Good afternoon, everyone. I'm Chief Housing Officer Jessica Katz, and I'm thrilled to be here today because I get to say to all of you, and especially to you, Mr. Mayor, promises made, promises kept. When we released Housing or Neighbors, the administration's Housing and Homelessness Blueprint, we said we were finally going to put people over paperwork. We promised to tackle the administrative burdens that keep people in shelter too long and make it hard for families to stay affordably housed. And today, you will see how this administration is keeping that promise. We are rewriting the rules and looking for new and creative solutions to ensure that this is a city for everyone. We are on the right path to building a city that is safe and affordable for all families. I want to thank my colleagues and friends who are here today, Deputy Mayor Ann Williams Isom, HPD Commissioner Adolfo Carrion, DSS Commissioner Gary Jenkins, and DOHMH Commissioner Dr. Ashwin-Bossen. You and your teams have worked tirelessly on this package of housing improvements, and I'm so proud of this coalition of dedicated public servants. I want to acknowledge the elected officials here with us today. Brian Kavanaugh, Senator Brian Kavanaugh, thank you so much, and that's it. Mr. Mayor, representing all like officials everywhere. Mr. Mayor, you have heard me talk endlessly about how we need to clean up our government processes to make programs accessible for New Yorkers, and I'm excited that we get to show how we are making that happen. Thank you. Somebody has on some nice cologne. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. You know, it's all so good. Good to be here with Christine. It's good seeing you. Was that one of your one centers? And I think that was in East New York and in Brooklyn, where those women there, women in need was receiving the services they deserve. And just want to thank Jessica, you know, met her on the campaign trail and was able to just sit down and speak with her. She brought a level of enthusiasm on the $22 billion that we're investing in housing and for the first time brought the conversation of nature to the forefront and just her assistance with folks who were able to bring the land trust, something that many tried and worked on. We were able to accomplish. And it's clear that the housing crisis is this big knot that's sitting at the center of many of the problems that the city is facing. When we did New York City Speaks, across this entire city, people had several issues, but one of the issues that remained constant was housing, housing, housing. If I could borrow from one of the great philosophers of our time, the rent is just too damn high. People are struggling and it's not only low income. Oftentimes when we talk about housing, we talk about a low income, but speak to that accountant in that cook. Or if you work in a fast food restaurant and you and your spouse are both being paid minimum wage, they're just hurdles to get over. And so we want to zero in on it. And we believe there were many things in a way of just dealing with housing. So we had to take that knot and loosen it and be creative in the process. We have to untangle those things that are preventing people from getting in housing. When we released our blueprint for housing and homelessness, housing our neighbors was the blueprint. We wanted to focus on some specific issues, but we did not want to talk to ourselves. We wanted to reach outside and talk to people like sham and others to get input from them. Those who are actually experiencing the housing crisis and those who have been working so long, like Christine Quinn on addressing the issue. When we developed that plan, we sat down with all the various sectors to talk about what are the solutions we need to do and how can we do a better job as a city. They have all been working hard. And today we delivered on a number of the key commitments that came from the plan. We're starting with a major new effort to fast track New Yorkers in need to permanent housing, including those who are currently on the streets or are living in our shelters. New York City has the only city-funded rental assistance program in the country, the only one. But it remains, when you look at it, you'd speak to people who are reaching out for rental assistance. They're just saying it's too darn hard. And we need to make sure that we are inclusive of allowing everyone to participate in the rental assistance program. So today we are changing that and getting stuff done for those who need the help. We are changing the city FEPS rental assistance program so that we can get vouchers to more families and make them easier to use. We're reducing the number of hours families are required to work to become eligible from 30 to 14 hours per week. And for voucher holders who want to move into single room occupancy units, we're lowering their monthly contribution to a maximum of $50. And we'll also cover the course of apartment application fees for New Yorkers living in DHS shelters. And it's also just, it just doesn't make sense when you think about it. A person making minimum wage are told they make too much money for city FEPS. Minimum wage, but they're saying you make too much money. That just doesn't add up. And what it does add up to is a crisis, a housing crisis, and we're changing that. We're going to expand eligibility to include all single adults working full time on minimum wage. We're also right now focusing on those single adults and families. When you look at it more than half of cities, federal housing vouchers are used in just 10% of city neighborhoods. We have to change that. We want to expand and allow people to live all throughout the city. So instead of focusing on certain neighborhoods, we're going to open up the other 90% of the neighborhoods. We will use federal housing vouchers and allow people to use them in more places around the city. We want people to have more choice where they can live. And that is how we desegregate our schools. That is how we give people access to healthcare, transportation, access to healthy food, access to green space, by making sure that people are able to live throughout the city. In partnership with Enterprise Community Partners and the Department of Housing and Urban Development, we're going to help 1,400 more families move into higher income communities. And so that should be good news for all the folks in higher income communities that say we need more housing, more housing, more housing, but not on my block. No, they're moving on your block. All of us are going to be here together. Makes me excited. The research is clear. The strategy works. Access to schools in other spaces is crucial to allow people to move throughout the city. And so finally, we will pilot a new street to housing program that will help individuals experiencing homelessness avoid shelter and move directly into affordable housing. We are not spanning the globe to find real solutions. We communicated with our team in Houston, Deputy Mayor William Isom and Commissioner Jenkins and others when we heard about what Houston was doing, a different landscape, a different atmosphere, and it's not our perfect, none of these solutions are perfect. There's no magic key to unlock every door for us to get folks into, but we said we want to look at it. And so we are going to look at the housing first programs in cities across the country and working with volunteers of America. We are moving L80 unsheltered New Yorkers directly into supportive housing. This is the pilot program to see how successful it is so that we can iron out any kinks and see the potentiality of expanding this program. After they're already in, we're not going to stop there. We're going to assist them, help them navigate the paperwork to take over the lease and to stay in their homes permanently and give them the support they need, such as financial literacy and other ways of keeping people in their home. This is