Left Face
Join Adam Gillard and Dick Wilkinson while they talk politics and community engagement in Pikes Peak region.
Left Face
Veteran Perspectives on Cannabis and Healthcare Privacy
What if your city banned something that had overwhelming public support? Join us as we unpack our recent experiences and delve into the heated debate over recreational cannabis legalization in Colorado Springs. Despite huge public backing, the city counsel is trying to ban recreational sales in the city charter. Drawing from Dick Wilkinson's firsthand experiences in New Mexico, we explore the complexities and resistance local governments face when shifting from medical to recreational cannabis. We challenge the conservative push to revert to old norms and advocate for the persistent need for cannabis access.
Veterans face a unique set of hurdles when it comes to cannabis use, from VA benefits to privacy concerns within the medical system. This episode tackles the stigma head-on, emphasizing the importance of open, honest communication with healthcare providers, especially regarding cannabis use before medical procedures. We discuss the compassionate need for recreational cannabis access, particularly for those hesitant to seek traditional medical help. Moreover, we highlight the positive impact of cannabis legalization in Albuquerque, noting a reduction in cartel activities and no significant rise in crime.
Finally, we shift our conversation towards the power of voter mobilization and responsible discussions on sensitive topics like politics, cannabis, and the trans community. With high voter turnout expected in the upcoming presidential cycle, we detail strategies employed by the Responsible Rec community to engage and mobilize voters, such as literature campaigns and word-of-mouth efforts. We also provide updates on exciting events like the Dem Gala and Veterans Day breakfast. Stay informed and connected by signing up for our newsletter. Tune in for an episode rich with insights and critical updates!
www.EPCCPV.org or info@epccpv.org
All right, take two. Hello everyone, Thanks for joining me today on the All Things Military and Veteran Podcast. My name is Adam Gillard and joined today's co-host, Dick Wilkinson that was a weird way to say your name.
Speaker 2:There's a lot of syllables, a lot of letters. Hi everybody, it's like a question.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, a lot of letters, hi everybody. It's like a question.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, I do joke about that and I tell people my name is dick, not richard, and I have the curse of having a first name that people struggle with and then a last name that people can't spell. So you know, it's been. It's been 40 plus years of this, so I'm used to everything so tell me a little bit about what you're saying.
Speaker 1:You know you're at the air show last week, you know, having the progressive vets tents up and things like that, you know, drew attention. What was your experience like and what are your thoughts on that experience?
Speaker 2:well, I wrote an email back to Pablo and the organizers and let them know that just kind of share my story from Saturday, because a lot of folks were coming on Sunday and I wanted to give them a little little inspiration. Saturday was one of the best interactions as far as public outreach that I've ever experienced. Regardless of the fact you know Democrat, Republican, it doesn't matter. Just having a captive audience and being able to have really, I think, useful conversations with people is one of the best times I've ever had doing that, and so that's down to the public more than the tent Right, and that's down to the public being willing to come and have conversations with us, and so I was just pleasantly surprised, and I look forward to doing it again.
Speaker 2:I think, yeah, yeah that's cool.
Speaker 1:I know we have a few things coming up, um, but we're always looking for volunteers. So if you're interested in volunteering for anything, make sure you check out our website, uh, epccpborg. Uh, you can sign up there or you can go to the El Paso County Democrats website, and they have uh places to sign up and participate too. So a lot of ways that we can give back right now. Another thing that we've been talking a lot about is the push for recreational cannabis. Here in Colorado Springs.
Speaker 1:We went down and talked to the city hall a couple of weeks ago and they voted that eight to one to move forward with their charter amendment to outlaw recreational sales at the city charter level, which will make it a lot harder to ever make it happen again. We had 25,000 or 28,000 signatures for that ballot, and then a group of eight nine people are deciding to spend a lot of taxpayer money to go against it. So I'm pretty frustrated with it. They did their second reading a couple days ago. Like we were talking, they spent a lot of their time dealing with noise ordinances that they approved before. Yes, but what are your thoughts on one, how the city council is handling this? Just kind of the push for recreational canvas. What are your thoughts on one, how the city council is handling this? You know, just kind of the push for recreational canvas. What are your thoughts on that right here locally?
