11.18: JCPS Addresses Budget Shortfall, Louisville Needs a New Jail, and Councilman Anthony Piagentini

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
All right, Dwight's still out today. It's Tony Venetti and
John William Alden the Third as the producer, and we've
got a busy show. John Anthony p Argentini will show
up here in about thirty minutes or he's calling in.
Got plenty to talk about with the Metro Council. A
lot in the news, including new jail possibility here coming up.

(00:20):
We'll talk about this in a couple of minutes. They
need of half a billion dollars to build a new jail.
It's been too small for too long. We also have
Mandy Connell coming on a little bit later in the show.
Mandy used to sit in this chair from nine to
UoN on Whas years ago, and she is probably the
most she's i think the favorites in the clubhouse for

(00:42):
being sitting in this chair over the last twenty or
thirty years. She's fantastic. She lives in Denver. I'm going
to talk to her about how much sports can distract
you in a city that, obviously Denver, that has some
issues policy wise, that has making it it's not so
great to live there. For a lack of a lesser term,

(01:06):
the Denver Broncos are doing really well. I saw her
husband posting pictures of him on the sidelines of the
game the other day, and how much does sports and
I think they do. That I think is why people
argue all the time of keep politics and keep social
issues out of sports, because this is supposed to be
the time that we have a distraction. John, That's why

(01:27):
we watch sports. We want to not think about the
problems of the world and watch some athletes do their thing.

Speaker 2 (01:33):
No, that's the truth. And you could say the same
thing about going out to concerts and certain artists that
like to be political. I think that's why you hear
people say keep politics out of music as well.

Speaker 1 (01:41):
Yeah, zip it, No one cares.

Speaker 3 (01:43):
Now.

Speaker 1 (01:43):
Look, I grew up in an era with Muhammad Ali
and Jim Brown and a Kareem of Jewel Debar and
all that, where I always had thought that. I was like, no, no,
they have a voice, they should use it. And then no,
it's sixty years later, No, no, keep it out. We
get it too much now it's any dated in every

(02:03):
aspect of our lives. So it's a good distraction. So
I'll ask her that how much of the Denver Broncos
taking everybody's mind off what's going on in Denver? All right,
So last night Jefferson County Public Schools, look, every meeting,
they are trotting out a new reason. Oh well, this
one hundred and eighty eight million dollars budget shortfall. This

(02:25):
is what we're gonna have to do. It's a very
good political tactic to pull the heartstrings. Right. So they
came out with the closer first week, which was we're
gonna have to cut the special needs kids programs, which
was like, really, you went right to that, how about
cut somewhere else before you cut it from those kids?
That is a little nuts. And the quivering lip of

(02:45):
the person that was talking that's on the board had
his name in my notes and now I don't have it,
but he was just so emotional about that, and it
was like, okay, then don't cut it from there. The
next week was we're gonna have to close some schools.
We're gonna have to These are all threats on what
to do before they get to what they got to

(03:05):
last night, which was they went over several different taxes
that they want to hit us with and there is
no and they and they have the right to do it.
Without our vote, right, so they can do some of
these things. The ones that take the vote, they will
lose miserably. There is no appetite for more money to JCPS.

(03:25):
Was there five years in twenty twenty, yes, but not today.
There's no appetite for it. If you can't run these
schools on two point two billion, that's twenty four dollars
twenty twenty five hasn't come in of what they what
their revenue was. If you can't do that, then we
have issues when we don't even have the audit. I'm

(03:47):
doing air quotes now. The audit that is that's going
to come out, I would assume soon before they make
a decision on all this. But every week they will
trot out and new feel sorry for issue, and no
one really is feeling sorry for anybody at JCPS. The

(04:09):
newest school that they built, that echo trail, the day
they admitted, the day they turn keyed the school, it
was already too small. It's an embarrassment. And then they
have schools like Western that have three hundred and sixty
five kids in it, but the optimal number is fourteen hundred.
They have a third of the kids that they're supposed

(04:29):
to be less than that in that school. Three hundred
and sixty five I think was the number. Their optimal
number is fourteen hundred. All the schools are under That's
why it's baffling to me Wagner. Wagner High School in
the East End is at sixty five percent.

