All right, we're gonna go ahead and get this baby started right on time happy Monday everyone and While we are waiting for the stream to get pushed out there to all the media Personalities and everyone to start getting their notifications that we are live. I see mine hit over here on my email Yes It's interesting because people still say to me Eric How do I get the notifications for the lives you got a subscribe and let the notification be turned on and you'll get an email When we go live, so thank you for everyone that's joining us tonight This is actually going to be a pretty good session looking forward to it. It was prompted to me by my son Excuse me Welcome welcome welcome Lisa welcome to Sheena Welcome Maria. Let us know who else is out there watching. This is a really I mean Be honest with you. It's funny because I was talking to my son last week after we did the last session and He reminded me Of all the stuff that I had done in my previous time before I did government contracting But I kind of put on a backburn and I forgot so while we're waiting on everyone to get into the room Let us know a little bit about your business Let's tell us where you're at. I see Arizona here. I tell us what your business is And what your business does so again, let me know because some people don't tell us tell me your industry that you're in The name of your business and the city and or state that you're from we've got 13 people on right now Expecting many more to come in the very near future While we are queuing up for our live session today. How's everyone's Monday starting off? Lisa Lee welcome All right, we're seeing a good evening. Happy to have you here today with us Man giant Hawaiian as always Welcome. Happy to have you here with us today So I look off from Atlanta, I just read that Wow, you down in Atlanta. Okay. All right Leave in Ohio. Tell us your business. What business are you in? Howdy from Los Angeles Sparkle Sims. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. I know brand a All right My man, Brandy is here today with us All right, Williamsburg, Virginia mobile food business All right. Nice Who else trucking I see trucking in the house always gonna have some truckers in the house All right today is good. It's this is actually a really good thing by the way It's if you are wondering, I don't know how many of you even saw it Welcome keep posting keep telling us who you are. Tell us your industry Tell us your city that you're in because again by the time this goes live people gonna be able to read those comments and you be surprised how often that People ask me hey to reach out to a guest or someone because of something that was posted in one of the chats So definitely you would like I encourage everyone to participate. That's how you're gonna get the most out of this opportunity before We jump into today's message This was interesting. I was we were gonna talk about the mandates. I decided against it I'd rather talk about ways that people could make money and create opportunities for themselves and their family So instead of wasting everyone's time discussing the mandates I just go ahead and share this post and I will drop it in the chat And it's done by govcom brief calm And it says the contract personnel must be cove it back COVID-19 vaccines by December the 8th and it goes into some of the specifics in terms of the task force The requirements and what they're what they're saying about it. So again as of now present Biden's September 9th executive order It's supposed to be updated in the far as in the 15th, which was last week I don't know if it got implemented or not in the far But that's what they were proposing and so again, I know if you tuned in last week We were gonna discuss this I decided against it I felt like a much more interesting topic would be to talk about grants and money Anyone else out there agree with me rather than spend our time discussing The vaccine and mandates it's coming it's happening If they decide to change it then they change it if not then You know, we all will have to deal with whatever the government decides to do Unfortunately, I don't have any executive power. So I can't decide or make decisions either way We'll drop this in the chat if anybody cares to read it. You want to learn about it? We're not going to spend a whole lot of time on today, but definitely if you're joining us today We're discussing grant opportunities and it's specifically something that I did a program that I was a part of Some many many many many years back I was a part of a community program and I totally like slipped my mind all of these things that I did and Asked myself was asking me questions about my journey and my story That's what brought all this back into like full circle. So that's what we're gonna talk about today I see a couple people put it in here Hey, let's see what we got here All right can't from Georgia Looking forward to grants start a business mother must open a florist nice good stuff. All right That's awesome. Thank you can't in fact can't my examples today are I picked a couple of towns in Georgia So you're gonna like that can't in fact you're gonna like let me Show you I actually picked a couple of towns in Georgia To share so that should be interesting for Kent anybody else out there. Where you where you from? All right, let's see Eric, Maine, Michigan staffing federal nice nice nice. Who else? Financial okay sparkle financial services financial insurance services to big business industries Why see what's up girl? Why see in the building? All right, great transportation services Houston, Texas All right, Ilana says they were briefed today on the December 8th day. Yes, it's coming I don't know what's gonna happen between now and December 8th But that's the definitive day as of now as per the executive order put up by the by administration So let's talk about grants. Let's talk about grants Let me pull up my screen and show some stuff This is really One second. All right Make sure I'm sharing the right screen. Am I? No, I'm not This is actually this is for man in Georgia. This is what we're gonna get into a little bit later on is Georgia but first I'm gonna start off with my personal story Here we go. All right good All right, last is there. Let's talk some grants, right? You want to forget all this other stuff By the way, 29 people in the chat. Give me a thumbs up if you like the content If you're having a good day Listen, just let us know. I always tell people I like to see sun shines in a little chat So if you're having a good day today, put a little sunshine in the chat Give us a thumbs up as always get some likes in here at the YouTube, you know Gods demigods, whatever you want to call them Google all these big-time companies They're only gonna push the content that we push so not thumbs up in the chat We need thumbs up hit the like button on YouTube or in Facebook so that it gets shared. All right So let's talk about grants today So go going back some time ago I Actually, let me put myself kind of midscreen So it's funny this everyone remember that what we were discussing Think it was a week ago. We talked about CDF eyes. Anybody remember that? Let me see if I can pull that up This video right here where we discussed the five point two million dollars award to micro Entrepreneurs and CDF eyes. It was a program that the SBA has out there where they are awarding entities money to then give to micro entrepreneurs and so we discussed CDF eyes that was about a week ago and So again, I'm in telling my story to my son. He's asking me He says hello dad. How did you meet this person? How did you meet that person? So my journey actually began? I don't know how many people know this, but I'm from a small town Let's see. Where's my little map? Okay, you back out. All right So this is actually the map of the area where I'm from here and if you could see that things as pinecrest bakery and restaurant ghouls You can see that on the screen. All right. So by the way Just just let me add so I could give you guys context. All right. Let me give you some context hold on All right. Did anybody notice right there? Church's chicken All right, you'll see that church's chicken. All right So we we already have established a basis for right the type of area that is Whenever you have a church's chicken, right? We already can kind of establish a kind of area that is and so that's actually the area in my aim I'm from it's called ghouls, Florida and ghouls, Florida Predominantly black When I grew up there Originally because my parents and my grandparents lived there a long time ago I asked my parents like why didn't we live in this area because it's high crime A lot of abandoned buildings a lot of vacant land vacant lots things like that And so she says back in the days that was the land that was donated to the black people that were working on the railroad tracks And so what happens is as I became older and I went away. I went to college and I came back to that area I Met and again, I shared the server for I met a real estate developer that was extremely successful and That area and he was the one that was the first person to tell me about government Well, not coming comment He told about contracting as a as a contractor general contractor before I learned about government contracting and so When he told me this guy was again was multi-millionaire he owned probably 50 or so properties In around that area and he was the first one to bring me back to the community and says son you can make money right here in your own backyard and I didn't know any better again.  