitrarily every year you're paying for that because all of
the workers that we hire, we how to pay their healthcare. Right.
And as those costs increase, your costs increase. Right. And

(17:09):
if you live in if you don't build housing. So
if you're not building housing, you're not adding people to
help you pay the bill. Right. So when you get
this ideal, we don't want to build any housing. We
don't nobody to come to our neighborhood. What you're essentially
saying is you want the cost to continue to go up.
New Jersey has more cities than California. Right, it was
eight times larger than New Jersey. So because we have

(17:30):
all of these cities, we're paying individual costs for all
the things we need, and our school system costs are
higher because we have less kids with the same infrastructure. Right,
because nobody's moving to our neighborhoods. Right, And until we
build housing, put people in our community and lower costs,
our tax is going to continue to go up.

Speaker 4 (17:46):
Why do you think people are leaving New Jersey Because
I saw something.

Speaker 3 (17:49):
I said this, For seven consecutive year, more residents moved
out of New Jersey than any other state.

Speaker 1 (17:54):
Well, we actually had a reversal of that this year,
so j have seen more people move to it than
most states in the country, so one of the fastest growing.
So people are now coming back into the state because
I would imagine because you know, it's getting expensive everywhere, right,

(18:14):
is expensive everywhere, and housing is an issue all over
the country, and New Jersey is a little bit more
liberal than other places, so folks want to come there
and not be targeted.

Speaker 3 (18:26):
I think Jersey is going to be I don't want
to say the new Hollywood, but when you got lions
Gate building what they're building in Newark, when you got
Netflix building what they're building in Mamouth County. I think
there's going to be a lot of people fluctuating New Jersey.

Speaker 5 (18:40):
Is that why, you guys? Because I'm looking here in
the Newark land bank came in twenty nineteen. Yeah, And
for as long as I've known in Delaware we had
a land bank. My grandmother has got a lot of
property in land and stuff, and I'm like, twenty nineteen,
that's so recent. Why did it take so long? And
is that why it happened? Because there's so much coming
you want to make sure people can get land.

Speaker 1 (18:58):
We the only city in the entire state that has
the land bank. Wow. We fought for it on the
state side and then we passed it and locally we
did it so we can turn property over the people
in the city who lived there. Yeah.

Speaker 5 (19:09):
I thought that was like a law, like there had
to be a landbank.

Speaker 1 (19:11):
No, Wow, that's no. We want to be able to
get it into people's hands, and that's been working. That's
how people have been getting property really through the land bank,
because through the city you got to go through all
this bureaucracy, all the other kind of you know, you
got to go before the council. The land bank. I
can sell you the property for five dollars, right. That's
how we're able to do the the Section eight mortgages.
We take people's vouchers and we turn it into a mortgage.

(19:34):
With the Bank of America and the Land Bank, they
pull a product together. Were working with the New York Giants.
New York Giants are fully furnishing people's homes. So you
got people moving into houses that used to live in
the projects, paying the same amount of money that they
were paying in backs to the terrorist projects. Now they
are at their own home.

Speaker 5 (19:51):
Can you explain what the land bank is just for
people who might not know what that is.

Speaker 1 (19:55):
Well, like, if I was a private dude with a
whole bunch of money, right, I could buy up all
of the property and bank it and sit on it.
And you know what usually happens is our weight until
prices go up, and then I want to sell the property,
I sit on it. That's why you go to a
lot of cities and you see a lot of vacant
property and you're trying to figure out, oh, why they
don't do anything with it because the city doesn't own it.
Some private person took it and they holding on to it.

(20:16):
So they can make money. So the city does that.
Now the city gets all of the property and we
bank it like so we hold onto it. We parcel
it together. And so we give the first right of
refusal to community development organizations to local folks so they
can develop it, so they can build it, to keep
wealth in the community, to create more diversity in ownership

(20:38):
in a property, and keep prices low at the same time,
so we can manage what happens with our property in
the city through the land bank.