Speaker 2 (04:46):
You know who's overpopulated though, at Bullet County public schools.
That's why you saw all that districting happening in a
couple a couple of five months ago, because everybody's moving out.

Speaker 1 (04:54):
Though yes, yes, yes, I make a joke all in fun. Well,
when I was growing up, if you moved to Bullet County,
you asked questions like, oh man, what happened. It's a joke,
but it's true. And then now it's like, oh nice
moving out to boule A County. Kids, all right, baby,
come oh boul A County. They got it all out there.

(05:19):
But they made the tough decision to redistrict. They had
a lot of people go in and talk to, you know, people,
their board members a couple of months ago, and people
weren't happy about it because you can't please everyone. But
they have a school out off of forty four on
the west side of the county called Nichols that they
have to shut down just because there's there's there's no
reason to have a school that's very underpopulated when you
can shuffle everything around and make things more cohesive for everybody.

(05:42):
Schools are the only thing in government that have no
They have no accountability to anyone, Like LNPD. The police
in every city is the mayor. The mayor's accountability and
a lot of times they have groups that did watch
dogs after them and and they they forced policy on them.
Force is probably too much of a word there, but

(06:05):
they they have someone watchdogging them, somebody they have to
answer to. Somebody JCPS, the mayor, the Metro Council. They
can't touch JCPS. The board does what it wants, does
the policy they want, no questions asked, spends whatever they
want on whoever they want, and whatever they want, and
no one has a say in it except for those

(06:26):
folks on the board. That's it. No one can control.
A couple of months ago when they did the bussing
was an issue and they were trying to find bus drivergs,
which they've solved that issue. They all met and the
Metro Council talked and the mayor talked, and I'm watching
this hour long press conference, going, you all have no say.
Of course, the JCPS guy got up there and go,

(06:47):
of course they can't tell us what to do. We're
all these are just good suggestions and we'll take it
all as information. But I think people lose that fact
is that schools just do what they want. There's no
one that that helps with their policy or says no,
we're not doing that. So this is where you get

(07:09):
when you can spend money on whatever. I mean, the
three schools that they spill they they built recently, they
spent three times what they could have spent on those schools.
That's a fact. They spent three times they could have
built nine schools new schools. And I think there's going
to be an announcement about a high school that they
are going to raise and rebuild very soon, and it's

(07:33):
going to surprise some folks. All right, Uh, the Sheriff's department,
John William Alden, the third, here's your test? Where'd you
go to high school? Bullet East, Bully East?

Speaker 2 (07:43):
That's right.

Speaker 1 (07:44):
What does the Sheriff's department usually do? What's their what's
their job?

Speaker 3 (07:49):
They do?

Speaker 2 (07:49):
The the dare to care their officer stuff? Is that
what you're getting at or a way off?

Speaker 3 (07:53):
No?

Speaker 1 (07:53):
What is their job? What do they usually do? I
might be they don't know. They usually are the ones
that drop off the not indictments, but the subpoenas and
all that. For it's actually a very dangerous job to
knock on doors, okay, all right and deliver paperwork to people. Okay,

(08:14):
especially these days when everyone has a gun and is
in a bad mood. So the sheriffs have always had
a pretty dangerous job. They are adding. Last night I
saw a story on WDRB the sheriff's department is now
going to be pulling people over for traffic violations. Okay,
they're going to add that. So if you see I've
always just you know, driven by a sheriff's suv or

(08:38):
whatever and not think anything. Well, they're working out doing
something else that they're not going to pull me over.
Well they are. They're going to start that. They're going
to have a unit. Not all of them are going
to do it. They did a three day trial and
they had ninety nine pullovers in three days and just
they designated just a couple of sheriffs to do this,

(08:58):
So they had ninety nine pullovers nineteen arrests. So it
was a lot of citations. I think it was thirty citations,
you know, tail lights out, tags, expired, stuff like that.
But they ended up getting nineteen arrests from this. See
I think this is it's under the guys that traffic
so people are like, oh great, more people are gonna

(09:19):
give me a speeding ticket. Super. I don't think that's
what it is. I think this goes back to when
Greg Fisher was in office and most of these the
analysis of MPD and how crime got to where we
were was because we stopped pulling people over. They actually