So this is the gentleman that He was part of what I talked about last week if you remember community development corporation Does anybody remember that we discussed community development corporations. Oh Sanford Keona, hold on. I know Sanford. So Sanford this actually is perfect This applied to Sanford and a lot of small towns as well. You're lying to you from a small town As well. Anybody remember last week we discussed community development corporations community development corporations All right. Anybody? No, no, no, no, no all right So he was a part of what was called community development corporation and I will pull that up on the screen or yeah Make it big. I learned my lesson last week when the things were too small We were part of something called the ghouls community development corporation. Let's go back All right, so here it is it's called building a brighter future for the residents of South Miami-Dade schools community and a strategy center on Exploiting I guess that's not a good word to use But you know what they meant exploring opportunities presented by the South-Dade busway Ghoul CDC is pursuing a program of community development affordable housing historic preservation and job creation through commercial revitalization and so this particular gentleman that engaged me that was the reason why I'm even like here today Yeah, run the likes up by the way 30 people watching run the likes up if you have not told me where you're from Let me know where you're from and your industry because that way we can talk to you in this conversation Specifically about you or for you like I got a couple people. I got someone from Sanford. So my small town Jersey I know my man's in Georgia.  Thank you for enterprise Big up for that So now we set up He was part of this community development corporation We mentioned something like that in the last call But for all those people community about corporation is all it is is a nonprofit organization Right and so they had several focus areas, which was one was community development Affordable housing historic preservation and job creation, right? what you have to Start to learn and what I hope that by the time we finish today's conversation that everyone on this call If you don't know these words and you don't know these terms that you learn what they are and that you understand them So that you can go back to your local areas and start looking this stuff up So that you can put yourself in a position to qualify for these programs So that is my goal today is that when we finish the call when this has a call when we finish this live session Excuse, I'm used to being on zoom calls and we finish this live session that you are able to go back and understand these words Understand what they mean and how to implement them because this is how you're going to get access to the money You have to speak the language just like when we talk about government contracting It's so important to talk the language because these are how the programs that are written Based on the language the vocabulary So you've got to understand and know this language and be able to use it so that when you're doing your research And you're looking for the programs and the money This is the language that you're using so we so he was part of this committee development corporation Housing development committee of development commercial revitalization How many people in your areas again that we're talking about How many people in your areas right thank you, you know, I know last time we had some people in here That said they were interested in doing housing We had some anybody in here their businesses can touch on any of these areas community development commercial revitalization Youth and recreation programs and housing Anybody listening to this out of the 40 people is anybody in there who's looking for funding Anybody's programs or your or your business can touch on any of these areas. I see for example retail manufacturing Absolutely, okay commercial revitalization job creation. What else do we have? Real estate. All right, that's community development commercial revitalization. What else what else do we have in here? Janitorial services that creates jobs such job creation. What else? Auto broker trucking janitorial All right. So again, they touch on all of these areas. So does that make sense? You just like when we talk about government contracting when we start talking about these federal grant programs You have to speak the vernacular in order for people to take you seriously for them to consider you for them to let you in The doors to let you sit at the table to be in the rooms and that's what we're doing today So now this is a CDC anyone by the way Any one of us out here could create a CDC anyone this is not limited to any specific type of person You can create your own CDCs now We this particular gentleman he was part of a CDC what he did was he invited me Let's pull it up He invited me And we're gonna talk about that in a minute He invited me to see it be a part of what's called the ghouls Is cash these stands for community action human services department public housing community development community meeting? so they invited me to be part of this community group for ghouls and In the community group that was sponsored by Miami-Dade County We would sit down and we would listen to issues that affected the people in the community Now, why does that matter? What why does anyone think it matters that he invited me to present on this particular be a part of this group where we listen to Actions and incidents that affect the community. Does anybody Understand why that this particular person who's a multi-millionaire wanted me to sit on this community action group Anybody understand anybody now can I guess? Look at this is the June 19 2021 agenda meeting All right, we've got our invocation roll call recital mission statement adoption agenda approval minutes. You see look at number 7 naming of ghouls park Look at number 8 commissioner key on McGee's update on district 9 commissioner Commissioners partner update Miami-Dade Park's recreation police department project peace community issues and concerns subcommittees adjournment Right. Why is he lost him exactly? representation from someone who grew up in the area That's right It's blurry someone says it's blurry. Let me zoom in That better is it better Nisha Hit it on the head Funding and needs of the community Yes, that's correct Funding and needs of the community Nisha hit on the head So often right the decisions that are being made with the dollars that go into your communities They're being made at these meetings So we need in order for us to understand to be a part of the process of how the money gets spent Someone has to sit on one of these committee meetings Now I happen to sit on this particular one that was for my specific group my buddy here He sat on this one what happens to be it was called South Bay Community Council And so he sat on it on a community council Let me zoom in All right. He sat on this community council and I sat on This particular cash team meeting which is for goals right so now mind you this is like When I was on the meetings, this is after college I'm talking about this is like two thousand. This is before remember this is before I got This is between real estate when I got into construction before I start government contracts. I Had no idea about any of the stuff or what it meant and this guy just said hey, Eric listen I need you to go over here sit on a board We're gonna put you on the board and then you're gonna listen to the meetings and you're gonna make decisions well what I didn't know at the time when this happened was that The Decisions for the monies that were being flown down from the federal government We're being made at these levels I had I didn't know this and so all of the grant money that the government was sitting down to the states To the cities to the municipalities to the counties We're being made at meetings like this and we were voting on How the dollars are coming out to community we're gonna be spent and so as a result of me sitting on this committee meetings I was able to vote on who was awarded grant dollars each and every year Come on man. Come on 54 people watching give me 54 likes Listen We It's so it was so simple That I look back and I go. Oh my gosh.  It gets better. It gets better late Look, this is this is this is just like this is the tip of the iceberg. Okay, this thing is good What's up, Tim? All right, hold on. Look Yolanda, you don't necessarily go to city council yet You don't have to go to that high level, right? You may not be able to city council but community meetings we want to stick with the community levels because That's where the decisions are made because look I'm gonna show you right remember. We got a church's chicken in our area Church is chicken. So, you know, I know What I learned Okay, what I learned let me come up to the bigger screen what I learned sitting in these meetings was that They made a decision how to divide up Unincorporated areas with corporate areas they drew up the dividing lines of what tax base this particular area would get versus this other area They decided on How we would revitalize the area which included Making changes to the zoning for real estate and property Okay, and that's where if I could have figured out how to put this thing together man Like I'm telling you I'm Promise you I'm telling you all of you out there. There you go. Look Toshina worked at a nonprofit CAA years ago Yeah, right Toshina. So, you know what I'm talking about. You worked at CAA So you already know what I'm talking about but the difference Toshina now you're on the other side, right? So we want to figure out how do we become the developers? How do we become the persons that that own the land that build out the land that pick up the real estate when it's very cheap? And then because we're on these committee meetings that we're seeing what's happening when the land becomes we all everyone complains about gentrification. I Hear so many minority people complaining about gentrification when they could have been a part of that process Just like Jay-Z said we need to buy back the block Well, guess what the people that are sitting at this community meeting, right? We had insight and information about decisions that were gonna be made in the future that we could have Invested in at that time If and again, I was young and I didn't know how I didn't know how to put it together And I didn't even really know the value of what I had but now That I understand this kind of stuff.  