Local Leaders: The Candidates #5 | Denver Ballard - Denham Springs City Council

0:00 Hey everyone and welcome back to Local Leaders, the podcast, and we are continuing, I guess you could say, our series on introducing you to the candidates. We have another one of those on the show today. He is running for Denham Springs City Council, so we want to welcome Denver Blake Ballard to the show. So welcome to the show. Hey, I'm glad to be here. Well, we're fired up to have you here and Denver, do you want me to call you Denver or Blake? Or it doesn't matter. It really doesn't matter. I like Denver. I'm rolling with Denver nowadays. That's the government name. There you go. That's why I tell everybody my real name is James. And I tell people the only people that call me James are my wife or my mother, and it's usually they're both mad at me.

0:47 That's crazy, Jim. I thought your full name was Jimothy. Yeah, Jimothy. Only Kelly Jennings calls me that. Well, I'm glad you came on the show so we can learn more about your campaign, what your plans are, should you be elected. And I think it's best to start off and let people know a little bit more about you. So tell me a little bit about where you were born and raised. Kind of take me through your life a little bit and what you do now. Absolutely. So I'm 34 years old, born and raised here in Denham Springs. I grew up on Amy Street. Oh, yeah. Decided to buy a house on Rodeo 1 Street over a little over four years ago. So I am Denham Springs through and through. I graduated from Denham Springs High School in 2009.

1:32 Go Jackets. Go Jackets. Got me a yellow jacket right there on the wall. I love it. When I walked in, it was the first thing I noticed. First thing I noticed. You know, when you're an alumni, things like that just kind of stick with you. But graduated high school. And then I'd love to tell you that it was a beautiful story of me going to college and being just this successful businessman. But it wasn't. It was young, dumb, stupid. We've all been there. We're going to refer to me as Blake in the bad times. We can get there. But I went through some issues and things like that and had to grow up. I had to grow up, and it was the best thing that could have happened to me. From that moment, I decided, you know what, I made a mistake in life, but I'm not going to let that define me. And I went and I joined the volunteer fire department, and I was like, wow, this is really cool. This is an opportunity to give back.

2:20 And I ended up going through rookie school in 2011. I graduated in October, and I became a fully certified firefighter without a job. Yeah, there you go. I was a volunteer and went to work for Citi. Okay. Citi of Denham Springs Fire Department hired me in 2011. That was my first full-time firefighting job. And so that was my first opportunity to serve the citizens of Denham Springs. Yeah, very good. And I tell all the firefighters, I've had several on my show throughout the years, and I tell people, you know, law enforcement and firefighters are different breed. First of all, firefighters run to what I run from. I mean, I'm running out of a house if it's on fire, uh, Blake is going, Denver is going to run in a house if it's on fire. And that's kind of the difference between human beings, you know? And so that's a very heroic thing that shows me that you don't have a lot of fear when it comes to your fellow man and you're going to do what you have to do to help them. So much respect for that and your decision to join. How was it?

3:24 Was it tough to Oh, man. Tough training? I'm not going to say it was a cakewalk by any means. To be honest, when I was going through rookie school, it was night classes at District 5. And so what I would do is I would go to class, get out of class at 9, 10 o'clock, and then I would haul butt over to Arlington Lakes Toss Center, a mental health facility. I was a mental health tech overnight. So what I would do is I would study there. We had a walking track outside of the St. Clair Center, so I would run laps and try to stay in shape so that I could make sure that I could do everything. So it was tough. It was very, very tough. I've heard that. Especially doing it while still working full-time, right? Not going through a school at a department that you're working at.

4:04 So it was a challenge, but it's a challenge that I would do again today. Absolutely. And in the job you're running in, and we'll touch on this a little bit, or running for, we'll touch on this a little bit later, but there are some situations that come up on the city council that relate to like fire. And I know one recently that related to something that will be right up your wheelhouse when it comes to that. But you have some other experience as well. You've also been in planning and zoning. Absolutely. So I'll take this time to shout out Mayor Gerard Landry. Yeah. Even though he's retiring and leaving us, he's still definitely leaving a mark on this city. And the mayor appointed me to the Planning and Zoning Commission because he knew that I had intentions one day to be a part of this city as a public servant. Mm-hmm.

4:52 And I'm so grateful that he did. It was a very controversial time on planning and zoning. Sure. A lot of people will remember the neighborhood proposition on Hatchell Lane. It was going to be one road in, cul-de-sac, I believe 13 homes, one way in, one way out. And it caused a lot of issues. Sure. And I think this is where it kind of came down to, as a public servant, what is my job? Yeah. Right? Because you look at things like the Euclid Law that say public health and safety is Always have to take the front seat. Everything else takes a back seat. But at the same time, when the law says, hey, you have to do this, this, and this to build this.

