Interview for today.

Um, again, I am joined by Counselor Aaron Rick.

Did I say that right?

And right, I'm sorry.

Counselor Cartwell, my joke, Monto, and Williams.

And welcome back, Helen.

So we're going to give you a couple of minutes to if you want to set up your interview, and then we'll go into the questions.

Again, we're going to do two a round of two questions each.

And then if there's time at the end, then anybody can ask one more question.

Can we see her?

Yeah.

Okay.

Okay.

Well, thank you.

Yeah.

So do you want to?

Yes, my name is Helen Hudson.

I am the previous president of the Syracuse Common Council.

And I am the previous counselor at large for the Syracuse Scotland Council.

I have served um fourteen years.

And it has been my pleasure because it has given me an opportunity to be able to spread broader into the community.

I co-founded Mothers Against Gun Violence, which is a program that actually works with mothers of homicide victims.

It's a way to bring comfort and reassurance to these or to these mothers.

I also created pathways to power pathways to povert uh to poverty, which is a program that works with the building trades, which gives under underemployed and unemployed young folks an opportunity to go into the trades.

We're in our 10th cohort, which I'm very proud of that, for us being able to work within the community to bring them to a level that they can reach into higher employment.

Thank you.

Do we want to go the other way now?

So that you get your question.

Hannah.

Do you feel that the common council should support an appointment that reflects the will of the voters?

Absolutely.

Because folks folks gonna bring our tax base up.

That's what's gonna get folks to buying houses, and that's what's gonna get people out of poverty.

Employment is gonna be huge in bringing people out of poverty.

I said appointment.

And then for the common council.

You said Do you believe that the common council should support an appointment that upholds the will of the voters?

Absolutely.

I do.

What did you think of Matt?

Because you gave some something good there.

What what did you think the question was?

I thought the question was do I believe in employment?

Employment, okay.

Okay.

Right.

Okay.

Did you have another question?

What are your thoughts on tenant protection protection specifically good cause eviction?

I think that is another tool that in a that gives the renters an opportunity to, you know, basically be able to see and be able to work with the landlords to um for their conditions, especially with the renters when we have slum lords.

And we do know we have a lot of slum lords, and I think it is a protection against slum lords.

Is it a protection we need in Syracuse?

At this point, yes.

Thank you.

I'm done.

All right.

So this is a bulldog in the house.

And I'm gonna say that we had to support you.

Um we had a bulldog and now we got another bulldog.

I tell you, we walk this space.

We bark everywhere we go.

Um so yes, um it's a little different because now you're on this side.

But I would like to just ask you a few quick questions.

Is um coming back from being a president and then now common counsel at large, and with the history of, like you said, 14 years and a lot of great things you've done in community, and a very passionate person.

Um what would be some of the things that you would like to help support on the common council?

Well, coming back, first off, I just want to say I missed two years of being on the council.

And I think with me coming back, I can continue to do the work that I've already started.

I was working with the housing strategy team, and I'll continue to work with the housing strategy team.

Right now I'm on the joint school construction board, and it gives me an opportunity to work with the school district to renovate and rebuild the schools in our community.

So, yeah, I think that I can be very vital in that, and not to mention working with the trades, bringing jobs into our community, which that one I'm very, very proud of.

Is that it?

Okay.

All right.

Um, so um beginning a little bit on on her and the question Rashida just asked.

So, what would be the major initial initiatives that you believe in in your 14 years she said of service, uh, you would like to move forward.

What was on what do you still feel you need to do?

I still feel that um housing is very critical, and I still feel that policing is very critical because I'm in the community and I talk to the community a lot.

And I believe that working into the community and talking to the community is very critical, which is one of my expertise, being able to go into the community and speak with people.

So I think that housing, policing, and education is key, but that's why they have a school board.

So we can only, you know, do so much when it comes to education, but when it comes to educating outside of the school district, I think that that's very important because we need to educate the community first off on things that they can and can't do, things that they need to do, and when they have an opportunity to speak to their elected officials, they need to understand the different roles of different parts of government.

And when they have an opportunity to speak to their elected officials, they need to understand the different roles of different parts of government.

So I think educating people is very important.

Okay.

Now, and having 14 years of prior experience with city budget, can you talk a little bit about the priorities for you in the budget?

When you talk about the budget, you have to look at each department.

So it's not just a blanket, say budget.

Each department, you have to go through each department's budget.

You have to look at the different ins and outs.

