Transcripts For CSPAN2 Discussion With Mayors On Coronavirus

Host good afternoon, everyone. I am the president of the center for American Progress and i am thrilled to be moderating this vital conversation today. I cant think of a more timely moment to gather these distinguished from a recent leaders. Im honored to be joined by the new york mayor, Atlanta Mayor and stockton mayor. I will say a few more words about them in a minute, but i want to really start by saying that we are gathering at a time where a lee are going through times of deep pain and anguish for so many americans. That has come to the floor in the last few, but it is a product of years in decades and centuries of equally and unfair treatment. The murder of george floyd, Brianna Taylor and many other black americans have shed a harsh light on this systemic racism that is pervasive in the country. The vaccines are on trial and medical professionals are working around. Still so many people are suffering and dying. Of the other this has riddled the country since birth and we have had decades to. The mayors are here joining us today and are on the front lines of how both of these diseases and challenges are leaving at the time where at the National Level we have a president that is incapable of and so we are fortunate to have these leaders that are developing Real Solutions and i am thrilled all four of them have been working at the forefront of better relationships, developing reform of the system. With that i want to get started on a brief introduction to the recent events in those areas. We have the Atlanta Mayor the third is the phoenix mayor from march of 2019 prior to serving as the Stockton City Council member and we will take questions at the end. There are question box on the left side of the screen. For each of the panelists, but i would like to start with this task you what you have experienced the last several weeks particularly the last two weeks as we are dealing with with the protests around Police Brutality and systemic racism how have you seen your role and tried to lead and what has been your experience . [inaudible] i can hear you now. Im going in and out but i can hear you now. I only heard part of the question that i think that it was about the last two weeks. How have you dealt with the last two weeks since the protests and addressing the systemic racism . The last two weeks have been extraordinary for so many others across the country. This is like nothing ive ever experienced in my lifetime, only what ive seen in history books. And i think that we are in this incredible moment and movement in our nation. I assume it is similar to that of the Civil Rights Movement that this is happening and amplified in the way that even the Civil Rights Movement was not because of the social media and ability to access information. Because we have an ability to instantly see is an equal responsibility in so many ways to react and respond to that are coming to the community. When president obama sent out a call to convene and take a look at policing in the community, we did it immediately. They had the first one yesterday with the Advisory Council thats going to look at the use of force policy in the cities, and what i anticipate is out of god there will be more commissions and task forces to look at all of the policies across the city in terms of how we are interacting with our communities and how we are allocating our dollars in the community because what we know is we either pay on the front end or back and meaning if we are over policing our communities will have a heightened response. I think that its common in the same way that they Obama Administration created meaningful and honest and legitimate relationships in the community so that we could work as partners, i think that its incumbent upon us to continue despite the leadership in the white house. First, thank you for having me. I want to echo some of the sentiment of what has been a few difficult months, not weeks but months here in the cities. Basically on our own trying to keep our people safe and alive without any direction or support so we have to be as creative as possible to make sure that folks are doing what they can to protect their families since its affected our lives more than it affected other peoples lives. We had a specific cold and heightened responsibility to provide sympathy and empathy and care, Emotional Intelligence for people in the community. Then the second pandemic that existed. Somebodys trying to get our attention. If nobody is paying attention now and they are not even on this planet. Its symbolic to what happened to emmett till and that in thih they take the Civil Rights Movement. Its not the first time a Police Officer has caught a black man. The fact that people have become so fed up at the Tipping Point and now it is up to us to do something about it for so we try to maintain and create space while at the same time save and equal. I am concerned that sometimes people will swoop in and first of all we cant use this policy anyway so they are doing all of those things where we have more money towards the prevention, social work, trauma care, all those things to help us reduce the virus and it helps us with the reduction of police so we have to reduce the numbers that we need and we do that. I am just worried people will begin to think that it begins and ends with the Police Department. It is deeper than that. It would be like an overseer at the end of the day you are still in the same position. We have to be more thoughtful about our approach to deal with this but all in all we are pushing forward. Excellent. It has been quite the two peaks. Weve been having robust conversations about the relationships between the Police Department and our community. This week the city of phoenix we passed a budget in may and this week on a bipartisan basis the big new expenditures for the office of accountability and transparency for the Police Department. I dont know that that would have been possible a month ago that on a bipartisan basis we would say this is something we are going to take seriously and it is our largest new expenditure. Our Police Department has been looking at use of force and its already made just this week some significant changes and we have a commitment to will continue. Its certainly an issue thats been at the forefront my entire time as mayor. Its been an eventful time but nothing like the last two weeks. What gives me hope as we have been having these conversations in phoenix for quite a while but it became a much broader conversation. Now i have the leaders of the community saying what can we do to fight racism. Those were conversations we didnt have as often as we needed to before. If you look at the peaceful protest in the city of phoenix, it is our whole community out there, people of all ages and backgrounds and that gives me the confidence to say this community will support our elected officials and