Speaker 2:Well, I think it's worth mentioning to the viewers that I'm relatively new to the Colorado Springs El Paso County area. I've lived here for about a year and prior to that I was in New Mexico for about eight years. So I got to be there during the transition from medical to what they called adult use. So I got to see firsthand and even participate in the industry firsthand and through charitable work, that transition. So I know what it looks like. I know what happens in a market when you go from one to the other. I understand the company's responsibilities and the purchasing habits of the consumers as well. So you know there's a lot of. I think I bring a lot of knowledge to the table around the topic other than just being a patient myself. So when I make comments around the different, I'm going to probably speak on the differences that I observe.
Speaker 2:I think and the city council is not totally unique in being against, you know, against access to cannabis in whatever form. This happened in New Mexico as well, where there would be counties and cities. We had a similar structure where different layers of government could restrict how many facilities there could be, how big certain you know businesses could be and those kinds of things and that's fine. I mean, that's fair in a statewide change like that. I think it's fair to allow communities at that lower granular level to make those choices.
Speaker 2:But the same type of pushback existed in certain pockets in New Mexico. Just the cultural either misunderstandings, miseducation, bad experiences that were valid bad experiences that inform those ideas. And so I'll say it's not totally unique that a municipality would want to interfere or change the way that cannabis is accessed by the population. The one thing that I did here in that city hall meeting and that we've kind of talked about in other settings is the access is not non-existent, the access is simply somewhere else. So if there's an adult in El Paso County or Colorado Springs right now that wants to buy cannabis we live in Colorado where it there's plenty of opportunities to get access to cannabis, just not within our city limits and so it's not that far to go to get access to it. So if your intention is to keep it out of the community, that is already come and gone a decade ago.
Speaker 1:So like I feel, just like on the common sense level to me, is that it's here Like you have to think of a plan to deal with it. You can't just turn your back to it and like, pretend like everything's. You know peaches and cream.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:Which is a good strain. But yeah, it's just it's naive to think that it's not here in the communities you know.
Speaker 2:And I mean I don't want to speak ill of conservatives, but that is a definition of a conservative mindset is let's get back to a marker in time where we felt more comfortable. And you know, before there was any legal cannabis, we believed that our community was not using this substance. We believe that our neighbors didn't want to use this substance. Now that their stores and now that it's been normalized, we're not comfortable with just that, that reality. So we want to roll back in time a little bit to when everybody else felt a little bit like more wholesome, yeah, and that's. You know, that that's. You can't really do that with policy and you definitely can't do it in this part of colorado, right? You just can't. Uh, it's this nostalgic policy position just pretend like it's not here and that's just. You can't even have a conversation with that sometimes.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because they're trying to really cherry pick. You know the dream state of things. And they don't look at like how much corporations gave to feed some of those programs that you know were the safety nets and things like that.
Speaker 1:And like the quality of life that happened back then is because, you know, corporations had a higher tax rate and things. We weren't getting taxed as much, so we had more to spend, but they don't want to do that either. So, like it's a tough conversation that I get frustrated with a lot, you know, trying to roll back to a simpler time and like it's there's never been a simple time, right, right I say that all the time.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's when was it better.
Speaker 2:Now you know like it's not bad, I'm not, uh, we're, we're not. You know a whole make America great again concept. You know, I'm in the mindset that we've always been pretty great and I think we're pretty great right now and I think we're as great as maybe we've ever been. You know, like I don't get into the argument of like we have to restore some glory. Um, I think we've always had our issues as a culture, as a country, as local communities, and we'll always continue to work on those issues. So it's kind of ignorant to pretend like once upon a time everything was just great.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:No, it wasn't. You know, we're always working on this experiment and that's great, that's great. That's the great part to me.
Speaker 1:That would always be the takeaway that we're moving forward and trying new things. Yes, you know, just trying to make life better for the next generation. Yes, so with that argument here with city council, that you know they don't want to end the neighborhoods at all, really, but it's here how do you combat something like that? How do you talk to people when you know, because you're a religious person, like how do you talk to people that are just morally against?