I don't want to get too into the budget, but you have to look at, we look at the overall, how many people are in here, how many people are not, how many are vacant positions, things like that we have to take into consideration when we're looking at the budget.

Thank you.

Councilman Joker.

Yeah, um, I think this is the first time uh in the since 2013 that I have ever called you Helen.

Never never called her Helen.

Um I did.

And and because I have never known you as some just from outside beside these walls, right?

First.

So I have never called you Helen.

So let me take this privilege first of all and say Helen.

Um it's it's it's amazing to see that you still have so much left in the tank, and you still want to give it.

Because for some of us that have grew up in this city and watched you do what you do as Helen Hudson.

Uh we we have nothing, nothing but respect for you.

And you hold such a position in this community that too many people don't.

And the amount of work that you have done in this community.

It it's it's it is a privilege and it is humbling to see that you still want to give some of that.

So I want to just get that out of the way and let you know that you are appreciated for what you have done to this day.

You are appreciated.

Okay.

You know, like I said that for some of us that have watched you do what you do, there's so many important legislation that you got your name behind, such as one of the legislation I remember well, is ban the box.

And you, when you guys put that together and the amount of work it took.

Um, I want to I want to hear the thought behind that when you put that together.

Okay, well, when you talk about ban the box, we were talking about contractors, contractors that actually was getting city work, but they weren't including city workers, and they were looking at people's records.

So we figured with ban the box, it would be a way to give people an in so that they weren't excluded from that process.

So that's where ban the box is actually worked a little bit like the living wage ordinance, because I worked, I was the chair of the living wage ordinance.

And um, it's been a while since that's been used, but it was the same thought process with the living wage ordinance.

It was where you paid your workers a living wage if you had city contracts, which a lot of the folks did have city contracts, like the fire department, they used um different like coin laundry, different places, and they had to pay those workers a living wage to be able to get the contract with the city, which I think that one should that should be instituted again because with band the box and living wage, those are protections for people that wouldn't ordinarily have those types of protections.

Yeah, and and for me as somebody that is admin, a strong supporter for residency, right?

What you just said there is a support of that, and I have seen you over the years fighting for to make sure that residency is a thing here because we talked about equal opportunities, and we don't talk about the doors that must be open to help people to give people opportunities, right?

I want to go here.

My second question, Madam President.

Um's against violence.

What is that?

It is an organization.

What happened was in 2002, which was one of our highest number of homicides in the city of Syracuse.

Every day there was a young person laying in the street dead.

And it bothered me that nobody was talking about that.

It bothered me that in the communities our children were dying, and we were really just, you know, numb to the fact.

So what I did is I organized a group of women.

And I said, look, mothers are the first person that when a child is hurt, they call their mother.

When a child is scared, they call their mother.

Mothers are the first people that children look to.

So I gathered a group of women and we started going out to the street corners.

Which was really, it was interesting because when we go out to the corners, we could clear a corner because the young people didn't want to talk to us.

But after we kept going out and going out, they eventually start coming to us and start telling us what they needed.

Some of them needed to go back to school, some of them needed housing, some of them needed food.

So it's a way for us to work with the young people, but it was also a way for us to work with the mothers who had been affected by the gun violence of losing their children.

So it was um that one was my baby.

And um, these are my babies that we're talking about, and it was a way to get in and talk to the parents because we all had to take put our hand in the pot.

We all had to talk to these young people.

We all had to let them know that they're valuable, and we could not continue to lose young people along the way.

I think as you know, I have exhausted my questions, and I have to.

But we'll come back, we'll come back.

Yeah, we'll come back.

Yes, yes.

Uh Mr.

Mun Jimmy.

Hi, Helen.

Um, so you know, we I don't know if you were watching when Shayla was here, but we Rashida and I both kind of went on this road of how when you walk in the door, you think that we're gonna solve all the problems that are here, and we know that we simply can't do that.

Um, I think a lot of eyes in the city right now are on Sharon Owens as the first black mayor of the city as as a new administration comes in, people are staring at her and saying, okay, fix the problems.

So, my question for you is what is our biggest problem?

I'm gonna go back to this question and sound like a parrot.

Our biggest problem is housing, because people do not have decent, sustainable housing to live in.

So that is a major problem in the city of Syracuse.

All you have to do is drive down the streets, and you see house after house after house abandoned, you see house after house after house neglected, and those are houses that people could actually be living in.

So for me, our biggest problem is housing.

My second question is you came from a world of community advocacy and uh kind of an accidental politician.