radical, but it's practical and we want to believe that we are a radically practical administration. And so this pilot program is something that we're going to examine and see if we could expand it. When we announced our housing blueprint in June, I said we were going to redefine success and work to tackle the affordable housing crisis and we are not going to stop at any level to make sure we continue to do so. So we're not taking a victory lap. We're far from a victory, but we're not sure we're not at the starting line. We're in the race and we're going to run this race in a very smart way to stabilize the lives of New Yorkers and we're going to celebrate every New Yorker that moves into a housing. We said we were going to change the paradigm and I just talked about how many units we build. We want to focus on how many people we actually move into a place that they can call their home. And these efforts are just the start of a wave of momentum and announcement we're going to make in the next few weeks and days where we could think about fixing a broken system and we are engaged and energized to do so. And we cannot have a city with red tape or a few loud voices keep people from accessing quality homes. The housing crisis is a citywide crisis. We all must play a role in solving that problem. And so I look forward to what this administration is going to do and as it was stated, it's a promise made, promise kept and every day we're going to continue to move to fulfilling that promise. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mayor Adams. These tools indeed are game changers. Today's about the actions we can take here at the city level but we will need our state partners to stand with us in Albany to push an aggressive agenda next session. Our state Senate housing committee chair Brian Kavanaugh has been a key ally already. Senator, get ready for us come January. We have a lot of work to do. Thank you so much, Brian Kavanaugh, chair of the housing committee and representative of Lower Manhattan. I mean, it is a great pleasure to be here today because as much as we have spent the last couple of years of blunting the effects, especially on housing homelessness of this enormous global pandemic and the crises that came with that through eviction moratoria, through the most extensive rental assistance program in America, we know it is time to return and recommit ourselves to fighting the crises that have been perennial now in this city for many years and particularly the crisis of far too many people being homeless. It is a crisis here in New York City. It is a crisis throughout the state. At any given moment, there are more than 90,000 people who are homeless in this state. We know that's not right. We know it's gonna take a lot of resources. I've been working to pass state laws with some success in recent years to make some of these programs more flexible, including the state version of FEPS and also hoping to put much greater resources on the table. But we also know that many of these programs are not sufficiently flexible. They are bound by too many restrictions that prevent homeless individuals and homeless families from using them and actually getting into permanent housing. We know that in some cases getting a voucher has been kind of a false promise to people who are homeless because they have been difficult to use. So it is great to see the city taking so many positive steps today. I thank the mayor for his commitment since he was elected and as represented in today's announcement and Jessica Katz and everybody in the administration. And also I know we're gonna hear from a moment from Chris Quinn who was a city-wide leader in city government and has also been a city-wide leader in making sure that these programs work for homeless people and making sure our system is more humane and coming forth with the kinds of ideas that are gonna get this done. So I wanted to be here to say I'm very supportive of all these initiatives and that I am very committed to working with this city and working with my colleagues at the state level to get to the point where no one is homeless in this city or in this state because of a lack of access to permanent housing. Thank you. Thank you, Senator Kavanaugh. None of this work would be possible without the advocates who push me and all of us to be better. Our next speaker is no stranger to putting the pressure on. Former city council speaker and CEO of Wynn, Chris Quinn. Thank you and thank you very much, Jessica Katz, our chief housing officer. I wanna profoundly thank Mayor Eric Adams and he mentioned being at Wynn.  So thank you. I have an invitation for another thing but I'll call you later. I wanna thank commissioners Kariana and my good friend commissioner Jenkins for all of their work and Senator Kavanaugh for what he's done and what we know he will do. My name is Christine Quinn and I am the president and CEO of Wynn, Women in Need. We are the largest provider of shelter and supportive housing and supportive services for New Yorkers with children experiencing homelessness. And many New Yorkers don't know that there is such a thing as family homelessness. But at any given time, 60 to 65% of the people in shelter are families with children. In fact, tonight there will be more children in shelter than there are seats in the bar clays arena. So the reforms that are being put in place will make an enormous difference in reducing that number and most importantly, getting children into permanent homes. You know, homeless families need housing. Children need to not grow up in shelter. The women who come to Wynn wanna work, 52% of our mothers end up working. But at times they haven't been able to work the number of hours required to get a voucher because they have social service visits to make, because they have mental health visits to make, because they have to meet with their case manager at the Department of Homeless Services, et cetera, et cetera. And for following the rules and working, they were still denied a housing voucher and make no mistake, a perhaps housing voucher is like the Holy Grail to a homeless mother. This reduction in hours required to get a voucher will enable really countless families to continue to work and to get out of shelter. It is, as Jessica said, a game changer. Recognizing the needs of homeless families, recognizing that they exist, talking to them as the mayor did and then making changes is what good government is about and that is what our mothers and their children deserve. So on behalf of the 5,000 people who will sleep at one of Wynn's 13 shelters tonight, I just want to say thank you, Mayor Adams. Thank you for recognizing that not one of those mothers wants to sleep in a shelter. They're not there because they want to be, they're there because they couldn't keep or find affordable housing or they had to flee an abuser. With the change I mentioned and the others, their lives are now changed forever. They now have real hope. And what's worse than having no hope is what the government used to do in this town. It used to give homeless mothers false hope. These reforms are not false hope. They are real hope and they are going to bring our families something to be very thankful for next week. So thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, Chris. Thank you for your support and for being a partner in Housing New Yorkers. I also want to acknowledge our impacted advocates who have been critical to this work and who are standing with us today. Shams, Paris, Sarah, Rob and others, thank you so much for being here today. We promised at the start of this administration that we were gonna center our homeless and formerly homeless neighbors and your guidance has been invaluable. You and the entire group of impacted advocates have put so much spotlight on these issues and how we can be better. That means supporting you more, making the process easier and opening up access to housing. Next up, Alida