So let me show you what happened Let me show you guys the story what happened with me, right? So now again, I'm sitting in this meetings So I'm sitting in this particular meetings and the police department comes the fire department comes Always, you know all the services come because they're trying to say Hold on one second. Hold on to Sheena says Look, you can nobody on our board was moving forward moving to just some mediocre non valuable things. So Toshina This is perfect. I love what you're saying. This is what's happening around the United States and our communities The people that are sitting on the board have no idea. They're voting for things. They have no idea How to really take advantage of it for their own best interests and for the interests of the people in the community The story I'm about to finish it telling you guys I'm going to show you how other people from outside our community were able to capitalize on the things that we did The programs that we voted for the things that we voted for it to build up our tax base So we could become a city so that we become viable. Those are the same programs that other people from outside the community came in Took advantage of and now they're gentrifying our neighborhood and now people getting mad But you don't have to get mad if you had bought up the block You'll be really happy because you'd be wealthy and you'd be rich and you'd be welcoming all that change because Again, you would be a beneficiary of recipient of it. And so could your kids and your grandkids? That's what we're talking about. Oh All right, no problem Tim But sarong don't worry about listen don't worry about the foreclothes probably is just yet Hold on a second. Let me let's let's go to the next step. All right, so let's now I'm sitting in this these meetings, right and By the way, that particular this organization Right, we were making decisions on On this particular funding Miami-Dade community development block grants Eligible activities for community about block grant funding must meet one or more national objectives set by HUD and Benefit low and moderate income persons of Miami-Dade County CDB judging funds are designed for projects that benefit low and moderate income persons Integrate long-range community strategy leverage further private public partnerships enhanced deteriorated residential and business districts All right, and they must go through these different programs for categories housing public service economic development public facilities capital improvement cool All right So so we were sitting on a community that made decisions about how this funding was going to be allocated to our community and By the way, everyone out there listening to this if you happen to if you've got to leave early something like that I Actually went through the exercise and pulled up some counties typed in CDBG and your website will come up with your local county municipality area and So then based on that you'll be able to see who are the decision-makers in your area if you stick around I do have some real-life examples because I Didn't pull up Georgia and so I've got a couple counties in Georgia that I pulled up their websites and we're going to talk about those specific examples All right, Nisha says I never qualify. I make too much. I can never get in Nisha that ain't going to count here Because I can promise you that the people that are actually doing these programs make way more money than me or you Because they're they're taking these programs and they're doing 20 30 40 million dollar projects with these same programs Because why how many people how many people have seen where they again? We're talking about gentrification type stuff.  We're talking about building 90 units 100 units 50 units Big big big big projects, right? These are the products that they're supplementing So the type of people that get them there are no income restrictions for the developer The the constituents the people that you're serving that's the income restrictions There are no income restrictions for you the person who's actually doing the programs whether it's creating the jobs whether it's Doing the development there are no income restrictions for you to receive the grant to do your program So that's not true Because again, I'm gonna show you an example right now. By the way Richard. Thank you for joining. Oh Oh, sorry, hold on Hey, Richard. Thanks for joining our membership. All right. So again That's not the case of none of these programs. There are no income restrictions. All right So now I remember I'm sitting on the board that makes decisions about how this funding goes. So What happens? Let me show you this. This is such. This is so crazy. This is so crazy Anybody understand a zoning what zoning maps look like zoning districts? Anybody understand this stuff? and I know now I'm talking towards the real estate people but I Mean, I want to talk about real estate because this is the example that I'm using where I really Tams buying multi-film exactly So, let me show you about this. This is the Miami-Dade County zoning districts area, right? And when I was sitting on the board Okay, when I was sitting with ghouls, okay now I I got I came on around 2000 and like I want to say six 2006 and seven but in 2003 Our particular community which again, we have barbershops churches chicken a lot of slum and blight The citizens put together with the help of Miami-Dade County and a bunch of funding from the government This citizens masters plan report. Does anybody see the date July 23rd 2003 at the top? I know it's kind of small But at the very top it says July 23rd 2003 All right So if you look at this particular port July 23rd 2003 All right, this was what we designed to help To change our community from slum and blight To an actual area where people want to live and work and create more housing great jobs and opportunity for folks, right? 2003 now 2003 so we came out and they put this together now. I wasn't a part of this But you see this particular guy right here steering committee JL Dems I know that Jim until this day ghouls Optimus Club Lewis Canty. That's the guy I'm speaking of Who actually was the one who was the wealthy developer? He was a black guy who was a multi-millionaire. Okay, Robert Barnes and associates. I know them Gladys Frisco. I know her. All right, and so they helped put this stuff together Now I know Robin Oxford. She's from my area. See this ghouls community development corporation Larry Canty ghouls community development corporation. All right So they helped put this master plan together to how we're gonna take and Like they say throughout this history through ghouls to come together times to help determine future what was happening is Miami-Dade County for the last Make it bigger for everyone to see it Miami-Dade County had been receiving a CDBG dollars using the statistics of poor people The statistics of communities that were not repaired Statistic for example like Flint, Michigan this those states those cities are using those statistics to get money from the government Anybody hear me out there? The states the cities the municipalities are using the statistics of the poor areas To get federal funding to make improvements Most of the time they re divert the money to other places, but they're using your statistics in your areas We got some my city from ghouls Family mod twenty thousand eleven. So you should know some of the people on there You should hey if you from ghouls, then you should know You got no dimps. Come on. You got no dimps over there from ghouls part. All right So they're using your statistics from the poor areas To get the money from the federal government to say these are areas that we need Water mains. We don't have sewers. Maybe you guys do these in septic tanks. You know, maybe you don't have sidewalks You got derelict buildings. You've got all of these things that need to be fixed They're taking this stuff packaging it up and submitting it to get funding for that Yeah Sorry about that. Yes How do you think they get the funding go back to what it says what's the funding for hold on Benefit low and moderate income persons integrate the long community strategy Okay Enhanced deteriorated residential and business districts. So they're not going to the other neighborhoods to get this stuff Oh no, so That's something to consider I want everyone and why is this important Why is it important to know that the funding they're using your statistics Your crime statistics your blight house slum and blight housing anybody ever heard the term slum and blight They're using the slum and blight housing like for example, Baltimore They're using all of those statistics to go out and get money from the federal government to say Oh my god, our cities is such trouble. Please.  That's why you're gonna change it now To Sheena says wow, is this legal? I don't know about the legalities of it. I ain't gonna do with that But I'm telling you that's why that's why I'm presenting to you the information on the screen. I didn't write this. I Didn't write it. So now let's go back over here to the presentation All right, so now. Oh, sorry wrong screen. All right. So now this is getting 2003 citizens master plan for my neighborhood my neighborhood my mom still lives there my father still lives there my grandmother grew up there my grandmothers My grandmother her Uncle's brothers all we all live within like four blocks in this area Very very poor Underserved community in Miami for many many many many many years Okay, so now look at this So the study area looks at we were blocked off by a canal the canal separated us from, you know, the other side And then all of this area in here was basically poor town and What they did was they looked at the existing buildings This isn't like a kid drew this. Does anybody like, you know, it looks like a kid do this So they looked at the existing buildings and then it proposed development And so if you look this big quarter down here in gray is us one That's the main thoroughfare comes through South Bay They built a bus way where the railroad tracks used to be at because we were across the track. We used to say we from Goose cross the track and so then You see all these buildings is where they wanted to do proposed development It's called citizens master plan by the way Everyone if you don't make it to the end of this every one of you can look at your city's master plan I highly advise you to go out and recommend. Oh NMB NMB is getting funding as well. So Ron. So I hope I said it right. All right.  