Was that fair?

Yeah, that's fair.

So how did the ugliness of the game of politics, how has that shaped you to become who you are now?

And the second part of that is what is your advice to the young people that you like to shepherd and mentor.

What is your advice on on how that shapes you?

Okay, well, the first question, the ugliness of a pop being a politician.

I think that if you continue to just I'm not gonna say it's ugly so much.

Maybe sometimes I just think it's it becomes a little overwhelming because again, you have people coming from all directions, but the problem is they don't know where to go because people will come to the common council for a state issue, and that's where we have to be the ones to shepherd them to the state level because they feel like that we're the closest to the ground.

So we're the ones they know.

We're more attainable than the upper echelon of politics.

And what I would say to the young people is um get your feet wet.

That's the only way there's no rule book on how to be an elected official.

This is all try and tried and error, and you just do what you do best.

And if you're uh accustomed to dealing with people, then that's what you know, you'll you'll come out on top because people is people power.

And I have that, so yeah, I've been able to use people as my power because I believe that when they talk about you know, money in politics, that's fine.

But I think that it's the people that move you in politics because you can have all the money in the world, but those signs you put up don't vote, all of those handouts, they don't vote either.

It's the people that you're knocking on doors, the people that you're talking to, the people that you help, because you we do help people in this position.

So it's the people that you help that are gonna be your biggest asset.

Thank you.

Hi Helen.

I've got three questions over two parts.

Okay.

And the first part one, I'll talk about your your votes, your voting history.

Um, I will ask you now the first thing that I ever asked you the first time we met.

What was the most difficult vote you ever made as the common counselor?

And I'll I'll fact check you because I'll tell you what you told me last time.

The most difficult vote.

I have to think on that.

You're talking over some years.

Will you repeat that?

Sorry.

I said I have to think about that one because you're talking over some years.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

The most difficult vote that I ever had to make.

I'm blinking on that one, counselor.

You want what you told me last time?

What?

Um to raise taxes on residents.

Yeah.

Yeah, you're absolutely right.

That's that was the most difficult because we have people that are living on fixed incomes.

And we have people, because I've talked to quite a few people, especially the elderly, when they're getting that once a month check and they're trying to hold on to their properties, which is why we see a lot of land bank houses now, because these people could not afford to keep their houses because we you know, even if you raise taxes two percent, that two percent is a big hit on people.

So yeah, you're absolutely right.

In part two of that.

In serving as president, you do not have a vote.

Right.

Over the past eight years.

What is the vote you wish you had?

Can you repeat the question?

Uh a vote that she wish she would be able to cast when she was at present as president.

One that you guys cast at the end of the year, which was on the budget.

So that was that's an easy one.

That's an easy one.

Um could have used all the votes we could get on that.

Um part two would kind of give homage to kind of what I just talked about in terms of the council president not having a vote.

Um in coming back to the council, you would be sitting as a at-large counselor.

Um, what challenges would you anticipate in shifting role from being the council president to being an at-large counselor?

Um for me, I don't think there would be any challenges because for one, like you said, president doesn't have a vote, president presides over meetings, which that would not be my role.

My role would be basically as an at-large counselor is to work citywide with the constituents to do more of constituent services and to basically pay attention to what our charge is, which is writing legislation and overseeing the budget.

Thank you.

And I've got um I am, but I have two questions.

And we have Marty here, too.

Oh, Marty, yeah.

Let's go to Marty and then we'll go to Marty.

Are you on a word?

Are you ready with your Marty first?

Two questions.

Thank you.

Uh, I apologize for being late for the chair of the uh transportation committee.

I had a meeting with the search metropolitan transportation commissioner today.

No.

I have two questions, and I'm gonna start with the first.

What should the role be if he counts at large today that has not been utilized in the last 30, 50 years?

What should the role of a counselor at large be in today?

I think I'm gonna go back to the question that I answered previously.

I believe that you know the counselor at large, counselors, period, are charged with certain things.

And constituent service had been brought into the loop.

Don't know how that happened, but that happened probably 30 years ago.

And I don't think that there's anything we should change.

I think that if anything, we should be more constituent focused.

I think that we should be more education focused.

I think that we should try to draw people in to the council chambers, because if you look at our council meetings, there's very few community people that come in here.

People only go by what they hear, and I think it would be good if we could bring more folks to the table to understand better what we do as legislators.

Do you believe that counselors at large should go throughout the city, go to various neighborhood committee, neighborhood watch meetings to to learn firsthand to be a backup to the district counselors?