Chikambu knows better than any of us how burdensome the housing process can be. Experiencing the shelter system firsthand. Alida, thank you for helping us understand how to improve for New Yorkers and for speaking us today. Thank you so much. Good afternoon, everyone. My name is Alida Chikambu. I'm an advocate of survivors of domestic violence, trafficking and gender-based violence. And I'm also someone with a live experience of homelessness in New York City. Today is a really important day. Thank you very much because I heard all these words. I'm feeling emotional right now because for me it's just like history happening as a survivor. For many years I worked with elected officials though they are good intention but sitting in those long meetings and having all this discretion didn't lead to really concrete solutions. But this administration is really different. Why? Because as an advocate myself, with my colleagues here, we set and then we propose a lot of solutions. And those solutions were taken into action and it's happening now. So for someone with a live experience who've been through trauma, I don't know if you can picture it, but this is justice being done. This is the day that we have been always working all these years because we are being listened to.  And thank you very much Mayor Adams. This administration is not only different for what I've said, my own experience, but it's also for everything that's being done starting today. I work with survivors of trauma. And it's really difficult when you are going through trauma, just as Quinta said, you have all these things that you have to handle. And on top of that, when you feel like the administration is against you, when it's supposed to help you, just make you go through a second trauma. But this time things are different because not only survivors are gonna be helped with access to supportive housing, but they are being assisted. So not only gonna put roof on the head, but they are going to hold their hands go through each process. This is what I call being trauma informed. And this is what survivors need. And another point that personally and then the client that I service today are really touching to me is all these changes that's happening with city facts. I've seen so many times, client not being able to use their vouchers just because they couldn't access, the difference was just 30 or $40. For 30 or $40, just the Mayor said, the husband is on minimum wage, the wife is on minimum wage, but yet it was when you look at the numbers, they don't fit for that 30 or $40, but now all these things are changing. You've said it so well, when you are in a system or in a shelter or whatever organization you're going through, that administration is required to do certain things. But when you are doing those things, you don't have all the time to work full time. But right now the 30 minimum hours are being dropped to 14 hours because many survivors only work 20 or 25 hours a week. So I don't know if you are really grasping the whole thing here, but this is really a game changer. And I really wanted to say thank you to Mayor Adams. Thank you so much, Officer Katz and the entire team and everybody here and my colleagues here. Thank you very much because today is an important day for us. And the fact that our voice is being heard and valued and we are brought into being a solution here to the problem is a great day for us. Thank you very much. Thank you so much, Alita. And I also wanna thank some of the others in the advocacy community here with us today and you stand with us into helping make New York City a better place for formerly homeless New Yorkers and to have fewer of them. Catherine Trapani of Homeless Services United and Volunteers of America's Young Lee. Finally, New York City has an extensive array of tools available to New Yorkers, but often people still face barriers to living where they want. The Community Choice Program is an important effort to end that and open more doors in more communities across New York City. Ernestine Jackson was able to work through the system and I hope that Ernestine's story is one that inspires others. Good afternoon. My name is Ernestine Jackson. I am someone firsthand, experiencing using the housing voucher. As a single mother and my son is 19 years old, my main concern was to keep him safe, keep him safe in a neighborhood that was crime affected. So HPD stepped in. They helped me find my counselor, Ms. James from HPD. She helped me find a new apartment in downtown Brooklyn. It has better libraries, better schools, better shopping areas, everything is better. This program, the housing voucher program, it puts people in better homes in better places, but you do find discrepancies far as because you have Section 8, you are quote a certain kind of people. But my background, my background, I'm an ex-NYPD employee. I am a chef, a professional cook. I am a cancer survivor. I am not what the stigma says about Section 8. This program taught me about the discrimination and how to handle it and where to go when I need help. I'm not a person that settles, I'm a fighter. I fight for my son for his safety and my next dream is to get a house, to purchase a house one day. I like where I live at, but that's not where I wanna stay. Mm-hmm. All right, all right. I want better. I thank Mayor Adams, I thank HPD for opening up the voucher program to make it easy for people to have access to a voucher, FEBS, or Section 8, where we wanna call it. It's hard out here and we need to help. My advice to people that's using the voucher, or Section 8, or FEBS is use the resources that they give you and just let you know that you're not your situation. Just because somebody sees you some kind of way, that's not your situation, it gets better. Have hope. Things will get better. Thank you. Before we move to Q and A, I just wanna thank all the incredible public servants who made all this work possible today. Working in government can be sleepless and thankless and everybody works so hard to make all this come together. So big round of applause for all our amazing public servants. How many more people do you expect will be eligible tonight? So the City of FEBS Voucher Program is funded as it goes and at times we have seen that it is less utilized than we would like because of all these barriers. So we're really hopeful that given all of these changes that we're making today, we'll be able to more fully utilize it and yes, that will be more funding. Get you that number. You know, and what we heard the most about people saying they're walking around with vouchers in their pockets or they can't get vouchers because of the hours that they're working or that they're not making enough. And so a lot of these vouchers are sitting on the shelf. And so we're gonna look at, we currently have allocated, make them more user-friendly and if they need more, we're gonna continue to fill that population. The voucher is cheaper than a shelter. So it's humane and small. Yes, you wanted to take that? Sure. So the Section 8 Voucher Program already has that feature where in a higher income neighborhood, you're able to utilize it at a higher rent level. The problem has been helping people find those apartments and helping people work their way through the process. That what we're announcing today is some grant funding in order to help people work through the system in order to make that possible. I'm going to be shortened because that's also contributing to this. Yeah, and that's something that advocates have talked about. We're factoring that in with OMB, to look at the dollar amounts, what would that mean? We're looking at every recommendation that was made. And so once OMB tell us how that factors into dollar amounts, we're gonna be looking at that also. So everything is on the table of how we can make the vouchers more user-friendly and how we can get more people into housing. Just going back to that question about locations. We were