I recommend that for everyone here. I'm putting it in the chat Go out there get your city's comprehensive plan or master plan That's everyone should do that everyone should know that if you're interested in doing any type of business or If you're interested in being a part of this process where the funding is being done This is what you need to do. This is where you start All right now now we're gonna now and I'll show you examples when we get towards the end of this So now They go off and they talk about moss and previous studies participation blah blah blah blah Look at what they're doing. This stuff didn't happen overnight. It did not happen overnight and it talks about Due to large continuous parcels of land several street dedication and proposed once development took place in those parcels The additional streets will enhance within West Goose and encourage additional pedestrian activity East of us one and the event that maze or redevelop new street Dedications also recommended created block structure in the place of super block that currently exists. They look at open space All right, I'm not gonna bore you with this but I'm gonna show you some cool stuff. So here it is proposed regulating plans existing conditions All right, so this is the existence conditions. They study our areas. They got the building footprint This is really small. I'm gonna zoom in and orange here. It looks at how many buildings are 50 years or older Right looks at the old buildings that we've got and our building footprint. So as you can see There's a lot of space in there that was not developed. Look at all that empty space So that white space in there undeveloped undeveloped land Right we're saying hey we've got land to build All right, so they said we're gonna propose doing what's these new by the way, give me a like 63 people watching we should get 63 likes if not more So we looked at public open space core sub districts and our sub districts. So what happens next now? Proposed land use this is where My people who are real estate people who want to buy real estate people would invest people look if you're looking at how Eric how does how does this turn into money for me? How does this make sense? Right? We talked about being part of the community committees, right? So you can dictate how the dollars are being flowed you get to decide how the grant money is going You're gonna vote on this stuff but even better if you check this out if you are participating You get the inside track on what's happening. This says here The proposed master plan is devised with a mixture of land used to engender a safe and attractive environment throughout the area The highest density development greatest variety of land uses are proposed for the core sub district Tavern down to the lowest density and lease variety of the edge district. What does that mean? That means Right, they're about to change the zoning to allow us to build bigger buildings Right in smaller spaces. What does that mean in terms of people? It means money that that land that you had before that your uncle had your cousin had right Then that land that was let's say was worth a hundred thousand dollars because you could put five houses on it Now you could put a ten story building on it now. It's worth five million dollars Make sense Yeah Tam says also make people make friends with people in the business life departments. They know it's coming on air and chains coming on a pipe Yes, you can do that and I and that's actually a great strategy as well But for those of you who are not maybe that's you know, you don't want to go out make friends with strangers this is something that Annie and everyone could do it's public information and You really get the chance to be a part of this process. I was Involved with this process and I'll show you how all right. So now you're taking here and I got to zoom in By the way, it's so funny because So now I'm zooming in. Let me see how it's on the screen. All right, you can see this so you see in yellow It says residential so residential says single family minimum eight units per acre Maximum 18 is per acre then you've got this residential in this light orange, which is a duplex town host of small apartments So you can go 18 units to 36 units per acre and then you've got this darker orange here mix use then you got mix use and red and Now you get 48 units per acre And then you've got mix use single mix use commercial store porch institutional public space, right? Hold on Let me keep let me show you something else Now Let's get the streets. Let's get the streets. Let's go into the good stuff Yep, I'm gonna put some new streets in great Check this out now. Remember what I was telling before the study area now They're allowing you we're proposing that you can go from what was originally one story to two stories now Two floors to the floor floors four to six stories So not only can you put more units per acre? You can now go higher and so that allows you to do more density So that's why you see your downtown areas with these tall buildings on small pieces of squares And then when you go further to the farmland you go put one house for five acres because they're changing the zoning and the density So now that you know now imagine if you had this kind of information in 2003 Right 2003 you've got insight and you know that this is being proposed Do you think that it would be who of you to try and Pick up as much of this land as possible That's four to six floors in here in this area and that's high density I'm just I'm just saying And so that's what they were trying to tell me back then that I didn't know because I didn't have the whole map of how this whole thing Works in the construct. I was just sitting on the board voting and making decisions about who gets 50,000 10,000 20,000 Grants Which I'm not mad at that because that's one element of this that's why it's it's called business grants and Housing because one element is you get to sit on the board and you get to make decisions for who gets the grants in the area But the second thing is you get to understand what the housing is going on with housing and Redevelopment and the projects and where the money's flowing like Tam said and you get to be part of that process So then now you can go in and invest early. So now this is 2003, right? Now I come along. This is where I was coming on 2007 so 2007 so from 2003 2007 it went from a master plan Went from this master plan right to actually being part of See this article section being part of actual Miami-Dade County's zoning So now is this is on the books And they literally took verbatim what we put it in the master plan Again in 2007 if you're on the communities and you know this stuff is happening You still had an opportunity to go in and invest and buy while things were cheap You still had the chance to go in there and buy these properties in 2007. They were selling those properties, right? for 50,000 40,000 30,000 Because remember 2007 the market crash So while this was happening the market was crashing. So all these properties around. I'm trying to show you the map Yeah, I pulled on this map so everything that was in that orange section You could have picked up all that stuff I don't think there's a single property in that section for a hundred thousand dollars not a single property Maybe the big squares the big ones Maybe these big ones, but all this other stuff in here All of this stuff in here you could have picked up for 50,000 100,000 25,000 40,000 By the way, the community development center Okay, Google CDC And this happens in so many areas. They were given land by Miami-Dade County to build affordable housing on Hold on. I don't think y'all heard me. They were given land By Miami-Dade County to build houses on given for free They set up a nonprofit. How many people are having nonprofit? Anybody has a nonprofit on here? Anybody knows how to if you don't have a nonprofit, do you know how to set up a nonprofit? Do you have someone that has a nonprofit? They created this nonprofit group and they were given the land for free Now even though Miami-Dade County where I'm at this is not happening anymore This is happening other places around the country This is happening all around the country and other places other cities And it might just be happening your city, but until you go out to investigate This you're not going to know it So they were given land. They were given they were given the land And they were given this property to build to build houses on and then they were able to sell the houses And then they were able to sell the houses Right and then they were able to keep the money to fund the nonprofit How many people could do that? It's pretty easy so Nowhere if you join in late, uh, we're discussing Uh cdbg monies cdbg dollars and participation In the councils, whether it's a local council Uh and how you get the chance to make the decision on funding for cdbg dollars community development block grants So every city usa if you type in the name it's usually developed tied to counties In municipal districts. So again, if you type in let me see hold on Here's an Here's a brief explanation of what a community development corporation is Uh, basically cdcs are 513 c non-profit organizations Uh that are created to support and revitalize communities any one of you can do this Especially those that are impoverished or struggling cdcs often deal with development of affordable housing They can also be involved in a wide range of community services meaning local needs such as education job training healthcare commerce development and other social programs While cdcs may work closely with representatives from the local government. They are not a government entity. So again They work closely with local government, but they're not a government entity So as nonprofits, they're tax exempt and receive funding from private and public sources They run a gamut from large well-established organizations like the new community corporation new work, new jersey Earthline here from jersey which owns and manages 2 000 units of housing employees more than 500 people To community groups that meet in church basements large or small cdcs have in common involvement and development work They don't have staff in some degree of incorporation Uh, they are self identified So you just say it You know, this is the thing that I think is fascinating that I think people don't understand This is why I enjoy teaching you guys because a lot of times the programs that you're chasing the things that you're going after um, if it's If it's like uh on a on an advertisement or some kind of billboard or something That's really easy to do.  