5:33 You do this, this, and this. Where do I stand as the governing authority to say yes or no? Right. And to me, what that boiled down to was, unfortunately, as a person, I want to say no. Yeah. Because I know what it's like to try to turn off a Jason drive on the Asheville lane, right? Sure. But as an official who is the advisory for a set of rules that the council has put into place, it's not my job to say whether the rule is right or wrong. It's my job to say whether or not you met the rule. That's right. And so I think planning and zoning did something for me that nothing else could have done. And it made me realize that, hey, it's not about me. It's about who I represent. But it's also both sides of the representation as well, not just the loud side.

6:17 That's right. That's a great way to put it. And shout out to Mayor Gerard Landry. Fun fact, has appeared on more episodes of Local Leaders than anybody else. Really? Yeah, with four. He has four. Last time he was on, I looked up that stat, and I'm like, you know, you've been on here more times than any other person. And I'm sure he wasn't happy about that. He's like, you must have been desperate, I think he said, or something like that. No, he's a great guest, and we'll sure miss him there. Now, back to you. You're running for a seat. that Denver will be, the majority of that seat is going to be brand new. Only two incumbents are running and they're not in the seat yet, right?

7:00 So at minimum, even if you assume those two will be back in their seats, you're going to have the majority be brand new. So you have five total at-large seats, only two incumbents are running. So at minimum, you're going to have three people that are brand new. You could end up with five people brand new. We don't know. You know, it all hinges on how the voting turns out. In addition to that, you're going to have a brand new mayor. That's undoubtable because Gerard Landry is not running in this election. He's going to go enjoy retirement. So all of that being considered as a business owner in this city. It makes me a little bit nervous because experience to me is important. I'm glad to see that you have some experience being in planning and zoning, which is a lot of what y'all do. Um, and some other people that are running are going to be new to the council, but they have a little bit of experience with government. What do you think about that though? How, how are you, how is that going to work?

8:08 I think that you are well within your rights to be nervous. I think that we should all be nervous. But it goes back to when I was fighting fire, people always say, you know, you can't, you can't be afraid of it. You can't be afraid of it. You can't be afraid of it. That's not true. You have to be afraid of it just enough to respect it. Right. And I think that that's the approach that we have to take here. We have to be cautious because we are getting a completely new government basically, right. Or completely new rulers of that government. Sure. But we also have to be open-minded, respect what's going on and know that, Hey, bringing some new faces in doesn't mean that we're going to erase the past. Yeah. That's, that's never the intention. That's never the goal. And it, it also can never be right. Right. But it means that we're going to embrace what those people have done.

8:55 And we're going to take that to the next level. We're just kind of, kind of bring some new ideas and new thoughts and new processes and maybe some ways to be a little bit more efficient. Maybe some ways that bring us to 2026 a little bit. It doesn't mean that we were doing anything wrong. It just, It allows us with a new group of people to be intentional about where we want to be for the next 5, 10, and 15 years. Yeah, I agree with that. And do you feel like you're being left in a pretty good position as far as the city? Oh, my gosh. What Gerard has done, especially after the flood, and him being a businessman and his background, you talk about background, what comes in. For him, he had planning and zoning commission experience. but he ran grocery stores all over.

9:40 You know that. And I think that that business management mindset has us in probably the best state that the city has been when it comes to finances and paper and logistics. And so I think that we're honestly, we're being handed a gift. And it's very, very important that we don't just rip all the paper off and look for what's inside. It's very important that we figure out how we're going to deliver that, how we're going to make sure that it stays intact, and how we're going to get to that end goal. Because the goal is to open the gift one day, right? Yeah. But when you're in politics, in my opinion, it's not your job to open the gift. It's your job to prepare the gift for the future. Yeah, that's a great way to put that. Great analogy. You got some good analogies with you, Denver. Let me ask you another question. Now, your family is no stranger to city leadership. You actually have a grandfather that was an alderman for the city many years ago. Is that correct?

10:34 That is correct. When Popal passed away, he left me his certificate from Governor McKithen. Oh, wow. And it hangs behind my desk every single day right above his lifetime service award. My goal one day is not to replace that certificate. It's to hang mine next to it. Yeah, very cool. But the coolest part about campaigning has been not Pawpaw as the alderman or Pawpaw as the city clerk or Pawpaw as the school board member, because those are all roles that he held. It was Pawpaw as the teacher. Yeah, really. I've talked to so many people, and I'm telling you, every one of them says, I was the Worst kid Mr. D.C. had, and he still made me something. I even told one at the game Friday night, and I said, you know, every person has told me they're the worst. And he looked at me dead in the eyes and said, no, I promise. I was the worst. But those are the stories that I'm hearing about Paul Paul. That's awesome. Paul Paul served. Dad retired 31 years from the city, six as a police officer and 24 as a fireman. Mom spent time on the sheriff's office as a dispatcher working in the jail. She was also a paraprofessional. Yeah. Uncle Jimmy retired a police officer, and Brenda retired a teacher.

