Interview with Mayor Armin Mizani

welcome to this episode of the wolf and

the shepherd today we have with us

armin mizani the mayor of the city of

keller

mr mayor thanks for joining us thanks

for having me so can you tell some of

our listeners

a little bit about yourself sure my name

is armin mazani mayor keller it's a

privilege to serve my community

i've been in keller since 2012 i had the

privilege of survival community of city

council from 2014 to 2018.

just recently got elected about two

months ago to serve our community as

mayor and

i've got two kids two beautiful kids

aidan and kendall six and three i've got

a wife

uh my college sweetheart from freshman

year

and um we're proud to call keller home

uh what college did you go to

purdue university purdue okay so she

went to purdue with you she did she's

the smart one so she

she graduated with engineer degree i'm

the uh public arts

guy i went to law school afterwards but

i tell people she's the one that handles

all the uh the math in our house i

actually wanted to go to law school but

i then i didn't go to law school and

when i went to school

i thought there was going to be a

pre-law major

and so they said hey all the pre-law

people go to this room

i showed up in that room there's a bunch

of people in there and they literally

said

well we don't have a pre-law major but

all of the pre-law people take political

science yeah

so i left that day as a poli-sci major

and then i ended up getting a poli-sci

degree

and then not going to law school so i

totally

i totally get that so my co-host and i

we're not that

up on local politics and how a city runs

so we kind of wanted to go through some

of that with you

and so what exactly is it that a mayor

does

sure so the mayor think of it as

a company for example and in particular

in keller we have a council

mayor form of government and so the

mayor kind of acts as the chairman of

the board um the city manager

would act as a ceo and so the mayor on a

day-to-day basis

obviously we have a lot of meetings

whether it be with developers or

businesses or maybe perhaps the chamber

non-profit groups things like that but

we really oversee

kind of what the vision is for the city

moving forward we when we have council

meetings we lead the meetings

with our council we have a council of

six including the mayor of seven and so

we in a sense

uh mayors not only justin keller but

mayors in the surrounding communities

we kind of help lead that vision help

guide counsel

but at the end of the day we are one

vote just like our other council members

so mayor and keller doesn't have any

more authority or any more

you know power when it comes to voting

um we have one vote just like my fellow

council members do

but we do aid in facilitating the

meeting and guiding kind of what the

vision

for the city is moving forward you know

my view of a mayor

came from a lot of tv shows where they

just turned up when they were open in a

public building and they'd cut a ribbon

um you know and kind of wave at people

when it came to you know the city's kind

of local festival and stuff but

you know how much balance is there

between putting out fires

and kind of getting to grips with the

long-term goals that perhaps you have in

mind when you first enter office

yeah i'll give you an example so i just

got elected two months ago

literally that less than probably 24

hours after i got sworn in

uh there was an incident with police

incident that we had here in keller back

in august

right i remember that it became wide

right turn yes

yes and it became very uh relevant and

much more than what we thought was going

to be

because uh just when i had gotten sworn

in there was a civil lawsuit and so the

civil lawsuit is what kind of got

a lot of media attention now that was

the first i heard of it

um was literally when i got sworn in and

so that was a fire that obviously no one

had expected including myself to

having to put out but it comes with the

role you know when you sign up to serve

your community as mayor you have to take

that responsibility and make sure you

address it

and then no no more than maybe a month

or a month and a half down the road then

we have

we had the winter storm that we all just

went through here in the entire state of

texas so

um these are things that you don't

necessarily account for

but you know that they will come up

during your term and

you as mayor and as an elected

representative you have to be ready to

be able to do that

while at the same time making sure

you're guiding your community and you

have a vision for what it is that you're

trying to do

two three four five years down the line

here in keller there's a lot of things

that we in the last you know the first

two months of my term that we had to

deal with

but that doesn't mean that we stop

working towards the end goal for what

we're going to be doing and so i was

very clear during my campaign that i

want keller i think keller is a very

family-friendly community it's always

been a family-friendly community

i want us to be the most family-friendly

city the entire state of texas that was

the goal that i set forth when i was

campaigning and so

with that whether it be taxes or whether

it be you know establishing a mental

health initiative

working with our youth whether it be our

trails in our park system or bringing

quality economic development

you still have to continue doing that

while putting up the fires like you said

and

and it's challenging of course but i

will tell you

in my first two months in office it

hasn't been as challenging as maybe you

would think because

partly we've got great people around it

around around

us we've got great staff we've got great

council people

council members we've got great citizens

and so it makes your job easier as mayor

to be able to do those long-term things

and be able to still put out the fires

when you have good people around you

and fortunately that's what we have in

color and i just want to say for the

benefit of our local

keller residents who are listening

unless there's going to be some heavy

budget cuts in the fire department our

mayor is not actually literally putting

out fires

so just as a little bit of a follow up

for that now the merrell positions for

three years right

yes does that put pressure on you to

start some things right out of the gate

which you know are going to be long term

but

it's going to be hard to squeeze in

those three years because if you don't

go for re-election or somebody else gets

in

they might not see that as a priority

and so you know what you really kind of

planned in some projects has gone to

waste or

you know doesn't get completed i think

anytime someone steps up to run for

office

you do it because there's something that

you're trying to achieve and for me i

don't really look at

well i've only got three years to

accomplish this or that and frankly in

my in my case

because of kovid the election was

supposed to be in may um but it got

postponed until december

actually november and then we had a

runoff which got to december so really

my term is

it's it got cut short uh 200 you know so

now i have a

what would have been a three year term

it's a two and a half year term

um but i don't look at it that way i

look at it you know listen i signed up

to run because there were things i

wanted us to do and i think

all people that run for public office

and want to serve the community

i think they they think that way and so

there's no pressure in that sense

other than uh we are trying to move

forward and so even in spite of

of the incidents that we've had the last

two months here in keller and throughout

the state

for example uh in march we're going to

be having a city council

i call it a policy summit kind of like a

workshop

but what i want our council to do is to

start thinking of short-term and

long-term goals for what we're going to

want to do

this year next year in the year after

that and frankly we at town hall have

not done that

in the last three four years and so

something that i wanted to bring back

because i think for us to really

be able to be focused as a council and

as a city and

a town hall you need to kind of start

setting those type of policy goals

whether it be short or long term and so

we're doing that we're bringing a

facilitator to help us with that

discussion

in march this month and i think that's

