What the "F" are we doing here?

What the eff are we doing here? This is the Elevate Polk Podcast, and I'm your host, Chrissanne Long. And with me, as always, is Rob Arturi.

I love that title.

Yeah, well, it's good because what the eff are we doing here? Why are we in Polk County?

Well, I was abducted and brought here with a bag over my head. I can't find my way out.

But, but you've choose to stay now.

I have Stockholm syndrome.

Oh, is that it? Uh-oh.

Okay, but hey, whatever, whatever.

So why, why this, why this topic?

Well, because we've talked about this before. There's some something going on where you have a lot of people here who've— I think this is changing, but they feel like they ended up here, where they got stuck here. And if they're happy now It's almost like they made lemonade from the lemons of being stuck here. Yeah, but I heard this a lot when I first moved here.

Mm-hmm.

And when I told people I'm not from here, oh, well, why did you come here? And then, you know, you start to wonder, like, where— why did I come here?

Right. And what's wrong with here? Right, right, right.

So I think, like I said, that's been evolving. But retaining quality, qualified, educated young people is a challenge.

Yeah.

And I think that that's an important stigma that we need to shed.

Absolutely. 100%. I think when Howard Wiggs was running for mayor of Lakeland, his— one of his campaign statements was we have to stop making our greatest export our young, talented graduates. And what we're doing is we have, what, 5, 6 universities in Polk County, probably more than that. But at least I know of 6, and they're graduating and leaving. And we're bringing them from all over the country. I mean, I've had interns from Connecticut and Vermont and, you know, Iowa. So they're coming to Polk County to study. And our job needs to be to make this city, this county, this area so alluring that they are like, man, I'll come here because it's Florida. I mean, they love— they come here because it's Florida.

Right.

And they don't necessarily want to go up to the snow or wherever it is that they hail from. But if it's not alluring and attractive enough to them, then by golly, they're going to go somewhere else. I said by golly again. I got to find a new way. I got to find a new thing.

We're just going to have like a bell that we ring whenever you say by golly.

By golly. So yeah, I think that that's something we definitely— that's a stigma we have to undo. And it's all of us. It's That's why we're here, elevating Polk. I mean, I think we have to intentionally think about what are we doing to improve our perception and what are we doing to— if we're doing anything negative, we have to stop those negative habits, like saying, by golly, by far not the worst on the list of negatives.

But I think we have to find a way. And I think some of it is really just in in messaging. It's in— we have to stop apologizing for what Polk isn't, and we have to start appreciating and celebrating what Polk is.

Right.

You know, there was a comment in an online— one of the pages we were both on. I don't even remember which one, but where somebody was talking about making Oh no, I know what it was. Somebody talked about the podcast.

Oh, okay.

And about making Polk more like Tampa and Orlando.

Oh.

And I think the person who posted, I think they meant well, and I get what they meant, but I think it's a losing proposition because we're not going to be Tampa or Orlando.

Right.

And even if we were to miraculously have an incredible spur of economic growth and all of this stuff, You know, time doesn't stand still for Tampa and Orlando. So we're always going to be in a different place perspective-wise. Personally, having lived in Orlando and in other parts of the state as well, I love it here because the traffic isn't ridiculous, right? You may not agree with that if you're sitting in traffic now on Bartow Highway or going from the north side to the south side during rush hour. Yeah, but As a person who grew up in New York, I could tell you that we don't know what traffic is, right, in this county.

And for a lot of people, that's what brings them to a place like Polk County, because they are trying to get away from the big city rush hour traffic and all of that. So that's an advantage that we share that we need to, you know, accentuate. We need to emphasize that and say, hey, get away from all the crazy traffic and come to Polk County. We have great things and great people here to let you, you know, find a new home. You know, that's a message that we don't share.

And also that it's, it's worth building here. Yeah, that, you know, there's like this weird— I understood it. And I understand how young people can have this mentality. Because without getting off on a tangent, we are pushing young people to going to college and borrowing tremendous amounts of money. And when they come out, their first thought is, oh my God, I got to make— I got to get a job. I got to start paying back these student loans. And for many fields, the salaries in metropolitan Tampa or Orlando are higher, right?

So I understand cost of living is higher. 100%. Well, I don't know the percentage, but it's definitely higher there than it is here.