partner with local officials as we make real change. These conversations happen as we recover. We have hit so many of the records we dont want to be hitting. We opened up too much, too early. So our hospitals are struggling. The state just activated the Emergency Hospital this week. We are setting all sorts of records for the type you do not want to have. One thing i do want to certify is our research at Arizona State university has been looking at the trends and they do not believe it is a result of the protests. There are certainly some cases spreading. But if you look at where it is increasing in the community, it really correlates with the lifting of th the stayathome order and some challenges we are having with our longterm care facilities and where people are putting closely together. But i come to you as the mayor of a Healthcare System that is stretched right now, and i am very worried about the virus and its impact on the community. Thank you. How have the last two weeks then for you and then i am going to get into the particular areas of leadership on criminal justice and systemic racism. First, let me just say its been a difficult year for sure. The points raised by everybody else on the panel, the most interesting and past several months have been brought to the surface what has been ubiquitous because of these and structural violence people of color [inaudible] you couple this up with george floyd. The last two weeks ive been struggling with reconciling the idea as a father of a seven monthold plaque signed and [inaudible] in 2014 while they were protesting michael brown. Its a bit of fatigue as well, here we go again. It is just a moment in time but it seems there are 15,000 people marching in amsterdam, the Democratic Caucus now instead of policing reforms its lucky weve taken this issue seriously the past several years. So we have the relationships with folks protesting and those that have been working on this. Last year we went to a state two things of that distorts what to ask a question about last two weeks ive been it would have been difficult in researching for the right words and write actions. I convey the seriousness and capitalize the opportunity of those that actually are doing more help pushing other colleagues along. I would like to followu foln that last point, because you have a big redemption. Can you share with us what the change in policies have been and what results you have seen . Thereve been multiple models. One is one that works more with the community and ones that have been working on top of the community to police the community. One thing that gets lost is the Service Model that has been more expected across the board and theres there is a great exampld love if you could share. I would love for you to just talk about the experience and the statistics are that youve seen and what that is meant in n peoples lives. Absolutely. Im glad to have a progressive forward thinking. To figure out another way to transform in the community. We did that in 2014 we were part of the National Trust initiative for the past four years has had an open door policy for anyone other justified or unjustified before the time ordering the time. To apologize for the atrocities of the past they said i understand that it started and the Police Things were used to watch when chang. I think those things have had moved the needle along. Theres more trust and that at least she gets it. On the policy side, 2014 all about officers have been trained on procedural justice and although not perfect, on whether the need to be understanding the issue is in fact people of color have issues with the wall and to be a Police Officer you have to be just and treat everyone the same. Its a bunch of tough conversations. The last thing i will say this since 2016 we have been saying the issue is the cost of social workers and jobs. The anytime you expect one person or entity to do all those things, you will always be upset and angry because they are not designed to do that work. Our cost are not the only First Responders for the socially ill in the community. What members have you seen . A state of decline they also have seen reduction of homicides and violins and it looks like it might be even lower this year which is incredible because stockton [inaudible] has become a Safer Community while also being a more to your point focusing on the actual space to light and i think that has gone a long way. Atlanta is a big city that has had more reform and better relations than other big cities. Are there any changes they were thinking Going Forward, and theres been a big debate about moving some activities that are related to Mental Health and Substance Abuse and as they try to address the problems from the nonpolice Public Health perspective. I again want to thank you for convening the panel and the others that feel they can learn so much and pick up from each other. Im making sure i can do some followup as well. It is as much as educating me for the public so i appreciate that. But in atlanta we begin to look at criminal Justice Reform several years ago so part of what we are doing in the city we allow inmates that are transitioning out of the state prison system to work, go out during the day, work as a part of our workforce an work force d department, public works department, transition into fulltime jobs so that when they are done with their sentences, they can transition to fulltime jobs with benefits, and its been so heartwarming to have conversations with many of the men that are in this program and to hear them really how meaningful it is for their family because part of my background as my father was incarcerated at some point, so i know how devastating that can be on families. But the other thing we are doing is we eliminated cash bail bonds in the city of atlanta and what this meant is you get stopped for a broken tail light, 200 in your pocket you can pay it and in an hour be out on the streets. If you didnt have it than you might end up being in the jails for we form an at a time so we eliminated that and ended our relationship with ice we had the contract of millions of dollars of year to house the detainees and we ended up giving the family separation that we saw at the border. So it allows us an opportunity to really reimagine what this 400,000 plus square foot physical jail facility could be and how it could navigate this model of mass incarceration into this model of Equity Health and wellness. The. We are passing our budget in the next week or so, but we have moved our corrections budget over to the Mayors Office and the services so that we can begin to reallocate the money that we were using towards incarceration to be able to put it into things that help improve our community, whether it is as simple as sending people out to help pick up trash in the communities or something more. Something a bit more robust it about how we interact with our communities and Going Forward