Speaker 3 (20:46):
How important is that because you know, you want to
keep even Lauren brought up gentrification, but you want to
keep new work full of people from the right. So
when stuff like the studio gets built, the line against
studio and you see you know, places like Audible coming up,
you still want to keep the residents of Newark in there.

Speaker 4 (21:01):
So how do you make sure that happen.

Speaker 1 (21:02):
Well, that's why you got it. That's why we have
those meetings that we have men's meetings, we have other
meetings because I'm trying to make people go get the property.
We set this thing up, now go get it, Like,
let's figure out how you can get property. So I mean,
you got people you know who own buildings was put
the store there's a grand open and an old boy
had a store, a sandwich shop. Now he has a

(21:23):
sandwich shop on top of residents that he owns now
in the building that he owns Right. Got my man
Chino who just came home, you know a few years ago,
who now is not only developed his own property, now
he's involved in a part of a development, a larger
piece of property in the city. And then telling developers,
big developers that you have to partner with missiles and
small developers from the city gives them an end right,

(21:46):
So you don't you don't need me anymore. You know
that these folks need you. So you show up with
your expertise and your skills and your ability and say, look,
this is what I can offer you. Plus I'm from Newark.

Speaker 2 (21:58):
So you know, I do have to ask to the
couple of months ago drones, what were the what were they?

Speaker 4 (22:08):
I wish I do you know something I wish I
do because they just went away too. They just been gone.
I haven't seen them since.

Speaker 1 (22:14):
They did just go away. But they were saying it
was just people putting up their individual drones. Like once
it started the size of big glass hysteria. Actually, I
know a company that that trains uh, you know, folks
on big drones like that too, like Alpha. It's called
Alpha Drones, you know. But they they removed graffiti, They
do all kinds of stuff with those drones. So I've

(22:35):
seen big drones like that before. But you know, I'm
glad I didn't get involved in that that that discussion
that was going on though, because now that sounds really
crazy that people are arguing about it does.

Speaker 2 (22:45):
But I don't think them drones would pulled up at Newark.
I think if it would have been and shot them
drones down to me.

Speaker 4 (22:51):
A beautiful place. You know, you got them down though.

Speaker 3 (22:55):
Another thing I love that you you've done in Newark
is the homelessness program, because you've helped to cut Newark's
homelessness in half.

Speaker 4 (23:03):
What have y'all gotten right that a lot of people
around the country haven't.

Speaker 1 (23:07):
Well, we have street teams, and our street teams we
just expanded it to twenty four hours a day because
they do so good, you know, and the state just
witnessed the uptick twenty four percent this year, I mean
the end of last year, and we got a little
uptick too. But because we had reduced at fifty seven
percent were still down. You know, our street teams go
out there through Path Home, We talk to folks, we

(23:29):
get them off the street, and we're being more creative
about like we created you know, housing out of containers, right,
we took the containers ship and containers and we build
housing out of shipping containers, which which was successful to us.
We just went to the housing authority took two hundred
of their units that they weren't using, that was abandoned,

(23:49):
and we're investing in fixing those up so we could
use them as transitional homes for folks that are off
the street. So we have flexes to put people when
we pull them off off the corners. And we're just
very very very deliberate and intentional through our street team
about that, about that work.

Speaker 3 (24:03):
Talk about the path home. In this you be speeding
through stuff they ever rocket because you do. Actually you're
one of the elected officials. I can actually say yo,
that guy out there, he does doesn't work and you
can see it reflected in the city.

Speaker 4 (24:14):
What is the path home?