(09:41):
call them pullovers. That's what they call them. It's a
lack of again a lack of a better term, pullovers.
So they stopped pulling people over because they didn't want
to violate their civil rights or whatever was going on.
One person had gotten pulled over, there was video of it,
and from that they stopped pulling people over. I think

(10:01):
this is just part of that, because pulling people over
is part of how you get crime down. They've got
nineteen arrests out of ninety nine pullovers. Dude, to me,
that's the number. That's what they're looking to do. I'm
again speculating all this. I have not talked to any

(10:22):
police officers and why they're doing this and all that.
They're going to say one thing, traffic violations. But I
think it's just let's increase the number of pullovers because
you will get bad guys. You will get people that
need to be arrested, that have warrants against them, and
that's how you get crime down. Seriously, pullovers as simple

(10:42):
as that. You're like, really just pulling people over. Yeah, Yeah,
that's how it goes. So the Sheriff's Department is going
to experiment with that. They did a little experiment with it,
and they're going to move forward with that. Staying on crime,
Louisville needs a new jail costing as much as five
hundred million dollars. Huh. Dwight and I got very intimate
with the detention centers a couple of years ago lm DC.

(11:09):
We did two shows back to back years with part
of the Kentucky Office Fiway Safety and learned everything that
goes on in the jail and detention centers and how
you get booked, what happens when you're there, and how
you get out and bonds and everything else. It was
very and Dwight actually ate one of the full meals.

(11:30):
He said, give me the whole whatever tray. They're like
thick plastic trays. They're like kid trays for adults. And
the food food was not good. Dwight ate the whole thing.
I don't understand why he does this eating thing. He's
dog food twice in the last two weeks, but he

(11:53):
ate all of that meal, and he will tell you
he did not feel right for like two days. The
numbers are stark. They they're too small, currently one hundred
and eighty three square feet per bed, while modern facilities
average more than three hundred and seventy square feet per bed.

(12:15):
They are stacking people in these in these places. They
are also the largest drug intake in the state of Kentucky.
Most of the people that come and get arrested again,
you get your duy, you get your whatever charges that
get booked through there. But mostly people are high and
they have to go through. They're the largest drug intake

(12:37):
in the state of Kentucky every single day. I'm sure
that that initially was not the point of metro corrections,
but it has become that so we'll talk to Anthony
Pagetini about that in a couple of minutes. So, yeah,
they need a new jail. That's going to happen. So
I believe Metro Council has to okay that for the city,

(12:59):
and that is a lot of money, there's no question
about it. And hopefully we can get some help federally
to pay for that. But they're gonna have to build
a new jail, and I don't know where they're going
to put that because the current one is on seventh
or sixth in Jefferson, right, Yeah, the courthouse is seventh
and Jefferson. Leave. The jail is at sixth in Jefferson. Maybe,

(13:21):
I don't know, really, John Kay, sound like I've been there? Yeah,
I wouldn't. I hope you haven't.

Speaker 2 (13:27):
Actually, I know, I wouldn't be too surprised if you
had back in your before your rock radio years, maybe
during your rock more rambunctious days, if things got out
of control, cops would just go all right, you need
a time out, make you sit in jail for six hours, BEFO.
Let you out own recognizant is o R is what
they call it. You just get out in the morning,

(13:47):
go to there. There's an Arby's there, used to be
an Arby's or a Wendy's there on the corner. Go
get some breakfast, then wait for your ride. Why did
you ask me which high school I went to?

Speaker 1 (13:59):
Because I was going to ask you what the Sheriff's department,
uh does? Who's going to look at the bull at
East Education?

Speaker 2 (14:06):
Oh so you're seeing if I'm smarter not? Yeah, So
I embarrassed my high school. I apologize. It's okay, not
to you, but to my school.