going to help us try to accomplish some

of the things that we're trying to do

within that time frame like you said so

you kind of alluded to this

a little bit but was there anything

specifically or even a little bit

abstract that

made you say here i'm gonna run for

mayor i will tell you

um i've got two kids as i said earlier

i've got a six and a three-year-old

and for me wanting to serve in this

capacity

was really wanting to make a positive

impact not only in their lives but

in the lives of their friends and my and

my neighbors and and so

ultimately that's always been the

motivating factor

as i mentioned earlier i think it's a

very family-friendly community

keller is a very family-centric

community and so but i think what's been

missing is kind of being able to

articulate a vision of what we're going

to be 5 10 15 years down the line while

at the same time

keep it in mind that our habits as

consumers have changed

keller even though we're reaching our

population

population limit were projected to kind

of max out at 50 000. we're

a little over 45 000 now so we're pretty

much built out

but there's a lot of development

surrounding keller so with that there's

some challenges right there

whether it be infrastructure or those

type of things those were kind of for me

the motivating factors as i see some of

the changes are happening around us

i wanted to be able to be a part of that

conversation i'll give you an example

consumer trends have changed amazon has

changed the way that we

shop grubhub or these type of you know

delivery services they've changed the

way that people now eat

they don't maybe go out so i think the

retail the old retail model

has been disrupted and so for us moving

forward

and one of the reasons why i wanted to

run is i want to be able to

be a part of the conversation of

reaching out and bringing out unique

businesses that offer unique experience

for our residents so that our residents

aren't necessarily going to

hypothetically a roanoke or a south lake

i love to

have taxpayers and our residents keep

their money here locally but we got to

give

that incentive to do so and so the more

that we can go and recruit

businesses that offer unique experience

for example the movie house and eatery

or the butcher shop that open up along

1709 or smoking access

where you can throw the uh the accident

and all that type of thing that to me is

a unique experience that will maintain

residents and surrounding neighbors who

want to come to keller and ultimately

that will help us as taxpayers also

there are a lot of things that motivated

me to want to run but i think at the end

of the day it's kind of all

predominantly focused around the fact

that i've got a young

young family this is where my kids are

gonna make their friendships and make

their memories and

learn their values and those type of

things and so for me to be able to

be a part of that and and help my

community

it was the motivating factor for wanting

to run so i know

um probably some of our listeners heard

what you just said and you mentioned

that 50

000 limit and i know the shepherd and i

are both curious what happens when we

reach that 50 000 limit does the

shepherd need to move into the keller

boundary now or will he be banned

once we hear that limit i'd always

encourage you to move now

i'm not going to discourage you the uh

no i it's always

that was a projected goal the or

projected vision that that keller had

and and i think if you have

conversations with keller residents

a lot of keller residents love the

unique character that keller has to

offer you know we have some areas maybe

a little bit more dense

we have other areas where it's a little

bit more rural and so

that 50 000 number was always kept in

in line with wanting to maintain that

character you know promoting our trails

and our parks and open spaces while

still

being able to do a lot of things that we

enjoy and maybe areas that may be

populated or that may have other sort of

amenities and so i think keller just has

a good balance

and that number was always thought out

to be okay

what what could provide that but yeah i

know there's not a you know gates are

not going to go up the minute we get to

50 but

i think a lot of residents and including

myself we want to make sure we do

everything we can to kind of

maintain with it okay you're not going

to put up a

sign like the national debt clock right

that's like oh 49 999

one more one more person and then we're

closing the roads

i don't think that's happening but i'm

never gonna you know say don't come and

move to keller we'd love to have you in

keller for sure

so now do you always had political

ambitions i mean like

obviously schools have um student

council

there's kind of you know practice

politics and i've got some good friends

who have kids in high school who do all

the kind of political thing that's

mainly for them to try and get out of pe

i think but you know did you even when

you're in school kind of thing

what i mean what clip that you suddenly

made you think huh

that's something i could do so for me

growing up public service has always

been a big part of my life for some

people it might be

money or it might be success in whatever

area may be but

for me what has always brought me the

most satisfaction

was knowing that i could help my

community in some capacity and so it

just happened to be

public service has kind of been that

that medium what kind of led me to that

growing up so

my my father's iranian he came to the

united states when he was 17 18 years

old

my mom is puerto rican but my

grandparents they left cuba right before

castro took office and so being raised

with

i think parents that come from perhaps

different ethnicities and different

cultures

i've always been growing up it's always

been

taught on me and it's always been the

impression that they've left on

myself and my brothers to wanting to

give back and so i've always grown up

i've always had that feeling

of wanting to give back to my community

frankly it's why

you know as mayor we don't get paid a

lot of people don't know this but when

you serve as mayor and council you don't

get a stipend you don't get paid nothing

like that it's a volunteer gig

but so my day job i'm an attorney and i

know sometimes we get bad raps as

attorneys and things like that but

but i will tell you the reason i went to

law school in the first place was

because of that

wanting to help people i think i just

like any other profession

there are people that do it the right

way they're people that do it the wrong

way

i try to do things the right way but

ultimately what led me to

wanting to be a lawyer and wanting me to

serve whether it be a council or as

mayor

was that wanting to help wanting to

serve and that's always been instilled

in me

really at a young age and i think that

came from my background and how i was

raised and

really kind of the the stories that my

parents

would teach to not only me but my my

four other

brothers looking at keller and of course

now you have about two and a half years

left

in your term i know this is gonna seem a

little tricky because you only have two

and a half years left but you know let's

hope you run again and that you win

again

and all that good stuff where do you see

keller in five years

i see us as uh texas most family

friendly city

and that is something that we've

articulated

early on when we're running it's

something that we've maintained now that

we're in office

and we've got a council that wants to

continue to promote that and we also

have a staff that wants to

make sure we obtain that title and to me

it's literally being named

texas most family-friendly city it's not

just a vision or a goal it's it's

literally

how can we quantify that and so i think

for us to get there we have to address a

lot of issues that

are affecting our residents on a daily

basis you know for example taxes

a lot of people as appraisals go up

people are getting priced out of their

homes

that's a problem you know how can we

provide tax relief for a resident so

that they can stay in keller

when i was on city council i was

fortunate to have been the one that

introduced

the first increase in over 30 years the

first increase to the homestead

exemption

right now keller we were at one percent

because of those efforts right now we're

at 14

i've talked about wanting to see keller

get to 20.

