Q&A
Lack of veterans in city council and strategies to encourage political participation
0:38:26
·
173 sec
Council Member Holden and Commissioner Hendon discuss the current absence of veterans serving as city council members and explore strategies to encourage more veterans to run for public office.
- It is confirmed that there are currently no veterans serving as city council members
- Council Member Holden emphasizes the importance of changing this situation
- The discussion focuses on identifying potential veteran candidates who care about their communities
- Commissioner Hendon suggests that DVS's role is to identify and engage more veterans in the community
- The conversation highlights the need for more veteran leadership in city government
Robert F. Holden
0:38:26
So there's there's another question that you're probably not gonna be able to answer.
0:38:32
There's only a few.
0:38:33
But this is how many council members are veterans?
0:38:37
Do you know?
James Hendon
0:38:38
To to our knowledge, none?
Robert F. Holden
0:38:39
None.
0:38:40
That's true.
0:38:40
At this time.
0:38:41
Yeah.
0:38:44
None.
0:38:45
Alright.
0:38:46
And I'm included in that.
0:38:47
So, however, we have to change that.
0:38:50
Do you have any ideas?
0:38:51
Because I'm trying to figure it out.
0:38:54
What I'm trying to get more people to run for office when I when I find someone that actually that are they're not really entrenched in a political party that they are really they care about their neighborhoods.
0:39:10
And they care about their community, and they care about the city.
0:39:14
And but I when I meet people, you know, it it's important to to see their motives for running for office, not that they're part of a club, you know, club house or anything, that they're part of engaging in their community's leadership.
0:39:30
And veterans are a group that I can say are mostly leaders in one way or another.
0:39:37
So how do we do it?
0:39:39
And and I'd like to just Yeah.
0:39:41
Again, off the cuff, no no.
0:39:42
It's just like, how do we get people veterans to run for office more?
0:39:46
How do we engage them to get involved?
James Hendon
0:39:49
I I feel like and this is me what the DBS had on.
0:39:53
It's really about it really comes down to the outreach and identifying more people.
0:39:56
This is an M and M's game to me, meaning that each council member on average represents a 171,000 people for our 51 council members.
0:40:03
So you're looking for that green M and M, that'll be that one that could potentially be that if we're talking about the council.
0:40:09
We need more M and M's in the draw in the first place to get the green one.
0:40:11
And so to me, a lot of the work for us on DBS societies, what are we doing to continue to identify folks and engage them, just bring them into the community?
0:40:18
So that they are already, you know, tied in so they can take advantage of opportunities.
0:40:23
It's not on us to be that group that does a political education, but we if we animate more people who become specifically involved, those things will inevitably take place to other groups and organizations that do the political education, the grooming.
0:40:35
But for us, it's just getting more folks to come on on the net.
Robert F. Holden
0:40:39
Right.
0:40:39
But, you know, again, when when you come, you know, you you you talk to a veteran and and there, you could hear in their voice that they're you know, obviously, they have that capability or they have that wherewithal.
0:40:53
Put that in the back of your mind just to try to get them to to run, encourage them to run.
0:40:58
And and if they If you don't wanna do it, I'll do it.
0:41:03
You know, it's it's important that we we we try to get more leaders who are veterans in in this city, just based on the city council that we're seeing today.
0:41:14
With with no members.
0:41:15
I think
James Hendon
0:41:15
it was tough for me.
Robert F. Holden
0:41:15
I don't think I could remember a time when that was like that, where we had no veterans on it.
James Hendon
0:41:19
What's tough for me is the top thing for me is identifying the veterans.