Speaker 2:it. Well, there's something that in thanks for mentioning this. Actually, this some of the things I was going to bring up if I had the chance to speak to the city council and I had. We had a technical issue that day, so I didn't get my three minutes, but I did feel like it was important for me to show that, as an individual, I represent the population that they believe they're protecting. As an individual, I represent the population that they believe they're protecting, right? I am the person that you think you're making these decisions for and that you think needs to be protected from cannabis. Right? Me and my family. So I wanted to show the things where I think I'm alike on their concerns. I'm a father, I'm a veteran retiree. I'm a small business owner. I am a Christian that serves in ministry here in our community. I actively outreach to work with veterans and work on addiction issues. So I think I'm the person that they're talking about when they say we want to have a safe environment for our citizens, and I wanted to draw those likenesses so that we could have a better conversation For me.
Speaker 2:I understand that there's a mindset within, especially on the if we bring up the church aspect of it. Yes, there's always going to be an element of uh, religious thinking, uh, no matter what kind of denomination or flavor of religion you're at, you know there's going to be something that says this substance is not safe. The substance isn't. You know, we're against it.
Speaker 2:I'm not going to argue with those people really, but what I can do is offer my own story, and that's the same way that we evangelize in, you know, the religious practice of being a Christian For me. I share my story of how my relationship with Christ has changed my life. Well, I just tell that story in a different way to say what's my relationship with cannabis been as a medical supplement for me and be able to talk about it. Now I've come to the same terms, that we're the same kind of person that have the same values and the same concerns for our community. Now let's talk about how I'm a responsible adult that uses this to supplement my medical needs. And if you after that can say I still don't think this is a good idea, then that's why we go to the ballot box and that's why we vote, right, you know. But that's how I approach those conversations.
Speaker 1:Well, and you know, I think you can get the folks to say yes to medical. How do we transfer to?
Speaker 2:recreational. Yes, ok, so that is a good point because that's really what's on topic now for the El Paso County area. So the argument that I think is a fair argument to make and that we've talked about in the city council, I believe your comments, adam. You mentioned this the stigma associated with being dependent on federal resources, as a lot of people are in our community. If they're veterans, they have some kind of relationship with the federal government, but access to cannabis can, in their mind, put them at odds with the federal government because it is federally illegal or being rescheduled into a different category where it would still you'd have to have some kind of reason to access it, right.
Speaker 1:When I had my TS, we would get briefings that we couldn't even invest, we couldn't be on the business side of it so like everybody else, can make millions. Like you can't invest in it. Yeah, it's crazy. There's a hard line, hard line, black and white yeah.
Speaker 2:But that does not, and we'll just take the opportunity and hopefully we'll talk about this often that the rumor is you'll lose your VA benefits, you'll lose your disability pay, you may lose your retirement pay, you may not be eligible for a job 10 years from now because you smoked weed once. There's all these myths that to prevent veterans specifically from accessing cannabis if it's appropriate for them Right now, as it's medical, you know, folks don't even want to engage with that process because they think it'll end up in their medical record and then their doctor will know, no matter what, they won't have a right to privacy anymore.
Speaker 1:So that's where the stigma really drills down is that if you have to touch the medical system, people are legitimately concerned, afraid of that you know, what's scary about that is, if you're not honest, that you're using cannabis, if you're going for surgery like anesthesia and stuff like that, they need to know that you know cause that goes into their equation.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, there's implications there for sure, yeah, and so I agree. You know we want people to be open and honest with their medical providers and with their friends and family. That would be on, you know, be standing bedside if there was an emergency right. We want people to know that and that's part of being a responsible patient. But if we talk about it on the rec side, I think that it is responsible as a community to have recreational access.
Speaker 2:Not that I want people to self-medicate or to not go through a process where they make sure that cannabis is safe for them, medicate or to not go through a process where they make sure that cannabis is safe for them. I still want people to consider it as it's not Tylenol. It's not Tylenol. You do need to be considerate and if you do think you have a bad reaction, you need to be considerate of that.