20 is the max that the state of texas

will allow us

and i think when you do that that's

going to bring a lot of relief for

homeowners in particular

which is going to help as far as easing

the burden on taxes

what what's your struggle with getting

it up to that 20

every year we do it we've done it

gradual it's been a gradual approach

and i think we just have to be careful

it's not to say that um

you can't get through in one in one big

swoop ultimately you want to be

take into account what can we do to not

only do the homestead but also

lower the the tax rate because they're

too different you know you've got the

tax rate you've got the homestead

and so one of the reasons why you

haven't necessarily seen keller go

for example from one percent to 20 is

because

what else can we do whether it be the

tax rate making making sure we lower

that but also providing the amenities

that a lot of our

keller residents have come to expect and

so for me

i've said that 20 is a goal and i think

we're gonna get there

it may not be this year um but i'm

hoping within two years we should get

there it's gonna it's gonna be kind of a

gradual approach as we've seen in keller

so my hope is we go from 14 to 17

and that from 17 to that 20. and once we

get to that 20 that is the max that the

state of texas will allow us to do

there's a lot of things that we can also

do to offset that dependency

for example we're talking about the

businesses and bringing some unique

business offering experience well when

we do that we can also start shifting

the burden away from homeowners by

depending more on that sales tax revenue

and so those are the type of things that

i want to see us do in keller

and and i think when we start doing

those type of things that's how we

become that family friendly

we got to continue to promote our and

push and expand our trails in our park

system

that's one of the things that has really

make keller unique when you compare us

to some of the surrounding communities

we've got trails and parks are unmatched

we've got 26 miles of trails

and the long-term goal is to get that to

52 miles of trails but we got to make

sure that as development comes and not

much is going to come but as they come

that we

provide a way for that to create some

connectivity between the trail system

you know when you talk about

issues that maybe we see at the state or

federal level for example mental health

mental health has been discussed at the

federal level but

ultimately i'm a big believer that the

best way to address those type of issues

is at the local level

if you have strong and effective

leadership and and i think we do i think

in keller we've got a good team of

people that really want to do the right

thing

when we talk about mental health and

what can we do to destigmatize

mental health which frankly has become

even more relevant with covid if we can

do that in keller and we can create an

initiative which is one of the goals

that i want to see us do over the next

two years

create an initiative that destigmatizes

but also provides us a resource for

residents as far as hey this is where

you can go to obtain some help or

whatever the case may be the more we do

that i think it's going to put keller on

the map it's going to take hillary to

that next level

so for me it's you know we got to

address the issues that we always talk

about

on the campaign drill taxes right

infrastructure

trails bringing quality businesses but

also start addressing issues that we

haven't and i think when we do that

that's really going to put keller in a

map

and that's what excites me what what are

some of the issues we haven't addressed

so mental health being one right for

example another you know

how can we engage our youth how can we

engage our senior population

so just recently we had a council

conversation where

creating a committee or a board of

senior residents

so when we have issues that come before

the city that's a way for them to

continue to remain engaged

same thing with our youth we just had

the police incident in keller that

happened in august what can we do to

work with our high school youth

and and kind of bridge some of that gap

that maybe whether it be

miscommunication or misunderstanding

between our police department and our

youth and so we just started initiative

uh our chief police chief is is going to

help lead that effort

it's a student forum where 20 to 25 high

school students are going to be able to

have meetings with our command staff

to discuss issues are relevant to

policing and and

and share ideas and i think the more we

do those type of things which we haven't

in the past

again it's going to help us put keller

that next step yeah i was wondering how

difficult is it to

prioritize things you'd like to be seen

down or that you know

in the background needs to be done which

the public might not always be aware of

you know the position of mayor is still

somewhat a population sorry a popularity

contest

when it comes to voting you know

residents if they feel that their needs

aren't being addressed it makes

re-election that little bit more

difficult

so do you feel that there's a need to

kind of over explain

some of the things you want to get done

and have to be done and why there has to

be priority before

one thing can happen before another the

way that i approach it

ultimately you listen when you run for

office you have your core values you

have your vision you have your ideas and

i think

for the most part should you get elected

it's a reflection on those set of ideas

and and those values and it's kind of

hard to be able to reach all

45 46 000 residents in keller that

doesn't mean that as an elected official

you don't do what you can to

engage with them and try to get their

input when these

items come up so for example whether

being social media i try to keep a

high profile there so that people know

that they can reach out to me and

whether it be questions ideas whatever

the case may be

but at the end of the day it you can't

let

it be a popularity contest i'm a big

believer in i'd much rather be respected

than liked

because being liked can go away with the

wind

any minute but once you're if you're

respected if people know hey this is his

position this is what he believes in and

i think one of the ways that you can do

that as a public official

is when you have a vote realize you're

not going to be able to always agree

with people 100 of the time

they may not agree with you right but if

you can explain

why it is that you voted how you voted

and give some sort of reasoning

people may not like it some people may

disagree with it

but they will respect it because they'll

at least understand or have a little bit

more insight of why you did what you did

and that's something that i always tried

doing when i was on council from

you know 14 to 18 was always do that and

i

found that whether you know when i met

with residents whether it be at a meet

and greet or on their at their door

a lot of people would say listen i

didn't necessarily agree with how you

voted on this particular issue but i

i appreciated the fact that you came out

and you spoke clearly on

why you did that that's always been i

found for myself

been helpful and the same thing as mayor

that's not going to change as mayor you

got to

you got to be who you are and it's

always been who i am as far as

try to engage try to be transparent with

the whole process and

and yeah sometimes elections seem like a

popularity contest and

but ultimately you got to stand for your

vision and i stress to be

understood as opposed to light and i

think when you do that

things end up being better than maybe

what you anticipated so along those kind

of lines i know it sounds

contradictory saying it but i've always

thought there's

too much politics in politics yeah you

know

there's some things you can give us some

examples where

on paper it should be easy to accomplish

but the red tape kind of makes it so

difficult a lot of people would cringe

if they really knew

how much work had to be done to get the

simplest and probably the most

common sense things to sure happen in

government what i found is kind of

frustrating and you see it here at the

local level too

government doesn't operate like maybe

private business would there are those

red tapes that you've talked about

but i i think at the end of the day it's

our responsibility

whether it be your mayor or council

member whoever you are you got to have

contingencies in place to be able to

respond to a lot of the red tape because

the reality is

you're going to find that no matter what

level local state federal there's going

to be those type of things

i'll give you an example because there's

a lot of them but one brief example that

we just had so

with the winter storm keller we get our

water from the city of fort worth they

are

our supplier one of the reasons why at

one point keller

had run out of water was because of line

breaks and

due to the weather and things like that

from our supplier once we

were able to obtain that water once the

lines were fixed and things like that

we had at one point if you remember we