Speaker 1 (14:13):
You don't embarrass Bullett County Boulet again. We're gonna call
it Boulet County. They're fancy now, Boulet County is fancy.
A busy show again today Mandy Connell, Anthony Piagentini ed
Gaalron former seal which used to operate in that area Venezuela, Panama,
all those areas down there. He has, he's a very

(14:35):
good insight on what's going on there, and I think
he's going to lay out to you that they're not
nilling nearly. What word am I thinking of? No, milly
willy willy, nilly willy nilly. They're not willy nilly about
what they're doing down there. They know everything. The intel
down there is spectacular. They have to they have to

(14:58):
be and and they know what they're doing. And hopefully
this will not escalate, that people will cooler heads will
prevail and Venezuela cleans their act up. But we will
talk to him a little bit later in the show. Also,
all right, short break, we'll come back. Trade Oak Towers
is a great place down on Third and Oak. It's uptown,

(15:19):
not downtown, a block from Saint James Court. They have
everything in this place for independent folks or not so independent.
They are independent. They are nonprofits. So the price is right.
It's not piecemeal. It is one price. And if you're
like me, if you've got to be sixty five or
older to move into this place, if you saw your

(15:40):
tax bill for your house at some point you're thinking,
why I'm paying five grand a year for just my
taxes on my house in retirement, Let's look at a
place of facility that's going to be fun, that's going
to be a great place to live, that has great
views from all their condos. Trade and Oak Towers is
a fantastic place. I've taken tours there, just threw my

(16:01):
job over the last couple of decades and it keeps improving.
So give him a call. Five eight nine thirty two eleven.
Five to eight nine thirty two eleven is the phone number.
Call that number and say I want to take a tour.
Venette says it's awesome. Tradeon Oak towers back after this
on news Radio eight forty whas several former law enforcement

(16:23):
contacted me in the brink. I think this Shriff's department
now pulling people over for tractor valiation is a little
more interesting than from what it looks like if you
read the headline. All right, I've always told my welcome
back NewsRadio eight forty whas, Tony Venette, Dwight Whitten will
be in next week. He'll be back for a couple

(16:44):
of days, and then I think he's going back to Cabo.
I'm not sure. John William Alden and third will be
with me.

Speaker 2 (16:52):
The least productive week in the entire year for everyone,
Thanksgiving week, there's no question.

Speaker 1 (16:57):
I think if Thanksgiving didn't have the four day weekend
and the Black Friday shopping deal, then Thanksgiving it's just
lost its luster. It's just Grandma doesn't run the show anymore.
That's basically the what the bottom line is. Okay, it's
not anything anymore than just grandma. Grandma used to run
the show. That means you showed up at Grandma's house.

(17:20):
She told you what time it was, cousins and uncles
and and just everybody in the family. You showed up.
Now you brought up a dish, but she basically cooked
everything right. And now Grandma's today just aren't the same.
That's the boomers. They're like, yeah, I want to come
over or not, No big deal. I don't know.

Speaker 2 (17:41):
I feel like what you just described there describes my
family's Thanksgiving.

Speaker 1 (17:45):
Still, well great, No, that's fantastic. I'm just talking across
the board. I'm sure you're right about that. Yeah, that's
just And then here's the other thing. When we were
also growing up, there wasn't I think when I was
in sixth grade there was one one kid that had
a divorce in the entire class. Like when I was
in sixth grade there were four classes in sixth grade.
They they there was one kid that had divorced. So

(18:06):
now you're you're you have these blended families. So now
which Thanksgiving are you going to? Now there's whatever how many?
So then you know, this year, you're going here, next
year you're going there. And then when you get older,
when your kids get older and you're in between your
kids having kids, it's everyone is just spread out. So

(18:26):
you just now it's like, well, who's available to have
to get together? So I don't even know if we're
doing anything. I think the Venetties are, but I'm not
sure if we're doing anything. On the other side. And
the thing is, we went to we ordered cracker barrel.

Speaker 2 (18:43):
Hey, that's not bad.

Speaker 1 (18:44):
So we ordered cracker barrel. It's something small because we
didn't want to make, you know, make a bunch of
food that both kids are going to be home. Amen,
both kids are going to be home, which is going
to be rare moving forward. So we just got I mean,
you can't be cracker barrel, dude. When it comes to
all American if you're.

Speaker 2 (19:02):
In a horror Thanksgiving meal from any restaurant, cracker Barrel
is definitely in the top two or three.

Speaker 1 (19:07):
Not bad. It's not bad. So and I think they
they make you it's like, look, Thanksgiving, that's only Turkey.
You don't get the ham option. I don't believe. And
then in Christmas you get the ham option. I think
they stick to the no turkey is you know, turkey is,
thanks Jimmy. That's not all they talk. But we have
been starting to go to Cracker Barrel a lot lately.