Speaker 2:There can be health risks, but I do believe that there are people in our community that don't take any kind of mental health treatment or any kind of mental health medication that if they did have access to cannabis, there would be some form of relief, and I don't know how well you know good or bad that would impact their lives. It's up to them to decide, but I think there's got to be thousands of people within our city that would benefit from access to it outside of the medical program and it's a compassionate move in my mind that I think. For me I don't see the harm that these other folks see, so I see the benefit and I see that compassionate. You know, let's expand access, I guess.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I want to swing back to some of the harm, but one thing that I've always told people is that with access to rec, it makes it easier for the veteran who's having a hard time asking for help yes you know, because you know, we all know that we need help.
Speaker 1:You know, we all know kind of what's going on. But it's hard to make those steps and like get the government involved with going, because you have to go to a doctor, you have to tell them everything and yeah, and I mean anytime you're telling a doctor your stories of what you did, things in the military, that there's some eye rolls and there's some you know you always like, yeah, like, like you just it's never fun, sure you know so I've gotten used to it.
Speaker 1:I do it all the time yeah, but having this uh helps people. Yeah, when you talk about some of the negative things, you know, when you saw it transferring down in Albuquerque, was there a huge spike in crime? What happened to the black market and things?
Speaker 2:like that yeah.
Speaker 1:What was your experience there?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's interesting. You ask that because before I guess I was in the army down there so I had no like. I was on the other side of that hard line and I saw the medical market around me and some growth happening. But the political movement towards rec was clearly going to be after I retired. So just that aspect of it was just so interesting to get to experience that all kind of in a row, you know, to go from the total other end of the spectrum where you can't even think about it, to here's an opportunity to help other veterans who've been on the other side of that line start businesses, make money and get involved and do something. You know, even if it's just a hobby to like, get in there and get their hands dirty Right. So that was super exciting effects there. You know, definitely no change in crime in the Albuquerque area, because there's already. You know, regardless, cannabis doesn't even rate as far as a drug that has an impact in that community.
Speaker 2:Right, you know, if everybody was smoking cannabis then there'd be a totally different situation going on. People are smoking much harder drugs in the open. So the chronic hard drug use there is really the driver behind crime, and cartel activity is really around pills and powders, not bales of cannabis anymore. So, if anything, it discourages definitely cross-border cartel movement. There's not much incentive to bring bales into the country anymore because we're growing bales on this side of the border now, you know. So it reduces that flow. So, if anything, there's a reduction in international cross-border traffic.
Speaker 2:I think that's the most popular place where the legal shops are is close to those border areas for other states and even, you know, for the other country. So not that it's legal to carry it back and forth, but that's where the access happens and that's replacing where that illegal activity was happening. I mean, that's why that's a hotspot. So the demand was still there. But most people would choose to go to a store and not, you know, a parking lot or a shady apartment to go buy cannabis. Right, they don't want to put themselves in a crime situation because they're not hard drug users. It's a risk they don't want to take. So most people that want access to cannabis, rec or medical. By and large, would prefer a legal access point.
Speaker 1:Knowing what you're getting. Knowing what you're getting feeling safe, knowing that you're not going to get a comment that kind of stuck out where he said it's harder to draw the line between, you know, tobacco, alcohol, marijuana, meth, heroin, things like that and like where do you draw the line of like illicit drug use? And acceptable drug use. What are your thoughts on that? Like is there, I don't know. Is there a way to kind of quantify that? Like better I'm.
Speaker 2:I think they're well, I don't know if better. I mean, I think the I understand that it becomes a gray area in a social argument, right, but I think the medical community, as far as how they define, um, substance abuse, regardless of what substance it is and how it affects your behavior to where it makes a detriment in your life, right, you know that you're harming your relationships, you're losing your financial stability, you're losing your physical stability because you're not being safe, right, those behaviors are the clear indicator of when both personal harm and social harm are taking place. So I think that's actually pretty well defined. And I think it's some willful ignorance in some of the arguments to say that we're blurring the line, because who knows a pothead that has, you know, physical ailments and is like losing their teeth, doesn't have any money, can't keep a job, their family has deserted them because they're smoking weed?