Oh, yeah. Yeah, absolutely. So With all of that in mind, I understand it. But what we have to do is there's— and there's a cultural, a greater cultural issue that we can address at a local level. But we have to make it to where people understand that investing, that building here isn't just wasting your time.

Right.

This isn't like trying to plant flowers in concrete, that there is opportunity here. There is tremendous growth. And I see I moved to Florida in the early '90s. We moved to Longwood, Lake Mary area in Seminole County. And at the time in Lake Mary, it was like horse country. There wasn't a whole lot going on there. The biggest store was a Kmart. If you go there today, it is absolutely insane. The growth— residential, commercial, corporate headquarters, all, all sorts of stuff. And I look at Polk County today very much the same way that we're kind of like at this precipice of, of some real growth because everybody everywhere around us is basically filling up.

Right. It's the urban sprawl and we're right in the middle of the urban sprawl. So it's coming in to us from both sides.

Right. Just as areas like in Seminole County were as suburbs of Orlando, it moved east and west from there. And I think you're going to see the same thing here. But people who opened up businesses, who started, who put down roots then in those areas, whether it was buying a house for $100,000 that they sold, you know, that they can now sell for a multiple of that 20 years later, or starting a small business that grew and grew as their community did as well.

Right.

We are in that position now. And I just hate to see where You know, if you look around, there's a lot of big money investment going on.

There is. There is.

I see all this. If you go up and down South Florida Avenue, businesses, buildings being leveled, they're building new, new things here or there.

Right.

There are professional bean counters and economic nerds like me, actuaries sitting in an office somewhere in some big city crunching these numbers.

Right.

And they've made a determination. That this corporation should invest millions of dollars to build a location here because of forecasted growth.

Right.

And that, that should be a wake-up call to people.

Yeah. Well, and when you look around and you see that, that growth on the, on the, on the precipice from the outside looking in, you're looking at it from— I don't really know anything about economic development. I don't know about what these bean counters are doing or figuring out.

Right.

What are the— what are the What are the actuaries looking at? What are the trends that they see? And that's something that the economic development people, we have to trust our leadership to know that they know what they're doing. But as consumers, like we talked about in an earlier episode, is sitting on the sidelines. I mean, we can ask those questions and get answers so that we can be informed about why these decisions are or are not being made. And that what we can do as just the general Joe on the side of the street, just saying, hey, what's going on in our community that we can do to help? Because I know that there are things, I just don't know what those things are because we're really not having that conversation.

Sure.

Yet.

Right. And even though that conversation may escape some people, and like you said, there are plenty of people out there that don't understand or follow the complex economic and geographic analysis that's going on. You don't have to be a, a bomb detection expert to know that when somebody is running towards you saying there's a bomb over there, you just start running the other way.

Right.

So sometimes picking up cues from other areas, people who do know, is, is important.

Mm-hmm.

So at the very least, we should be able to do that.

Right.

And the growth that's going on, it becomes a systemic positive, right, where people see this and they go, wow, all these, these companies are building new things. Now is a good time to start a business, right?

So let me— on the counter of that, and I don't want to go down this tangent too much because this is really about why we're here, but I also think that a lot of times with that newness of things, the sustainable people who've been reputable business owners and members of this community get lost in the shuffle. It's like, oh, there's a new business, let me go, you know, support it, support it, support it, support it. And then these people who've been here for 20, 30, 50 years It's like we're— they're old news. So we also need balance in our own mindset as to, hey, you know, that's really cool. There's some really new, really great new locations opening up. I want to go to those. I want to experience that. But then let's also include on our regular route those that we have always gone to, but now we're kind of putting them on the back burner because they're no longer new or flashy or cool, but they're still just as significant to the ecosystem of our community because of the fact that they're still relevant to the economy.

And I agree. My, my counter to your counter—

oh boy, here we go—

would be, well, I completely agree with that. I think that we should not just take stock in what's new and exciting, But what is— what is here? The foundational parts as well. However, my message in all of this to those established business people that have been here for 20, 30, 40 years is if you are also losing out to people who are brand new, just as I'm telling the average consumer or budding entrepreneur to look at the trend and decide, Hey, maybe there's something going on here. If you're losing out to people who are just entering the space, some of that, yeah, some of that can be because it's new. Every— people are familiar with the restaurants, the honeymoon period. But some of that also is in the way that these things are marketed. And, you know, sometimes old established businesses, they don't like new tricks.