That's like if you got a certification and you just said, hey, I'm a day Hey, I'm hump zone self identified That's what it means. Does that make sense? By the way, thank you christie Lopez. I appreciate you. Thank you christie. Um So again, it says it's important to know that they are self identified Okay Say wow, how did the county give a nonprofit free land and build multiple residential houses on This is what i'm showing you Sanding, this is let me let me zoom in so you can see this again Okay, it says right here. Hold on. I'm gonna zoom in so you can see this again Where is it? As nonprofits there are tax exempt and may receive funding from private and public sources public as the government Public sources is the government I know cdc's that were given land that they didn't sold to private developers and pocketed the money I'm not gonna call them out But they were given land because because cdc remember Maybe somebody were joining late for those of you that are joining late What did I say in the beginning of this everybody remember if you understand the lingo the language the vernacular if you speak Their language. This is how you win at the game This is just not in government contracting and government everything if you speak the language and you understand What people are talking about Then you can sit down and have an intelligent conversation And now you're at the table and they will respect you and take you seriously The first thing that I said that we all at the end of this today session that I want everyone to know is hold on Where is it? Nope. Nope. Nope Where'd it go? This all right These are the things I want you to know by the end of today's call Today's live session understand these words use these words commercial revitalization community development housing development Restored preservation. All right. These are things that cdcs do. This is the cdc that Again, I showed you here an example google cdc. This is what they did self-incorporate robin go back to Let me connect the dots for folks out there Let me go back. This is the master plan that they put together. It was done by steering committees All right, how so now you're asking me. How did this happen? So let's go back. So now here you are steering committee Sorry, I gotta bring these things together All right So now let's bring this back next it is So here's the cdc that they incorporate that they created Right now they're sitting here On a steering committee with mind we did counties and state staff Look who's here office of economic development office community economic development Mind we did transit department of planning and zoning floor department transportation floor department transportation Metropolitan planning organization. These people are part of a nonprofit group But because they call it a community development corporation that gives them power So now they're sitting on a community. He's part of an optimist club. Optimist club is a football. It's the football team You know optimist club this person ghouls coalition of ministries and laypersons All right south data lines for neighborhood development Ghouls community development corporation So now they're sitting at the table with mind we did county staff making decisions about how The zoning is going to be changed for an entire community And all of you out here can do the same thing All of you out here can do the same thing. That's why I'm sharing this today. All right. Yes, joy tea is all game. Welcome back, brother I haven't seen a minute.   So actually A big part of this has not been affordable housing development The very first thing that I said is us that sat on these communities made decisions for the funding that came down From cdb dollars, which a part of it was housing The rest of it was money that went to small businesses I voted on who got the dollars that went to small businesses one aspect is housing but The housing part to me is super important because that is the part where Is the big money maker where a lot of us can actually make a big transition and so The reason why I'm focusing and I'm talking so much about the housing because I want to bring this around full circle Okay, in the very beginning what we discussed was if you And again, thank you for bringing that question up if you Are in any town USA you want to be a part of your community's advisory committee I'm from ghouls. This is my ghouls committee advisory committee Right, you want to join your advisory community because your advisory committee that's that's tight end and my buddy was So this is like an agenda from our advisory committee If you're part of the advisory committee You're going to sit on the group that makes the decisions for how all of these dollars Are flowing into your areas and so for example here All right, this is community development block grant Right and so here they have economic development, which economic development they talk about jobs All of that is businesses So if you have a business and that's why we ask everybody out here to put their name of their businesses in here So if you have a business that you can show That's part of economic development then guess what? That's they you they can award your business money as long as you can show that it touches on one of these areas And that's why I asked everyone to put in here what type of business you are So we can figure out how to tie that into economic development. Now again, if you've got a business Uh, like see this is my area All right, so here this is from florida Sorry, it's a little small i wasn't a man The florida small cities community about black grants competitive grant program awards funding to eligible cities counties towns and villages All right, they're approximately two and a four or not eligible communities in florida to be eligible for the small cities Cbg a city must have a population under 50 000 and accounts probably supposed to be under 200 000 Award sub grants into four categories and so when they then award these money to the small cities um, then the small cities then in turn give it to To come to corporations Or nonprofits like yourselves to do whatever type of program that you have that fits into these groups. And so that's The objective that we're talking about the business side of it. All right, it makes sense So whether it's logistics transportation Uh, but but but but who else that we have in here We had mobile notary services We had on here, uh, let's see Okay We have real estate investment. We have multifamily See that see you guys and put your stuff in there so I can't find out your businesses Uh, whatever type of business regards to what it is You know, you you can't qualify because again, uh, the whole point of this is creating jobs, right? And i'm guaranteed in your town if you're in a small town It's probably not happening for you. So let me finish up my story real quick on this. So now this particular, uh, master plan That we had in here proposed is now became part of law right, so now it went into law and all the zoning all the housing Look, they put it here So now they changed this corridors They got double m which is first and second floor businesses professional offices 12 units to 52 units per acre And then, uh, so then up here max 52 years per acre in the core sub-district So basically they took all this land and enhanced it. So now it went up probably 10 x in value So what do you think happens once they do that? Then people come in And this is what happens So now they start building And so where this was all vacant land and empty they start building And this picture I took a drone of shot in 2017 They actually now have two high rises sitting right here side by side And I want to show you something one step further before we continue conversation because I think this is really fascinating um So this is the current picture Okay, and this is the area. I just want to make it go full circle That's what's sitting there today. All right. That's what it used to look like behind there Now you can see the big buildings back there But they built two of them. Let me go back. Hold on. I want to show I want to show you Let's see. How can I change it? right So there's two this there's two high rises right here karis village and silver creek So that's okay There's silver creek right there That's what's sitting there today Now Did I take it down? Did I take it down? What I want to show folks out here and connect the dots on this was Yep, I think I take it down shoot Let me see if I can Give me a second. Let me second. Pull this up. Give me one second Give me one second. Let me pull this up I want to show it because I want to I want to tie this all together And then I want to then I want to go into real life examples with you guys So let me um, let me pull this up real quick because I want to show you something that I think is pretty interesting I want to show you guys this Give me one second By the way, put in there. Okay The type of business that you have if you're just getting here Put in a chat the type of business that you have That you're looking for funding for The type of business that you have put it in the chat If you're just showing up now You didn't get a chance to tell us about who you are in your business Go ahead and put that in the chat right now Well, I'll pull this up for you guys Just because I want to show folks Now it's funny. Someone said beautiful, right? Which it is beautiful, but other people would say that, um All right, here it is All right, so here I want to show you something So here's the building That's the building we're talking about. Oops All right, that's the building we're talking about in yellow Right All right, so this is the building in yellow that was built Uh, I actually did some research today. I'm not going to pull it up But they did receive three million dollars in cdfi funding We talked about that in the last grant program the cdfi funds they received and by the way, this is for you, nisha