what we are seeing, our Police Department is far from perfect but there are some great things happening in terms of interaction with our Police Officers and orchid. We have a youth center in atlanta and we are in the process of building two more. Part of the requirements is the Police Recruits come in weekly and spend time with kids working alongside kids helping to mentor them and they are learning just as much from the kid as the kids are learning from them to create through impactful relationships. The list goes on. But again, the opportunity to hear what is happening in other cities and how we are approaching our relationship with our police and community is incredibly important because we dont have all of the answers in one city in so many times we get it right and so many times we get it wrong. But the great thing about atlanta is the opportunity to keep trying again and again and we had this legacy of the civil rights in our city, and so i think that we have a benefit of having this blueprint of what changed should look like right at our fingertips that many other cities dont have. Thats fantastic. Thank you so much for your words. I would like to ask thereve been significant reforms as a part of the process and accountability in other areas and i wondered if you can share about and the changes that have already been made and also just put the changes have been for the communities. The good thing about it we were not trying to fight the consensus. We stood up even though you said you had to have this oversight. We had good use of force training now a, implicit bias training, all of the things talked about. The we have all these things that happen to. They talk about the issues people have in the communities. This happened, that happened. The back has become incredibly important i and that we established the citizen clergy that we train residents of our community under the police practices, wall, policy. We give them an opportunity to do the cooking to crime scenes to help de escalate situations that have a potential to become crazy. We use the community in many ways to help change the relationship between the police and community and also they are now 80 which is huge based on when we first started. And we have the reduction of homicides since 2013. When i took over in 2013 over 115 homicides and last year we had one. Its too many but certainly a lot less than 115. Weve been seeing crime go the opposite direction because of the kind of social changes that take place. I think we have to deal with the issue of violence. That is the most important thing. People in our community, theres this idea that any ticket with the police. My mother and grandmother wont go for that because [inaudible] at the end of the day we have to do something about the violence which is why we have the money and resources in alternative ways to reduce violence and deal with it whether its social work, Mental Health, other opportunities to give people the de escalation of the conflict resolution. All of these things are necessary. And then Going Forward they already hired social workers now. We want to begin to put all of the community organizations, give them an opportunity to have a constant stream of funding so they can do the work that they do in expanded ways so we think of this as being able to do th that. I want to highlight what you are illustrating a, violence, these strategies lead to Violence Reduction which lead to American Progress<\/a> and i am thrilled to be moderating this vital conversation today. I cant think of a more timely moment to gather these distinguished from a recent leaders. Im honored to be joined by the new york mayor, Atlanta Mayor<\/a> and stockton mayor. I will say a few more words about them in a minute, but i want to really start by saying that we are gathering at a time where a lee are going through times of deep pain and anguish for so many americans. That has come to the floor in the last few, but it is a product of years in decades and centuries of equally and unfair treatment. The murder of george floyd, Brianna Taylor<\/a> and many other black americans have shed a harsh light on this systemic racism that is pervasive in the country. The vaccines are on trial and medical professionals are working around. Still so many people are suffering and dying. Of the other this has riddled the country since birth and we have had decades to. The mayors are here joining us today and are on the front lines of how both of these diseases and challenges are leaving at the time where at the National Level<\/a> we have a president that is incapable of and so we are fortunate to have these leaders that are developing Real Solutions<\/a> and i am thrilled all four of them have been working at the forefront of better relationships, developing reform of the system. With that i want to get started on a brief introduction to the recent events in those areas. We have the Atlanta Mayor<\/a> the third is the phoenix mayor from march of 2019 prior to serving as the Stockton City Council<\/a> member and we will take questions at the end. There are question box on the left side of the screen. For each of the panelists, but i would like to start with this task you what you have experienced the last several weeks particularly the last two weeks as we are dealing with with the protests around Police Brutality<\/a> and systemic racism how have you seen your role and tried to lead and what has been your experience . [inaudible] i can hear you now. Im going in and out but i can hear you now. I only heard part of the question that i think that it was about the last two weeks. How have you dealt with the last two weeks since the protests and addressing the systemic racism . The last two weeks have been extraordinary for so many others across the country. This is like nothing ive ever experienced in my lifetime, only what ive seen in history books. And i think that we are in this incredible moment and movement in our nation. I assume it is similar to that of the Civil Rights Movement<\/a> that this is happening and amplified in the way that even the Civil Rights Movement<\/a> was not because of the social media and ability to access information. Because we have an ability to instantly see is an equal responsibility in so many ways to react and respond to that are coming to the community. When president obama sent out a call to convene and take a look at policing in the community, we did it immediately. They had the first one yesterday with the Advisory Council<\/a> thats going to look at the use of force policy in the cities, and what i anticipate is out of god there will be more commissions and task forces to look at all of the policies across the city in terms of how we are interacting with our communities and how we are allocating our dollars in the community because what we know is we either pay on the front end or back and meaning if we are over policing our communities will have a heightened