(19:28):
I just there's nothing. You know, here's the thing. It's
so rare that I kept you know, I'm not called
darlin or sweetheart, sweetheart, you want me top off that coffee.
It's very rare. I don't go into stores and going hey, darling,
are you gonna buy that? Uh? We like it? And yes,

(19:48):
I am getting old. I grew. I shaved my beard
except for the mustache, and I was hoping to pull
off Burt Reynolds, and I look more like Ned Flanders.
And it's not fun. And I'm part of Gen X,
which means we're the most insecure generation in American history.

(20:11):
We cannot stop seeking validation. That's our generation. That's why
we post on Facebook pictures and inappropriate pictures. We shouldn't
be at sixty, at fifty five. It's like what I
saw pictures of Martha Line Collins. She was like forty three,
and she looked like her grandma. She had the helmet

(20:33):
hair with the grandma earrings and the grandma dress and
she was like forty three in nineteen eighty four, so
I think it was crazy. All right, shortbreak, we'll come back.
Anthony Pagentini from Metro Council will join us. We'll talk
several topics on that and catch up with them. We
haven't been talking to Metro Council as much as we
used to, so let's catch up here in just a

(20:54):
couple of minutes. Keep it where you got it. News
Radio eight forty whas thank you for not playing heavy
metal while today. So that's the thing you want. Man,
this is a lot better, I think News Radio eight
forty w h AS, Tony Venetti and Dwight Whitten will
be back next week. The whole team will be together
before we head off to Thanksgiving break. Let's bring in

(21:15):
Anti Apagentini from Metro Council. Anthony, how are you, sir?

Speaker 3 (21:20):
I'm doing great now that we got rid of Dwight.
This is a full Italian American, you know.

Speaker 1 (21:26):
Let me tell you I was never so proud. My
son got a scholarship from the Italian American Association, the
big one, the one in New York uh and he
made the he made the national magazine uh AS. He
got a whole full page. He wrote a letter about
the similarities to when we came over that time and

(21:47):
and what's happening now? Uh and obviously yeah, yeah, yeah,
obviously connected with him and hey, dad, anything that helps
with the college, we're all in. Thank you Italian American Association.
All right, let's get to some issues here. First of all,
I live in Saint Matthew's and my wife is on
the Metro council or the Saint matthew City Council, and

(22:10):
we've talked about this before. There are I think there
was twenty eight break ins or a windows smashed in
twenty eight days in Saint Matthew's or in the area
right there. And part of the problem is that they
cannot chase so they know because there was the police
officer was responsible for any damage or anything else after
it's done. That is a topic you want to talk about.

Speaker 3 (22:32):
Yeah, So let me give you a quick story or
two about what happened in my neighbor. And this happened
across the city, as you well indicate, right. So for example,
just a couple of nights ago, three thirty in the morning,
criminal comes up, smashed the window in a car, hits
the garage door opener, and the driveway of somebody's house
goes into the garage. Once you're in the garage, you're
in the home attached garages. You might as well be

(22:54):
walking into the living room.

Speaker 1 (22:55):
Amen.

Speaker 3 (22:55):
As far as the laws comes, So breaks into their home,
steals another car in there, takes off. Police respond pretty quickly,
you're good. Freeight Division. They get there pretty quickly, and
they say, we cannot. They knew where the getaway car was,
they knew where the stolen car was, where the car
they drove up in, and the car they knew where
they all were. They could not respond because it did

(23:18):
not meet the standard of chasing, the standard for now
here's where it gets even crazier. One of the two
officers there said that they got dinged for chasing. Now
here's the story related to that case. Middle of the
night again it was this is about a little after
twelve am, Suburbs, right still East End Suburbs. Police officer

(23:40):
spotted a stolen vehicle, or pinged on a stolen vehicle,
gives chase, okay, successfully and completely safely interdicts the stolen vehicle,
arrests the perpetrator. Everything sounds good, right, This is exactly
what our police officers do, right, right, for that, for

(24:01):
that officer's trouble, he got a two day unpaid suspension.

Speaker 1 (24:06):
Stop.

Speaker 3 (24:08):
Oh, I swear to god, they unpaid suspension for successfully
and safely chasing down a stolen vehicle and arresting the perpetrator.

Speaker 1 (24:17):
Make that make sense to me? What is the thought why?