Right. Well, and there's a competitive mindset that we need to shed. As business owners because it becomes— if you're acting out of a response to a threat, you're not able to focus on the best parts of your business model, your business plan, or who you are or what you offer. Now you're feeling like, oh, well, I don't have shiny new furniture. Oh, I don't have that location. Oh, I don't have this thing that everybody's, you know, seems to be flocking to. And so now you kind of are shrinking your own mindset about what you offer as opposed to ramping it up and saying, hey, if that place is too busy for you when you're waiting in line, I'm right around the corner. Come have a drink while you're, you know, having whatever. Embracing that new opportunity that the community is having sends such a positive message to the consumer. It's like, oh wow, this is cool. This guy could probably be really angry that there's this new business right around the corner and, and just kind of sit there with his arms crossed looking at all the people going over there. Or they can get involved in the conversation and be a partner or a collaborator or a supporter to, to, to show what kind of character and integrity, because it's all about all of us, not about one of us. Right?

Right. It is. I think I would encourage established businesses to look at new businesses for those collaborative opportunities. I mean, that's something that we talk a lot about in BridgeLocal and I think on a broader scale, if you own the ice cream shop down the street and there's a brand new restaurant that comes in, right, go over to the restaurant and give them discounts, right? And say, give everybody one of these 25% off for an ice cream cone at my shop if they eat at your restaurant with the receipt. And, and I'll do the, I'll do the same. So there are symbiotic relationships that can be had rather than saying, well, this is just another business coming in and, and taking my share or a piece of my pie or whatever.

Right. Yeah.

Because it's not a zero-sum game, right?

It isn't. And it's, it's, it's really cool. I think I mentioned this on one of our other episodes, a book that we're going to get to by Simon Sinek called The Infinite Game. And that's really it. It's like you choose to walk into this game. We choose to be in this community, and we also choose to sit on the sidelines and say, you know what, I'm out. I don't have time. I don't have the resources. I don't have the energy. So I'm just going to sit and watch. It's— and it's kind of like the ebb and flow of the life cycle.

Right.

You know, as a young, energetic person and, you know, entering the workforce for the first time, you know, you've got a lot to prove. You've got to show your hustle. You've got to show what you can— what you can bring to the table. And then when you retire at 65 or 70 or however, however old you choose to wait to retire, then it's your turn to relax and enjoy and watch everybody else doing the hustle. Oh, do the hustle.

You know, they're so— they're so protective of copyright music. Otherwise, I would—

oh man, that would be a great opportunity to just chime in a little song there, but it would— we don't want to break any rules.

I know, we obey the law.

So we went into the business side of things, but from a personal standpoint, I feel like I want to tie in like why I— why the eff I'm here. Um, because I think I mentioned a little bit about my story as we were getting started, but I grew up in Polk County, um, from the age of 5 to now, and I remember my contemporaries, my peers, my friends, the attitude they had was, I can't wait to get out of here. When I graduate from high school, I'm out. And I never shared that sentiment. I don't know why. And so as I was preparing for this episode, I was thinking, what is it about me that makes me love Polk County? And why do I choose to live, work, and play here with enthusiasm? Like, this is a— I wouldn't want to live anywhere else. I really can't. If you said to me, Chrissanne, we're going to give you $1 million to move away, I would probably say okay. But if other than that, there is nowhere else on my bucket list. There's nowhere else on my bucket list that's calling me. And I think it comes back to my Cuban roots. So my mom is from Cuba. She was born in Holguín. She left Cuba when she was 14 years old and they moved. My, my grandfather took a job in Indianapolis at a He was a chemist and he took a job at Stokely-Van Camp. So, um, Stokely-Van Camp is known for Beanie Weenies.

Oh, pork and beans.

Pork and beans.

And then also, I'm sure there's a lot of, a lot of chemistry if you read the label on one of those, right?

There's some chemistry involved in those recipes, just FYI, full disclosure. But he was also on the team that was responsible for Reddi-Wip, so the aerosol cream that come— that you put on the top of your turkey or your— not your turkey, your pumpkin pie. Please don't put Reddi-Wip on your— I warned you, I am goofy.

I am not editing that out.

