Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Let's check in on the common Spirit health topline with
Senator Barb Kirkmeyers. She's popping in because we know that
we're going to be hit here in Colorado. This is
one of the reasons that I started the show urging
you to please donate to a food bank because SNAP
benefits are not coming because Congress can't get their act together.
And i'd like to welcome Senator Barb Kirkmeyer to the show. Hi, Barb,
(00:22):
how are you good?
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Thanks for having me on. I appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (00:26):
So what does this mean at the state level, Barb? Like,
what what does this mean in your view that SNAP
benefits are not coming in in November?
Speaker 2 (00:35):
Well, again, as you've already stated, and it's it's not
Congress this time, it's actually our two US senators, both Democrats,
Senator Bennett and Hick and Looper are they're just carelessly
gambling with people's lives and their ability to feed their families.
And then we have a governor who doesn't use the
tools that are out there that he should be using, saying, ah,
this is you know, we're gonna have an issue here
(00:56):
because of Tabor. Seriously, this is an emergency and instead
of coming to the Joint Budget Committee and saying, gush,
I need ten million dollars to give for you know,
to make sure that people have access to food because
they've shut down, the Democrats have shut down the federal government.
He should be looking at his emergency management protocols. We
(01:18):
have an emergency operations plan to deal with emergencies, and
that's what he should be looking at. And we should
be looking at our disaster Emergency fund and actually figuring
out how to provide for these benefits food for people
that they can get it onto their table.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
I think it's very very interesting that you started out
talking about Senators hicking Looper and Bennett because the reality
is they do have the power. You know, we need
five more senators to vote to move this thing along
to get it done. And I have to say barbed,
you know, and the Republican Party for the last I
don't even know how many years, because I mean, I
(01:55):
feel like we have a shutdown every five minutes now,
and I just I don't even care anymore. That being said,
I've never seen them be so firm about sticking with
what they're doing now and refusing to capitulate to these
kind of threats by the Democratic Party, and I'm kind
of proud of them a little bit because they're not
(02:17):
doing something crazy. They're asking Democrats to vote on something
that they voted on in March. I mean, it wasn't
that long ago. My frustration is that they won't do
it through regular order. But that's a whole other conversation
for another place. So tapping into the emergency benefits, I.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
Agree, what would that look like?
Speaker 1 (02:33):
I mean, what how does that process go?
Speaker 2 (02:36):
So here's the thing. The governor goes out and just
announces we're going to you know, we're going to do
ten million dollars. Next week, the Joint Budget Committee is
meeting because they're like, well, we got to do a
supplemental and we need ten million dollars a general fund
to try and feel you know, what is a program
that's costing one hundred and twenty million dollars in benefits
on a monthly basis. So you know, he's coming up
(02:58):
and saying, look, I'm going to put about eight percent
into it. I'm going to overwhelm the food banks and
food pantries in our state. You know, he didn't have
a discussion with all the food pantries and so the
food banks. And he's just gone about this the totally
the wrong way. There is no plan here, and he's
just gonna make matters worse. I mean, what's gonna happen
when people go to a food panty or a food
(03:19):
bank because Polus told him that's where they should go
and there is no food there? There is going to
be enough, right And the whole thing about donations, and
I think it's wonderful that people want to donate funds
and donate canda items and food and that type of
thing that I can tell you after managing our Hurricane
(03:39):
Katrina operation for the state of Colorado back in what
was that two thousand and five, two thousand and six,
somewhere in there, you know, I can tell you that
donation management becomes a disaster all in its own because
people just start dropping off all sorts of things. What
are you supposed to do with all of that? So
what should be occurring here is this. We have what
(04:00):
is called the Disaster Emergency Fund and it actually has
about somewhere between you know, somewhere around two hundred and
seventy million dollars in it as of September thirtieth. Now,
I'm sure there are some other bills there because of
the flooding that occurred in Laplata. But this is a
fund that we have in place that the governor can
tap into. He doesn't need to ask for a supplemental.
He can tap into this simply by declaring an emergency.