also finding that people with vouchers were being discriminated against. So the Human Rights Commission is going to be, we're gonna do some testing. We're gonna make sure that those brokers and landlords and others that are not taking vouchers that they have to be held accountable. And that's some of the legislation we want to introduce into Albany, that those brokers and agents that are telling voucher holders that we're not going to show you apartments, that's not acceptable. Hi, thank you for that question. How is it going to work when a person is identified on the subway or on the street? We bring them to one of our welcome centers in DHS. They're gonna spend some time there a week. We're gonna do a survey and we're going to address those individuals and see what the specific needs are. So this is just one extra tool that's in our toolkit. If they elect to go to one of the vacant supportive housing units, then we're going to work with them. And this is fantastic pilot because all of that back-end work will be done while they're in that vacant supportive housing as we give them the supportive services that they need. So is there an H or something that's prioritized or it's just whether the first 80 people are on the move? As the first 80, as we do the assessment with the individuals that's coming in, again, it's client choice. Once we show them that vacant unit and they want to move into that vacant unit, then we're going to move them in and again, work with them and provide the supportive services. Mr. Mayor, because there is discrimination in acceptance of vouchers, I wonder where you're going to find these places to move people in, where people will want to accept vouchers and what neighborhoods will be off limits given the fact that there are a lot of places that say, as you know, not in my backyard. It's a combination. Number one, we need to do a better job of really defining the faces of homelessness. I think your testimony was powerful, as you stated. We have stigmatized homelessness and not understanding it's just our brothers and sisters and neighbors who have fallen on hard times due to a series of circumstances and redefining the face and having a real conversation with some of our developers, some of our building owners and really engaging in the conversation. Number two, let's be honest, it was difficult doing business with the city. You know, you would be a landlord and you're rent with the city and the city would start playing all these games after tenants are in and people just have a bad taste in their mouths of dealing with the city and we have to change that narrative.   I used to be a real estate agent, so I know that. And they're licensed by the state, yeah, I had many jobs. I was trying not to. You know, so they're licensed by the states and they have a responsibility to follow the rules and regulations and we think we need to put some teeth in laws that state if you discriminate against someone that's carrying a voucher that you should be held accountable for it.  Within the rights we have in the law and laws that we're looking at, one should not be denied the right to housing because they are receiving assistance from the city. But we have to do our part and make sure that we are good partners with those who are open indoors. Which many developers and landlords are doing and we need to make sure it's done correctly. You know. You know. I stopped at eight units for this pilot when there's... We have to get it right. And that's a good question, but we have to get it right. We, when we learn about what Houston is doing housing first, we did a real analysis. It sounded great, but we started digging into the weeds and we realized that there are other dynamics to it. And so we want to get it right. And if we could expand it, we're going to expand it, but we have to get it right. Well, number one, you wanna make sure as the commissioner stated, not everyone is eligible or meet the criteria. You may be dealing with severe mental health issues. And you wanna make sure you get the wraparound services that you need. You may not know some of the financial literacy aspect of it, how to make sure that your rent is being paid. So we need to look, to start with 80, the worst thing we can do is start with 10,000 and figure we have to shift and pivot and shift without doing the proper analysis. We're gonna get it right and make sure that we can expand it. I'm sorry, that what? Are these changes enough given that rent is at record levels in New York? You said are we taking that into account? What changes to the expensive rent has gotten in New York City? Listen, I think I started out by quoting the philosopher. It's clear rent is too high, you know? And there are things we can do as government and we have been doing some of those things. Increase in our income tax credit, what we're doing around our childcare of the money we invested in the 22 billion that we invested into housing. We could do our part, but parts of housing is an open market and there's limits to what we can do as a city.  I know this has been an issue that the city council and city hall have debated for a few years. But we should continue to push as much as possible. I think the Bregner project with Councilman Villasquez was a perfect example. We're engaging in conversations right now with Innovation Queens, where we could have a substantial number of units that are deeply affordable. I think there's a combination here. Number one, we need to push as much as possible when you receive city subsidies. That's number one. Number two, we really have to stop this conversation of not on my block. I don't know if you realize how serious this issue is. I'm amazed that sometimes when I see some of the rallies of we need housing, we need housing, we need housing. And then the next time I get a phone call and I said, why aren't you at that? We need housing rally. Now you telling me not to build on your block? Our desire must reach what we're saying. And it's not. Every one that's elected and every advocate should all be identifying locations in their communities where we can build housing. This should be an all hands on deck moment. And it's just not. We should not be fighting some of these projects that are good, solid projects that are producing thousands of units of houses in communities where they have not built affordable housing. That's the key. We're saying let's not go to the traditional communities. Let's go to those communities also that have not built traditional affordable housing. Okay. Okay, thank you. Y'all don't want to be around to do this. You're on your own. Thank you. Thank you, Reverend. I stand behind you. Yes. So let's do this in layers. Number one, we see what's playing out in El Paso. The airports seem to be dealing with some issues because of the migrants and asylum seekers as they're waiting for flights out. The federal government called, responded to our call. And then so this is still a fluid situation. And we must be prepared. And that is important. So the second dealing with the necessity of dealing with the Randall's Island of, I'm just really baffled of those who don't realize the successful execution of a plan. We were in line to get 100,000 migrants. And the worst thing could have happened in the city is that we waited until the 100,000 was here and didn't have many layers in plans. We executed a plan. And those who sit on the outside and talk about how to execute a plan that never had to execute a plan during a crisis, they need to take note of how we executed a plan. Part of the plan was to be prepared by having the hurt on Randall's Island. And because we were successful in convincing the federal government that we need to have a decompression strategy at the border, we were able to avert that crisis. That's successful. We are not writing and talking about the migrant crisis right now because our team executed a successful plan. You're no longer talking about it because we