11:42 I don't say that to say that all of these people made me or are going to make me good at this job, right? I say that to say that I've been raised around public service. It's all I know. I don't know the process like you were talking about to run away. Yeah. Because I was raised around people that always ran towards. Right. Very good. Very good. Now, I'm going to ask you kind of a compound question here, and we'll take the first one. So you personally, what do you see as maybe issues you'd like to work on should you be elected to the city council? I think the first and foremost is a very complex question.

12:24 So I'm going to go with the easy stuff first. Obviously, infrastructure, traffic, drainage, these are all things that we can all talk about. And they're all things that we have to talk about. And to be fair, going around talking to folks, that's what they want to talk about. Yeah. What I want to talk about is the bigger picture. What encapsulates all of those things? So Louisiana Revised Statute 22, I believe 320, states that all municipalities must be required to have a master plan. We have what we call Denim Strong. It was something that was put together post-flood, and it's fantastic. It was the public's input on where we want to be. That's what a master plan is, but it brings everything together.

13:06 A lot of what a master plan entails is, We have in pieces around the city. We have the zoning codes. Rick Foster has done a great job of putting all of that together. But a master plan brings everything into one picture so that let's just say this big development, you know what, I'll go ahead and kick the hornet's nest. Let's say a data center sees Denham Springs and says, man, I see that spot right there and I want to be there. They're going to look at our master plan and go, yep, they're not rezoning for industrial. They're not doing it. They've already said that this section of land is exactly what they want it to be. Maybe it's a green space. Maybe it's a grocery store. Maybe it's an apartment complex. Obviously, don't quote me on any of that.

13:48 All of that can be inflammatory. But it's just getting the people's feedback and being intentional about where we want to go. So to me, the biggest thing that we need to do is we need to get a master plan in place. And again, unfortunately, we won't reap the benefits of that master plan. Yeah. Yeah. But my eight-year-old could see the benefits of that master plan. That's right. That's right. And, you know, I've looked through the Denim Strong plan. It's pretty cool. They've got things like suggestions for sidewalks throughout the city and busing system throughout the city and some things I'm like, wow, this would be a great idea. Of course, you have to pay for all those things. And so you've got to find funding a lot of times.

14:32 That's the hard part. But, you know, really– That was a plan of what could be if everything went perfectly. And so I encourage anybody to check out the Denim Strong plan. It is posted on the City of Denim Springs website. But yes, I would like to see a comprehensive master plan in place, something that can be used as a guide for any city official. that's an elected official to shoot for because that's what the people want. I think it protects us too. I think so too. I think that that's, that's our protection. It's not saying that because the Louisiana revised statute says we should have one and we don't, that we're in the wrong. We're not, we're not saying that the city is operating crazy. Right.

15:15 What we're saying is, is we don't have that protection. It's like we were talking about earlier with, with a bank. If a bank calls you and says, Hey, Something looks off. We think you should change your numbers, right? And you say no. Well, they're going to say, well, the liability's on you. To me, that master plan, that's our federal protection, right? That's our state coming in and saying, hey, no, you know what? Denham Springs did everything they were supposed to do. You don't get to argue. This is what the master plan says. Right. True. And, you know, we talk about that. And Denham Springs is not a huge city. It is highly populated. And I would say in Livingston Parish, it is your strongest city relative to tax dollars. But I think it's only like 3.7 square miles. 7.4 square miles. Is it 7.4?

15:59 Okay. Ooh, Jordan Landry is going to kill me for not knowing that. He says it to me every time he comes in here. Here's the kicker, though. And I know this. Back when I was on the fire department, I'm sure things have changed since then. Mm-hmm. There were over a thousand businesses inside this 7.4 square miles. Our daytime population is extraordinary. Well, that's right. And that kind of leads me to my point is that, you know, Denham Springs, you almost can't fit anything in the city anymore. Do you think there's going to be a time where we have more and more areas that are technically outside of the city now annexed into the city?

16:41 I definitely think it's a possibility. I know that annexation has been a hot topic for my entire life. There was a time in the city council meeting where someone wanted to annex Jubin Road, and the comment was made, are you trying to get the tax dollars from the cows? Of course. I would love for us to play those minutes on repeat right now, okay? That being said. Not for the gals now, though. Exactly. Yeah, the cash cows. Somebody needs something. And that's where looking to the future matters. Yeah. Right? And so I do agree with responsible annexation, but I don't agree with annexation to the point that I can get on here and go, yep, we need to take the back of Jason Drive because that makes sense. Because you know what? To you and I, it does make sense.