response. I think that its common in the same way that they Obama Administration<\/a> created meaningful and honest and legitimate relationships in the community so that we could work as partners, i think that its incumbent upon us to continue despite the leadership in the white house. First, thank you for having me. I want to echo some of the sentiment of what has been a few difficult months, not weeks but months here in the cities. Basically on our own trying to keep our people safe and alive without any direction or support so we have to be as creative as possible to make sure that folks are doing what they can to protect their families since its affected our lives more than it affected other peoples lives. We had a specific cold and heightened responsibility to provide sympathy and empathy and care, Emotional Intelligence<\/a> for people in the community. Then the second pandemic that existed. Somebodys trying to get our attention. If nobody is paying attention now and they are not even on this planet. Its symbolic to what happened to emmett till and that in thih they take the Civil Rights Movement<\/a>. Its not the first time a Police Officer<\/a> has caught a black man. The fact that people have become so fed up at the Tipping Point<\/a> and now it is up to us to do something about it for so we try to maintain and create space while at the same time save and equal. I am concerned that sometimes people will swoop in and first of all we cant use this policy anyway so they are doing all of those things where we have more money towards the prevention, social work, trauma care, all those things to help us reduce the virus and it helps us with the reduction of police so we have to reduce the numbers that we need and we do that. I am just worried people will begin to think that it begins and ends with the Police Department<\/a>. It is deeper than that. It would be like an overseer at the end of the day you are still in the same position. We have to be more thoughtful about our approach to deal with this but all in all we are pushing forward. Excellent. It has been quite the two peaks. Weve been having robust conversations about the relationships between the Police Department<\/a> and our community. This week the city of phoenix we passed a budget in may and this week on a bipartisan basis the big new expenditures for the office of accountability and transparency for the Police Department<\/a>. I dont know that that would have been possible a month ago that on a bipartisan basis we would say this is something we are going to take seriously and it is our largest new expenditure. Our Police Department<\/a> has been looking at use of force and its already made just this week some significant changes and we have a commitment to will continue. Its certainly an issue thats been at the forefront my entire time as mayor. Its been an eventful time but nothing like the last two weeks. What gives me hope as we have been having these conversations in phoenix for quite a while but it became a much broader conversation. Now i have the leaders of the community saying what can we do to fight racism. Those were conversations we didnt have as often as we needed to before. If you look at the peaceful protest in the city of phoenix, it is our whole community out there, people of all ages and backgrounds and that gives me the confidence to say this community will support our elected officials and partner with local officials as we make real change. These conversations happen as we recover. We have hit so many of the records we dont want to be hitting. We opened up too much, too early. So our hospitals are struggling. The state just activated the Emergency Hospital<\/a> this week. We are setting all sorts of records for the type you do not want to have. One thing i do want to certify is our research at Arizona State<\/a> university has been looking at the trends and they do not believe it is a result of the protests. There are certainly some cases spreading. But if you look at where it is increasing in the community, it really correlates with the lifting of th the stayathome order and some challenges we are having with our longterm care facilities and where people are putting closely together. But i come to you as the mayor of a Healthcare System<\/a> that is stretched right now, and i am very worried about the virus and its impact on the community. Thank you. How have the last two weeks then for you and then i am going to get into the particular areas of leadership on criminal justice and systemic racism. First, let me just say its been a difficult year for sure. The points raised by everybody else on the panel, the most interesting and past several months have been brought to the surface what has been ubiquitous because of these and structural violence people of color [inaudible] you couple this up with george floyd. The last two weeks ive been struggling with reconciling the idea as a father of a seven monthold plaque signed and [inaudible] in 2014 while they were protesting michael brown. Its a bit of fatigue as well, here we go again. It is just a moment in time but it seems there are 15,000 people marching in amsterdam, the Democratic Caucus<\/a> now instead of policing reforms its lucky weve taken this issue seriously the past several years. So we have the relationships with folks protesting and those that have been working on this. Last year we went to a state two things of that distorts what to ask a question about last two weeks ive been it would have been difficult in researching for the right words and write actions. I convey the seriousness and capitalize the opportunity of those that actually are doing more help pushing other colleagues along. I would like to followu foln that last point, because you have a big redemption. Can you share with us what the change in policies have been and what results you have seen . Thereve been multiple models. One is one that works more with the community and ones that have been working on top of the community to police the community. One thing that gets lost is the Service Model<\/a> that has been more expected across the board and theres there is a great exampld love if you could share. I would love for you to just talk about the experience and the statistics are that youve seen and what that is meant in n peoples lives. Absolutely. Im glad to have a progressive forward thinking. To figure out another way to transform in the community. We did that in 2014 we were part of the National Trust<\/a> initiative for the past four years has had an open door policy for anyone other justified or unjustified before the time ordering the time. To apologize for the atrocities of the past they said i understand that it started and the Police Things<\/a> were used to watch when chang. I think those things have had moved the needle along. Theres more trust and that at least she gets it. On the policy side, 2014 all about officers have been trained on procedural