had a boil notice people had a boil of

water because there was concern that

could have been contaminated things like

that

for us to get that boil notice lifted we

had to

take our water to a lab in in tarrant

county and get it approved and all that

now keep in mind we had to also wait for

fort worth to get their water

approved fort worth so friday evening

fort worth got their water

their boil notice lifted the water

samples were clean

in theory you would think that means

that whoever they supply that same water

to

would be clean well keller couldn't just

lift the notice we had to wait for fort

worth to do that

but not only that we also kind of

redundant but we had to also take our

water samples

and take it to another lab ourselves and

make sure it got approved it was just

the little things as

and one of the reasons why keller was

actually able to lift their notice 24 to

48 hours

sooner than even some of the surrounding

cities that still get their water from

the same supplier was because

it was just a little things as when we

got the water sample

it was late in the afternoon the lab

closed at 4 pm

and if you couldn't get your water in

time what that meant is you'd have to

wait another 12 you know

15 hours to be able to bring the water

the following day which

kept prolonging when you could lift that

water so it was frustrating and so one

of the things that we did

first of all kudos to our public works

department because they

rushed to get the water samples but what

i did in the meantime to help them buy a

little bit of time was i gave a call to

our county commissioner gary fickas and

i said gary

you may not know this but your lab

closes at four is there anybody that you

can call to make sure that they will

keep their doors open for keller to

bring in their water

should we bring it past four and he said

mayor no problem let me make a call and

sure enough he did now

our public works people work quickly to

make sure we got there in time

but it was the little things like that

that i think if if we wouldn't have

done done those preventative measures we

could have been another 24 48 hours

without

being able to lift that that ball notice

and so it's just the little things along

the ways and so ultimately it's what i

said earlier it's

you just got to have contingencies in

place knowing for no

full well knowing that there are there

is going to be that red tape there

there is a set of protocols and and

that's just the reality and that kind of

the nature of the beast but i think if

you're prepared for it you anticipate

those type of things

you can react to it in a much better way

sure and i can almost see

journalists spinning that right saying

keller didn't get their samples to the

lab

on time and that's why you still have to

boil your water

versus hey we tried to bend heaven and

earth just to make sure

to get there and yeah they closed it

forward but we had somebody coming in

and blah blah

so you can see it's fun yeah absolutely

yeah and

and so it's the challenges but i think

if you have plans in place and

contingencies then you can kind of react

to it and so

yeah you're right i mean it could work

one way or the other absolutely

yeah so do you think keller is missing

anything and if it is missing something

what what is that thing that it's

missing man that's a hard question

because i love keller and i love

everything that keller has to offer

i think again one of the reasons why i

ran was i felt that

uh we could have done a better job of

articulating a vision for

a long term vision what were we going to

be 5 10 15 20 years down the line

you know you go back two three months

ago i felt that we were kind of lacking

that vision um and and maybe being able

to

articulate that in a in a way that was

clear and effective and kind of set the

expectations for everybody

whether it be staff or to be counsel

whether it be our residents and so

i think we're heading in the right

direction for sure

i think uh it's been very clear our

residents

they they believe in that vision they

believe in in us being a family friendly

city for all it doesn't necessarily mean

that hey you have to have kids in keller

to be a part of you know the

community when i say family friendly it

means

the empty nester it means perhaps folks

with no kids it means

people with myself that have you know

young kids that's just who keller is

we're just a family-centric town you

look at the amenities that we provide

it's always been family-centric and so i

think ultimately

just being able to set that vision

articulate it and really

work to that end and it's why we're

having those workshops with council

we haven't done that a long time but i

think when we do that when we start

putting pen to paper of what it is that

we're trying to accomplish

ultimately that's how we get there and

along those lines i had

a friend of ours who had been on the

podcast he actually submitted a few

questions regarding

uh activities in calories

with covid hopefully getting on the

downturn now

uh will there be an increase in

community activities this year like the

5k

the fun runs color crawfish boil live

music

as opposed to last year wherever

obviously everything was curtailed

you know yes yeah i mean obviously kovit

made that very difficult with a lot of

the activities that we did but i'm i'm

happy and excited so one of the things

when i was on council i wanted to bring

a firework show to keller a fourth of

july fireworks show

and i get it i know there's always

concerns with safety and things like

that and

and so unfortunately years ago we were

not able to

get it through well i figured hey you

know what

i just ran for office i mean let's bring

it up it's a different council it's a

different you know perspective

staff maybe have a different opinion so

we brought it back so in fact to to

answer your question we're actually

gonna have a fourth of july fireworks

show in keller for the first time

uh very much so maybe like some of the

surrounding communities do

and it's gonna be a big show we're gonna

bring in uh

we're in fact gonna be partnering with

the keller chamber and and the keller

farmer's market

uh we're gonna be doing also lighting of

the lanterns event so keller has a great

venue with the pond right behind it

we're going to light up about 3 000

lanterns and put them in the water

and then we'll also do the fireworks as

a grand finale

so we're going to do that that's an

event the keller summer nights is gonna

be back

so in june every thursday we bring in uh

uh music

and we do a movie at the end of the

night that's out of keller town hall

and um so we're gonna do that and so my

hope is

now that kovid seems to be and we got to

be safe obviously we got to continue to

take preventative measures and be

you know cautious about what's still out

there but i think we can start moving in

the right direction of getting back to

what keller is about and so for example

we're gonna have the connor's car show i

know in june as well so

a lot of the the things that we used to

enjoy in keller are coming back

maybe not right away but we are planning

for them and and i'm hoping by summer

we're gonna start seeing these things

come back so are you gonna get a

mayor's choice award at that car show

yes

actually we are yeah yeah no i i uh no

joke yeah we met with uh

with the representatives and yeah i

guess uh i i was not aware

that there was such a thing but he did

mention that and so

i'll probably bring my six and

three-year-old so it'll be the mayor's

choice award but it's really going to be

aidan's and kendall's choice award so

i'm kind of concerned already for

whoever may win that because well

it'll probably be the pink car that wins

well if there's a

silver pontiac convertible in there from

the 60s i'm just saying maybe

take your kids near that car and say hey

this might be your

your mayor's choice that's funny well my

kids like lollipops and chocolates so if

you happen to just have that in the car

i'm sure they

they might take favor with that yeah

i'll make sure that happens

is there a possibility of having

restaurants added near the trails around

bear creek

similar to katy trail in dallas yeah and

so in fact

if there's a neighborhood it's called

the i'm forgetting it's right behind

bear creek park bear creek trails or

something like that but there's a

neighborhood that's already developed

and i just happen to be forgetting the

name of it but there are two

parcels of commercial land uh right next

to the trail to your point

and we've been having discussions with

uh restaurants and retailers two of them

to go there and so kovit has put a

little bit of a

pause on that but we're continuing to

have those conversations and i think

it's starting to look pretty favorable

that i'm hopefully

within the next year year and a half

you're going to see something there

very similar to katy trail and the same

thing with the hotel that just came up

the hampton inn

there's a parcel there for commercial

restaurant or retailer

at the very end kind of that end cap and

so we're hopeful that we'll be able to

bring someone there as well

so it's gonna make i think that whole