Speaker 1:I don't know anybody like that I do know some alcoholics like that. Yes, absolutely yeah, and it's interesting that we were cool with that.
Speaker 2:We were okay with the alcohol portion of it. We've tricked ourselves into believing that we've dealt with the problem or that the resources are available to deal with the problem. And it's just down to the individual to choose their way into or out of this path of destruction. And I'll speak. You know this is a good chance to talk about the harm reduction topic there and I'll speak personally on it for a moment. You know, being in the military and being on the other side of that line as a hard black and white line, I had every desire to respect that line. You know, at no point through my career did I think oh man, now that there's weed for sale down the road.
Speaker 1:I'm going to go get some, or I'm going to send my wife to go get some or whatever.
Speaker 2:You know, that's what a lot of commanders are afraid of is dependents have access, right? Okay, I mean, it's not a wrong idea. And young people, no matter what job they have, make poor choices, and so there are young people in the military that are going to make some poor choices. So it's not impossible to think that it impacts the military community. But let's talk about what does impact the military community. The drinking culture is part of it, right? We can't ignore it, we can't lie about it. That alcohol is part of the military. Whether it's command sponsored or not, it's just part of the military. Um, and whether it's command sponsored or not, it's just part of the culture, and we're not it's not going anywhere.
Speaker 2:you know it's highly encouraged it is it is, and it's because I mean, this is my own uh experience, but you know, the anxiety is fairly, um, the military is fairly anxiety inducing there. That's the sentence.
Speaker 1:That's a good one.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it just is right. You're, you're high level of readiness at all times. You're supposed to be ready to deploy into a war zone within X number of hours or days. You're supposed to be ready to pack up a whole warehouse full of kit and be in a different country in less than a month. You know things like that, that are, and you can practice that as though it's going to happen tomorrow. Right, Um, that's just when you're in a training position and your unit's waiting for deployment. Right, which is most you know. Two thirds of the military is kind of in that status most of the time. Then you have operational work. So if you're not in one of those training things, you're in actual hands on work supporting or being the warfighter. That's its own ball of stress. That is really overbearing. So it creates anxiety, it creates sleep problems, it creates physical health problems. We all Again. That's why we all get disability at the end of the road. Here's a question for you.
Speaker 1:How often do you go on base?
Speaker 2:Almost never, yeah, now that I've been retired, now that I'm retired, and I rarely go on base.
Speaker 1:when I do, I feel the anxiety Once you kind of start untying your knots and everything as soon as I drive on the base. I'm like like I just feel it.
Speaker 2:Yes, I can feel that, yes, for sure, that just like, oh, more people are looking at what I'm doing and like, why am I here? I need to be here for a purpose, right, like that's really what it comes down to. Is I need to come here for a purpose and leave when I'm done. With that reason, I'm not, shouldn't just be hanging around because I'm not in uniform. You know I'm not, I'm not active duty anymore. So, um, you know, all that adds up to drinking too much. You know, that story is just to say that we, so many people, use alcohol as a crutch, and so I was, uh, not special or different than anybody else.
Speaker 2:I used alcohol as a crutch and used it too much. Um, I have a family history and genetic kind of predisposition to it, so I just walked right into it. You know, Um and I I got to a point where it became, you know, it was an addiction after post-retirement, it was definitely a problem that was falling into that definition of it's impacting your work, it's impacting your relationships, it's impacting how you serve your community, all those things. And so I knew, like, the end of this thing is coming. You know, it's good, it's going to be time to stop soon. Um, and luckily I'm, you know, very happy to say that I'm almost four years, um, totally abstinent from alcohol, and cannabis has been a tool in my tool chest, um for me to be able to use it as a harm reduction and have the access to a substance that is much safer than alcohol.