justice and although not perfect, on whether the need to be understanding the issue is in fact people of color have issues with the wall and to be a Police Officer<\/a> you have to be just and treat everyone the same. Its a bunch of tough conversations. The last thing i will say this since 2016 we have been saying the issue is the cost of social workers and jobs. The anytime you expect one person or entity to do all those things, you will always be upset and angry because they are not designed to do that work. Our cost are not the only First Responders<\/a> for the socially ill in the community. What members have you seen . A state of decline they also have seen reduction of homicides and violins and it looks like it might be even lower this year which is incredible because stockton [inaudible] has become a Safer Community<\/a> while also being a more to your point focusing on the actual space to light and i think that has gone a long way. Atlanta is a big city that has had more reform and better relations than other big cities. Are there any changes they were thinking Going Forward<\/a>, and theres been a big debate about moving some activities that are related to Mental Health<\/a> and Substance Abuse<\/a> and as they try to address the problems from the nonpolice Public Health<\/a> perspective. I again want to thank you for convening the panel and the others that feel they can learn so much and pick up from each other. Im making sure i can do some followup as well. It is as much as educating me for the public so i appreciate that. But in atlanta we begin to look at criminal Justice Reform<\/a> several years ago so part of what we are doing in the city we allow inmates that are transitioning out of the state prison system to work, go out during the day, work as a part of our workforce an work force d department, public works department, transition into fulltime jobs so that when they are done with their sentences, they can transition to fulltime jobs with benefits, and its been so heartwarming to have conversations with many of the men that are in this program and to hear them really how meaningful it is for their family because part of my background as my father was incarcerated at some point, so i know how devastating that can be on families. But the other thing we are doing is we eliminated cash bail bonds in the city of atlanta and what this meant is you get stopped for a broken tail light, 200 in your pocket you can pay it and in an hour be out on the streets. If you didnt have it than you might end up being in the jails for we form an at a time so we eliminated that and ended our relationship with ice we had the contract of millions of dollars of year to house the detainees and we ended up giving the family separation that we saw at the border. So it allows us an opportunity to really reimagine what this 400,000 plus square foot physical jail facility could be and how it could navigate this model of mass incarceration into this model of Equity Health<\/a> and wellness. The. We are passing our budget in the next week or so, but we have moved our corrections budget over to the Mayors Office<\/a> and the services so that we can begin to reallocate the money that we were using towards incarceration to be able to put it into things that help improve our community, whether it is as simple as sending people out to help pick up trash in the communities or something more. Something a bit more robust it about how we interact with our communities and Going Forward<\/a> what we are seeing, our Police Department<\/a> is far from perfect but there are some great things happening in terms of interaction with our Police Officer<\/a>s and orchid. We have a youth center in atlanta and we are in the process of building two more. Part of the requirements is the Police Recruits<\/a> come in weekly and spend time with kids working alongside kids helping to mentor them and they are learning just as much from the kid as the kids are learning from them to create through impactful relationships. The list goes on. But again, the opportunity to hear what is happening in other cities and how we are approaching our relationship with our police and community is incredibly important because we dont have all of the answers in one city in so many times we get it right and so many times we get it wrong. But the great thing about atlanta is the opportunity to keep trying again and again and we had this legacy of the civil rights in our city, and so i think that we have a benefit of having this blueprint of what changed should look like right at our fingertips that many other cities dont have. Thats fantastic. Thank you so much for your words. I would like to ask thereve been significant reforms as a part of the process and accountability in other areas and i wondered if you can share about and the changes that have already been made and also just put the changes have been for the communities. The good thing about it we were not trying to fight the consensus. We stood up even though you said you had to have this oversight. We had good use of force training now a, implicit bias training, all of the things talked about. The we have all these things that happen to. They talk about the issues people have in the communities. This happened, that happened. The back has become incredibly important i and that we established the citizen clergy that we train residents of our community under the police practices, wall, policy. We give them an opportunity to do the cooking to crime scenes to help de escalate situations that have a potential to become crazy. We use the community in many ways to help change the relationship between the police and community and also they are now 80 which is huge based on when we first started. And we have the reduction of homicides since 2013. When i took over in 2013 over 115 homicides and last year we had one. Its too many but certainly a lot less than 115. Weve been seeing crime go the opposite direction because of the kind of social changes that take place. I think we have to deal with the issue of violence. That is the most important thing. People in our community, theres this idea that any ticket with the police. My mother and grandmother wont go for that because [inaudible] at the end of the day we have to do something about the violence which is why we have the money and resources in alternative ways to reduce violence and deal with it whether its social work, Mental Health<\/a>, other opportunities to give people the de escalation of the conflict resolution. All of these things are necessary. And then Going Forward<\/a> they already hired social workers now. We want to begin to put all of the community organizations, give them an opportunity to have a constant stream of funding so they can do the work that they do in expanded ways so we think of this as being able to do th that. I want to highlight what you are illustrating a, violence, these strategies lead to Violence