17:25 It's completely surrounded by the city. Maybe it doesn't make sense to the people that live there. That's right. And they should have a say in that. They should. And maybe it doesn't make sense to the city budget, too. What does it do to the city to bring in another 400 residents? Seems like it would cost them money. Exactly. Without any business tax dollars. So annexation, yes, I'm 100% for, but we have to be responsible. You know, it's interesting. I live literally, if you look at the city of Denham Springs map, my street is where it ends. It's like they knew I was moving there or something. But it ends right there. That being said, when I pay my water bill, I pay it to the city of Denham Springs. And that's been kind of a hot topic because I have heard, I don't remember which city council person said it. And I'm not I'm not criticizing them, but I was watching a meeting online and this particular councilman had said, well, we want to take care of the people that are inside the city limits first. And I'm like, hold up. I write a check to City of Denham Springs every month for my water bill. And if I'm having a problem, it doesn't mean you put me on the back burner because I'm not technically in the city limits as it relates to my water. Yeah. Or, or, or a sewer issue that I'm having. I'm still a paying customer. I'm just happened to be outside of city limits, but I'm still paying city of Denham spring. So, uh, I'm really glad those

18:57 are situations. Some people have, I'm. Really glad you said that. Cause I think that's where it becomes so important that the city does not sit on an Island. Yeah. We are in a parish. We are surrounded by other municipalities and governments. We are surrounded by different agencies and institutions that we need to have a really good relationship, working relationship with. It's something as simple as I talked to a resident a few weeks ago in Sarah Estates off of Hatchell. They're having an issue that I know for a fact has been there for at least four years because I almost bought the same house that I was at. And half the backyard is now gone. I contacted Wesley Kennebrew, Gravity Drainage number one. I was like, hey, I don't know what this means. Right. I just know it's a problem. And he was able to point me in the direction of the different agencies and say, hey, this is the part that I can do, but I'm going to contact this agency and they can do that.

19:48 That's where the key comes in. is, yeah, you live outside the city, but you pay the city. Right. But we have to have those relationships that it doesn't matter where you're at or what your situation is in the city. The city is not going to have every person that you could possibly need on staff. Right. That's not possible. Yeah. But we should be able to have those resources. We should be able to connect the dots for you as a city. So that when you do have an issue, we can say, yep, you don't live in this city, but that is our issue. That's our water system. I agree with that. And that kind of leads me into my next question, which is, look, I think you have definitely the best campaign slogan of any candidate this year. I always give one an award. So you get the award.

20:30 And that is just me saying it on the show. One denim. I love it. Perfect, perfect campaign slogan there. But what does that mean? What does that mean? Thank you for asking. That means white, black, red, yellow, Democrat, Republican, no party, independent, libertarian, Christian, non-Christian. It means one Denham. It means that in Denham Springs, we know that when tragedy happens, everybody comes together, right? Yep. So why don't we live that every single day? Why do we let things that don't really matter get in the way? Because guess what? If you polled all of the people in Denham Springs, and I can say this for a fact because we've been walking the neighborhoods, everybody wants the same thing.

21:18 Yeah. Everybody wants the same thing. So, yeah, maybe we disagree on how to get there. And that's where these different parties, these different cultures, different backgrounds come in. But if we all want the same thing, then we should all be able to sit at the same dadgum table and and have one idea of how we're going to, how we're going to do it. Right. And that's what one denim is. It's, it's stop arguing back and forth. Stop thinking this person is not going to agree with me because they've got a different letter behind their name or because they live in a different neighborhood than me. How about we're both denim Springs and maybe we want the same thing. Yeah. That's one denim. I like it. I like it. And I would like to see that, uh, come to fruition. Wouldn't it be awesome? It really would. Um, Now, the biggest lesson in politics, in my view, is that an elected official, when they get elected, is there to represent the people, the majority of the people that voted them into office. Even if your own personal view may differ, it's my personal opinion, this is where a lot of elected officials kind of fall short. They... have thoughts and processes in their head and they go walking around these neighborhoods and they hear the concerns and what the people that are voting them into office have as concerns. And maybe they have a different opinion or a different concern. I've always been of the belief that it's your responsibility to vote with the majority, even if you may not agree with the majority who puts you in office. Do you agree or disagree with that?

22:50 I actually 100% agree because we are an elected official. Right. Like you're elected by the people. You're there for the people. You have to listen to the people. There's one thing that I've done in this campaign. It's probably different than most folks. You'll see. I don't, I don't have the cutouts. I don't have the handouts. I have business cards. Yeah. They say why I'm running and they have my phone number on them. That is my personal number. And that means something to me. It means that if, and when I'm honored to be able to serve on this city council, I want you to know that as my constituent, you have my phone number. So that if at a point you think that I'm not doing what you elected me to do, you should tell me. Yeah. Now, does it mean that we're always going to agree? No. Right. I walked into someone's house two weekends ago and, you know what, I'm just going to go ahead and address it. They said, I don't want Scotlandville here. Don't let those people move in here.