Speaker 3 (24:22):
So here was the thought process?

Speaker 1 (24:24):
Right?

Speaker 3 (24:24):
Look, we don't want and this I agree with, we
don't There are chases in the past that happened in
the middle of the day, middle of rush hour, where
people got injured, right or even worse killed. Right. So
there were a couple of high profile cases. It's been years, right,
but a couple of high profile cases that happened. In
every instance it was with people on the sidewalks or

(24:46):
there were lots of pedestrians around the middle of the
day type chases. So in order to stop that, the
Mayor's office and starts with the Fisher administration. They said,
we're only going to chase violent felony offenders, okay, And
they're still even within that chasing policies. For example, if
you're chasing somebody and there's a parade I'm going to
use an extreme example. You obviously wouldn't chase the perpetrator

(25:11):
into the parade. But what we've lost here is number one,
a home invasion. Somebody coming into your home. If they
don't physically or verbally threaten you, that is not considered
a violent felony. So think about that. They could get
all the way into your home, and if you're standing there,
they could be robbing you blind and as long as

(25:32):
they don't brandish a weapon or say anything to you,
that is not breach a violent felony, and they can't chase.
What I want to do is say, look at midnight
and three point thirty am in the suburbs, how many
people are on the streets, Like that's when you can
actually do some chasing, and that's when the stolen cars
are happening and mitigate the potential risk. And even so,

(25:55):
if they go into a populated area, slow down, you know,
call off to chase whatever, but least make the attempt
when the risk is low in the middle of the night.

Speaker 1 (26:04):
Okay, So who sets those policies? Who sets those policies
that that is that you all, or is that the
police chief or the mayor that's.

Speaker 3 (26:12):
The that's the that's the police chief and mayor, it's
executive brand. Okay, now I'm looking at I'm looking at
possible legislation to force the issue. But but yeah, they
technical they it started with the Fisher administration, the Greenberg
administration carry it forward. I'm asking them to reconsider and
start when there's low risk, particularly in the middle of
the night, very few cars on the street. When we're

(26:33):
talking about particularly cars stolen from people's homes. You violated
their home, Yeah, Thanktuary. We should be going after those
people and prosecuting.

Speaker 1 (26:43):
Them to the high So I guess that the thought
pattern is we're going to avoid lawsuits and we're going
so so what's more dangerous the criminal that has enough,
you know what to break into a home and steal
a car, or the possibility of someone running over a
mailbox or or or having a terrible wreck. Right, is

(27:05):
that what the thinking is?

Speaker 3 (27:07):
Correct? But here's the problem with that thinking. We know
what they're doing with these vehicles, and in some cases
they find weapons in these vehicles. Whether what they're doing
with the stolen vehicles and weapons, they're going to other
areas of the city, particularly the West End, where we
see the most homicides, right, and they're using them in
the furtherance of homicides. Yes, how many people have died
because we have not tracked down these people and arrested

(27:29):
them before they got out of some of these residential neighborhoods.

Speaker 1 (27:32):
Right, I mean how many people? It's I mean.

Speaker 3 (27:35):
That's how you get to proactive policing. We arrest them
for these lower crimes right before they commit the higher crimes.
And so yeah, it's it's a big issue. Again. They
are trying to mitigate liability. I get that, and we
should have policies in place to do that, but I
think we have the pendulum has swung too far where
now the criminals know what the policy is, they know

(27:57):
what the loopholes are, and they're they're invading homes in
the middle of the night and the police are completely hamstruck. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (28:03):
Again, it's been an issue in Like again, I tell
this story all the time. I moved in fifteen years
ago to my street and I talked to a Saint
Matthew's police officer and asked him, Hey, by the way,
you know a lot of break ins in this neighborhood.
And he goes he'd been on the force for a
while and said, I can't remember a break in in
the house, and now they're averaging eighteen a month, so

(28:24):
every other night. And then now we're on a roll
because one of the things dovetail back to you is
they they know they won't be pursued. So if they
just get in their car, they just get in the car,
they're gone.