(04:23):
And if not having enough food to feed six hundred
thousand people in our state is an emergency, I'm not
sure what would be. So he needs to declare an
emergency and what he should be doing right now, And
he doesn't even have to declare that emergency right now.
He can declare that if we find out we're not
going to be able to get the government running again,
if Bennett Hickolob don't do their job and actually get
(04:44):
government running again. So what should be occurring right now
is they should be putting a plan in place, and
he should be pulling in his departments of Education, his
Department of Human Services, his Department of Health, probably the
Department of Agriculture, in any other of our state's apartment
that have food programs in their departments. You should be
pulling them in. We should be pulling in the faith
(05:05):
based community. We should be pulling in Salvation Army, Red Cross,
other non governmental organizations and other government organ or non
governmental organizations are volunteer groups that work through the Emergency
Operations Plan that help out in emergencies and put together
what is called an Emergency and Incident Management plan and
(05:25):
put the plan together. And they should be talking to counties.
They counties can be doing this at the county level,
and the state can help by providing resources through the
Disaster Emergency Fund, which again somewhere up to two hundred
and seventy million dollars in it as of September thirtieth.
That what should be occurring here. This governor has totally
missed the boat and he's going to make things even
(05:46):
worse by saying if I'm going to try and fill
this gap with ten million dollars, and oh, by the way,
it's because we have Tabor. Get over it. We've had
Dabor for thirty years. It's time to actually govern and
be a governor that's going to do right by the
people of this state.
Speaker 1 (06:01):
So do you think he's not doing that just to
what could score some kind of political points or attack
Tabor or what is the And I'm asking you to,
you know, assign motive. And I realize that's hard. You're
not inside his brain. But what are your thoughts on that?
Speaker 2 (06:16):
I think they think politically first instead of legitimately. How
do we run a state government? What do we do
in our emergency right? I mean, I don't know why
his staff isn't going to him in saying governor, here's
the plan. You know, I mean think about after like
the Marshall fire, or the floods that we had in
twenty thirteen, or when tornadoes hit, or even for goodness sakes,
(06:39):
when we've had those snowstorms out on the Eastern plains
and cattle were stranded out and build because of all
the snow in the wind. I mean, we figured out
how to get food to the cows, using the National Guard,
using our emergency operations plan. This is why we have
an emergency operations plan and why we have a disaster
emergency fund in this state. And I don't know why
(07:01):
his staff isn't telling them. Maybe they are. I don't
know why he's doing this, but to step up and say, well,
you know, because of test payer Bill of rice and
because of you know, the billion dollars hit from that
big bill, you know, we're this is this is all
we can do. That's wrong. That is wrong. That is
not all we can do. We should treat this as
(07:22):
we would treat any other emergency. And he's just missing it.
I don't I don't know why. I don't want to
assume that there's ill intention here. I mean, we've gone
through all the political stuff for the last six months
on this, or since July fourth, on all of this stuff,
and I don't know why. But I do know what
he should be doing. And this is what we should
be doing in this state. And we should have a plan,
(07:43):
and we should involve the right people so that we
can provide for people to have the ability to feed
their families, to you know, low income folks to be
able to feed their families and not have a food
security issue on top of all the other issues we
have in this state.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
Aim into that. I just got this text message a moment.
Maybe Mandy, maybe Colorado or Denver could use the E
vehicle rebate money for food banks instead of rebates for
rich people.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
Well, there you go. I mean, there's also just things
that we could be looking at, but quite frankly, we
have an emergency operating plane. All of these departments have
different emergency support functions within that plan. They should know
what they were doing. I don't know why he's not
getting good advice, or maybe he is and he's just
not listening to it. I don't know, but I do
know this is what we should be doing, and we
(08:31):
know we can't keep blaming everybody else. We need to
have solutions here, and this is what's expected of a governor.
It would be nice stop blaming everybody if it.
Speaker 1 (08:41):
Was solutions first. Politics.
Speaker 2 (08:43):
Second.
Speaker 1 (08:43):
Senator Barb Kirkmeyer, state senator and gubernatorial candidate who sounds
like she would know what to do in this situation.