Sometimes things come out of my mouth and my brain is ahead of where my mouth is. So put it on your pumpkin pie. But also the recipe for Gatorade. So these were like projects that he worked on and they were originally, they were owned by Stokely. I think the Gators bought the recipe for Gatorade and you know, we won't talk about that. But, um, so I say all of that to say, we— they— my mom lived in Indianapolis as a 15— from 15 years old till she got married and moved to Florida. And I think what the allure for her to come to Florida was, tropical climate was more similar to where she was familiar with as a child. She hated Indiana because of the snow and the— and this— and the big change, nasty, you know, winters. She, she just didn't want to live there forever. So we moved down here and There's a song that I remember, and I don't know who the author is or the singer, who, who the, um, who the musician is, but there's a song, I think it was, I want to say it was Celia Cruz, but I could be completely wrong, but it was Soy Guajiro. And guajiro in Spanish means I'm a country person. I'm like a campesino, a person from the countryside. And I love that song because my mom loved that song and she related to it because she was a person who had this this connection to her country that for some reason has passed on to me. And I have this connection to my country, but also to my community. And that's kind of what I love about Polk County. It's a little bit of country. So, listen to Garth Brooks growing up and 97 Country, shout out to them because they've been around since I was a little kid. And that is who I— that's how I resonate with my own roots. Like, that's who I am as an individual. And to imagine myself living— and I have family in Miami because I am Cuban, so there's plenty of people down there, um, that I, I love going to Miami, I love visiting Miami. I just don't like the stress and the worry and the, the traffic, traffic, and the people being in a hurry. And just, there's just way too much there for me to feel like I could live there forever. Same thing in Tampa and Orlando. Um, so Polk County is my home. And it's because I'm a Guajiro and I love being connected to human beings and people in the community. That's my why the eff I'm here.

Well, I already told you why I'm here. Yes, but we'll, we'll get into that in another, another episode. I have quite a winding career path that brought me here, but I really want to focus on what you said because Either way, your story is way better than mine.

Well, just because I have a cool story about Cuba and— Yeah, yeah, Cuba's cool.

You win. You win on that one. You win. It's, it's more colorful than, than mine. But I think the important part of that is I think it works for two types of people. There is something unique about the way that you are, I think, as a person that draws you to that, that desire to, to stay and to improve upon where you live.

Right.

However, not everybody is like that. And, and that's okay. But I don't think that is a prerequisite. It certainly makes it easier and I think more instinctive if you are, if you're similar to how you are. You probably kind of get it. But if you're not, I think the other part of that though is maybe you're not that type of person, but look at those people. They are by any estimation more grounded, more fulfilled, happier people than those who are maybe less attached to where they live.

Yeah.

They become kind of more wayward.

Mm-hmm.

You know, years ago they used to talk about putting down roots, right? And then for some reason, putting down roots became like a taboo thing. Like, nobody's going to put me in chains. And it was just, you know, this whole like 1960s, this evolution, I think, of freedom. Right, right. I'm unrestrained. I'm going to go where I want, do what I want to do.

The man can't hold me down. Right, right.

And, you know, good for you. But everything has a cost. And for a lot of people, having that establishment, feeling connected to where they are and having that security, if not just that it's inherently taking care of you, but when you feel like you're connected to your surroundings, you can start to cultivate that around you and it can start very much on an individual level, right? So you have your, your personal relationships, maybe your family relationships. Outside from there are your professional relationships, and then you go into your overall community, right? You know, and that's, and that's your space. I mean, you've encompassed all of those things, but I think that there's a recipe for fulfillment in doing that, regardless of whether or not you have it. You look at these things naturally the way that you do. I think it's a winning recipe for anybody.

Well, let me contradict something. It's not natural. I came to this point, it took a while. As a teenager, like I said, I never thought that I wanted to live anywhere else, but that doesn't mean that I was always an engaged participant in the community. I was really insulated. I was really more, I think I wrote a blog post several years ago kind of that there was this awakening leader that came out of me through the process of running a business and, and just deciding that I was going to engage. So I was much a sideline participant of the community, not engaged. And, and over the course of the last 10 years, 11 years now, um, that has changed, but that didn't come naturally. Nobody taught me that. I kind of had to voluntarily go in and take that risk of getting connected. And the risk is, what if I get rejected? What if, what if nobody wants me here? And that's not a thing that is completely resolved. Like, there are days in my life where I'm like, I don't know, maybe, maybe I don't fit here. As much as I fit, I don't feel always like I am the fish swimming in the same pond with everybody else. So clarification on that, there's, there's an, there's an active, intentional work behind the thing, the person that, you know, and it isn't just I wake up, you know, like Pollyanna every day. I do have to overcome negative thoughts and frustrations and things that aren't going the way that I like them to go. But I still overall feel an affinity to this community no matter what.