town center

belt bear creek or trail system it's

gonna you're gonna see some

restaurants in retail that i think will

be very unique to color now are there

any volunteer opportunities that are

open for teenagers with special needs in

the community

and if so i mean does the cal does

keller have any partnerships that allow

for any of those opportunities to take

place

with our youth we're implementing the so

we've had

a keller citizen's academy we've had

that for adults but we also actually

open it up for high school

students as well okay that's apart from

the

chiefs forum that we just talked about

with the keller police and

and all that those are two separate

programs to help engage our youth you

said

special needs special needs and things

like that special needs yeah it's not

that i'm aware of right now

but those are the type of things that as

mayor i love to see us start looking

into

just like as we talked about the mental

health initiative i think when we start

doing those type of things whether it be

mentorships or

you know whether it be a program for

special needs kids or students or

families

i think the more that we can address

those type of things in the future

that's going to really make our

community stand apart and frankly it's

it's needed

right it's needed there's a lot of

families that kind of need that support

and so

i want to be a part of that so those are

the type of conversations that when we

have

our workshops and when we have our town

halls with residents which i plan on

doing

whether it be a meet and greet so every

month i'm going to be doing a mayor

spotlight

we'll be going to a unique business in

keller every single month

and and the reason we call the mayor

spotlight is because

we're going to be answering questions

from our residents we're going to be

taking ideas soliciting ideas so i hope

you can come so march 18th is our first

one

um hope you'll be able to go and and so

those are the type of things that i'm

looking f

from our residents is if you have ideas

to help improve our community

you know share that with me share that

with your counsel

and i'm trying to make sure that we

provide forms for that type of

conversation

this month is march 18th and then we'll

do that every month and

and that will also help us aside from

just soliciting ideas from residents

we'll be able to spotlight a business a

different business each and every month

and hopefully

bring more awareness to our residents

that they're out there so we can support

those type of establishments

got you so now let's let's shift a

little bit to uh

what the wolf and i called snowmageddon

yeah we

we're just now getting out of that uh

you know once in a

lifetime for some people you know storm

that

that happened around here where it was

just four-wheel drives driving around

and everything else and and everything

shut shut down

and of course the the talk of the town

the state and everything was

er caught i mean a lot of people didn't

even know what that was

before and now we found out today ercot

has fired the ceo

well actually fired him yesterday

and seven of the directors of ercot have

resigned as of last week

so given the statements made from ercod

after all the recent power cuts

because of the snowmageddon are you

concerned that

where state infrastructure won't get the

funding or the upgrades it needs so this

won't happen again

you know to your point this was an event

that was

very unordinary right this is it was

unprecedented in a sense

um but if you just go back to 10 years

ago we had

the snowstorm that came through the

metroplex as well and it created some

not to this extent but it created some

damage as well

and so i think ultimately we just have

to be prepared and so

whether i'm concerned i think ultimately

what would concern me is if we don't

react to what just happened

you know what i don't want us to see is

i don't whether it be the local level

number one we at the local level need to

make sure that we are prepared for that

should it happen whether it be next year

or 10 15 20 years from now

but also the state level as well right

and so what would concern me is if

you don't see action coming out of this

legislative session

but i think fortunately for us as

residents as

and and as constituents i think you see

the governor for example he you know

called for

special hearings you saw the state house

and the state senate they continue to do

those and so they're asking all the

questions and i think right now they are

in fact finding mode

and i've been in conversations with our

state reps i've been in conversations

with

a lot of our elected officials and

i think they're looking for not only

just accountability they're

they're gonna hold people accountable

but i think they're looking for what is

it that we need to do what do we need to

winterize for example

our infrastructure to make sure that

this doesn't happen again i know that's

something that the governor has talked

and so

i guess i'm i'm not as concerned so long

as we're taking

action and i get the sense that we are

taking action

at all levels of government i think

people are asking all the right

questions

and i think it's why you see that the

ceo had resigned and where you see some

of the board members that resigned as

well

and so i'm hopeful that we're heading in

the right direction not to

hopefully have this happen again but the

reality is

we should be prepared for it to happen

again i think if we just sit back and

assume it won't

that that's that's going to be a problem

sure and and one thing we

we would like to actually give a little

bit of a shout out because

the keller public library became one of

the warming stations right and that was

obviously the keller public library is

not prepared to become

you know some kind of warming station

but we can't we can't go without

mentioning our favorite librarian kelly

holt who works for

uh the city of keller in the public

library and was one of our early guests

on the podcast

actually and and talked about the public

library so

that action right there just kind of

showed hey you got to be quick on your

feet got to think about something and

turning

the library into somewhere where hey

yeah come get warm

maybe read a book i mean we do have

books there but but at least get warm

and use those public services no

absolutely and we have great staff our

keller public library is

i think top notch i mean if you look

throughout the state and cities

comparable to our size i really think we

we run a very

top-notch program but no absolutely you

got to be able to react on your feet

and so the one of the reasons why the

library was actually

a warming station for keller believe it

or not some of our city buildings so

town hall for example or the keller

point could not sustain power

continuous power to the point that we

felt comfortable opening that as a

shelter

the library was the only facility aside

from our police department our fire

stations

that was able to maintain that type of

power so which is why we opened it

but i will tell you we also had

contingencies in place so in the event

that we felt that the library was

there were too many people and we need

to create a second

spot we had conversations with our

school district i got on the phone with

dr westfall rick westfall our

superintendent and

we were in the event that we needed to

uh he was willing to open the keller

high school the gym

because they also had maintained power

and so we had contingencies in place

but fortunately enough in keller and

also

we had worked with some of the

surrounding cities i know south lake and

collierville for example had warming

stations

we were sharing resources we had

encouraged residents if you're from

south lake or

colleyville and you come to keller for

whatever reasons feel free to use our

station

and vice versa but we had contingencies

and

contingencies in place for that but no

i'm very proud and i think to your point

you just have to be able to act on your

feet so for example

when we had run out of clean water and

keller

well we're not gonna wait for a star

request even though we did put that in

to obtain water from the state or from

the federal government we're going to

reach out to samantha springs

which is a great local resource joe

mccombs was a

he actually a former council member but

when we gave him a call he said

absolutely how can i help and

he brought a 6 000 gallon tanker to the

foots of town hall

we were able to distribute clean water

that same day

when we realized that oh man there's

there's actually a greater need than

what we had anticipated and

we don't have enough volunteers well

made a call to northwood church and

northwood church

helped us in distributing that water

same thing with milestone milestone

church was able to use some of the

connections they had with nestle and

some of the surrounding companies

they were able to get some cases of

water to distribute water they got in

contact with the city and so we created

a system for the residents that really

needed it

that that had emailed and things like

that they're out there distributing

water 24 7.