Absolutely, because the at-large counselor is a backup to the district counselor.

My second question is over the many years, we have the vowel.

We have developed a lot of pristine housing.

We did it in Armory Square, we've done it in the downtown area.

Have we neglected housing for the middle class?

Maybe those who maybe uh would like some good housing, but because they've been let out because the apartment are because they're high class, they're a higher range.

Should we have done more New Year's for the middle class and housing?

Um, I agree with you on the middle class, but I'm gonna talk about the poor of the people.

Okay.

I think that we've neglected housing all the way around, because as I stated earlier, when you go down these streets, you can see that's the housing stock, and you can see the condition of it.

I mean, lower income people, they want to live well as well.

So I think that we've we've done an we've been neglectful of housing when we stop funding through HUD when we stop doing bills, when we stop going through neighborhoods and bringing neighborhoods back together to be neighborhoods.

That's why it's so important with the Syracuse housing strategy that we start connecting neighborhoods, which is what that program is designed to do.

So we're connecting uh lower income neighborhoods to more echelon upper echelon in neighborhoods so that we can have a balance there.

So I think that we should be going throughout the city, not just downtown, not just Armory Square, not just you know Franklin.

We should be building housing throughout our city and bringing our stock up.

We have a lot of uh abandoned houses that were home ownership, they've abandoned.

Um you believe the city of Syracuse should work at a faster pace to get these houses onto the market because they have been stagnant and these can be revitalized.

Well, when you talk about the city of Syracuse, you gotta have the funding too, and funding is key here.

So we can only do what we can do with what we have.

That's why we have the land bank, that's why we have how home headquarters and housing visions and jubilee homes.

That's why we have those entities in place so that we can all be partners in bringing housing up, bringing the standard of housing up.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Um we're gonna give an opportunity to counselor Moore.

Does she have any questions?

She does.

She puts you in the chat.

Hi, Helen.

There's a lot of conversation.

Oh, she's leaving.

There is a lot of conversation around good cause and eviction.

Landlords have their issues and are also disturbed by landlords, but also share concerns about tenants who do not pay rent and are a nuisance to neighbors and other tenants.

It's difficult to get the courts to evict those individuals.

Will you work with landlords to help find ways to make the court system more balanced, both for landlords and tenants?

Absolutely, because there should be a balance there.

I think that again, as I've stated previously, we have good landlords and we have good tenants, but we also have bad landlords and we also have bad tenants.

So there should be a balance there that were there can be a win-win for everybody.

And she has a second item here around workforce development.

She writes, as someone who works in the workforce development arena, I see many programs started to help individuals gain skills, but it continues to leave some of our most vulnerable community members behind due to lack of education, whether it be a GED or HSC, and also many who need more assistance navigating their IDs in order.

Um small nonprofits have the ability to help these individuals get to the point of being able to eventually access these training programs.

Do you support our small neighborhood nonprofit organizations?

Absolutely.

I came from a uh nonprofit um first off, and secondly, um, yes, I do support that.

I do support the work support workforce.

That's why pathways to apprenticeship is so important to me, because it doesn't just say, oh, you do this and you get thrown into the trades.

It's a lead up.

They're they're actually giving um training, they're actually talked to, they're actually counseled because Ebony does a wonderful job working with those folks, and these are our most uh vulnerable population.

These are folks that's working a job, but it's not not a living wage job, and these are folks that does not have a job, and they want to have a job, so we're working with them to get them into, and like I said, one of the best for me, one of the best um career choices ever, which is the trades.

Before we move on, Patricia, how are we doing on time?

So we have a time.

All right, so we're gonna go for one more question.

Um do you want to go first or do you want to go first?

No, you go first.

Mighty has five questions.

I got another one coming up.

Um you have been responsible for a legislative body that for over a quarter voted unanimously and did not advance anything that didn't vote in unanimously.

I believe that reflects a failure of good governance.

Could you speak to that?

Well, as you know, each counselor is elected individually, and the president cannot tell them how to vote or when to vote.

And what what they did when you have a democratic uh caucus, you're basically gonna be on the same same page.

And that's what you saw happening.

And I don't think it was a failure of leadership.

I think it was people with their own independent minds that I cannot persuade or change.

With respect, I didn't say a failure of leadership, I said a failure of good governance.

I agree with a number of my colleagues on a number of issues.

I disagree with them a number of my colleagues on a number of issues.