Speaker 3 (28:37):
They're gone, right, And I think that's where we start.
If you have breached the property line, particularly the home,
but I would include the property line and stolen property right,
stolen vehicles for example, from that property, and we can
hunt you down, particularly when it's low risk in the
middle of the night and there's not a lot of
police people around now, a lot of cars on the street.
I think it's high time we start doing that because

(29:00):
this is only going to get worse. And unfortunately people
people are starting to arm themselves and they're saying, well,
I'm not going to take this anymore. And you know,
are we going to start exchanging gunfire in the middle
of the residential neighborhoods because of home invasions? I mean,
where's this going to go? Yeah?

Speaker 1 (29:13):
Yeah, Nick Coffee's got a buddy that did that, got
the gun, got in the house, came out to confront
and he was staring at a twelve year old and
it's in it. This is where we're going. But I
will dovetail also into this where I when they fixed
because I'm my back window of my F one fifty
got hit because they hit four trucks in six houses
that night. And it was a Sunday night at nine

(29:35):
thirty Anthony, it's crazy. So I when the guy came
to change the light or to fix the window, it
was safe Light or whatever company that I used for
my internship, and I said, hey, it was the end
of the day on a Friday, five pm on a Friday,
and I said, hey, by the way, how many of
these have you fixed today? Not rock in the windshield?

(29:56):
What the law was? Four? Right? How many of these
have you fixed? And he goes, this is all I've
done today. We could probably get a more accurate number
of what's happening if we went to the Safely people
and said how many of these smashed in back windows
of theF have you dealt with? And you could get
accurate numbers from them rather than another source. All right,

(30:19):
let's move on to what they talked about last night,
which was Louisville needs a new jail. How much will
you all have to do with this? As Louisville Metro Council,
they're looking at maybe, look if you build it today,
they're saying a half a billion dollars, five hundred million dollars.
But the longer you wait, the more expensive this is
going to get.

Speaker 3 (30:36):
Anthony, Yeah, So this is now probably the sixth expert
to say this. I mean, this has been a multiple experts,
multiple reports over multiple years, all saying the same thing.
We need to replace our jail. It is wholly inadequate.
The risk of not doing it, to be clear to
the public, is if we don't a couple five years

(30:57):
from now, when it's chronically overcrowded, it's already overcrowded. When
it's when there are substandard conditions and it starts to fail,
we are going to get a civil rights lawsuit and
we are going to get ham. The risk to the
taxpayers of this city is going to be massive. So
we need to get in front of that. Not going
to happen overnight, but we need to get the planning

(31:18):
done now and start budgeting for it. Which is going
to take multiple years, and it's going to take help
from the states. I mean, the city does not have
five hundred million dollars, And I might dispute a little
bit that that number. Probably are ways to do it
for less than that, but the point is, let's just
say four to five hundred million. The city will not
be able to bear that all by ourselves, but we

(31:39):
would need we would like I think we should seek
state assistance with that. Again, but we we will have
to pay for it. But I want to be clear
with the taxpayers here, We're going to pay for it
one way or the other. There is coming a day
and we are already at the overcrowded problem. We have
been for years. It's been a chronic issue over and
over again. And if we're going to do more to
crack down on pub book safety and law and order,

(32:01):
that will not get any better. And we need a
safe environment for the guards and the inmates. Their loss
of freedom is the punishment. We're not doing torture chambers right.
It needs to be a safe, clean environment for the guards,
for the inmates. And these new facilities actually have much
lower operating costs once you upgrade, so We've looked at

(32:24):
other cities, Nashville and others, they have much lower per
capital costs once they go into these new facilities, well.

Speaker 1 (32:30):
And the design has to be it has to be
creative for the needs that we have now. The jail
that was the jail that was built right now that
that's operating now, did not anticipate that that that facility,
that corrections facility, would be the largest drug intake in
the Commonwealth of Kentucky. That was not predicted. So the
new jailhouse is going to have to address that issue

(32:53):
if we're going to take that many people that are
high on drugs every single day. The number was told
to me when I did the show out there, and
I could not believe the number of people that were
high on drugs that were coming through that We have
to be creative on how we handle those folks.

Speaker 3 (33:09):
Well, one hundred percent. Some of these other facilities in
the first floor, they have these treatment centers where basically
they go through that process get the sort of medical
correction including rehabilitation, but incarceration is part of it's still
in the jail right so we're keeping the public safe,
we're also rehabilitating these people it's part of an overall strategy.