at one point miles don't even use the

tanker that we had at town hall the

following day they took it to their

church and used it when we realized that

people

because of the power outages and and

frankly are if you remember if you

recall

our grocery stores that were running low

on inventory as well it was just a crazy

you know snowball effect everything was

being

affected we realized that people some

people were going to go hungry because

they didn't have groceries for whatever

reason

and and um and so the chamber uh

you know helped us with partnering with

some of the surrounding restaurants

whose food was not being utilized

because they were all closed

so they cooked up 1700 meals free meals

to distribute i mean that's

awesome that's that really to me i mean

keller i think

again it's not one person it wasn't you

know it's not me or

this person or that it was really a

total team effort

a community approach pulling together

and i think it's why you saw keller

in my opinion it's why we stood out when

we were faced with extraordinary

challenges we really pulled together

our non-profit groups our high school

you know the the keller isd

the the chamber the churches

everybody pulled together samantha

springs and we did what we could

and i think it's that type of type of

team approach that's what's going to

take killer to that next level and it's

why frankly is mayor

is what excites me because if you take

that

same approach that same mentality and

now you're addressing things like you

talked about whether it be special needs

or

when you when you start dressing the

issues are a little bit more normal in

nature

well then they're gonna not seem as as

difficult because

you know you've been there and done it

before with a good team that's what

excites me and

and i think keller is ready for anything

i know from friends posts on social

media

that i think everybody felt a little bit

more vulnerable

after the storm had passed and what they

went through i was without power for

44 hours and it got down to about 42

degrees in the house but

you know i was lucky enough i had a gas

fireplace and a gas stove top so i could

at least kind of cook some warm food and

keep somewhat warm but you know some of

the residents weren't that lucky and the

certainly the rolling blackout thing

didn't work as

you know erica told us it was going to

because we just didn't get any power on

where some people were like an hour on

an

hour off i guess that's reminded us that

we are the

little bit of the mercy of outside

forces so how do we reassure our

residents that

i know this was supposed to be a one in

a 100 year storm whatever but

with texas we're only ever one summer

away from it being a record-breaking hot

summer and again if that puts too much

strain on the

grid that you know something maybe on a

smaller scale something on a larger

scale

doesn't happen again so when we have

those type of emergency situations the

mayor acts as

the director the director for for our

emergency plan and so one of the things

again

i think we've got a good team around us

but we just need to be

ready for it to your point and so along

those lines

we are continuing to evaluate

what we did during this this time

what can we do to improve because i

think no matter how good you think you

did

there's always room for improvement at

all no matter you know what facet of

life

there's always room for improvement so

what can we do to improve but also

how can we be of assistance to folks at

the state

and federal level i reached out to all

of our representatives whether

you're a federal u.s senator whether

you're a state senate whether you're a

state rep i've reached out to all of

them in what i've

what i've expressed to them is if

there's anything that you need

in as you formulate and start drafting

your legislation

to address some of the things that we

saw know that keller is here to help

and so if i need to go and testify and

be able to provide insight as to

how you know this issue impacted keller

or communities of our size i'd be happy

to do that

if you need data if you need you know to

be able to quantify

what is exactly that cities like keller

how were they impacted

we'd be happy to share that with you and

so all of our representatives at those

levels

who are right now addressing those type

of issues

they know that they can reach out to us

but i think here at the local level as

you saw

we're not going to wait for anybody and

we're not going to wait for answers for

us to react we

have to react and that is the

responsibility of local municipalities

when things like this happen you have to

be able to react and so

what that means to me is continue to

evaluate what we did

what can we do to improve and so when

this does happen because the reality is

it is going to happen again i don't know

when it may not be next year it may not

be for another hundred years but it's at

some point gonna happen

you need to make sure you're ready for

it so that's what we're doing on our end

so let's shift to your election so you

got

uh based off of our research and of

course our listeners know we're terrible

at research but we're gonna

we're gonna stand by these numbers and

you can you can correct me if we're

wrong but

you in in the last election you received

3809 votes which is

approximately 59 or so of the

votes in the election your opponent

received 2659 votes

and we talked about the population of

keller being around 45

46 47 000 somewhere around in there

let's say

half of them are kids make the math easy

because

i can't reach my calculator right now so

let's say there's 20 000 people and

they're all registered to vote so that's

about a 25

turnout what could the city of keller do

to increase that voter turnout the

people that

come to the polls for a local election

versus

you know everybody talks about oh the

president election that's the big one

right and

you know you almost don't want to be on

the ballot for that one because

everybody shows up

but those local elections where they're

you know there's no president on the

ballot those off-year elections or even

not even the off-year but the the random

elections right what

what do you think we could do to

increase voter turnout

yeah so it's funny you asked that

because in my election for example it

was supposed to be in may

the covete got extended so i was part of

that november ballot so i was on the

same ticket with trump and biden and so

you have a lot of people that

naturally they're going to come and vote

for the presidential race and some of

the other federal

elected you know positions and so but we

were on that same ballot

which as a candidate it actually kind of

made it a little difficult because

when you're in a may ballot you can

inform and meet with

a lot of voters and you're the only

thing on the ballot

so they'll maybe pay and want to give

you the time of day to kind of listen

what you're trying to do

when you're in the federal election i

found it made it a little bit more

difficult and just even think from a

practical sense

you know you can't reach as many people

because for example

you're gonna have a lot of voters and so

whether you're trying to make a phone

call or you're trying to send some sort

of mail

just naturally you can't reach all the

households that you know are going to

come out and in this particular election

that we had

you know november with the president i

mean that was a high you know a record

turnout

so in keller in the mayor's race is

actually the highest turnout naturally

because of it

we had 23 000 people vote in the mayor's

race in november

so in november i i took i forget what

the percentage was but

i think it was like 47 48 it was a

three-way race

in november and then ultimately the top

two moved on to the runoff

which is when you mention those numbers

and talk to them so my numbers are the

runoff numbers yes that's the runoff

and and and actually in in comparison to

some of the runoff numbers

and i think because it was a mayor's

race usually

at the local level or local level you'll

see that the mayor's race will

you usually get more people to come to

the polls so i think we had 74 7 500

people that came to vote

which was actually pretty high turnout

but you kind of wish it would be like

that every single cycle right and and

frankly you wish it would be the 23

000 number i mean that would be an ideal

world and so i think ultimately the way

for us to do that

is try to do a lot of things that we're

trying to do whether it be the town

halls i think the more that we can

engage with our community

the more that we can provide insight as

to what is happening and

and really kind of get their feedback

then i think that helps

people are going to feel more engaged

they're going to want to participate and

that's one of my goals i i

would love to see that type of level of

engagement in color and i think that

comes naturally from just

being out there and making yourself

yourself accessible and transparent

and letting people know that hey what

happens in town hall is reflective of

what you want to see at town hall that's

how it should be i think part of the

challenge with it though

is for the most part keller is a great

community too

and a lot of people in keller live very

busy lives

people have families in color they go to

work they do all these type of things

and so

that i think is also presents as a

natural challenge

because some people may be very happy