needed to be done. And I'm proud of the team. Not one child slept on the streets of this city that was a migrant because of the way this administration responded. A very steady hand. We executed a plan. And regardless of all the noise around us, we executed a plan that prevented this city from dealing with a major crisis. Do you agree with that estimate? Number one, number two, what's the latest on reimbursement from the federal government? The independent budget office made that prediction. I will get exact numbers of what it's going to cost from OMB and be able to let you know. I'd like to give you as much information as possible around these financial issues. And we are still fighting for reimbursement. We think that the campaign season is over. You know, it's time for people to focus on this issue. We need to be reimbursed. We spent a great deal of money for a national problem. And we're looking for reimbursement in assistance from the state and from the federal government. The 90-day rule, during the housing plan rollout in June, you had the chief housing officer said that that 90-day rule was going to go away immediately. Clearly it didn't. I'm just wondering because that whole level is not a challenge. Yeah, I don't recall that, you know. Okay, but in any case, OMB does an analysis of these decisions. OMB does an analysis of these decisions. And I have a lot of respect for Jack who's there and he will assist us. We looked at what we could do right now. Low-hanging fruit, fruits that's in the middle of the tree and the fruits at the top of the tree. Right now, these are low-hanging fruits that came from advocates and those who are experiencing homelessness. And so we were happy that as it was indicated that those who are experiencing homelessness and advocates said we gave them recommendations, they executed on those recommendations. Because that's how we operate as an administration. How are you? Gang date, database? Some people there are saying that they friends with or family members with somebody who is actually in the gang. So just curious where you stand on the issue of the gang database. Should it continue? Should it end? Does it need to be changed? What are your thoughts? Yeah, okay. Two things. Of course, there are two ways. I think it was too broad and we need to do a real analysis of who we are putting in the gang. And I'm a strong believer in that. I advocated for that for many years. We cannot just target people and place them in a database. Remember, it was my legislation that got rid of the stop and frisk database with now Congressman Hakeem Jeffries and our partner on that. You should not create database to hold innocent people if they are not, if they don't fit the criteria. That's number one. Number two, I have yet to find someone that said, hey, Eric, I am in the gang. So let's be clear on that.  So we have to use the right analysis that we do not unfairly target people but we have to be honest about those who are participating in illegal gang behaviors, which is generating a lot of our shootings. Mr. Mayor, over the weekend, you did an op-ed piece for USA Today.  That's the only question you had. Where you going? You excoriated your fellow Democrats for having the long attitude of not meeting the needs of working New Yorkers and you talked about how there've been a drop-off in support in the Latino community, Asian communities and others of support for the Democratic Party. So my question to you is two-fold. Number one, what are you willing to do to get these people back into the phone and to vote for Democrats? And secondly, what should the governor be doing to try to do the same thing? Well, I think two levels, you know, as I do an analysis of how we campaign, I did not see mailings or communications that talk directly to blue collar working class people. We were successful in getting an increase in income tax credit. Why weren't we talking about that? We were successful in getting childcare for mothers, decreasing the cost for families, decreasing the cost of childcare. Why weren't we talking about that? Southern Brooklyn has one of the largest nature development. We were able to get land trusts. Why weren't we talking about that? Public safety, we made changes. People once wanted to dismiss the changes we made in criminal justice reform that I thought were good changes. We weren't selling that. We need to sell our product. I think the Democrats have a good product. We need to sell our product and do a better job in selling our product. I don't think we did a good job in doing that. We allowed people to hold on to one aspect of criminal justice reform, when the whole system needs to be examined and handled. And we should have been selling that. And that's what I will continue to do. I believe we need to create a system that is going to make sure people get justice on both ends of the spectrum. And I'm going to continue to talk about that. Oh, you gotta let more of this. I'm sorry. Don't you think there's a worry on the part of some people in the Democratic party that coming with the city council raises coming up next November, you could lose more seats to Republicans because of the failure to address the issues of working people in my Queens and Brooklyn. Will people go to Republicans? Well, I think that when you look at the fact that we were seven or eight out of 10 people that were from the Latino community and the Asian community were voting Democrat, now it's down to six out of 10, you know? That should be a wake-up call. It should be a wake-up call. It should be a wake-up call that people don't feel we are speaking to them. And we have good plans, we've done good things, but now it's about selling our product correctly. And I don't believe we did a good enough job to do that. We've allowed others to define us. We have a good product. We are pro-public safety. We invested in police when others did not. The Republican parties did not. We pushed to have sensible guns laws. The Republican parties did not. So if we are not selling our product, then we're leaving a vacuum where others are selling our products. And so this should be, I think that this should be a moment of reflection and it's a moment of recalibration to say let's get back on the ground and sell our products to everyday broken-class people. That's what I believe. Is it campaign season is over? Were you waiting to ask until after gosh on the governor and other Democrats? No, when I say campaign season is over, people seem to be more focused on issues when they don't have to run around from location to location to location. Now campaign season is over because no one wanted to talk about it because I was talking about it. I was very clear talking about funding and the midst of the campaign season. But it seems like people get more focused when they're not running around from one location to the next. The governor has been a real partner. She sat in the room with me with the president. When the president came here to respond to the hurricane in Puerto Rico and in the Dominican Republic, we said, can we speak with you for a moment? He came in a room and sat down. The governor was extremely vociferous around that we need to have a real solution at the border and that we need to get funding here. She was a real partner with this and I am sure she's gonna continue to be a partner with this about the cost of reimbursement and can FEMA onboard? Need to make it happen. We had several conversations. I'm not gonna go into detail of all those conversations. Steve, I heard it out, I heard it out. Mr. Mayor, I'm not going to... He was as good as Kate now. Oh, my God. Good to see you. That's well. Going back to Randall's Island, Comptroller Lander has estimated this could cost the city several million dollars. He's asked basically to see the receipts for you that this total cost is what the city estimated before to be about 650,000. Well, okay. He sent a letter on Friday and then he started talking