Speaker 2:Self-dosed in a safe and responsible way, treats a lot of different things for me, not just anxiety, and so it was part of my safety net, I think, as I was moving through those early days and early stages of sobriety, to know that one substance is way harder to deal with and way more dangerous and like guaranteed problems, and this other one, it just doesn't come with any of that stuff attached, you know. And so for me it was an important part of that first, you know, year of getting done with 20 years of bad habits with alcohol and changing my entire lifestyle so that I didn't feel like I needed it anymore. And that's just one person, one story. But you know there's a lot of people in the military that are in that same glide path.
Speaker 1:It's very repeatable, like we hear that a lot where you know, trying to cut cold Turkey, like there's still a lot of things that like, if we don't have something to relax our minds, we just get spun up on and like you know, my big thing was, you know, like two o'clock in the morning. I couldn't sleep past two o'clock in the morning but like I would just wake up and be spun up with, you know, the thousands of tasks that we haven't done yet, you know.
Speaker 2:so like been there, been there months and months on end where you just wake up, pop up and you're going.
Speaker 1:it's go time Um so yeah. And having something that you can quickly administer the effects and go to sleep, back to sleep, versus, you know, trying to drink a six-pack and then go to work in a couple hours, yeah, yeah, you know, and, like I had friends that did that, yeah, and they lost their lives because yeah, you know they were drinking and so they had to go to work pretty much.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you know it's a, once you get that monkey on your back, that's a tough one to get off like that's. Yeah, that's a threat, and I don't see that with cannabis users.
Speaker 2:No, that gets into the. You know, I'm always careful with my language to say this substance, this plant let's call it that. It's a plant is not a panacea, it's not for everybody body, but it is a very flexible tool that even a person who doesn't necessarily have a medical recommendation or prescription, if they access it recreationally, they're going to be able to manage. Most people are going to be able to manage its effects and its benefits very responsibly, and that's just not the case with almost any other substance. You know, and I don't know why, you know but this people succeed better when this is their choice of how they manage what the things we're talking about anxiety, sleep issues, pain issues.
Speaker 1:You know, yeah, and I've always heard you know that cannabis isn't addictive and I've always thought that. But my mind is kind of flipped on that. Like I think it like it can have addictive properties. Now but it's a lot easier to get off of too. Yes, yes you know like the physical and the mental, coming off of you know using frequently is a lot less of a cliff than any other substance.
Speaker 2:Yes, for sure, Even prescription medications that are, you know, just things you need to take daily. If you don't take them, you need to go to the hospital, right? Alcohol you know to go to the hospital. Alcohol If you're drinking on a regular basis and you just completely stop, you need to go to the hospital. Cannabis you can smoke all day, every day, and then not touch it for a week and you might get a headache on Wednesday. You might not sleep great that week.
Speaker 2:But it's not going to ruin your life and it's not going to be your life, you know, and it's not going to be. I need instant attention, medical support, clinical support to do this. But I will say I do believe that there's, you know, an addiction capacity there. I do believe there's a small amount of people that have some other. You know, as we say, if you're using it and you have untreated mental health issues, your propensity to abuse anything is very high.
Speaker 2:And so that connection of if you're self-medicating I don't want people to do that there's a medical program here for a reason right, I want people to break the stigma and access it with support. But if you just absolutely cannot do that, then there's going to be a small group of people out there that do fall into a bad relationship with cannabis, and that's where education is required, that's where money from these taxes is required. That's where better programs, not just for youth but for the general population, to explain all of this, just like we have don't drink and drive, don't smoke meth billboards you know what I'm saying. I mean, we've already got social campaigns around how to behave with substances, so there's no reason why we can't continue to do that with cannabis.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I really wish you know in my younger years I would have known more about, like the effects on brain development and stuff like that. I don't know if it would have affected me Right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I do understand, yeah.
Speaker 1:But it would have been nice to you know, have a little bit more information as a parent To make my bad choices.