Reduction<\/a> which lead to Greater Community<\/a> safety and theres been this development that you have to have Police Strategies<\/a> that are just really almost militaristic in order to have safety and its quite the opposite. The data yo that you are sharins helpful to make the point that having police and other forces in the community, social workers, clergy serving people in a way that reduces violence is a way that gives federer. I want to highlight a point and id love for you to talk about some of the strategies. Thereve been reforms before that i would love for you to talk about. Absolutely. During my time as mayor, we have done body cameras on all of the officers out in the community, and i think thats an Important Message<\/a> for building trust. I also launched a program with my colleagues this year to invest clinicians with our Police Department<\/a>. A lot of the cases that have been most difficult for us to have had a Mental Health<\/a> component. And even our officers agree that we need to make changes in that area. One officer told us people call 911 when they are in crisis because they do not know who else to call. Weve tried to make sure that there are Mental Health<\/a> Resources Available<\/a> and traditionally the way the Government Works<\/a> in arizona, we are not the Public Health<\/a> authority. But its been so intertwined with everything at the fire and Police Department<\/a>, that we decided to as much as possible not point a finger on another branch of government and say its their fault and just try to step up and look for solutions. Weve been able to have really good success with our departme department. Thats been very successful and weve been putting a lot of investments into the crisis intervention team. Officers who are highly trained at helping people in crisis. One of my inspiring moments there was another who called in, a military veteran with a firearm. She was heartbroken and facing addiction. Her son told her i never want to see you again. Im done with you. I dont know what its like to be in her shoes, but i am a mother and i know how i would feel if my son said i dont want to see you again. I dont want to be part of your life. It would be heartbreaking. Our officers spend time with her, developed a relationship, found things they hav had in con and gave her a sense of hope. It went from a very dangerous feeling situation with a woman with a firearm to ending up with her accepting services, seeing a path forward. I felt like i got to witness an officer saved a life without any use of force. We can have clinicians supporting that but when there are firearms involved, i think there do need to be Police Officer<\/a>s involved. So that is what our role model has been for how we want to move forward in the city of phoenix. We have had good success with programs similar that my colleagues have mentioned. When i was elected to the council, we had some significant challenges with taking away peoples drivers licenses. Im a proud supporter of Public Transit<\/a> but phoenix is still a city if you dont have a car or lose your license that can hurt youit can hurtyour prospects. If you couldnt pay the ticket and you had a job in the car it wasnt leading to success and we took that away from people and that reform has helped thousands of people in our community. We heard from one woman who said i was in a Domestic Violence<\/a> situation but i felt like i couldnt leave because i didnt have a drivers license, and then the program helped her get into a safer situation. We have had good success and we have very successful City Employees<\/a> that had a felony but so much to offer and once we looked at our employment policies, we felt we could win as an employer and provides needed an appointment to people in our communities. So we have had i think some very successful policies and we are not done. We need to keep having these conversations into doing more but its been important in the city of phoenix. Everyone has been dealing with the last few weeks of heightened attention of the Police Brutality<\/a>, systemic racism. Weve also had to deal with the pandemic and that is often put on your shoulders as the leader so i want to just ask you each, and i will start with you, you are in a unique situation in the state that you are and has been very restricted around reopeni reopening. And i know perhaps you have a different perspective on reopening. I would love for you to share your views about safety, literal Health Safety<\/a> as the state of georgia with a governor that pushed reopening very aggressively at the time when the data pointed contrary to the direction. We had to create a parallel path in atlanta, and theres been no playbook at least not for me on how to deal with the pandemic and certainly not one on how you deal with Transitional Movement<\/a> like we are seeing in this country. I think that for so many mayors, its just been this opportunity for us to leave our head and heart. When i look at the numbers in georgia, the reality is 80 of the hospitalizations in the state were black and brown people in the state and for me it was this moment that the content couldnt remain silent about reopening. With that being said at the beginning of the reopening in georgia, i wanted to be wrong because i knew if the governor was right, more people would die. We are somewhere in the middle that if we are seeing in creases of around 25 to 30 in terms of people testing positive, it will increase around eight to 10 . So a lot better but still not great. What we did is we created an Advisory Council<\/a> comprised of people in the Corporate Community<\/a>, smallbusiness owners, colleges, universities etc. To create a framework for the city of atlanta so it is a five phased approach and to the extent the numbers are still down atlanta, i believe in large part its because many of our larger employers because they are home to the fortune 500 in atlanta. They havent opened back up their campuses. So you have thousands upon thousands who may go in and out of i will just say the cocacola building everyday but when it then opens back up, that certainly helps with us not having people coming together in mass groups. We will see what happens on the other side of the gatherings. We were still waiting on numbers for the memorial day weekend and with Mass Gatherings<\/a> we have taken testing into some of these highly Populated Areas<\/a> to encourage people to get tested and just asking people to get tested. I got tested after i participated in one of the demonstrations. Thankfully my test came back negative, but i think weve got to continue to encourage people to do that and continue to make decisions that are the best for our communities. Because nobody knows their Community Better<\/a> than the mayor does their community. I remember the first time i met Vice President<\/a> joe biden, hes had been on city council was harder than being Vice President<\/a> and i was shocked to