about it like he sent the letter a week ago and we didn't give him the information. Come on. I'm hoping he doesn't turn out like the relationship with the previous controller and mayor. Brad, let's work together, Brad. Listen, you sent the letter on Friday. Give us days to respond to your letter. We're not going to hide the cost of anything. The goal is he knew it was a crisis. He had many opportunities. Even if we were to place people in hotels, it was going to cost something. People could not live on the streets. So there's a dollar amount attached to giving people shelter. We're going to release all the numbers because he's part of the process. I brief him after every budget. I sit down with Brad and Jimani and I go over everything. So this is not a secret and we should not politicize a crisis that the city navigated together. He's part of the leadership of the citywide leadership. Let's work together. We had a crisis in the city. This city averted that crisis and I would think he would be saying, you know what, thank God that this administration was able to avert a crisis that would have cost us probably so much more. I don't know exactly what was the reason for that letter and he could pick up my phone. He knows my number. He texts me all the time about other things. About good vegan restaurants. He could text me about this. I love this guy. I love this guy. Since the last hearing, 13 more people have died in Rikers Island. So what case can you make to the judge that the city is still capable of holding on to control at Rikers? Well, I think the monitor made the case. The monitor clearly indicated in those who read through his entire report, he clearly indicated that, you know, we are moving in the right direction. And I'm a bit baffled about people who think that the federal receivership of oversight is the end home. I mean, is the federal prisons, those are poster childs of good prison? I'll go to 30th Street and 30th Avenue. So I don't know why people think that, okay, let's turn it over to the federal receivership. And all of a sudden, all the problems are going to go away. That's not true. And so it's commendable that the commissioner is saying, there are problems here and I want to fix them. That's commendable. That's what we want. You know, we can't be a city that every time a problem comes up, we say, well, let's give it to someone else to do. No, no, we want the problems because we want to fix the problem. And so we saying to the federal judge, we saying to everyone else, we saying to legal aid, we have been here for 11 months and the current person who is looking over our shoulders, he is saying that there are some indicators that we're moving in the right direction. I mean, it should not matter 11 months of a problem that has been in place for decades. For decades, the independent voice is saying, these guys and ladies are moving in the right direction. Let's give them an opportunity to do so. It just makes no sense to me that everybody, every problem we have, call the federal government, oh, we got a pothole, call the federal government.  We don't need the federal government to run our city. We can fix these problems. Mr. Mayor, I have a quick education question.


Good afternoon. And once again, it is my pleasure to be able to participate in these conferences. And I have ten minutes to do my presentation. So let's start. So we talk about the social isolation and suicide. So I think just put you on a global map. I think that there's a suicide situation released by the WHO, and then we are in this red area. So I think that this where the area which have the above the average suicide rate. So what we're talking about, I mean in Asia, Hong Kong. So we are talking about, we have about 40% of the population, but it account for 60% of the world death about suicide. So I think at the rate, we are talking about 13.5 per 100,000 is about 1,000 people to kill them. So every year in Hong Kong is about three or four per days. I think that is where we can beat the Australian and American and Australian. So and whenever we'd like to bring the suicide prevention, I think to the government, I think we'd like to bring in a cost element there. I think we told the government that actually, I think every 1,000 death, it costs about 1.6 billion dollars as a potential economic loss and also another 100 millions in providing the mental health care for treating the double self harm. So I think that there's a situation in Hong Kong. I think the elderly, we have a high rate, I mean the young people here and then the middle age are here. But what's something go into this three age group? I think what we, before we go into that, then we look at the 10 leading cost of death again. So it ranged at number nine, number eight and number six. So it actually, it is getting more and more serious. But that is only in terms of the number count. But if you look at what we call the year of life loss, so I think if someone we expected to live until 75, if someone died at the age of 60, so we lose 15 years. But if someone died at the age of 15, then we lose 60 years of the lifetime. So when you look at it from that perspective, eight from five to four. Now actually when you look at this one, so it actually this proper health aspect or the disease burden itself, it becomes more significant. Now we have been talking about about the digestive system, infectious disease. The government spending huge of money. I mean doing the SARS, I mean the billions of dollars. But now we are talking about every year we have 1,000 people, they kill themselves. It's three jumbo jack, it crashed. Okay, using a really key comments. But when we look at this three age group, what are common? I mean what we call the risk and the protective factors. I think in one of the study we do among the older adults, I think there's the psychiatric illness, I think Gene Wu will give an expert to this. But when we look through all this sort of thing, and then the last thing we say that, well the lack of the social support, it's just one of the risk factors for the older people that commit suicide. What happened to the 20 to 59? Okay, I mean the presence of psychiatric disorder is also one of the high risks. But at the end, when we go into it down there, when you have social support, it shows that the societal risk, it actually reduces societal risk. I mean if you have the social support, so the odd ratio as well 0.27, what it means is about four times less likely that you have the suicide ideation. Now when we go to the youth, I mean when we youth itself, I think we look at the family dispute, the financial difficulties, the relationship problem, I think all these are the significant factors. Now actually when we look at deeply, when you look at the family dispute, financial difficulties, and all these somehow it is related to the social isolation. So that is the, in Hong Kong, you represent 18 districts, I mean that is what we talk about. Now Yunlong and Chi-moon, I mean these are two districts, I think they are at the western side of the Hong Kong, I think they are more disadvantaged, they are more vulnerable people here. Actually you can see the changes from 2008 to 2009 and then to 2010. I think between the metropolitan area, there's some hotspots or there's this area with experience higher societal risk than the others. So what we have found out when we compute the SMR, the standard mortality rate, which when you're above one, you mean you have higher than average, the suicide rate below one is less than the average. We have found out that all these, some Singapore, Wontai, Xin, Guntong, Kuaicheng, and Chi-moon. But what are the commonalities among this sort of district? Now if you look very carefully, there's Wontai, Xin, Guntong, now that is the overall what we have seen. I think the household side is more or less the same, it's still about three people per household. But the median income, what you can see, this group itself, they