23:42 Yeah. And I said, listen to me for a second. Your hate is misdirected. Yeah. I said, you don't want bad neighbors. Yeah. Some black people. It's not a neighborhood. It's not a culture. It's not a community. Your hate is misdirected. I said, I don't want somebody throwing parties, doing drugs, acting a fool next door to me. I don't care what color they are. I don't care what God they serve. I don't care who they call father. You know what I'm saying? That doesn't matter. You just don't want bad people. I said, and this goes back to one denim. It's not about, I don't want Scotlandville here. In fact, I reminded him. Politely, if you've been to Scotlandville lately, it's actually been cleaned up a good bit.

24:25 Right. But it's about all of us coming together and having the idea of what we want and seeing that to fruition. Yeah. It's not about separation or segregation. I know I keep going back to one denim, but it's hard not to. Yeah. No, I agree with that completely. But I guess I kind of got misdirected there, but I say that to say that it is about always being for your constituents. Yeah. But sometimes it might be taking your position and the experience that you have and explaining to them that, hey, we may differ here, but this is why. And you never know. They may convince you otherwise, and you may convince them otherwise. And either way, you've done the right thing. That's right. That's right. And you have a guideline. You have rules and procedures. And you have these amendments and all of these things that you have to follow. And sometimes that may not at the time, line up with what the people want. And that's when you have to bring things back for a vote and, you know, maybe, and say, okay, we'll put it on a ballot. And the majority rules and whatever they say is what we're going to go with. And you can handle those on a case-by-case basis. So with all of that in mind, you've spent a lot of time, I follow your Facebook, you spend a lot of time walking the campaign trail of really getting your boots on the ground as far as talking to people, knocking on doors and things like that.

25:54 How has that been for you? And what is it you're hearing that the people would like to see for Dem Springs? Honestly, it's the best part of campaigning. I love people. I'm a people person. I don't mind going to all of these events and shaking hands and speaking and handing out business cards and seeing people at games. And all of that is fine. That's part of the process, right? But when you sit down and you talk to somebody that your grandfather taught or you talk to somebody that's been here for 60 years or you talk to someone who just moved in the last few years and didn't even know you had a separate mayor from the parish president because that happened. Yeah. Those are the conversations that make this all worth it. Those are the conversations where, wow, I talked to this person today and they know more now than they did when we started. And maybe I know more, too, because we had a conversation. I've learned so much from people throughout this trail. You want to know what's coming up? You can guess it. I guarantee you. Infrastructure, drainage, traffic, schools.

26:59 School has been a big thing. We have one of the best schools in the state. We have the largest high school in the state. That's right. People want to know why we don't have multiple schools. Yeah. That's not my answer. It's not for me to answer. Please know that I'm not taking a platform on that. These are the type of conversations that people are having. You get You can talk to someone on this side of town or on this side of town, and you're going to find the same centralized points. And it's the conversations like I'm having. We're not going to be able to fix today. What we can hope for is that our kids and our grandkids will be able to see to fruition what we're working on today. We know that these are problems. We know that we have to fix drainage and infrastructure. But let's be real. The 2016 flood was going to happen, whether it happened or not.

27:45 It's going to flood everywhere. I mean, unless you're living on a hill, that's a mile high, you know what I mean? Like that was going to, that was a situation that happens every thousand years and hopefully, and you don't see that very often, but. But look at that and take example. We talked about Gerard Landry. I don't think people realize that FEMA uses what the city did after the flood as a standard to, or other municipalities across the country. We are the standard because of the way things were handled after that. So again, I'm not coming in here thinking that we're broken by any means. We just have to maintain and prepare for the future.

28:28 Look, I say it all the time on this show. And, uh, uh, you know, I was chest deep in it literally for the flood. And, um, it, You know, one thing I say about the people in Livingston Parish, not just the city of Denham Springs, throughout the entire parish is we will fight with each other more than anybody else. But we will get each other's back quicker than anybody else. Absolutely. We'll fight against you. We're like siblings. You know, we'll fight each other. Brothers fight all the time and brothers and sisters. And we'll do that. But you know what? Somebody else messes with you. We got your back. And that's what I saw in that flood. So many people did so many things to make this city and this parish come back after that flood. I remember a time sitting there looking at water just down neighborhoods, standing on 16 stranded and thinking, we are done. I mean, everything is gone. And I snapped out after about 30 seconds of thinking that way and saying, no, we're too strong of people to let this destroy us. And there was a lot of leadership at that time that did a lot of great things. You mentioned the schools. I mean, almost all the schools flooded. We had school two weeks later.

29:51 I mean, wrap your mind around that. That took a lot of people doing a lot of things and not getting any sleep to get that done. I get real passionate about it. Because I went through it. And those of us that went through it will never forget it. It speaks to the people. It really does. And we're just a different breed here. I believe that. And so we touched on this earlier, but there's a huge transition, right, for the city and the council, the city council specifically. And, of course, you're going to have a new mayor soon. And you have a pretty major project, and I'll give George Landry's flowers again on this one. Absolutely. A hotel conference center that has been needed by the people.