with what you see in keller which could

naturally lead to

well maybe i don't need to vote this

cycle because things are going well

and so i think there's that natural kind

of phenomena

and that's impacted but i love to see us

continue to raise the voting numbers and

i think ultimately the best way to do

that is

more engagement more more participation

i think people are going to want to

participate

when they see that now one thing we do

see in north tarrant county

is every election cycle all of these

signs on every available

piece of grass you know on every road

and there's so many signs

that you know unless you want to risk

wrecking your car

that um it's impossible to read them and

i'll be honest with you i did not

notice or remember your name from those

signs but what i did remember was

stuff on social media such as nextdoor

app i know you're on there i contacted

you through there

but that's where i first looked you up

on there not because i saw those signs

now i had a little bit of a question in

terms

how many of those signs do you actually

put out i mean when you were running

yeah i know you've got to have people

going out there maybe volunteering or

paid whatever

how many signs do you actually have to

put up around keller so

i'm not a big believer in signs frankly

because signs don't vote

people do but the nature of politics you

kind of have to have

signs just as a visibility and and i get

it so we do get our you know we do

purchase signs

i'm trying to think as far as the large

signs i think i have the 4x4 signs i

think i had like 15

4x4 signs i know from prior campaigns

people would tell me oh man you only

have 15 we had 40 of

the large signs again it's just i don't

believe signs vote

i think what you do outside of that you

know for example you said the social

media and just your engagement

i think ultimately that's what's going

to reach a voter on the small yard signs

though

we actually did order quite a few but

frankly it was because

we had a and we're fortunate a lot of

people were just

requesting it and you know someone's

going to request a small yard sign i'm

not going to tell them

no you can't have it because we don't we

ran out we're going to you know i'm

going to order it and so

i'm trying to think back at one point so

when i ran for city council the first

time

i just ordered 100 yard signs small yard

signs and that was it

now at that point i moved you know here

i didn't really know many people and

so we didn't feel the need to order i

think this cycle i want to say

we had purchased in total about 600

700 of the small yard signs and we had

them all

um out there i don't some of them

disappeared

i don't know what happened to them some

disappeared but they were out there and

i

i try to stay away from when i had

people to help with the campaign and

things like that

we would put them in people's yards i

mean it was a request hey we like to put

your yard sign type of thing

i don't like putting yard signs out in

the middle of nowhere if it's a public

right away i always try to stay away

from those the

larger ones you saw them more out in the

public but the small ones we always

usually had them

in people's yards and so i'm not a big

believer in science i don't think signs

vote people do

it's what you do outside of that if you

run a campaign based on signs i think

chances are you're probably going to

lose

that it just it doesn't to me it just

doesn't impact the

uh you know a voter yeah um but

it's kind of the nature of the beast you

kind of have to make that purchase i've

i've always just tried to limit

what i did with that yeah now we're

pretty well behaved in keller but

i've got some friends who live out in

west texas and they say when those signs

come up

after six o'clock at night they're just

shoes for target practice

i mean they're driving behind the car

you'd be surprised i drive by a sign i

was like

i don't think i had that sign there you

know the uh i don't think it was like

that someone did something

and you know the reality is it's kind of

sad but

you kind of come to expect it signs are

going to disappear things are going to

happen to them and

and as a candidate you can't let it

affect you if you're worried about

do i have the right sign placement here

you're probably not worrying about the

right thing

right and one last thing actually along

those lines and i mentioned the next

door out

i posted on there a couple of weeks ago

that you know we were going to have you

here on the show and i asked for any

questions they might have for you and

we've put in some of the questions in

okay here but a lot of the questions

wanted to know more about you i think in

keller we're very lucky in that

people value character over a lot of

achievement stuff and they want to know

who a person is and

actually a question which was asked

quite a number of times

was that you know with you being a

personal injury injury attorney in

grapevine

yeah with your own law firm there are

questions like ask him how he

how he got started with that yeah

again for me wanting to go to law school

was because i viewed it as a way of

wanting to help people now you can help

people in many different professions i

just

happen to have chosen law and i think

for me i've always been someone i've

always enjoyed

interacting with people growing up that

was always the thing i enjoyed i've

always enjoyed negotiating

i think that's something i took from my

dad and so to some extent

from a personal injury perspective why i

got into personal injury

there's a lot of negotiation involved

with the insurance companies

i kind of view it as a david vs goliath

type of thing because insurance

companies they're real quick to

take your premiums but the minute that

someone truly gets hurt

or is truly an accident and needs some

assistance all of a sudden they

you know they start pointing the finger

you should go somewhere else and they

don't want to pay and so it

i take joy in helping people in that end

and especially folks are truly hurt you

know that and that's what i try to focus

my practice on is people that really

need help

and um whether it be a veteran that's

suffering from ptsd and have you know

gotten a you know

18 wheeler accident and and now the the

insurance company is

saying well that's a pre-existing

condition we're not going to pay

i love having that type of challenge and

it's why i enjoy being a personal injury

attorney and

what led me to that is frankly i think

it's

that interest in wanting to do those

type of things whether it be negotiating

and representing people but also it's

just

i think opportunity when opportunity

knocks you kind of take it and so

when i graduated law school i went to

undergrad at purdue university met my

wife there

i knew i was going to go to law school

in fact i wanted to come to law school

to texas

but my wife took a job my at the time

she was my girlfriend

took a job in wisconsin so like any

smart man

if she's going to take a job in

wisconsin you got to be pretty close by

so that whole texas plan

it was put on on the back burner and i

took i went to law school michigan state

which was close enough for me to visit

and she can visit every other weekend

once i graduated we knew that we wanted

to come to texas i have family

that lives in san antonio and so we've

always wanted to come here it was great

opportunities things like that

so i applied everywhere i applied

everywhere in the state and there was a

firm out of dallas that took me at the

time

and that's kind of how we landed in the

metroplex and

and keller it just so happened to be

kind of the

the midway point of where my wife was

able to transfer to and where i

ended up working with and and that's how

we landed in keller

and ever since we've we never left since

then i've started a practice

of my own i've been uh on my own now for

i want to say six years i think and

we've got our practice in grapevine and

and so i enjoy it i enjoy why i do what

i do like i said earlier i know there's

some people that

maybe do things the right way and some

people that do things the wrong way and

unfortunately the

the few that do it the wrong way kind of

put a cloud over the whole profession

and that's unfortunate but i try to be

one of those people

that does it the right way you know if

you if you call i'm gonna answer your

phone

and for me i don't take every single

case that comes through the door because

frankly

we need to give that one-on-one type of

attention to everybody that comes

through

yeah and that that's perfectly alluding

to my next question for you did you feel

like that

connotation behind lawyers might have

hurt you in an

election for mayor say in a small town

like keller

versus you know your senators and

representatives a lot of them are

typically attorneys

but maybe at the local level they're

like i don't know if we really need

another attorney

in a political office because it's all

full of lawyers anyway right

yeah unfortunately this is the reality

yeah no doubt i mean i i came across

doors where people say yeah aren't you a

personal injury lawyer or you're and

sometimes you get a you know people

unfortunately will say or you're just an

ambulance chaser or something like that

and

and uh the reality is i i kind of

explained it how i did i

i tell them the truth listen i am a

lawyer i do personal

injury and here's why i do personal

injury and and i think for the most part

when i explain what it is that we