actually they have about 20% or something more, less household income than the average. The unemployment rate itself, they also have a higher unemployment rate than the average. I think the median age, well I think it's more or less the same, the elderly population, yeah the divided, we showed that the elderly population, the proportion itself is not significant. Then we look at this one, the dependency ratio. But what we have seen is the median income, the unemployment rate, they are, they have some sort of overrepresented in this, these high risk area. So when we look at the unemployment rate, these are the 18th district, I think this is the unemployment rate, this is the suicide rate, it actually, there's some strong correlation. By the same token, when you have a smaller household income, you have a higher rate. Okay, so then we look at the mental stages, and then that is the widow group, and then that is the divorce group as well, and there's a strong correlation. So if you look at the 18th district where we're trying to compare this 15 to 24, 25 to 59, and 60 or above, and then in terms of this, I think the correlation itself, it does suggest that there is some relationship between this at a population level, at a, at a population level. So we also, we have, we have identified some hospital as well. I think this GIS is, is really important, such that when we do suicide prevention, and then we can go to the right to that district or the block of the building itself, having to do the work. So I think that when we look at the social ashrine indicator, unemployed, elderly population, next household income, divorced single parents, the recent migrants, the ethnic minority, and living unknown. Now, what the challenge in Hong Kong, I think what we have seen, it is there, there's disconnection in our community. And then the challenging way now is how do we identify the effective way to connect them together. And I think what we see this physical isolation, the isolation itself, it could lead to the social isolation. And then now we say that how can we reconnect them. So I think we cover de-stigmatization of the district. I think in this morning, I think our secretary Carol Lam said that there's a sadness district, the Tinsui Wai. And how to de-stigmatize this?  And how to go into, at a community-based response, and how to make these not to be the people who are staying there, and who feel that they are disadvantaged. So we look at the enhanced understanding of the need of the vulnerable and the disadvantage in the community, and then try to remove the myth and also their prejudice as well. I think in our study with the Learner School of Economics and what we feel that it is a space, I think what you have been talking about, the Hong Kong, we have been deprived of this space. But now how can we create a space for these people? Now, I think once we talk about this split threat with 120 square feet, but they only take 30 minutes to go to work. Or you have a choice to have a 500 square feet, but you take one hour or more than one hour to do the traveling. Now, this morning, we are talking about the equity. I think in Hong Kong, I don't think we're talking about equity. Actually, you do not have a choice. You do not have a choice, we just have to live with it. We have to live with what we are given. And it's just like when you come home and then you have the food on the table and then you say, I do not like the food. Then they say, you still have a choice. You eat it or you don't eat it. So I think there's a correction at page 28 here. I think this is one of the articles. I think it is not 1,036 feet. Now, I understand why there is a misprint. There could be the people from the Learner School of Economics they couldn't believe. How come half of the household, I think we are talking about 1.2 million of a household who live in a less than 500 square feet, which is less than a garage size, you know, in one of the home in Australia. But you are talking about 3.1 people in one household. I think that's what we're talking about. Now, we are trying to work with the government saying that if we do not have the private space, what can we do? Can we use the school playground? I think in the school, during the weekend, which can be open to the community, I mean, which is accessible and then they can do it. So I think we have done a mentorship program and not doing the living space of these people. They are fiscally very, very close, I think, but emotionally we are quite disconnected, although they are very self-sufficient and that has worked. So we went to the school, we tried to help these young people, we bring them to our university and then we enlarge their living space. So at the end, I think we talk about in Hong Kong, if we really want to do it, do a suicide prevention successfully, I think strengthening the social support is very important, enhancing the coping and the problem-solving skill and also the partnership with the family and the community is important and we cannot just rely on the government to do anything. So I think we saw the GIS is good and then the community ownership is very important. At the end, I'd like to show you this as a hand, hands to go there to connect the disconnected. And at the end, I'd like to show you this curve. This curve, we have a group of people who are vulnerable, who are disadvantaged, who are suicidal. If you want to reach out to identify these group of people to make a change, it is difficult. But according to the Ross theorem, we say that if you can reduce a small risk to a large population, it will be more defective than to do a high risk with a small population, how it could be done. Now, if we can manage to move the population health to the left-hand side, so the number of people actually have problems will be less. So I think what we believe that a strong population health program is good. So at the end, to finish my talk, that's the tip of the iceberg. I mean, suicide is a great event, but actually it is just a realization of a much larger problem in our community. Now, how can we make our iceberg smaller? Climate change. Yeah, exactly. There's a change in your environment, change to make it a warmer environment than that. So that is the good thing about the global warming. Make it smaller, then I think we will be better. Now, in Hong Kong, I was told by the minister that you have to tell something good about our government. Anyway, so actually, we are looking good. Actually, the suicide rate at the historical high here, I think within the five years, our suicide rate has come down by 30%. Now, we have not seen it in any part of the world. I think Hong Kong has done it. Why? Hong Kong has done it is because those who morph in this, including the government, I mean, who make the differences here. Thank you.


The wait is finally over, football is back in Bemidji as the BSU Beaver's football team hit the field for the first time today, gearing up for the 2017 season. The season will be the first full season for head coach Brent Bulty who was named interim head coach last season just days before the opening game. The Beavers are hitting the ground early with only 20 practices before the opening game against Winona State. For now, the team is just excited to be back on the field. Just like any time you got a long ways to go, it's hard to tell what you're really getting accomplished in helmets. You know, it's football, it's a contact sport, but just fun to see the kids run around, see how much hard they work during the summer and a lot of the guys did put a lot of time and effort in. We had 50, up to 70 guys here during the summer at different points, so it's fun to see all the further labors kind of paying off. The Beavers will open the season on August 31st when they will travel to take on Winona State. If you've enjoyed this segment of Lakeland News, please consider making a tax-deductible contribution to Lakeland Public Television.