(33:30):
And again, look what we did last time. If you
look at our current jail and you go back in
history as to why we did that, they wanted to
do it on the cheap okay, and look where we
are twenty plus years later from when that was constructed.
We are in a situation where we're like, Okay, that
was a huge mistake. We need to redesign and we
need to move forward. So we need to be thinking

(33:50):
about the next fifty years of needs for this city
and do something that will set the city up for
the future and stop thinking short term. And if we
wait longer, we are going to get more reactionary instead
of thinking about it strategically and starting to plan.

Speaker 1 (34:06):
Now, all right, give me something before I'll let you go,
give me something good that's happening with the Metro Council.
We always tend to obviously go for what's the most needed.
In a lot of times, it's conversations that are hard
to have anything good happening at Metro Council and these meetings,
and that we can say to Louis.

Speaker 3 (34:22):
Yeah, yeah, So as part of the Republican Couts' strategy
for a safer Louisville. One of the things we wanted
to tackle was human trafficking. We just passed legislation last
Thursday that's going to do that's going to revamp the
licensing process for massage partners. Quoe unquote, Oh yes, because
that is the primary way. I mean, the numbers are

(34:46):
quite staggering, hundreds. It's hard to nail it down, but
there is an epidemic of human trafficking, really what I
would call modern day slavery, where these women are apprehended,
are put into these horrific environments, literally raped over and
over again essentially for money for their owners, and then frankly,

(35:09):
what the FBI tells us, are discarded, they disappear afterwards.
So it's really a horrific thing. This is a huge
step forward in giving federal, state, and local law enforcement
to tools to crack down on this and eradicate that
from the city.

Speaker 1 (35:25):
It's amazing. Sometimes I grew up in this town and
you think, you think of the cultural issues that we've had,
this including people trafficking, is human trafficking is like in
the cultural multi pot that is Louisville, Kentucky. It's unbelievable
if it's here, then it's everywhere.

Speaker 3 (35:47):
Well that's the thing, It is everywhere. So there's been
a task force working on this for a long time.
We've organized it over the last year through Metro Council,
but it includes federal state agencies. The federal agent will
tell you this is an international crime syndicate. This is like,
you know, the drug trade or something like that. It
is a huge international issue. We are not going to

(36:08):
solve it internationally, but at least we can take the
steps to solve it within our own city and say
we are not going to accept this anymore. So so
that was a huge step in the right direction. And uh,
you know why, bipartisan support by the time it passed.
So we're excited to take that huge step. And then
the only other thing I'd say as far as good
news is I think you know the mayor and there's

(36:32):
more announcements coming regularly. We're seeing more and more businesses
invest in the city. I think our focus on public
safety is paying off for those industries that want to
invest in our city. But we're concerned that we weren't
taking public safety seriously. So I'm seeing tremendous momentum actually
on the Jobs and Business Investment Front and and and

(36:55):
that is a compliment to this submissue.

Speaker 1 (36:57):
Yeah, the five hundred folks is KFC that we're going
to move into the downtown building. That was a huge
That was a huge start right there. That was a
big one, A shot in the arm for sure. Antheopyagentini,
you're Metro Council member. Thank you for what you do
and we'll talk to you soon.

Speaker 3 (37:12):
Appreciate it to thank you.

Speaker 1 (37:13):
See you. But all right, man, shortbreak, we'll come back.
Al number two is coming your way. We'll include Mandy
Connell here coming up soon and Ed Galern former Seal
will and he used to be and operate in that
area from Panama down into that Central America and all
that area, so he's got some opinions a while it's
going on in Venezuela, so we'll talk to him also

(37:34):
with that back after this on news radio. Way first,
let's talk about the top vision. First, I'm going to
get my ray band prescription, so they have ray bands
there and I'm going to get the aviators. Yeah, that's right.
I'm a a gen Xon Secure person. I need to
have my aviators. But they're my prescription for my glasses
so I can wear them all the time. So John,
I'm just going to do the show in the ray

(37:56):
band prescription. I think you look good. Yeah, thank you,
thank you for Vision First. I'm just gonna wear them
all the time. Vision firstiicare dot com. Whether you're six
months old or sixty, they'll take care of you at
Vision First. Get an appointment eighteen locations back after this.
News radio eight forty eight wh