Speaker 1 (24:16):
Path home is like you know, we say housing first,
so we talk to people on the street until they
comfortable coming with us to go places. So they know
our street team know most of the homeless people in
Newark by name, where they live at so well and
so on what street they on, what corner they end,
what tent day under, so they continue to talk to them, right,

(24:36):
And then we have a cell phone thing text path
home eight five five one path home to that and
the guys that go out there and engage these folks
right and make sure and it's just not regular people.
You know. You have a drug counselor's there, you have
a psychiatrist there, you have social workers there, you have
regular street team folks there. So it's a whole team

(24:57):
of people that go out and break bring mobile units
to the folks where they are and begin to try
to convince them and pull them into housing, right. And
sometimes they don't come right away. But the first you know,
we keep going, keep going, keep going. It was the
lady told the story that it took the folks three
or four times to talk to her before she said
I'm going, you know, but but she finally went, and

(25:18):
she gave a testimony how it turned her change her
life around because they kept being persistent about, hey, we
come in here, we go again, you know some food.
We're just not giving you food. We try to give
you help, support, get you off the street. A lot
of people come and give out food and it makes
them feel good for that moment. But the person need
more than food, right They need a house, They need treatment,

(25:39):
they need counseling. So we try to bring all of
that to the folks and bring them into housing when
we can. All we have to do is keep building
housing so people could come in to have a place
to go because it's no place for us to put them.
Then these street teams don't make it. They become useless.

Speaker 2 (25:56):
Now, when you become governor, because you know we're gonna
put that in the air. What's the first thing you
want to do for the people in New Jersey? What's
your first attack?

Speaker 1 (26:02):
I think we need to get the budget in order first.
I think is out of control and we need to
one cut spending, cut costs, make the wealthy paid their
fairs share. That's number one. We need to invest in
the economy by building housing next to transit all over
the state. We need to put thousands of people to work,
turn it into a public works project, the same way
we did the less service lines. Put thousands of people
to work in the economy. Get the building trades to

(26:24):
give us a price for affordable housing and tell them
they can make up on the volume what they're going
to miss out on what we reduce in the price.
Build ten fifteen thousand units up front. Right, we need
to take our procurement dollars and invest in black and
brown communities immediately, to South Asian communities, women businesses. The

(26:45):
state of New Jersey spends less than one percent of
his dollars in those communities. Now, we got to turn
that around because to me, that is why the economy
doesn't grow. I mean, you know, you can't have an
exclusive economy and expect it to grow. There's a whole
bunch of communities that need to be gauged in the
economy that we're leaving out. The Latino populational business community
represent twenty percent of the workforce in New Jersey. That's

(27:08):
on their own merit, that's without any investment, without any
support from the state. We got to put money in
those communities and watch those communities grow. Hire people. If
you hire more people, we have to pay them less
unimportant employment. We get them opportunity to get homes, they
can pay taxes, and then you will be crying less
about the taxes you pay because they'll be helping you
pay them right invest in those communities asap. And that's

(27:31):
what we do in the first one hundred days.

Speaker 2 (27:33):
And I wanted to know when Newer Acquas should say
Jersey lost the professional team, how bad did that affect
the industry of the market or the finances during that time?
How bad was that And is there any talks of
getting another professional team money chance?

Speaker 1 (27:46):
Well, I think it's impossible because you know New York
the teams. You got to get permission from the Yankees
and the Mets to put another team. From the Giants
and the Jets, you gotta get permission from them to
bring another team in this market. First of all, if
they don't allow you to do it, it ain't gonna
happen unless one of the move to New Jersey. The
good thing about Prudential Arena, the Potential Arena is one

(28:07):
of the top three most selling arenas in the nation.
So you know, after the Nets left, they really up
their game. So and I think it's like that because
of diversity, because you could go there, go to a
K pop show, right, you could go see Romeo Santos.
You know, they have everything there. And because of that,

(28:27):
it's always crowded. Eighteen thousand people on the street almost
every day of the week. I mean, it's crazy over there.
They making a lot of money and they bringing a
lot of attention to the city of Newark while people
keep putting business there because it's always crowded.

Speaker 3 (28:42):
How will Lionsgate impact Newark and how will Netflix impact
just Jersey as a whole, like both of.