I'm not even Pollyanna. All right, fair enough.

I bet you, you can watch Pollyanna on Disney Plus.

Yeah, my wife keeps reminding me to sign up for that because we have it free with the cell phone thing, right?

Everybody's doing it.

I know. So, okay, that's fair. I'll give you that. But something that I don't think— I don't know if you've thought about it. I don't think a lot of people think about it. You can look at the world around you. And think, do I fit in here? Am I swimming in the same direction everybody else is?

Mm-hmm.

But I think sometimes we misrepresent that to ourselves as if we are, if we're going in one direction, we look around. Everybody, you know, it's natural.

Right, grass is always greener on the other side. Somebody else has it better than I have it.

And sometimes you just wanna get perspective, right?

Mm-hmm.

Okay, so here's the thing. Ever been sitting in the car and you have your foot on the brake and maybe you're at Publix or something, and then the guy next to you starts backing up, right, out of the parking space. And you see in their peripheral vision out the side window, this car is backing up. And for a split second, you think that, oh my God, my foot on the brake, am I going forward, right? You feel like you're moving forward, right? So sometimes what we see around us can actually influence where we think we're going. The truly successful people are the ones that can fight past that, right? And they're the ones that can go, huh, well, I don't know, maybe I am, you know, uh, different than the shadow water, right? Maybe. But I have found that while it is, uh, the, the comfort of being around— I don't want to say like-minded people, but we'll say, uh, similar people is like a warm bath, right? It feels great, but for a short period of time it cools off. The most successful people, the happiest people I find long term, are the ones who focus on where they're going because of where they need to go.

Right.

And why they're doing the things that they're doing, not just doing it for the sake of doing it because it's cool, it's trendy, but because of the way it benefits them in a way that makes them feel right.

There's a mutual benefit to a relationship because of the fact that they're— well, you challenge me. I mean, me again, I'm probably gonna— I'll get tired of saying this eventually, but the fact that I'm doing this podcast is, you know, a sign of the fact that I'm willing and open to accept a challenge, overcome a fear, and do something in spite of the fact that it doesn't come naturally. This is not something I feel super comfortable with yet. Maybe someday it'll be old hat like it is for you, but it's allowing the people around us to sometimes push us in a direction that makes us want be better or be more or, or explore new opportunities that we wouldn't on our own consider, right?

So I'll summarize it in this, and we'll get to our, our last little segment on this. But I think if I can offer anybody any advice out there, it would be very simple. What you just described— so you don't know if this is, you know, you're outside of a comfort zone. Right. Well, maybe it's, you know, being on a podcast or whatever it might be, right? That's just one little sliver of, you know, a huge apple out there. But whatever it might be and whatever trepidation that you have about pursuing any of those goals, being the type of person who is willing to take that risk You know, you brought up, well, maybe not everybody wants to hear what I have to say. So am I just being arrogant by doing a podcast thinking people want to hear what I have to say? I could tell you this. It doesn't matter because whether— that's why when I say I don't care who listens to this, it's not that I don't care about people listening and everybody, you know, you hope that it's beneficial and people enjoy it. But ultimately speaking, I'd rather be the person that is confident enough to go on the record, right, and do something like this without any hesitation or without being held back because of fear of what other people might think.

Right.

And so whether it's, you know, for you with being on this podcast, whatever your feeling is out there, you know, listening, if you are that person, if you're— if you have that mindset, you're better off, period. End of story.

Right.

So even if nobody ever listens to this podcast and it doesn't help anybody else, you're better off because of what you did overcoming that.

Right. Well, and I think when I— tying this back to why we're here and what I love most is that there is a— there is a complete melting pot in Polk County where we're consistent. What we're made up of, what we're— what we consist of is completely balanced across all spectrums, all socioeconomic backgrounds. Everything is here in this community. We don't have just everybody is affluent or everybody is poor or everybody is this or everybody is that. We have the ability to, to within our own ecosystem, we don't have to explore new areas or territories. We can go find people who will challenge us to understand a new perspective and, and give us the opportunity to overcome those fears or the things that make us uncomfortable without having to work really hard. We don't have to travel across the globe to go find things that we can make better, or we don't have to travel across the globe to go find others who can make us better. We're all right here, sitting here in this community, waiting for someone to say, hey, let me, let me grab you by the arm and take you with me, because I know that this is going to be good for both of us, like you did for me on this podcast. Or let me find others in this community that I can help because I am now in a position that I am able to do that. But we don't have to. I mean, do I believe in helping people across the globe? Absolutely. 100%. But do I really want to shore up our own resources and make Polk County the best that it can be? That is really my number one goal as a person.