Speaker 2:That's where I get to now. With that we have that knowledge and that we understand the impacts, that's a tool in my tool belt to have a conversation with my kids. Right, have a conversation with a teenager who you know is going to get exposure to this substance without your supervision most likely, right, and you know for our years away from it happening legally for them, right? So in that gap, which is five, six, seven years long, you got to have a conversation with them and that's an important talking point, right Is that scientists do understand that this, this impact, is real and if you do this, you're taking this risk and you can inform your kids, right, with things that are not the smoke and mirrors war, war on drugs, crap, you know know from before we don't want the reefer madness, or even just the early 80s like, uh, every drug in the world is going to kill you, right like it was, it was that life or death and
Speaker 2:that that falls apart. When a teenage kid sees another teenage kid take one hit off of a joint and their head doesn't explode, or the police don't show up, then they go. Uh-oh, everything they told me about drugs might not be true. I'm going to have to find out on my own what's true and what's not true. Right, and I mean I'm not saying they, it's just this light pops on and it's time to go snort heroin. Right, but the, the, the, they know Santa Claus isn't real anymore.
Speaker 2:Right and now they've got to find out what is the truth, right?
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I definitely think responsible conversations for everything. You know our politics, even Like you need to start having conversations with people for them to be able to go out in the world and have the conversations themselves. Yeah, you know so, yeah.
Speaker 2:I think a lot of the complaints that I hear a lot is just like people don't want to parent their kids.
Speaker 1:sometimes it's like you just have to sit down and have a conversation. I get it that you don't like cannabis or the trans community, things like that. But you have to sit down and have these conversations and if you're not comfortable telling your kids what you believe, think about what you believe.
Speaker 2:Right, sure, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it kind of frustrates me that people want to try to just box themselves in and have this little version of their own little utopic universe.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's just unrealistic.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I agree, and you know, I think, from a policy perspective, if we're bringing it back around to the city council and the ballot initiative, as I mentioned last week, it's really disappointing that there's going to be most likely a confusing setup on the ballot. But you know, I don't know. I think there's going to be very high voter turnout this year. It's a presidential cycle that's more than just interesting. People are pretty committed and passionate about voting this presidential cycle. People are pretty committed and passionate about voting this presidential cycle, so I think it's going to give us, at the best, the most realistic response from the public that maybe this ballot initiative has ever had. Right, the most thorough, I should say. And we'll see. We'll see how it goes.
Speaker 2:What are the issues? Let me ask you because you're always asking me questions and we want to switch it around what do you know? Tell us a little more about the Responsible Rec community that's out there and what are their efforts between now and the day that people vote to get the word out, and what is the word. If you know what they're saying, Tell us about that.
Speaker 1:So right now the big push is they're going to be going to the Democratic Gala. They have some fundraising things that are going on there. They're going to be going to the Democratic Gala. They have some fundraising things that are going on there. A lot of it is going to be word of mouth on the street and it's mobilizing our voters. So getting out to things like the Beats and Ballots that's going on on the 7th of September down at Acacia Park, Just trying to get our word out, I know me. And another initiative that we're working on with the Progressive Vets is a stamp, a paid postage program, oh yeah, so that we can get you know progressive minded voters a stamp.
Speaker 1:So that they can make it easier to vote.
Speaker 2:Sure.
Speaker 1:We saw like a 38% increase in the folks that we gave stamps to.
Speaker 2:So it's just about mobilizing our voters.
Speaker 1:now we're in that period where it's time to get out the vote. We're like under 70 days or something like that we're pretty close.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we're getting close, yeah, so now it's just about trying to get mobilized with the voters I think that's a great strategy because, um, this one ballot issue is not gonna get a lot of people off the couch. You know there's a hundred people out there that would go and vote just for this, um, but because they because they're already in the box right, or because they're just already want to vote about other passionate issues like who's the president, um, we need to get the get out. The vote helps this initiative just as a secondary ballot measure Right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's like one of those spillover things, yeah.
Speaker 2:More, more blue voters in the box should, we would think, leads to more progress on this topic Exactly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you know we have a lot of close races here locally with some of the house district races and things like that. So, yeah, it's just about, you know, getting high density voters. So, because you know we're on a limited budget, yeah. So getting those high density areas?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Flooding their mailboxes with our stuff.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:So we can try to educate you know doing things like this.