I'm just saying, Bart, I appreciate your time today as always,
Let's check in on the common Spirit health topline with
Senator Barb Kirkmeyers. She's popping in because we know that
we're going to be hit here in Colorado. This is
one of the reasons that I started the show urging
you to please donate to a food bank because SNAP
benefits are not coming because Congress can't get their act together.
And i'd like to welcome Senator Barb Kirkmeyer to the show. Hi, Barb,
(00:22):
how are you good?
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Thanks for having me on. I appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (00:26):
So what does this mean at the state level, Barb? Like,
what what does this mean in your view that SNAP
benefits are not coming in in November?
Speaker 2 (00:35):
Well, again, as you've already stated, and it's it's not
Congress this time, it's actually our two US senators, both Democrats,
Senator Bennett and Hick and Looper are they're just carelessly
gambling with people's lives and their ability to feed their families.
And then we have a governor who doesn't use the
tools that are out there that he should be using, saying, ah,
this is you know, we're gonna have an issue here
(00:56):
because of Tabor. Seriously, this is an emergency and instead
of coming to the Joint Budget Committee and saying, gush,
I need ten million dollars to give for you know,
to make sure that people have access to food because
they've shut down, the Democrats have shut down the federal government.
He should be looking at his emergency management protocols. We
(01:18):
have an emergency operations plan to deal with emergencies, and
that's what he should be looking at. And we should
be looking at our disaster Emergency fund and actually figuring
out how to provide for these benefits food for people
that they can get it onto their table.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
I think it's very very interesting that you started out
talking about Senators hicking Looper and Bennett because the reality
is they do have the power. You know, we need
five more senators to vote to move this thing along
to get it done. And I have to say barbed,
you know, and the Republican Party for the last I
don't even know how many years, because I mean, I
(01:55):
feel like we have a shutdown every five minutes now,
and I just I don't even care anymore. That being said,
I've never seen them be so firm about sticking with
what they're doing now and refusing to capitulate to these
kind of threats by the Democratic Party, and I'm kind
of proud of them a little bit because they're not
(02:17):
doing something crazy. They're asking Democrats to vote on something
that they voted on in March. I mean, it wasn't
that long ago. My frustration is that they won't do
it through regular order. But that's a whole other conversation
for another place. So tapping into the emergency benefits, I.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
Agree, what would that look like?
Speaker 1 (02:33):
I mean, what how does that process go?
Speaker 2 (02:36):
So here's the thing. The governor goes out and just
announces we're going to you know, we're going to do
ten million dollars. Next week, the Joint Budget Committee is
meeting because they're like, well, we got to do a
supplemental and we need ten million dollars a general fund
to try and feel you know, what is a program
that's costing one hundred and twenty million dollars in benefits
on a monthly basis. So you know, he's coming up
(02:58):
and saying, look, I'm going to put about eight percent
into it. I'm going to overwhelm the food banks and
food pantries in our state. You know, he didn't have
a discussion with all the food pantries and so the
food banks. And he's just gone about this the totally
the wrong way. There is no plan here, and he's
just gonna make matters worse. I mean, what's gonna happen
when people go to a food panty or a food
(03:19):
bank because Polus told him that's where they should go
and there is no food there? There is going to
be enough, right And the whole thing about donations, and
I think it's wonderful that people want to donate funds
and donate canda items and food and that type of
thing that I can tell you after managing our Hurricane
(03:39):
Katrina operation for the state of Colorado back in what
was that two thousand and five, two thousand and six,
somewhere in there, you know, I can tell you that
donation management becomes a disaster all in its own because
people just start dropping off all sorts of things. What
are you supposed to do with all of that? So
what should be occurring here is this. We have what
(04:00):
is called the Disaster Emergency Fund and it actually has
about somewhere between you know, somewhere around two hundred and
seventy million dollars in it as of September thirtieth. Now,
I'm sure there are some other bills there because of
the flooding that occurred in Laplata. But this is a
fund that we have in place that the governor can
tap into. He doesn't need to ask for a supplemental.
He can tap into this simply by declaring an emergency.