30:34 You want to talk about what the people have been saying for years is we need a conference center. Every time you would ask what's the number one thing you need, the Livingston Parish Chamber of Commerce would put out that question every year. And that got more answers than anything else. We need a conference center. Why? Because we have dance recitals here that we were having to hold in a gymnasium or band, you know, look, All my kids were in band and the gym was great to sit and listen to a band. But the sound is horrible in a gym. Oh, my gosh. It's not made for that. It's made for basketball. And so, you know, I always dreamed of a place where people could go and the acoustics would be great and it would sound beautiful. And we are finally making that come to fruition. Not only that, we're getting a pretty high end Hilton Hotel here that's going to be connected to this to this new center.

31:31 And it's going to create infrastructure around it that would have been difficult to pay for any other way. So that's going to facilitate more business, more tax dollars. That's right. More money for the city. That's right. And so are you as excited about that as I am? I cannot. I mean, the first time I saw the mock-up in Gerard's office, the same one he gave you a copy of, I about jumped out of my shoes. I told you earlier, when I was in junior high, Gary White was a band director out of Texas. He came over here to direct our parish honor band. And he made it very clear that it was absolutely disgusting that after all of these years that Livingston Parish still was holding band concerts and cafeterias and gymnasiums. And that was when I was in junior high. Yeah. Y'all, junior high.

32:19 We're talking 9-11, Twin Towers, and we're still having the same conversation. Right. So when I tell you I'm excited, I'm excited. This is amazing. All I'm thinking is the people that come in from out of town that come here, being able to go there, being able to utilize those conference centers when we do have some big event that comes in. And the hotel is already attached to it. And then, like you said, the infrastructure that's being brought around it. Y'all, it's just so exciting. It really is. And it really speaks to me about the forward thinking that is required in positions like the city council and the mayor position. For people that don't know the story, this original gentleman that is building this, he went to the mayor's office and he basically said, you know, I got all this land over there off rushing and I don't have anything that I can do with it. And I'm paying taxes on this thing every year and I really don't want it anymore. And so I'll just give it to you. And he's telling the mayor, if you want it, I'll give it to you. And that way, he doesn't have to pay taxes on it anymore. Maybe the city can use it for green space or something.

33:30 And the mayor, in his wisdom, looked at him or spoke to him on the phone. And he said, look, why don't we both make money on this? I need something. I need a conference center. And this guy was in the hotel business, owns 60 Hilton hotels. I need a conference center. You need something that's going to turn some money over for you. So why don't we both make money? And you build me a conference center and a hotel and you get all the revenue off of that. And I get all the tax dollars off of that. And, you know, that is what a city council and a mayor are. They are salesperson for the city at their core. And negotiating for the city. That's right. Because you don't function without tax dollars coming in.

34:15 Everything you do is based off of tax dollars. And the last thing you want to do is take tax dollars from your people. So how do you subvert that? Well, you build business to where you don't have to rely on the tax dollars from the people. And that's what was done here. Look how quickly Bass Pro paid off. Absolutely. Paid that TIF off early. Very early. And it's paying off now. It's a big part. As a matter of fact, Bass Pro is like top three in business generating tax dollars in the city. Walmart's in there. Home Depot. I think the All-Star... the all-star automotive group was, was way up there. So you're people sometimes, you know, don't like big business and look, I'm one of them. I, it's not that I don't like them. I just don't, don't think they need help on my show. So you're not going to see a Walmart executive on here, but they're needed for the tax dollars they generate because they're putting, they're investing millions and millions of dollars in this city. So, Fun fact, another fun fact from the city. You may already know this, but I'm going to test you on it.

35:22 What do you think the tallest building in Denham Springs is? Oh. It's a tough one. It's going to surprise you if you don't already know the answer. It's the Bass Pro? Nope. It is the storage center. Right there on rushing. All right. In my defense, I went to my archives from being a firefighter, and that building was not there when I was a firefighter, okay? I can tell you the tallest building that I have stood on in the city is Bass Pro. But, you know, I want a building taller that's not a storage center, and that's nothing against storage centers. Nothing against the storage center, but I hate it. I hate it. I'm sorry. It's an eyesore.

36:05 Yeah, it's a weird thing to have on the corner anyway. But the plus to that is the hotel is probably going to be the tallest now. So we can say we've got a Hilton Hotel. That's the tallest. Look, back in 2012 when I was on the fire department, there was plans over by Bass Pro for the same type of deal. It was going to be a Holiday Inn. Yeah. And it was going to be the tallest building in the city, and it was going to have a conference center. And I don't even want to imagine what happened and why that didn't happen. But I know we were terrified as firemen here in the city because– We train enough on the hotels. Yeah. But, you know, high-rise is a whole different animal. It really is. It really is. But I found that interesting when I found that out. I'm like, yeah, I would have never thought that was the tallest. So we need something taller than a storage center. I love storage centers.