They received 17 million dollar From td bank for construction loan and they received Three million dollars from cdfi funds, which is funded by a taxpayer dollars for low-income housing So I just wanted to share that with you Now what's interesting Is I want to show you guys this And let's come back around Look at The zoning code I'll see that Goose community urban center so This the people that sat on that steering committee back then Voted to put this master plan together So that and then ultimately This became law and the zoning and today Um, they're actually using that code to do developments if We had got together if someone had shared this kind of information with me and we understood what we're getting involved in We could have got together Ourselves and acquired that land And make sense Yes, make sense. So I just want to show people that how it comes full fold. So now let's jump in and look at some real life examples Thank you for putting that in the chat. Keep putting in the chat Your businesses we're gonna look at some real life examples now I just want to tell you that story to kind of open up and get your eyes open to expose you to Like what's out there and what's what's possible because this is these are the things that Again, we're complaining Which is so easy to do and you know my man here hold on. Let me go get my cup You know Hold on. I gotta go to the big screen So y'all can see All right our cup There it is All right So, you know, we be out here complaining and stuff and these things are sitting here right in front of our eyes and we're the ones that have the chance To be a part of this to be part of the decision-making process to be involved and we're choosing not to Or we just don't know and so that's why again having this information and knowing that stuff out here This is why this is super important. Make sense. Make sense. Make sense Yes, no, maybe so All right, you like it so far. We're doing good. All right. So now let's Pull up some real life examples Folks out there. I don't remember you just tell me where your cities are at. I don't see them Nisha says no, we don't know that's right. Nisha. So now that we do know now we could do better Tam, you still on here I thought I saw tam on here. Okay, it's different tam. All right, and twine gets it all right Jacqueline gets it. All right Who so look I got some clothing manufacturers in here victory textile mill clothing manufacturing If we're looking at economic development, do we not figure out how clothing manufacturers textile mills that ties into economic development Yes Is that that's economic development part of when we when I wrote a grant for economic development for my buddy's ac company um at the time Uh, if we can show that we created or retained one job that was worth 25 thousand dollars So for example victory in your particular case Uh, if your textile mill and clothing manufacturer, let's say you want to go to government and you want to ask for some of this Economic development dollars are coming out from cdbg Right and you're I don't what town are you in? Victoria, what town is that if victoria, pennsylvania, phoenix Arizona. Okay, so you're in phoenix. So let's say Um, there's and again phoenix is is like the metro area So we got to look at what arizona says for that area But let's say there was an area where there were the government could give you buildings Right they could donate to the buildings or the land Um, and you could say you could write a proposal to take a derelict building to turn it into a manufacturing facility And they will give you the building and they could give you cdbg dollars 25 000 per job that you plan to create or retain. So if you can show them That you want to create 10 jobs. That's 250 000 dollars. That's economic development So let's keep let's let's keep let's keep talking. Let's talk. Let's keep talking. Hold on Let's keep talking. Oh, we got a couple clothing manufacturer here. She wants clothing manufacturer All right, and she's in north mommy beach. So let's again, we'll Let's let's talk about this. So now what I did as my real life example is I went to atlanta Because I knew I had some people here from atlanta because I always had people from atlanta So I put in here atlanta region. I was looking for smaller areas So I literally I just typed in the 10 poorest areas in georgia because I didn't know where else to pick So I just really wrote 10 poorest areas in georgia And then from there I started with makin so I went makin And You can see here what I wrote makin georgia cdbg. That's what I wrote That's it Clicked on and it gives me here community members organizations honor pro proclamations All right. Now the website is really old. Well, this one has a 2021 news. This is 2018 news Uh makin county commission meetings several proclamations for issue recognizing people organizations All right cdbg funding workshops economic development department holding annual cdbg funding conference This is old, but they're still holding these conferences. So I would imagine if the last one was held october 6 2017 Or around I bet you if you're in makin county georgia, they're holding a cdbg conference funding conference right now I would be looking Okay, I would be reaching out and finding out when is the next conference coming up So here it is very simple. I went down to list and went to the next place All right calhoun georgia All right, I didn't even know what calhoun georgia was so what I had to do I had to go back and I google Try to show you Okay, it's back. It's back a little bit more all right There you go. I found it at calhouns in cop county So then I found cop county cdbg There it is community development all right Now When we talked about before what two things do you want? Oh, you're metro Atlanta. All right. No problem. All right. What do we talk about before for all of my late comers? When you are reaching out? Okay, you want to know You want to ask for a comprehensive plan or the city's master plan When you're reaching out to them comprehensive plan city's master plan all right So That's what you want to do look out. All right. Make sure so now I was there. Let's go back And we're looking at it zoning All right I had zoning maps. Let's see Zoning codes zoning maps border zoning appeals planning commission look We got to get in there civil service board cop county water authority. Here we go community services board Look at that board members cop county community services board Now look this person she works at well-starved medical group northwest women's care This person superintendent of schools superintendent cop county schools We are not metro Atlanta ambulance service All right, siri marietta was We are not professor of nursing retired professor of nursing that Remember what I just showed you antwan. Do you remember did I not just show you this stuff be a part of the community's board? Did I not just show you this? They're making decisions on the funding that's coming down to that town They're making decisions. Do you see how easily I found that? You just have to know what you're looking for Everyone can do this What's easy to do is also easy not to do Why because you don't have to do it You could sit back and complain and say, well, I just want to go on a website and apply for a grant That's fine. I'll show you how to do that another day. Today.  Okay. I go sit on the board. I didn't even know What is it called robbins rules official rules or something like that the voting things, you know I didn't even know those robbins rules official. I had to learn that stuff I still don't even know what it's called. I just followed in what people told me to do If I had someone else that was on my side That could have told me how to maximize this information The man told me he said young man, you don't have to leave your community to be rich You can make all the money you want right here in your own community. I said this place I couldn't see it because why you got people selling drugs You got people getting killed. You got people getting robbed. They don't stay that way Anybody been to brooklyn lately try to buy something in brooklyn right now. You can't get nothing in brooklyn It ain't happening So same thing they're complaining about dc. DC has been gentrifying for the last 20 30 years Try to buy something dc That's it's happening in every town usa People are doing this right now Why y'all sleeping why y'all on tiktok people out here figuring this thing out They're sitting on these boards. They're making a decision. Why is this person who's retired? Why they want to sit on this board? Why you think retired professor doctor carol holtz is on that board I can tell you why dr. Carol holtz is on that board I promise you I know why dr. Carol holtz is on that board. I'm willing to bet you What's that old saying 10 and 1 I'm willing. I'll take this bet 10 to 1 at dr. Carol holtz Somebody that she knows in her family is requesting funding From this grant and she wants to be on the board to sway the decision makers Who wants to take me on that bet? Who wants to take nip on that? Come on man I bet you won't take it So this is how again, we're saying The person got is so many of us get distracted because oh, he's only talking about housing No Housing is one aspect. There's four components of this Right. There's four components of this Housing is one aspect housing happens to be the biggest biggest aspect because typically The dollars go to higher profile type projects Um, so now nisha said not me Vicky andrew said I'm with you Right vicky Okay, for mires florida. Oh vicky. I know for mires got it going on. So this is what we're looking for Dr. Carol holtz is not innocent and by the way, she's not doing anything wrong She she's doing nothing wrong So See, you know hers if if her husband or her son has a hold on Let's go up here. Let's find a business What might people put the business at? Hold on hold on Okay, if her husband or son has a florist business That they want to start up in that area And they said hey look We get to make a decision on this last 250 thousand dollars Uh, should we give it to five companies? Should we give it to three companies? Should we give it to one company? right and Again, we're at cob county It's ranked number two number nine