(04:23):
And if not having enough food to feed six hundred
thousand people in our state is an emergency, I'm not
sure what would be. So he needs to declare an
emergency and what he should be doing right now, And
he doesn't even have to declare that emergency right now.
He can declare that if we find out we're not
going to be able to get the government running again,
if Bennett Hickolob don't do their job and actually get
(04:44):
government running again. So what should be occurring right now
is they should be putting a plan in place, and
he should be pulling in his departments of Education, his
Department of Human Services, his Department of Health, probably the
Department of Agriculture, in any other of our state's apartment
that have food programs in their departments. You should be
pulling them in. We should be pulling in the faith
(05:05):
based community. We should be pulling in Salvation Army, Red Cross,
other non governmental organizations and other government organ or non
governmental organizations are volunteer groups that work through the Emergency
Operations Plan that help out in emergencies and put together
what is called an Emergency and Incident Management plan and
(05:25):
put the plan together. And they should be talking to counties.
They counties can be doing this at the county level,
and the state can help by providing resources through the
Disaster Emergency Fund, which again somewhere up to two hundred
and seventy million dollars in it as of September thirtieth.
That what should be occurring here. This governor has totally
missed the boat and he's going to make things even
(05:46):
worse by saying if I'm going to try and fill
this gap with ten million dollars, and oh, by the way,
it's because we have Tabor. Get over it. We've had
Dabor for thirty years. It's time to actually govern and
be a governor that's going to do right by the
people of this state.
Speaker 1 (06:01):
So do you think he's not doing that just to
what could score some kind of political points or attack
Tabor or what is the And I'm asking you to,
you know, assign motive. And I realize that's hard. You're
not inside his brain. But what are your thoughts on that?
Speaker 2 (06:16):
I think they think politically first instead of legitimately. How
do we run a state government? What do we do
in our emergency right? I mean, I don't know why
his staff isn't going to him in saying governor, here's
the plan. You know, I mean think about after like
the Marshall fire, or the floods that we had in
twenty thirteen, or when tornadoes hit, or even for goodness sakes,
(06:39):
when we've had those snowstorms out on the Eastern plains
and cattle were stranded out and build because of all
the snow in the wind. I mean, we figured out
how to get food to the cows, using the National Guard,
using our emergency operations plan. This is why we have
an emergency operations plan and why we have a disaster
emergency fund in this state. And I don't know why
(07:01):
his staff isn't telling them. Maybe they are. I don't
know why he's doing this, but to step up and say, well,
you know, because of test payer Bill of rice and
because of you know, the billion dollars hit from that
big bill, you know, we're this is this is all
we can do. That's wrong. That is wrong. That is
not all we can do. We should treat this as
(07:22):
we would treat any other emergency. And he's just missing it.
I don't I don't know why. I don't want to
assume that there's ill intention here. I mean, we've gone
through all the political stuff for the last six months
on this, or since July fourth, on all of this stuff,
and I don't know why. But I do know what
he should be doing. And this is what we should
be doing in this state. And we should have a plan,
(07:43):
and we should involve the right people so that we
can provide for people to have the ability to feed
their families, to you know, low income folks to be
able to feed their families and not have a food
security issue on top of all the other issues we
have in this state.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
Aim into that. I just got this text message a moment.
Maybe Mandy, maybe Colorado or Denver could use the E
vehicle rebate money for food banks instead of rebates for
rich people.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
Well, there you go. I mean, there's also just things
that we could be looking at, but quite frankly, we
have an emergency operating plane. All of these departments have
different emergency support functions within that plan. They should know
what they were doing. I don't know why he's not
getting good advice, or maybe he is and he's just
not listening to it. I don't know, but I do
know this is what we should be doing, and we
(08:31):
know we can't keep blaming everybody else. We need to
have solutions here, and this is what's expected of a governor.
It would be nice stop blaming everybody if it.
Speaker 1 (08:41):
Was solutions first. Politics.
Speaker 2 (08:43):
Second.
Speaker 1 (08:43):
Senator Barb Kirkmeyer, state senator and gubernatorial candidate who sounds
like she would know what to do in this situation.
I'm just saying, Bart, I appreciate your time today as always,
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