So charity begins at home, right?

Right. Absolutely.

There you go.

So when other nonprofits and organizations that are doing really, really good with marketing attract our dollars to go to Africa or to, you know, other areas, it's, it's kind of frustrating because I think we could do better if we could shore up our own resources and help the marketing side of the community reach the audience in a better way. And maybe we are the— maybe, maybe we can share that load by passing the word on and being a microphone for these small businesses and nonprofits and doing things, even though maybe it's not perfect. One of my perfect, one of my favorite examples of a charity doing marketing really well is Charity:water. And they just, they have it right. They have it figured out. They do an amazing job with their marketing, and it's an example for us to kind of hold ourselves to. So if we can look at those, those examples of others that are doing a really good job across the globe and then bring some of those, those examples here, we will be ahead of ourselves. We will be moving forward in the right direction.

Well, that, that's an excellent segue because I think that one of the things that I've, I've noticed, especially the last few days as Lakeland prepares for a runoff election in a week or so, one of the things that I found is, and I'm sure that this will come up in various times and ways as this podcast evolves, but there is a misconception that our elected officials are essentially the, the ones in charge, right?

Yeah.

And I don't mean to sound cliché, like, well, you know, they're— they work for us. We're the people, right?

Right.

I mean, in a different sense that what I, what I hear a lot about is criticism of, well, this person has a lot of financial backing from these organizations or this PAC or this big corporation. We all know the big heavy-hitting corporations in our, in our county. And we act as if that's the end-all be-all for this, that if you're not one of those, then you're on the outs, nothing you say matters, and all of this. Well, I think it's a misnomer to call these people leaders in a way. And that's not a knock on anybody in public office. But I think it really is a it's a— is asking too much.

Mm-hmm.

Okay. Now, remember, these people— there are mayors in this country that make hundreds of thousands of dollars. That isn't the case here.

No.

And our county commissioners and the city mayors and city commissioners all around Polk are not getting rich off of their elected offices.

Right.

And yet we hold them to the standard of the future of Polk is up to them.

No, the future of Polk is up to us.

Right. Because you know what? It's really not fair to them because it's, it's a, it's a losing standard. They can never attain that.

Well, and if you take these elected officials and stand and have a 15-minute conversation with any of them, you discover the reality is they are just as human as you are.

For sure.

And we have this perception in our country. I think that we hold people in positions of leadership— I won't say power, but positions of leadership— separate from ourselves. That— and that's not true. That is our own— in our own mind, it's like, okay, because you do this, you don't think like a human being, you think like a politician. Or because you have this role, you are different than I am. And that's absolutely not true. They have the same challenges, the same problems, the same issues that we have. And they will listen. And so every time that I am one of the— I am, I am an apologetic when it comes to having an agenda. I don't like to feel like I'm pushing an agenda. I like to feel like I'm a part of the collective goal and we're all working towards the same goal. So when I have something that I'm trying to do, to get done, to ask help for, or whatever, it's hard for me. But when I ask for it, they're there and they're open to listening, to considering, to the ideas. Now, I'm not going to say that they're, they're not more in tune maybe with or in the habit of listening to some of the more significant players in the community with, with that, that reputation that we were— you were referring to. Right. But I think it's because they already have the microphone, they already have the path, the relationship exists. There are people in positions to communicate to them, with them on that path.

Exactly.

But there's no rule that says because you are just sitting on the sidelines and they don't know your name, that they won't hear what you have to say and consider it when making decisions. And I think what's ended up happening with the national politics is that trust has eroded. We don't believe that politicians are worthy of our trust. So therefore, we're combatants of the leadership that we have. If we take a different tact and go in a different direction, I think if you— we would be surprised to learn that anybody on the dais in a commission meeting or anyone who is in any official capacity elected to lead wants to hear a voice of someone with a new or fresh perspective. That is, there's nothing that you can tell me that they don't want to hear. Now, the problem is how we how we communicate that to them. If we're using social media banter and creating memes and making fun of the people that we're trying to get the attention of to consider our position, right, we're probably not going about it the right way.