I believe that reflecting what the voters want us to bring forth requires a variety of voices.

And voting unanimously does not get us there.

So on council, we would be expected to bring forth a variety of voices.

How would you do it differently this time around?

Because as I said, independently, I as well as you hear voters, and I as well as you will bring to the table some of the things that folks are saying.

Everybody doesn't agree with everything that's done in this room, and everybody doesn't think the same way.

So again, I would be in tune to what my constituents are asking for.

And a lot of the things that they're asking for may not be what this body wants to do.

Thank you for answering the question.

So as a common counselor at large who has a thought process of her own, who know never waves left or right, who listens to all the constituents and make decisions.

Is that me?

Oh, I apologize.

Makes decisions based on the whole entire city, right?

Not based on one.

And sometimes, you know, it goes like this, right?

And you have to do what's best, but it's also good to work together as a uniform team.

Um tell me a little bit about uh you mentioned earlier about you, but tell me a little bit more about because the the previous person, and I don't want to talk about anything on agenda.

I want to just like I asked her about her.

She phenomenal not in him graduate.

I love it.

Tell me a little bit about you as a Nottingham graduate.

You told me about, you know, all the things that you have done in life, but what about you?

As a Nottingham graduate, I was probably one of these young people that you see a lot of.

So I'm just gonna put that out there and be honest about it.

Um I had struggles going through high school, but it was phenomenal for me because I had teachers that actually cared about me.

So I think that when you have people that care about you and your well-being, that you um are gonna do well.

I was a cheerleader, I ran track, and I played basketball.

So yeah, yeah, that's good.

So yeah, I um enjoyed my time in Nottingham.

And it's funny because when I went to Nottingham for the state of the city, when I was younger, it looked like this big giant school.

But now when you walk in, it's like my head can almost touch the ceiling.

It's like I'm sitting back saying, oh my God, it it's really small.

But no, I um I had um wonderful days at Nottingham.

I was like I said, I was a problem and I struggled, but guess what?

I made it out, I graduated, and those were my best days were in Nottingham.

Um question, yes.

I want to go back to uh 2011 when a local labor leader approached you and said, Circus common counselor is no representation with unions.

And you you were elected.

So what have you taken your prior work experience when you worked for Chrysler?

What did you bring working with them to the common council and what you want to continue to do?

Being a team.

Um working in Chrysler, we had to be a team because uh you had one piece of the machinery up front and it had to make it all the way to the back to be assembled by another team member.

So, what again I want to bring back to the table is teamwork because that's what it's gonna take.

Because if you sit here and you see a divided council, I don't think that bodes well for the community to see people that cannot actually coexist with one another.

Are you okay?

So one of the things that we're working on starting this year, it goes about the modernization of our office or the way the workflow, how we do things.

And I was wondering, you know, uh what would be something you would like to see happen?

It could be in in any front, could be technology or just workflow in in general, uh, that could be implemented to make our our office and our services effective, efficient, and good.

Well, what I had talked about previously with the former clerk was looking at getting someone in there to basically do like a newsletter, but do it electronically, and have each counselor, the at-large counselors, the district counselors, the president, each outline what they were working on.

And I still think that that would be a good idea because a lot of people are on the computer, a lot of people aren't, but I think that that would be a start is to have folks um being able to talk about the different things that they're working on within their districts and within their citywide purview.

Thank you.

That's a great idea.

Thank you.

My other question is um, I remember years ago there was one of our neo-Americans who uh was experienced some some health issues.

And in that you showed up for them.

And I remember there was some of us that couldn't help.

We couldn't help her, right?

We were in the same circle, but we were just we just couldn't do it.

And because of your present in the community, I don't know if you remember, but it was it was it was very sensitive issue, and you stepped in and you helped her actually seek help, and she listened to you.

Um that some of us then were not aware of who Helen Hudson was.

I was because I was all entrenched in politics and I knew you were.

And um that introduced you at that point to a good number of new American leaders at that point.

And your support then was really appreciated.

Uh coming back on the council, what would what do you think is the room for opportunity to help continue to support near Americans in this community?

Since they are everywhere in this community.

I feel like that um one, we should be there listening because when you talk about new Americans, a lot of people think that they're all just on the north side.

I know there's a huge group of Haitians down on the south side.

So we need to figure out a way to bring the different communities together, and we need to listen to those communities because I've gone to quite a few of the meetings up at the um Park Street, is it Park Street location?

I've gone to quite a few of the communities there.