36:50 I'm not hating. If the guy's listening. I'm not meeting on the storage center, okay? I'm meeting on the location of the storage center. That's right. That's right. Let's talk agendas real quick. Let's talk about what y'all do when you're on the city council. Because me and Denver talked a little bit off show, and I'm like, not everybody is political nerds like us. That's true. And enjoy watching council meetings and stuff. And you've been going to quite a few. I go to some in person from time to time. A lot of mine gets done on YouTube. Same. Because, you know, people's lives are busy, right? And so I'm glad that they have an option there. One thing I would really like to see continue is the Facebook stuff where they've been posting meetings live. I think that's very important. We have the technology here, folks, nowadays that They need to make it as easy as possible, meaning government, no matter where it is, for you to intake whatever it is, whether it's a council meeting or parish council meeting or whatever. You should be able to see that at your leisure.

37:53 Not just see it, not just intake it, but to understand it. And you can only understand it if you watch it. I mean, if you're following it. So a couple of things, we'll just kind of go over some agendas you've had in the last two weeks so people can understand what it is y'all exactly do. So I pulled one from September 23rd and one from September 3rd. So the last fiscal month, one of the things that you did was a proclamation recognizing National Service Dog Month in the city. So that was kind of a neat thing. You take pictures, stuff like that. It's an opportunity. And you proclaim. And that's a great thing to proclaim, by the way.

38:36 It is. Great proclamation. I like that you referenced that to like, what does the council do? I believe that was Ms. Lori Lynn Williams. That was a constituent of the city. They had a service dog. They were a student here at the high school. And as a council person. It's our job to recognize things like that and bring recognition to. So, yes, absolutely. And shout out again. I believe it was Miss Lori Lynn Williams. That's that's your job. Yeah. Bring awareness to things like that. Yeah, that's right. You also approved an application for the city of Denham Springs for the Centerville Street improvements in the amount of one hundred thousand two hundred nine dollars and thirty six cents. So a lot of things you'll see in these council meetings or stuff like that. The mayor's writing a check, and the council has to approve that check.

39:23 Have you been on Centerville? I have. This is a fantastic time to go see that money at work. Absolutely. And I'm saying not just to you, but just to everyone. everyone. No, 100%. Go drive down Centerville. You'll see the sidewalks being put in, the drainage issues that came about after they decided to do sidewalks. So, again, how things compound, how you allot funds for a sidewalk project, and then all of a sudden it gets delayed because, oh, wow, we can't just put a sidewalk in. The culvert's collapsed here or whatever that deal is. This was one of those situations where the developer or the person that was doing the work even said, hey, it's dragging out a little bit because we found some more stuff we had to work on. That's right. Great point. Another thing you talked about in that meeting, kind of in your wheelhouse, was nuisance or hazardous fires. So from what I recall from watching the meeting, the containers that these fires are held in, they're now wanting a grating on top of these of some sort to– Because the problem is embers float out and then they end up in your neighbor's leaves. And then there's a possibility that could catch on fire. Apparently some people were complaining about this.

40:27 And so really what it boils down to is the, the law that was on the books from the eighties just said approved vessel. Yeah. That could be almost anything. The problem is, is that who approves the vessel, right? So now you put that on the fire department who is not a governing authority and They should not be looked at like law enforcement who have to dictate laws and determine them. And so someone calls 911 because their neighbor is burning, and the neighbor says, well, I'm in this 55-gallon drum. I've been burning this thing for 55 years, and he's probably not wrong. And back then that might have been an approved vessel, but we know now that that's not safe. We know now that that's not something that we can do. And so what Chief Stafford did was he took a code that was on the books that was antiquated that was literally encapsulated all of this in five words. Yeah. And he put detail to it. Yeah.

41:16 Put detail. Now it's cut and dry. You know exactly what you can have in the city when it comes to burning things. And yes, the great thing was a controversy. Robert Poole brought up a good point. Why? You know, the government's telling me what I can do on my own property. And he's right. He's right. But at the same time, I'm a firm believer that the government should stay out of morality, ethics, and my business until my business or my morality or my ethics begin to affect my neighbor. Well, you nailed it. You have– I mean, you couldn't say it any better than that. You have all the freedoms you want on your property as long as you don't impinge on those around you. Yep. That would be like saying I can walk around my property naked outside.

41:58 And believe it or not, there are some states. Look, I do a crime podcast to y'all. There are some states where that's completely legal. As much as that would blow your mind, me and Kelly Jennings talk about it. We're like, if you go to Vermont, you can just walk around outside. No clothes on. Nobody says nothing. But here, you're a pension on your neighbor. We don't want to see that. Exactly. So go put some clothes on. It's a public domain private. That's right. But that's a, be it far-reaching example of the same thing. We all can do what we want with our property to an extent. You can't impinge on your neighbor by doing that. And if you're taking a chance of setting your neighbor's property on fire, that's an issue.