actually do again i think it's just the

few people that do it the wrong way that

put a bad cloud on the whole profession

but i think when you explain what it is

that you actually do and who you

represent

and what and and i think people

understand it but the reality is in

politics people will use everything they

can against you

yeah i remember running for city council

in the first place that was

one hot button issue you you'd have two

or three people that are really vocal

that would use that against you for

whatever reason

same thing happened when i was running

for mayor at the end of the day

listen it's your profession and you got

to be able to explain it and you got to

be able to

ultimately take pride in what you do and

i take pride i don't have any qualms

about what i do

and i'm very proud of

of you know the of what i do and and you

can't hide behind it

so and i think the more that you can

stress that people again

they'll probably maybe respect it

because sure enough

i'm sure there's a lot of people in

keller who may be personal energy

attorneys or

and and i think i think people can kind

of

relate to it right so if we were to show

up at your law firm you do not have an

aquarium in there

with sharks swimming around no okay no

yeah we don't have an aquarium not yet

no we don't well if we do have anybody

that wants to sponsor our podcast that

provides saltwater aquariums with sharks

we

we will try to get them in touch with

you and get you all set up

i appreciate it right now before the

shepherd asks you

his last set of questions and i'll warn

you now they are trivia questions okay

and you always ten dollars for each one

you get wrong which i'm pretty sure is

legally

binding but you know i owe you guys ten

dollars yeah for each one you get wrong

yeah

you know okay but one thing we didn't

discuss what if he gets him right do we

have to pay

nothing he just comes off off as a

brainiac if you get something right

yeah the problem is he's a lawyer so

maybe he's going to take this as some

kind of contract

well i don't know we don't have any

money there yeah we don't have we don't

have any money so

we just want to let you know so the last

question well you can get 33

of nothing he can that's true that's

right

so the last question i wanted to ask you

was do you have any further political

ambitions beyond

mayor of keller are you thinking like

you know later on maybe taking it a step

further or do you think this will get it

out of your system as such

i've always in so one of the things i've

always disliked is when people get asked

that question and naturally i get it you

know i'm a young guy

i've served as a council i'm a mayor and

so i've had that question before

you don't you can't really think about

it because you don't have time to think

about those type of things and i will

tell you

i think i'm a big believer in things

happening for a reason so i served on

council but

i ran for state rep after that and i

lost things happen for a reason i think

there's always a plan

that god may have for you and and

ultimately

um what i had realized the last year and

a half two years that i wasn't in office

was how much i really cared about our

community and how much i

i thought there was still a lot of

things that still need to be

accomplished in our community

which is what prompted me to run for

mayor i think along the way you also

realize kind of where you're at in your

life

i've got a six and a three year old for

example my son has baseball practice

mondays and wednesdays as mayor i have

the ability to go to his baseball

practice whereas if maybe i were in

austin or somewhere else

i wouldn't be able to do those type of

things and so i can very

sincerely tell you i want to be mayor

for keller for a long time especially

kind of where i am in life who's to say

15 20 years from now where you'll be

because frankly i don't know where i'll

be maybe

i'll like to your point maybe you'll say

i'm out of i'm done you know i've done

what i need to accomplish but

i've always enjoyed serving and

ultimately i want to be able to serve my

community the best way i can

and the way that i see that at least for

a while

as my kids go through school and go

through high school things like that i

see that here locally

as mayor i wouldn't want to have any

other seat

i think being able to have a stake and

have a be a part of the conversation of

who we are as a community and what we do

5 10 15 20 years from now

and being able to impact my kids life

and maybe their friend's life and our

neighbors

it's a pretty awesome feeling and i'm

enjoying it i know it's only been two

months

but um i'd love to be able to be mayor

for a long time so here comes the fun

part

so uh i don't know how much of our

podcast you've listened to but we have

an

or a segment rather called stump the

shepherd

and so the wolf will ask me all these

questions and

i usually never get them right so he's

allowing me

to have this segment called stump the

mayor okay so we're gonna have some

some trip i'm kind of scared on this one

yeah all right so

question number one and and by the way

uh over there wolf keep track because

it's 10 bucks every time

do i get to like phone a friend or

something no no

yeah no no googling okay no no

smartphone usage none of this

but uh but yeah it was on the first page

of google so

it's gonna be bad i got this is bad all

right all right here we go so

question number one before keller was

called

keller what was it called i know that

one ethel or

oh dang it all right well

good all right come on at least i got

one that was nervous i was gonna get any

of them yeah he got the first one

question number two where did keller get

its name

john c keller who is a foreman now you

guys are going to think i had these

questions before

i met for the record i did not did not

happen this is why i always write the

stump the

questions because i always ask the ones

which nobody ever gets correct well i

guess that's why you should have been in

charge of this part why did you put me

well

we know now yeah we know now okay so he

was a foreman for our railroad here

yes he was yeah john c keller a railroad

foreman

yeah question number three so so

literally

the shepherd is oh for two right now

yeah what is keller in

mandarin

all right question number three how big

was keller when it was first started

oh and see this is typically what the

wolf does to me because

i it the question needs to be answered

in acres

in acres yeah so the odds of you getting

this

right or slim when it started yeah so if

i'm not mistaken

i think keller now

i think we go to 50 miles from how do

you say that like a

corner group

of course when it first started way back

in the 1800s

what was that initial plot of land you

want me to guess

yeah i guess well what error margin are

we going to give him

plus or minus this is tough quarter over

nine

i know yeah i like that a quarter of an

acre that's

plus or minus twenty big now i'm gonna

go

give me ten acres 40 acres

oh okay okay all right i'm i'm one for

three so

chick-fil-a yeah yeah there you go all

right there's ten bucks all right

last question

what is the greatest star wars movie

ever made oh my gosh

i have not okay i'm going to lose a lot

of votes right now

uh-oh i've never watched the star wars

oh my god oh

so wolf you are no longer in charge of

getting our guests

if if you did not preface this with

watching star wars i think you guys are

big stars

i've got an uneasy feeling in the force

that half of our listeners have just

switched out

i'm so glad i feel glad they also last

four brothers i'm the oldest of five and

uh my youngest brother is a huge star

wars fan so when they come and visit

now he's getting my son into it so

really i should

be able to give but i can't because i

know that they've watched it when they

come home and

and visit they watch it they i know they

there was a disney plus there was a show

that i guess a lot of people liked

the mandalorian yes you have baby you

know

looking at you right behind you oh i

didn't

yeah you know what there was a winter

storm that we had to take care of and

keller i didn't have time

i used that but no i'm gonna watch one

all right at least one

well uh mr mayor was so glad that uh

it's so glad to have you

and everything please let everybody know

how they can get in touch with you how

they can find you on social media and

all that good stuff before we close

empire strikes back is that one yes okay

so so

here we go empire strikes

he was able to figure out the right

answer even though yeah i had to think

of it i i was

not going to leave without naming one

the um people can find me

on facebook and on twitter uh if you go

to the handle armandmizani

tx so armin mizanitx i'm on facebook and

twitter facebook i

really try to stay engaged there as much

as i can i find that to be

a way that's kind of easier for for

folks to reach out so if people have

questions they can message me there

they can also email me amizani at city

of keller so

a-m-i-z-a-n-i at city of keller.com

that's my email address but social media

is probably the best way to reach me if

you have if you're there to reach me and

also to get updates i try to put updates

there whether it be town halls meet

greets things like that

i try to do that on social media so yeah

great

well once again thanks for joining us

and thank you for listening to this

episode of the wolf and the shepherd and

we will catch you on the next one