Speaker 2:So there's going to be a mail campaign or a literature campaign?
Speaker 1:Yeah, so keep an eye out for that.
Speaker 2:I guess if you're here in the Colorado Springs area For real, you know, keep an eye out for the literature. It may either be in your mailbox or you'll see it around town.
Speaker 1:So you know we're looking to drop stuff right around the same time the ballots drop.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And ballots drop around October 17th. I think that time frame. So, yeah, right about when you're getting your ballot, we should be getting some information out to folks so that you can vote, you know, with everything available to you. Yeah, and actually just sitting here thinking like I should talk to them about in their literature they should add something about the other measure. Yeah, you know what I mean. Yeah, and just be upfront about it. An explainer of some sort? Yeah, Like there's two things.
Speaker 2:It takes a lot of words, though it takes a lot of print real estate to get that you know, yeah.
Speaker 1:So yeah, It'll be a.
Speaker 2:Which would kind of fall into the trap of like making a confusing ballot situation in the first place.
Speaker 2:Like you're wasting resources and time and breath trying to explain what's going on. I think for me I'll say I'm not going to get them in my mailbox because I'm a little bit outside of the city limits, but for folks that get it, I want to encourage you to use it as a talking point with your neighbors or with your family or with whoever else that you think might be interested co-workers, whoever you know. It's a topic where it's not like you're talking politics and it's a big partisan thing depending on you know. You know the people you're going to talk to about it, so it might be a chance for you to motivate them to get out and vote. And it's just saying hey, did you know this is going to be on the ballot?
Speaker 1:this year, you know, so that I think that word of mouth, there's two things on there. I like how you put it last week, where one's legalizing yes and one's legalizing no.
Speaker 2:You just have to flip it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so those things are going to help out a lot. I know a couple months ago we did a Vets Outreach forum down at Munchies downtown Some of the folks from cannabis, the cannabis council were there and we just, you know, we have those little one-on-ones where people can talk, and you know the next one, I hope you can hop in on that too.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:So, yeah, we'll keep doing things like that. We'll keep pushing things out through our newsletter, through the podcast, things like that Great.
Speaker 2:And what's the dollar range?
Speaker 2:I heard you mention it last week Estimate $10 to $15 million $10 to $15 million, but that's for we've got to remember that's for the local population, right? That's not money, yeah, per year, and for our districts, if you will. So it's not money that's going to be flowing out into other areas, it's going to be spent right here. So, even if you don't really have a big strong feeling about cannabis one way or the other, if you'd like to see funding that's voluntarily given from the customers to support social issues that are directly related to homelessness, mental health, veterans, crime, that's where the money goes, and so you know, if that's something you care about, then there's a reason to go and vote for it. So yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you can attack it from three or four different angles, and it just makes sense. And that's how you like, we should be able to sell this to any demographic. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Outside of partisan concerns. Yeah, the more local you get, the less partisan you should be, and so that's that's what this issue is about.
Speaker 1:Well, I think we're going to wrap it up here. Thanks again for joining me.
Speaker 2:Thanks for telling us about the initiative too, adam. We're going to, we're going to make this to where we're tag teaming now. So, yeah, that's good.
Speaker 1:Like I definitely want this to be more back and forth flow. So I appreciate the questions. I wasn't ready for them, but you haven't ever given me a prescript so so what do you think about this huge topic?
Speaker 1:yeah, 30 seconds on bike. Um man, thanks for uh tuning in today to the all things military veteran podcast. Uh, you can catch dick and I on every podcast app that's out there. So look us up, tell your friends. Uh, we'll be in touch. We have some things about the, about the gala, that you'll be seeing on our news list. If you want to get onto our newsletter, go to our website, epccpvorg. Sign up for the newsletter. The Dem Gala is still selling tickets, so if you don't have a ticket for that yet, go ahead and buy tickets and then we'll have our Veterans Day breakfast coming up, I believe on the 9th of November, but you'll see emails on that. So get signed up for our newsletter and we'll be in touch. Stay safe out there, everyone.