hear him say that and i said why. He said because Everybody Knows<\/a> where you live. That is part of being a mayor even in this time period, knowing where you live means at least in my case, protesters even show up at our house sometimes. So we are just trying to figure it out as we go and make decisions that are the best for our communities. And i think in atlanta those positions are helping us to save lives. I want to follow up on the issue mentioned about the disproportionate impact on the communities of color that the virus has had in any strategies in fact that you have about how to address those issues or redress them whether it is more resources to hospitals thatre serving communities of color, changing the way the Health System<\/a> is dealing with these issues and anything you would like to share about how you are tackling the virus. What we need to do now is mitigate those things. Some of them cannot be fixed in the middle. We have to restructure the entire Healthcare System<\/a>, access to quality food in the community, decent housing. So what is happening is they give it to their family. [inaudible] apply a more support, give more support to the hospitals in these areas with more mobile testing going to some areas where folks are not going to come out and get tested. But we have the Information Education Committee<\/a> where we go out with fires, information and now testing so come get tested and get information education in these communities that dont have access they are not watching, they dont know who the doctors are. They have very Little Information<\/a> so we have to take that. Thats the only way to really address and mitigate some of this stuff. How do we stay safe in a place concerned more about Everything Else<\/a> in your health and as the state opens up their places in new jersey that do not have the cases [inaudible] there are different demographics so when the governor says this is what they are going to do for the state, it isnt onesizefitsall. It mighif my tip everybody elset its hurtful to us. That is a really good point. We will be taking questions from the audience in another minute. About your experience and how you were viewing the address of the health needs of your community, again, in a state like arizona seeing a surge in cases and its reopened kind of more radically than other states and has seen a large surge and now has the Hospital System<\/a> incredibly stressed. I want to ask when you have a governor sending a very different message than you are and get you have a big Population Center<\/a> in arizona, how are you handling that, what advice do you give people and what are your strategies on that issue . They led the effort to fight early on. I joined with a the mayor of southern arizona. We did executive order and implemented social distancing, moving restaurants to take out, shutting down bars, different Safety Measures<\/a> which we have data from the universities showing that it did slow the spread and the governor followed us and went to a statewide order and been a stayathome order and to talk about whats needed to b be in the stayathome ordr originally the cost of business is considered were quite broad and included things where researchers have shown that there is pretty significant transmission rates. Leading to some of the outbreaks, so again i was proud to work with other mayors to send a strong message of safety. When the governor lifted his his stayathome order, he preempted mayors and cities from doing our own precautions so you will see raging nightclub parties in arizona and that is not what the cdc recommends. They recommended a gradual reopening set of looking at more essential services to. I am trying to use whatever i can have a bully pulpit to remind people if you can stay home, please do. We are talking about masks as much as possible and continue to have a debate with our state when we went to require masks we have legislators that said this was tierney. I would get people saying shes the gestapo were some pretty rough things. Im jewish and i think i will talk with other jewish mayors were theres been been a leftii terminology thrown at us. Jewish governors as well, and we are talking about how unhelpful that is in our community. I am trying to work as closely with our healthcare leaders to put the data out there and help people get information about what they can do to stay safe. We in phoenix are proud. Its tough and nothing can withstand it and there are people in the communities who thought that we didnt have to worry. But if you look at the hospitalization numbers and the equipment that is at capacity right now, it isnt a cureall. It is an exponential growth right now so im asking my residence to take this seriously. If you are tired of staying home and frustrated and you can think about those that are most vulnerable whether it is your grandmother or brother facing cancer, maybe that will help you realize how important it is to take this seriously because it is deadly and we have already lost too many. Thank you so much. I do think it is such a great irony that we have all of these calls for the preemptive mayors and their ability to actually i want to ask you finally, how are you handling the virus differently than say arizona, how are you seeing the stresses and any ideas for us on the best way to address it lacks i am lacking because i think ive been called on by Health Professionals<\/a> in the last couple of them is. Biology was my worst subject. In terms of california, i think that we are lucky they usually made of the way. So between us and the counties they are surrounded and dont have a lot of people. I say that because we have been having a very vocal fight. 20 of the population have received as you caller is from the counties to address the crisis. . And the amount of misinformation so i have been sounding the alarm. This is how we have to do it and then the last thing is from the first time covid hit on mothers day we gave 125 single mothers so they could get take care of themselves and their children and work with our home the shelters to do what we can to protect the most vulnerable and for those that were hit hardest before that are heading even harder new ideas like wear a mask in public or protesting whenever you are wearing a mask it doesnt care about her feelings or the weather it is a virus and it is real. If it was this great of a challenge referencing wearing the mask it really just has been established and that the message was you really dont need to wear the mask and i just want to say that makes all of your jobs harder because people dont wear the mask and then it is a problem for the mayor. Other countries do what that mike brazil is another example that you need these people to issue the masks so now lets get to questions. So to redesign the space what are other areas in solving the challenges . So really its a question is toward the systemic institutions or racism we see embedded