on the poorest counties in georgia and we're saying hey look We don't need no housing because nobody lives here blah blah blah you know, but we really could use a floral shop because we don't have a floral shop and Because we don't have enough population to really support Someone coming to bring a floral shop in this area. If without any type of government funding We will never have a floral shop And so we think it makes sense for the for us to to actually give 25,000 or 40,000 Towards the floral shop because otherwise we'll never get one in town because there's not enough people to sustain it To make it a profitable business in this type of area And then when it goes Yeah, Carol Dr. Carol like the Hertz that makes a lot of sense. You're right. You know, I You know, I'm a wife I want I like flowers and you know, I wish some might bring me flowers and you're right You know all the floor shops that come and go they close down because there's not enough people sustain it So if we don't support them We don't give them money or we don't subsidize them in some kind of way We won't have a floral shop and I really love flowers And as silly as you guys may think this sounds this is what's happening and because y'all not at the meeting y'all don't really know And that's how the floral shop gets 40,000 dollars in grants Just like that because Carol sat on the board and said she liked flowers and uh lisa said I like flowers Pete and chris was like look, I don't care as long as my housing project is this money right Dr. Paula, you know, she likes flowers too. So you got dr. Paula. You got lisa and And so again, everybody's like, all right, you take care of my stuff.  We negotiate and we shake hands and We sign off and Twan said he would like flowers too. Good There you go. I like flowers Listen, kin I would vote to put your flower shop to give you 40,000 dollars. You know what? Because it ain't my money So kin if you want to put up a flower shop I would that would be my logic and that would be my justification and I would vote to give it to you because guess what If there's nobody else coming to the table to propose to get this money and we have to give out the money does everyone know Hold on hold on hold on hold on hold on Does everyone understand our government's policies use it or lose it does everyone understand our government's policies use it or lose it Does everyone understand our government policy use it or lose it? Yes Yes, no give me if you know use or lose the policy put a star drop a star to comment If you know use or lose the policy If you don't know use of the policy put the little guy with the question mark face If you don't know what use or lose it policy is in our government No Use or lose it, right? Yes law enforcement budgets that way. Nisha says correct Hold on Where is it at?  Look here it is If you don't use it before the end of fiscal year don't look for next year So let's go back to our example with dr. Curle and them If no one comes to get this cdbg money and they gave us a hundred thousand dollars or two hundred thousand dollars or three hundred thousand dollars No one comes to get it If I gotta decide between give them a man can a flower shop for forty thousand dollars or send it that money back up to the state back up to the feds Next year they're gonna cut me What I didn't spend the following year So we lose that money so they have to give it to someone Have to they would rather give it to anyone Even if the person did not check all the boxes If they check half of the boxes It's better to give it to that person than to lose the funding because then the government's gonna say well, you didn't use all of your allocation So guess what? Look can't get in two flower shops. That's right. That's right That's right because I'd rather give kin forty thousand for the flower shop Then to sit at the money go back to the state or to the federal government Remember, we told you what happened with the the money for the rent program Does everybody remember that if you were here at my last live session Do you remember that when we talked about the money that went back for the program Is y'all remember that hold on let me pull it up for you guys Hold on Let me show y'all what happens If you weren't here last week Here it is last week This is what happened 99 million dollars are rental assistance for florida's return Look, the florida housing finance corporation created this affordable housing struggle to distribute the money They had to return 99 million dollars. They couldn't give it away. They couldn't distribute it fast enough. They had to return it 99 million and unspent unspent rental assistance meant to help florida's live in a affordable house We returned to the state after the agency overseeing the program struggle to disperse the money Come on Listen This is what happens Now you're sitting on the board. Are you going to give my man a flower shop or are you going to send the money back? so Let's talk about community development block rants cdbg um Again, I I was picking on georgia today because I don't know I know I was going to have somebody from georgia and or at least I know the people that participate georgia people always are participating So I can get support from them. So when I was setting up this uh live session today I decided I was going to use georgia as an example. Um Because it's always a good example to use georgia Look, that's right. Everyone's getting a shot. Yes Everyone's getting a shot Look Yep, we lost it Tams open a car wash or detailing shop. Well, you can do it That's right No, all this is possible. Um So community development block grant As we said before it focuses on benefiting low-income people by providing resource for livable neighborhoods economic empowerment and decent housing Again, you're gonna no matter where you look because the community level block grant has the same mission They're targeted towards low and moderate income people By the way, low to moderate income doesn't mean poor. Trust me if you look at the definition It's almost like government contracting when we look at the definition of low to moderate income It's almost like the definition of small business All right, it's not just Poor people. So when you think look People you everyone knows the definition of small business, right? If you're in construction It's 35 million dollars a year. Thank you, Chrissy Lopez again. Thank you for showing me love. Uh, if you look at Small business definition and the federal government standards, right? That means 30 30 I think we're at 37 million a year or 35 million a year Oh, so 36.5 million a year average over three to year period. That's a hundred million dollars That ain't small business that's small business by the federal definition Again, low to moderate income yeah trucking 16 million a year if you do 16 million dollars a year and in trucking business You're doing pretty good Right same thing Uh, so here when they talk about low to moderate income that doesn't mean poor people don't think that means section 8 housing No, that actually low to moderate income today pretty much means 90 of the people just hold on one second um So when you look at it that way when you look at low to moderate income people in fact Just to prove it to you Let me let's pull it up. Let's just let's we're gonna do it ourselves. We're gonna do the research ourselves. Let's look at Low to moderate income Let's look at it by county But we could just look at what the HUD definition of low to moderate income means now Right, because again, low to moderate income you're like, oh, that's No, you don't have to put in a That's working class people basically is what it means, but they call it low to moderate income. That's basically working class people Uh, let's see what it says. Give me All right, give me a thumbs up. I got 81 people in the chat. Give us a thumbs up hold on estimates at three income levels low income Right here up to 50 percent of the area of immediate income moderate income greater than 50 percent Up to 80 percent of the area of immediate income and immediate income greater than 80 percent up to 100 percent of the errors media income Does that even make sense? Does anybody even get that? I'm gonna drop this in here so y'all can read it y'all still This is why you know, I'm actually I'm first of all, I'm honored and privileged to be able to teach this to you all out there But I really want you to understand how all this stuff is kind of like trickery They make it seem like it's so complicated and that they're doing so much for the Bottom people and it's really not look at the definition. Let's Look read that. I want you to read it yourself Look what it says Up to 50 percent of the error media income Moderate is greater than 50 percent up to 80 percent And medium is 80 percent up to 120 How the heck is that medium income if you're up to 120 percent of the does that even make sense? Hut put this out not me by the way. I didn't write this. Huh put this out.  I didn't write it If you make 120 percent Of the errors media income, how's that medium income? anybody else scratching their head Is anybody scratching their head if you make 120 percent of the areas media income? How is that medium income?    Do not let these things Discourage you or because of the word play How in the world can you make 120 percent of the error media income and be considered medium income? It doesn't even make sense. But as you can see This is this is this is how it goes. I I I I don't make the rules All right Look, this teaches you right here Demonstrating area benefit to low of moderate income persons as fiddle explains Overview moderate income summary and the methodologies used in cdbg grantees to determine if your area is cdbg fund activity qualifiers lma or low to moderate activity, so it's It's really um By the way, look at this says right here a certain exception grantees may qualify activities As area benefit with fewer lmi persons than 51 percent so By the way, just so you know It says Your lmi has to be 51 percent That means that technically You could have rich people in that area too Just as long as 51 percent or lmi the other 49 percent could be rich Now look saying it says oh, I like this 1.2 of the median income certainly isn't high. No, but it ain't poor either This that's the point I make it not that it's high because we're not trying to we're not obviously we're not targeting high income But it's not poor and so the the what I know people are gonna Respond to me back with is they're thinking it's poor people and it's not poor people program It's not high income. It's every day people Uh, let's see Loops commented in that post.  