Speaker 1 (28:47):
Them, Well, lions Gates will help a community, a neighborhood
that's been distressed for a very very long time. And
when they come there, you know the path the airport
is already building a stop there by there so people
could get on the train to get to the airport.
So that that's gonna be awesome. And because those studios
are there, obviously they're they're gonna be retail that's gonna

(29:08):
pop up there because people have to eat, they need
to do these things, they want to get the hair,
they don't do whatever, So they're gonna obviously the retail
is going to grow there, and it's gonna do something
about the housing market as well, because the housing Authority
is already talking about investing in the housing in that community.
So I see a shot in the arm happening for
the economy in that area, and obviously the state that

(29:29):
region is gonna benefit from it. Once you put the
train stop there, you know, people could get on the
air tran from there. It's gonna create incredible opportunity for
that neighborhood and for the Elizabeth and all of the
cities that are attached to it.

Speaker 3 (29:40):
In that reason, what about the cannabis industry, because you know,
we opened up a Pashtoria in Newark, myself and Rae Coon,
the chef and car sellers.

Speaker 4 (29:48):
What about the cannabis industry.

Speaker 1 (29:49):
I think it's a I mean, we got to do
better in New Jersey. Let me say that. You know,
I just think the bureaucracy is too much and the
cost of cannabis of putting it together in New Jersey
is hired in place like Pennsylvania and other places like that,
that we have to work out those price lower that stuff,
make it competitive in our state and cut a lot
of the red tape so more these things can happen

(30:11):
faster than it's happening now, and lean into to making
sure that black and brown and underrepresented community. So with
victimized have a bigger portion of what's happening here that
we have to do this deliberately, like New Jersey is
they want to do the right thing, that is afraid
to do it out loud, you know what I mean.
So you got a whole bunch of people. If you say, oh,
black people are suffering, they'll raise their hand. I agree
with that. They say, oh, we should do something about it.

(30:32):
Their hands don't go out, you know. So that's really
what the difference is. So we have to lean into like, look,
this we notice is the problem. You agree with it.
We need to fix it right. We can't charge this
amount of money. There has to be carve outs for
certain people in certain communities, and we have to grow
it faster than what's happening. I just think it's taking
too long.

Speaker 3 (30:51):
Well, come see us, Come see us at hash story
of seven nine nine Broad Street in Newark. I need
you to have the chief of police just do a
little sweep in front of the store.

Speaker 1 (30:58):
Though.

Speaker 3 (30:59):
Oh yeah, a lot of entrepreneurs be out there, you
know what I'm saying.

Speaker 1 (31:02):
We had a discussion about.

Speaker 4 (31:03):
That out there.

Speaker 3 (31:07):
You know, it's very like our customers pull up and
they be trying to get their own sales.

Speaker 4 (31:12):
Drop a diamond, move down the block, deal with.

Speaker 5 (31:15):
The people that be outside his story. He can drop
tell four bags all so that he can increase their revenue.
Maybe you should talk to those brothers and see what
they're trying to do and how hah story you can
talk to them.

Speaker 4 (31:23):
They try to get me.

Speaker 3 (31:24):
We we own the dixpense, give me nothing.

Speaker 4 (31:28):
When is the election?

Speaker 2 (31:29):
When can people make sure they toate to what they
need to make sure they support you in your site
and everything and absolutely rask.

Speaker 1 (31:36):
For governor dot com that's us. June tenth is the
primary UH in New Jersey.

Speaker 4 (31:41):
UH.

Speaker 1 (31:42):
The general election is in November, first Tuesday in November,
but the primary is June tenth. You can donate, you
can get on the website, volunteer, ask questions, do whatever
it is that you need to do it feel comfortable doing.

Speaker 5 (31:54):
Absolutely, you're not worried about the trickle down from this
new administration because a lot of stuff you're trying to do.
Of course they ain't really the biggest proponents of it.
You know, you're not worried about that at all.

Speaker 1 (32:05):
I mean, I think that we got to govern the
way we govern. We gotta do what we do. Like
that's it, Like we can't like do what we need
to do thinking about them, Like we have to do
what we need to do, thinking about the people in
New Jersey. If they come up come over to New Jersey,
they got to deal with us, then we my no
own business. But if they come over here with some nonsense,
then we got to take your business. Other than that,
we're gonna do what's right for the people of the state.