Right. I could not agree more. Yes, the big— the heavy hitters, the big organizations, the big, big employers and around where we live, do have that microphone, they have that access. But I think also we as individuals tend to overinflate our genius. We tend to think that we see everything, right? And most of the time we don't, right? Nobody in this county, elected official that I know of, I haven't found one yet, is is getting wealthy, wealthy off of their office. And if you are, you know, you pointed out that these people want to hear from their constituents. The reason they do is because what we pay and the amount of power that these people have holding local office in Polk County, Florida, or any of the municipalities is not suitable to attract authoritarians that are people who are going to just get in and take over because they want to impose their will. It isn't worth it.

The system isn't set up that way.

No, it's not. They want to know what people want, right? They're not elected to lead the county in a better— or the cities in a better direction, per se. They're elected to solve problems that could never be solved on a collective basis. They're answering questions, they're making decisions for all of us as a whole. But in terms of shaping the direction, the vision, the way that things want— you know, we should want to go, we have to stop looking at them as the end-all be-all, right? If our county is not what we want it to be, we have to stop looking at an elected official getting a $25,000 or $30,000 annual stipend for a part-time commission seat as the reason that our town is not flourishing. It's a cop-out. And I think that it's lazy.

Yeah.

And ultimately, it's, it's up to us to make that change. And the analogy that I came up with for this was the pilot and the navigator.

Mm-hmm.

Okay. So whether you were talking about ships or planes, whatever it might be, normally the person who's navigating is not the same person that's flying or operating, what have you. I look at our businesses as the navigators.

Mm-hmm.

And our elected officials as the pilots.

Right.

So we as the people are the ones looking ahead right now. If you're a big corporation like Publix or Saddle Creek, you already have a 5, a 10-year plan because it's part of your business.

Yeah.

And therefore you're not hesitant to voice that to those people. But at the same time, as individuals, we get a little bit too self-important, right?

Well, we get into our silo.

Yeah.

And I think, you know, I think where I think you're landing us or you're navigating us or you're taking us as the way to—

is, is good layup there.

The collective small business community and the collective voter constituency, if you will. I mean, this isn't just about business, but I think because of who we are and our reputations and what we do in the community, we, we tend to lean in that direction. And I think everything that we're doing, if we could do it in tandem, if we could do it with the consideration of the business next to us or the business across town and think, what are the 5 or 6 things that are most important to all of us? To me, it might be this, and to Sam across the town, it might be this, and someone else might need this. But what are the foundational needs we all share? And what are the 1, 2, or 3 number 1 agenda items that we can all say, stand next to each other and agree on so that we can show that our voices are significantly organized. Because like you said, these larger corporations have business plans and they have everything figured out for the next 20 to 30 years according to what their— the trajectory or the direction that they're taking their companies. What smaller businesses lack is that cohesion, is that organized planning mindset that gives them the direction of what they're trying to accomplish. So if you can find organizations, and I don't think Bridge is perfect, but it's striving to achieve a collective, unified voice. Together we stand, together we're stronger, together we can accomplish so much more. There are other organizations like that. Dig in and connect to those and share your thoughts and share your voice. Don't be a dissenter because no organization is going to be perfect. Be a contributor, be a supporter, and find ways to make it better. So that instead of the negativity that can eventually erode the conversation or detract from the value that is being provided by the greater good, not overlooking that, but improving upon it. That's the biggest challenge is it's easy to tell everybody what's wrong with something, but it's harder to find a thing that you can do to make it better because that requires commitment. True. It requires commitment and effort and effort.

You know, and we're a little over on our time here, but I'm going to— I'm going to summarize it all up for you.

And then we'll talk about some of this stuff again later.

Yes, we will. But in short, if you get nothing else from the 40-some-odd minutes that we've been talking, it's this: if you care about your community, you could be a driver, run for office, you could be a navigator, and, and forge ahead. But nobody likes a backseat driver.

Oh, I like it. Yeah, right. If you're going to be— if you're going to try and, and make change, you can't make it from the backseat.

Amen.

Got it. Well, I think we're running out of time, or we probably ran out of time like a while ago. So thanks for listening, and make sure to subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts. And don't forget to leave us a review. You can find all of our episodes at elevate elevatepolk.com. And if there's something you want to hear specifically about on an upcoming episode, reach out to us on Facebook at Elevate Polk.