Yes. Awesome. No and Uh, so again, uh a private loading hub yard Those are kind of things where again if you can demonstrate right where it's going to check off one of these boxes right then That's how you're going to be able to receive the funding for these areas So but in order to do that what we've got to do Right. I just and again. I'm just showing that what we have to do is first we have to do what we've got to get The city's master plans or comprehensive plan Right. Um, we have to figure out about the community boards Um, and so now once we get their master plans and the and the comprehensive plans We know what they're planning on doing for the next 10 years like tam said earlier Uh, now we find out about the community boards and how do we become part of those community boards? And if you're not a people person, that's okay. Go find your friend That's a people person like my friend didn't mean and he put me on the board So he sat on the community development corporation, but then he sat me on the Miami Dade County community board So guess what we have both we had both prong to prong approach So now that's what i'm saying. Even if you don't do it Take your take one of your friends that you know is outgoing that maybe they're a ra ra cheerleader for your Cause or for the community.  So All right first government contract. I ever bid thanks to you and I shook my head at how the government consider you economically disadvantage of net worth Was less than four million dollars exactly Exactly, so let's go back and I just want to let's look at some because I know we know we're looking at percentages uh, let's see Low market income based on zip code All right. All right. So medium household income this zip code is 36,000 um This is around Broward area So again, so wilton manners. Uh, I know someone that lives in what matters. Oh, I don't know personally, but I know somebody I know somebody live in wilton manners. So this is about okay. This is Broward. I'm just north of Broward So here's your medium income. So again, so now if you do 120 percent of I don't know $70,000, right? I mean I I don't know. Do you guys call that middle income? I don't know. I don't know I'm kind of out of touch now. So you tell me You guys look at this numbers and tell me even if we took the bottom number at 36,000 um Low to moderate income 120 percent of that I still think that's a high number, but And then again, some of these zip codes medium household income Or 3311 it's less than the main house income for 334 3301 Right. Hold on. Where's my zip code? I don't see it up here. Let's see I don't even know why I pulled that zip code up. I'm not even in that zip code Anybody got a zip code they want to check Anybody have a zip code that they want to check? Florida income statistics. So medium household income of floor is 55,000 average medium household income is 80,000 Let me see if I can check my zip code Very beach. Let's see. We got it. All right.  All right, let's check yours 53 209 36,537 There you go all right, so uh, so we Who else we'll do one more. I do my man Antoine because he's always participating 813 He's always participating. So I'll do my man here Antoine 80,000 brother So I don't think they'll be building on housing around you If they do though, you could build it for regular people It'll be you can go up to about was 120 percent of 80,000 about 100 grand So you could build a low mint moderate income housing and 20 your area Okay, I think you can build a house up to 100,000 over there where you live at And you still be considered lmi All right, so uh, so again, that was just an example to show people because I just want you to understand Um what the requirements are we're gonna get off in a little bit, but just to finish up Let me go through community development block grant. That's what you're looking for You want to type in your area by the way? So look this is it tells you all the cities their populations Uh, here's a flyer is a great application. We'll go through this really quickly Uh, look programs annual competitions employment incentive programs A median threat danger set-asides redevelopment funds by the way a lot of the covet money like the shelters programs They went through cdbg to distribute the money. So revitalize revitalization area strategies revolving loans The key for Ernie and all of you out here is how do you tie your? business your program to economic development Creating jobs and helping people and so if you can show that then And I'll go through I'll show you this um This was given in these areas. So see here Adele the city of Adele economic development 750 al dora 350 macintosh county redevelopment half a million half a million So again economic development is is not actual housing.  That's where they're giving you money for that is under the economic development area. And so um, what I'll do Because we are like close in two hours. Uh, what I'll do is the next time that we do this I'll see if I can pull up the uh, if I can find our economic development grant that we submitted Or I'll see if we can pull a sample up to show people what that looks like because I think someone asked me in here Where was it? I think someone asked me Oh victory set So you don't need a grant writer to get grants and the answer victory is no you don't need a grant writer to get grants actually The people that are awarded a lot remember you're going to your local, um, Nicipal your local county your local town and so a lot of times there There's just a simple application that says what are you gonna do with the money? Are we gonna do it? And then you tell me like what your business is or what your proposed business is what you're doing So for example, like tam says a car wash or car detailing shop if you tell them About your business what you're doing and you could show some numbers like hey, how many jobs gonna create Again, a lot of these grants that by the time they get down to your level It depends on the size of the dollar you're requesting if you're requesting I don't know. Let's say 10 or 15 thousand those people never submit They never submit a grant application But not a grant proposal if that makes sense victory So it wasn't it wasn't um, you didn't need a grant writer because And in this particular case, I'm not saying for every grant that's out there. I'm saying in this particular case They were done on applications We took applications because they were grants for small businesses and so typically they were like 25 000 or less Now when we did the the bigger grant that was a 250 000 We put it together ourselves and really was just answering questions And also collecting letters of support from people in the neighborhood. So again, how do you get letters of support? You sit on the community boards when you sit on a community board You're going to get support from people in the community because they're going to know your face They're going to know your name. They're going to say, oh, yeah, I know victoria She's such a nice person blah blah blah blah blah So that's how you get letters of support from the community, but no a lot of this money Was um, was already there out there. So, uh, and again, you say any programs for mental health or parent education? Children's special needs we didn't so so Just to wrap up as we close out. We didn't talk about specific programs tonight the program I'm talking about a cdbg and as long as Your program ties into economic development Or it ties into one of those three categories that they discuss Then you could submit an application for those dollars Uh, let me see if I could pull up on the screen real quick Oh, by the way, gordon county, I pulled up down your comprehensive master plan. This is what it looks like So if anybody's in gordon county, I did pull it on their comprehensive master plan Just to show as an example that every every I don't care how big or small your town is You have to have one of these plans All right, and then going back to my friend here Oh, I'm sorry. It was on the other screen Sorry, my friend. It was on the other screen that I shared before that ultimately Yeah, I'm sorry. It was on the other screen, but basically cdbg So if your program ties into any of these areas where, uh You're help benefiting low to my income people by providing resource for livable neighborhoods Economic and power and decent housing then you can propose your program under cdbg dollars Whether it's a mental health or parent education and you can propose that in there So tonight, we'll just focus on this particular program and the future will talk about specific programs Maybe like the one that you're discussing. So, um, and by the way, congratulations on writing a book. Uh, I know how tough that is. It's really, uh, difficult. So, yep, um So look, I don't know how to pronounce your name. I'll just say the last name So it says yes, I just looked at my city and the one next to me and cdbg supports both of those types of public services There you go Wow. All right. Hey, if you love what we talked about today or you had a good time with me You know, just give me a thumbs up share it with your friends family and fools people that you care about that you love Uh, there's a lot of things out here for small businesses We just got to know where to turn where to look and what questions are asked and I hope that at the end Um, you were able to get some additional knowledge And I thank my son for also Reminding me about all these things that I had that I totally forgot about and I was happy to share that because These are part of my life experiences and I totally I missed the boat on some of this stuff But I won't be missing the boat the next time. So Listen, thank you guys for joining me. Thank you for the 81 people that stayed till the end Uh, I'm glad you enjoyed it. I'll keep bringing you more game putting you guys on. All right Love you guys be good