in institutions and then redirecting resources education, job training and the resources to build those assets and communities of color so lets do a quick round if we ca can. All of those things are important better housing better education, over a longer period of time so we are trying to spend more many within those areas that the big budget is not as big and most of that is personnel. The more people you have the more you spend. So we rely heavily for the government to subsidize some of the work they are doing and even the private sector for us to get the services that we need in our community. So specifically Affordable Housing<\/a>, land trust to create opportunities where these institutions have to hire and invest in local businesses and in the city of newark to try to give Early Childhood<\/a> folks access to more opportunity Getting Started<\/a> early and then to expand on those programs yearround with meaningful jobs and an opportunity from just another vacant lot so theres things we try to spend the money and resources on to get people to help us there are systemic changes that we need to get into as well. As we have tried to recover from covid19 were trying to be intentional in the city of phoenix over equity concerns with a Small Business<\/a> aid program for businesses in low income areas and we know communities of color have been hit harder dont have the access to traditional banking to get federal aid trying to save you want to target those that have been hit the hardest also a multi milliondollar program for the Refugee Community<\/a> which has struggled to get access to the traditional programs many of which have extensive forms to document income improve you are impacted by covid19 so we are developing programs only for the Refugee Community<\/a> so they can get the much needed aid and a very diverse city has been very welcoming to refugees whether powering the airports or designing one of the police substations, we have a significant Iraqi Community<\/a> including those who translated for our troops when they were in iraq and saved americas lives we think the city of phoenix is stepping up for those who stepped up for us. We have one of the largest programs through covid19 in the country to branch out to artist. Our great cultural institutions that interrupted their season to help us through the threat you are trying to be very intentional to put that into multiple languages to get it out with the full diversity of our community and as we recover from covid19 we are putting in programs to address the equity issues over the longterm we dont want to wait for one crisis and not addressing the other and we want to walk and chew gum at the same time. As you think through we building the effort and the these issues varies systemic racism issues, all the mayors have talked about investing as an alternative to ensure that all communities can actually thrive so when you think about allocating resources. And something thats right at my fingertips as getting our budget approved, this is a pretty big book to live and breathe the municipal government there is a understanding it is a complex process and there are so many things that are reflected and things that are not so for example the city of atlanta we dont control the Public Schools<\/a> so we will not see that money and here that is something people have been crying out for because typically that is the elected body that we are setting aside housing in the city because the authority is not reflected in here and you also want a project with the Corporate Community<\/a> called the center of workforce innovation where we look to train people for jobs that Delta Airlines<\/a> is playing on paying 100,000 per year but the list goes on. There are so many things that we are working on in conjunction we will maximize those that are available to us in atlanta that we are very fortunate with a fortune 500 company that they are invested in a very meaningful way the owner of the Atlanta Falcons<\/a> there is a huge robust brand called the future find a nonprofit entity working in conjunction with our Nonprofit Community<\/a> to make sure people have the Wraparound Services<\/a> that they need if they are looking for Affordable Housing<\/a> even if they are looking to continue their Education Beyond High School<\/a> those resources are at their fingertips. So we continue to be creative in that way. I encourage people who are becoming more interested of how the cities are allocating their dollars that not with the instagram poster the social media headlines they really do educate themselves to become more informed not just atlanta so that key to success is for us to Work Together<\/a> and not necessarily work at each other if the mayor cannot tell it to his mother and grandmother is my mothers saturday bridge club. What does this mean to her if i Start Talking<\/a> about equity i may as well say what does that mean but if i talk about how much it empowers and the reason we need to look at the panel and the underserved communities who may not speak in the language of climate change, that is a true test how the message resonates within the community and how it feels on the ground. Let your elected officials know what you care about. It doesnt have to be a fancy municipal government speak language but push it to what you care about but if we dont know what is at issue in our community theres no way we can try to change it. Ending with you mayor, you have been doing a lot of innovations and what we have been hearing that what are your final thoughts to make those systemic changes for the black and brown communities with that systematic way . I feel part of it as we heard from the mayor we are doing everything we can pounding the basic income and then covid19 and then every single going from a three or four Year Trade School<\/a> that with those points raised earlier there wasnt much structural violence that is a National Policy<\/a> what we see with civil unrest part of the balance of poverty and housing and healthcares we have to imagine the social contract that should include things like housing and we love to do those things but police, transportation and some youth activities but we dont have the budget or the money or the county board of supervisors and a new deal and recognition. I cannot think of a better way to talk about the program of re envisioning the social contract with what we have seen perhaps that is an opportunity for those profound changes we need to address these things and for the leadership of mayors thinking for being a part of this conversation to be important in this moment and for your leadership across the challenges you are seeing. Thank you so much. The senate is in recess until midnight when senators will debate on the backlog on National Parks<\/a> in public lands legislation is set for 1 00 a. M. Eastern followed live when it returns on cspan2. 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