42:42 That supersedes your freedom when you do that, in my view. I completely agree. You know how dense the city is. Yeah. That, and that's really the main issue. I mean, people, uh, opponents of that may say, well, you can burn in parish, you know, if you live on parish, uh, Property, you can burn in your backyard. And, yes, you can do that, but also it's a lot more rural on parish property. Even in a neighborhood on parish property, they're not typically stacked on top of each other. And you sure don't want to know. I have a huge old. You sure don't want to know the DEQ laws that you would technically have to follow, even doing that out there that are maybe not as enforced because people don't know. You're in an unincorporated area.

43:23 But if you choose to live in the city, there are specific rules because this is the type of life that you chose. Yes. That's right. I mean, it's just like living in a neighborhood that has an HOA. I mean, you know going in when you buy it what the HOA rules are. No, thank you. So, yeah, I wouldn't want to have to deal with that. But you do know when you buy that house that, hey, you can't park a camper in the front, you know, or something like that. So, you can't complain about it after you buy your house in the HOA. You knew the rules. You knew the rules. Amen. Uh, just one more here. We don't want to, we don't want to bore anybody, but, uh, you also approve a lot of waivers or hopefully you're not approving a lot of waivers. I shouldn't say it like that, but there are situations where you have to take things on a, on a case by case basis, and maybe somebody needs a waiver and it makes sense. I mean, there are occasions when it does. And so y'all do a lot of that. Um, a lot of regulation stuff, just reviewing regulations and, and maybe, uh, Like you just said with the example with the vessel, maybe you see something, a law that needs to be updated. You take measures to do that. So you feel like you're ready for that?

44:33 You feel like you're ready to hit the ground running with all that? I feel like I am. I actually have a file put together of 83% of the Munich Code that hasn't been touched since 1980. Oh, wow. Okay. Interesting. And look, some of that stuff, there's no reason to touch it, right? It was detailed. It was done right. But some of that stuff is just like what Chief Stafford found in that law where it's an approved vessel. Yeah. Right. And so things that maybe we should be more specific about, maybe things that shouldn't exist. I'm glad you mentioned the run around naked in Vermont thing. You never know the kind of crazy law that might be on the books. That's right. I highly recommend anyone to go look up the Municode website. It'll tell you anything you need to know. And honestly, from the time I first started using the Municode back in 2010 to now, It's actually advanced search. So if you're looking for a specific law, you just put in the keyword and it'll find you all of the different muni codes that are relevant to that. And if you live in the city of Denham Springs, you should be doing that. It's important. I've done it. I ordered some spotlights for my house. I wanted to make sure what is infringing on my neighbor. What is the lumens? It's in there. Yeah. You know, noise ordinances. It's in there.

45:41 Anything that you can think about because you do live in a city, it's there and it's a great resource. But it's also a resource that needs to be updated too. 100%. 100%. Any final thoughts? Anything you want to mention that we haven't maybe discussed yet or just a plea to the voters? To be fair, there are a lot of excellent people that are running for office in this city. And I'd be honored to serve next to any one of them. The most important thing for me this time around is that you look at number 93 on the ballot and you give me a chance. Because I promise you that I'm ready to serve this city just like my family has, just like I have done my whole life. And I can't wait to see what the future of Dental Springs can be.

46:27 There you go. And for those of you not aware, early voting is the 20th through the 27th of this month, October. And if you can't make any of that, which I would highly encourage, by the way, because voting day is on a Tuesday this year. And they're expecting a less than normal turnout because it's on a Tuesday and everybody works. And then they go home and they're tired and they don't feel like voting. I wouldn't be in that class. I get excited for voting day. But there's, like I say, we're different breeds, me and Denver, when it comes to voting. So please consider voting early. The great thing about that is I can promise you, you're going to walk in and walk out of there. There's not going to be a line. It's easy. It takes five minutes. Do it on your lunch break. But let your voice be heard.

47:15 A lot of people have given their lives, and I know that's a token saying, but it is absolutely true, have fought and given their lives for your right to let your voice be heard. So no matter who you're voting for or why you're doing it, go vote. And if you think your vote doesn't matter, you're wrong. That's right. That's right. This is our city. Enough people think their vote doesn't matter and their vote matters, right? Exactly. That's what I tell people all the time. All it takes is about 500 people to think that. And that can swing a whole election. And we've seen that happen in the past. So go out there and let your voice be heard. The actual voting day is November 3rd.

47:56 I will put your Facebook. I'll tag it in the description of this video. so that anybody who wants to learn more can learn more. And I appreciate you coming by and giving me all the reasons you're going to run and telling everybody about all the great things you plan on doing, Denver. This has been a lot of fun, Jim. I really appreciate the opportunity. You got it. And thank all of you for listening, watching, sharing. Look, we are over 1 million downloads of this podcast on YouTube now. And it wouldn't have happened without all of you who support this show. So thank you so very much for doing that. And until next time, I'm Jim Chapman reminding you, love your community, support local business and keep leading. Thank you very much.