And I've had um some of the new Americans tell me some things that was very disturbing because they feel like people come in and people talk at them and people tell them what to do.

And like like the person said, we're tired of people coming in here telling us what to do and not asking us what we need.

Oh, so um I think it's no secret for for anybody that I uh were it not for Van Robinson, I don't think I'd be sitting at this table without his mentorship, and I think I we all know how you felt about him too.

So I think he'd be very mad if somebody didn't ask a question about 81.

Um after watching the city make very terrible decisions for decades and decades around housing and infrastructure and highways as we sit at the prospect of that decision.

What scares you the most about that project?

That this the same people that have been disenfranchised are gonna be disenfranchised again if we don't step in and do the right thing.

I think that when the highway comes down that that should go back to the city because it was taken from the city.

I don't think that um the not-for-profits on the hill should be privy to take any of that land.

I think that land should be used for the residents there for small businesses and for different housing development.

Do you think we're getting it right or on the right path right now, or do we need to I I think that we're somewhat on the right path.

I think there needs to be a little more um pushback and a little more conversation.

I think we need to let our state electors know that um short of giving the land back to the city, there's really not a lot of conversation.

Alvin.

We got an 81 question in there.

All right.

Donna does not have one in there.

I guess I'll I'll finish it off.

Um I'm gonna borrow from what Jimmy asked our Kennedy in the prior interview.

Um, what do you love about the city?

This is my home.

I've grown up here, and I'm gonna tell you, I've watched this city, I've watched this community to where any time anything happened and there were real serious issues.

I've watched this city come together.

I've watched my community come together.

There's one thing that I can say about us is we do stand up for each other, regardless of what I might feel about whoever when it comes time to help.

Our city is there, and our people are there.

That's what I love most about this city.

Um I love the fact my child was born in this city, my child is still here in this city.

Just as people say, Well, my child had to leave because they left to find a job.

Well, guess what?

Mine are still here, and I'm thankful for that.

So, yeah, I am at my first house in this city at the age of 29, which I think was phenomenal because if it hadn't been for you know the different programs that they had, I probably would not have been a homeowner.

So, yeah, I love the resources, and we are resource rich, so I love the resources that we have to help everybody in this city.

Um does uh Councillor Moore have a last question or not in there.

While we are checking, can I jump in?

Wait, hold on.

Um Hannah us first.

Okay, so while they're checking, Hannah, go ahead because we don't want to get any.

I just had two clarifications.

One is you had responded that the council should uphold so that should the common council should support an appointment that reflects the will of voters.

The designation process last night did not return success for you.

Could you clarify?

The designation process is that's biased because you can't you just refrain that and because the designation is one party, you can't play party on I understand.

Okay.

Um seek an election to this office.

Absolutely.

There's 140,000 people in the city of Syracuse.

Okay, you know what?

My apologies.

Ask whatever you like to do.

No, no, I apologize.

Did I said that the wrong way?

No, you said it, it's fine.

Yeah.

Okay.

My apologies for bringing that in.

No, okay.

I have the letters speak what you like.

Clarification also on good cause.

Is that a recent change in perspective for you?

After I've done research, yeah, it is a different change of perspective.

Which is what is the beauty about human minds, that they always can be changed at any time.

100% agree with you.

Was there something particular that changed your mind on this case?

Listening to tenants, and I'm actually listening to landlords as well.

So again, yes, the human mind is a beautiful thing.

I appreciate you indulging my curiosity.

Um, what what do you see is the best way to handle the relationship of mayor's office and the common council.

Well, when you talk about the mayor's office and the country council, you have to understand they're both two different entities, and we have to remember that because the mayor's office is administration.

The common council is legislative, and we're the legit legislative branch and to the mayor's office.

So we have to remind ourselves that we do have a job to do, and we have a job to do independently.

Anyone else?

No.

All right, so we'll give you a closing um statement.

Okay.

Well, I appreciate you know you taking the time out.

I appreciate being here, and I am looking forward at this point.

Um, coming back or not coming back of still working because I'm gonna still be in the community.

I'm gonna still be working with my people out here.

I'm gonna still be working with the young people.

I'm gonna still be working to bring jobs into the community that I love and that I serve.

It has been my pleasure to serve the city of Syracuse, and it has been my pleasure working along beside you guys every day on a daily basis.

So, yeah, um that's about it.

Okay, well, thank you.

We're gonna adjourn these proceedings.

I need a move.

Thank you.

Thank you.