Speaker 3 (32:27):
Is the federal government gonna make what you want to
do in Jersey easier or harder?

Speaker 1 (32:31):
Probably harder. Probably in some instance it's probably hard. I mean,
but this guy ran saying he wanted to make the
economy easier. He wanted to lower prices, costs. He want
to do all of these things. Put people to work.
We want to put people to work. We want a
lower cost. That's what we want. All the other crazy
foolishness that he's talking about is what he really wants.
He's not He haysn't started doing that right, and I

(32:52):
don't think it's ever good. Just like he said he
wanted to invest in the infrastructure. The last time he
was the president. That never happened, right, All the other
stuff happened, but not that, So I think that's a ploy.
But we're gonna lean in on creating jobs, creating small business,
incubating folks, giving people a housing, reducing the costs. Were
leaning in on that. And we're gonna protect the immigrants
and migrants in our community. We're gonna protect the LGBTQ

(33:14):
community in our neighborhood. We're gonna protect the people who
from Newark that we know, those our uncles, our nephews,
our cousins, our neighbors, the people we you know, we
hang out with. We're gonna protect them. I mean, we
ain't gonna run away from them because now that Trump
is the president of the United States, what kind of
people would we be in, Like, we leave our folks
behind because the bully done showed up. Now you're scared, right,
It is what it is. These are our family members

(33:36):
and we gotta make sure they're good.

Speaker 3 (33:38):
How insulting is it to be called a DEI mayor
as a blackness.

Speaker 1 (33:41):
Well, I'm not insulted by it, you know what I mean?
I mean, I think diversity and equity and inclusion is
the right thing I think what they're trying to say
is that you're not qualify and what they and they
say that by everything, So what they're really saying is
that we not qualify for anything. Now you can't be
anythingcause you're not qualified for anything. That's what they're really saying.
I don't think that we should run from the idea
of being of supporting diversity, equity inclusion. In fact, the

(34:03):
economy needs diversity equity inclusion. It's just not enough white
men to support the economy of this country just doesn't exist.
So there are a whole bunch of people that keep
saying we have a labor shortage because they're talking about
the traditional folks who have these jobs that are aging out,
and because they're not going into the black community, the
brown community, the South Asian community, women. Then, yeah, people

(34:25):
aging out. There's a whole bunch of folks that are
a part of this country. You know, American families are different, man.
You know, we eat plantinos and you know black beans
and rice and college greens and cornbread and you know,
black rice and conch American families are different. It's not
the same concept of what American family is. It's all

(34:45):
kind of people that are Americans these days, and we
just got to own up to it and invite these
people to participate in the economy.

Speaker 3 (34:51):
My last question, because you know, I just wanted to
cover some great things that you've done in new that
I know you would implement. Of view government, the shaping
the education future, innure, what did you do to help that?

Speaker 1 (35:03):
Well, you know, the state wasn't control our schools for
twenty years. You know when I was a vice principal,
principal teacher, most of that time was under well all
of it was under state control. We took the state
the schools back from the state when Chris Christy was
the governor, by the way, and got the schools back
under the city's control. Since then, you know, we have

(35:24):
been trying to help with childhood literacy, maternity, help with
maternity care, and giving women access to opportunity for child
care and literacy because we want kids to start school
ready to learn. That's really what we've been focusing on.
I mean, the school system is not under our control,
but we're doing we can to support what we think
will help kids get a better education by preparing them

(35:46):
for school before they start.

Speaker 2 (35:48):
All right, Well, we appreciate you for joining us. Definitely
make sure you go out support Mayor ros Baraka. He
will be the next governor of the Jersey. We're gonna
put that in the air and thank you so much.
Brother rask for governor the number four or governor.

Speaker 1 (36:01):
All right, it's Rosparaka. It's the Breakfast Club. Good morning,
wake that ass up in the morning. The Breakfast Club.
M hm.

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