I am flabbergasted. What has happened to me this week, but earlier? You're flabbergasted at what? What has happened to me this week? What do you mean? In the training fraternity, I am so blessed. I've made so much money. I don't know what to do with it. Pauls, or what are you talking about? Are you doing other things? No, your calls, other things are being made. I was $50,000 in bonds. Wow. I tried to pull back at 24, and I went to bed. And I wake up this morning, I was $24 up. Wow. And I left this afternoon. You came with your two calls, and the groceries in between the two calls. That is a lot with this. So let's just kind of quickly review this. You can see the chart here. What do you want to do with this here? Are you going to hold it? Are you going to keep it? Are you going to hold it or not? Yes, I could be wrong, but it won't when you initially asked for it in the room. But after carefully looking at it, my target's about 449, 448, just before the 450 mark. So you've got it there on 443, yes, just before closing the gap, yeah. So basically, lots of gets there today. So you'd have to hold this till whenever, which tomorrow, if the market goes up tomorrow, this could continue right away tomorrow. If it doesn't, this may rest tomorrow. And then I have a pop into next week. You have plenty of time. I don't think you need the market for this trade. So that's a good thing. I don't think you need it. But I'm saying if you get the market's help, if Amazon does get back tonight, which I don't know if it does, but if it does, if you get the market's help, it'll have another good day tomorrow. If you don't, it could rest tomorrow. Don't panic. You don't really need the market for this move to continue here, because the chart has turned around. So you put in the email that doing the gap classes this past weekend helped you. Helped you take it, helped you take the risk. What did you help you do? Is it going to help you hold it, or was it going to help you do? No, it helped me to hold it. OK. Why? Because tomorrow is a holiday here in South Africa. OK. And we're going away. So I must make a choice. Am I going to kill the trade tonight? Going to come back to the market on Monday? Or I'm going to leave the trade. But I've made the choice already that I'm going to leave the trade. OK. Both of the ones that you did. I did both the calls that you called. So what did you pay for the 410s? Sorry, just to repeat that, what did I pay for? What did you pay for the 410s? And what did you pay for the 425s? Well, the 410, unfortunately, I wasn't at my screen when you sent the email and I priced for it. I paid $13.20. But that's OK. Remember, what did I say in the room about this? Sorry? Do you remember what I said in the room about that, this? No, man, it's a stuff up. It's a stuff up.  You won't believe me, but I won't lie to you. What? I was anticipating, please, send me an option. Send me an option. Oh, that's so funny. You didn't, that's so funny. Yeah, well, this was the big one here. All right, what did you pay for the 425s? The 425, I played $174, but that is after I went to Woolworth's, bought groceries for the weekend and came back and I said, shit, but there's another email. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I did that because I saw that that one was fine, too.  That was actually a blessing because why it pulled back, but I checked the timing on the chart when you sent out the email. That was actually in my favor when I came back. OK, good, good, good, good. So basically, so where are you going to get out of this? If you said 440, is that where you're going to get out of it or are you going to give it a chance to go up?  Like, this could really go to 500. Like, that's not even an insane number actually.  They all, the whole thing has retraced 50% already.  Right, that's what you're going to have to deal with if you hold it. That's the choice you make. When you're up close to 12 grand and you decide to hold it, that's the part of the volatility of options if you're going to hold these because of the time value and also the way that these things swing around. So you know, that's why you just kind of shut it down and wait to get to the number and have the conviction in it. But I think that the class is going to help you. Again, this is now in an uptrend. Do you see this here? This is now in an uptrend after today. So what does that mean? It means it's talking to the downtrend. Now it's in an uptrend. This is, yeah, go ahead. So therefore, I don't even have the, previously, I would have just jumped out of the train and said, oh, thank you for what the market has given me. But now I want to say, no, no, no, no, no, no. There's more coming here. Right. I don't mind the pullback. And I don't mind having the, well, as I said, when I emailed you, we were at 1150. Now we are at less than 6,000. But that doesn't bother me. It shouldn't. It shouldn't because I mean, when you look at the size, you have to take that into consideration. And also the way that they swing, then one of the reasons they're so profitable is because they can be crazy. What did you end up doing with the spy put? You got out of it then, or what did you do with that one? Yeah, yeah, I was actually, the spy trade, we awaited yesterday and I was sleeping. I should have just caught out when it was at maximum. And I didn't. And I still managed to make an extra $390 on top of the previous day's profit. That's good. So I didn't feel bad about it. I still made profit on that day. That's great. This really, these are the kinds of trades, like we briefly discussed this, I don't remember when, but as far as, oh, I'd said it in the class. These are the ones like the CMG, where you want to either A, hold or B, take more risk because of the fact that the way it's turned around. The fact that it's changed trends, that gives you more conviction in holding it because the low of the day in this is going to hold for a very long time. So you know that it's going to fall through. You know that it's turned around. You have all the shorts stopping out. And this is series, series buying.  Let's just quickly look at it here. It closed last night at $339.52 and opened today at $388. So I mean, and then it still went. I mean, this is just fantastic. I mean, just fantastic. I wanted to make sure it got over $400. That was where, that was really the point. And then I didn't call it right exactly there because we were in the A&B, but I mean, it doesn't even matter. And that's what I was saying in the room. You must not have heard it. I said, take it no matter what, even if you get the trade, late take it because the momentum is in this, it's going to go. So, you know. That was a brilliant call. Yeah. Well, I am so glad that you got a lot out of the class and it almost hit 425. Look at that. 424.50 was the high. Yeah. So you're going to have to weather the storm here now this afternoon. If it doesn't go back up to the high into seeing what happens Friday and next week. And but I, yeah. I don't think it will go up today. That's trading. I mean, we were excited when it was at 11.50. We were there and the picture, we still got two weeks. Two weeks is a long time. Yeah, for this stock to go. Yeah. It could have a small pullback of some sorts just because of the guys taking profit. Two weeks time, I think it can raise a little bit. So why don't you figure out, I mean, if you would get out of this at 4.50, what do you think the option will be worth at 4.50? For the 4.25s, it would be 25 points to the strike. You paid, let's just rough it out at 12 without any extra time value, 12 plus 25. So how much then, how many contracts do you have at the 4.25s? I only got 10 contracts at 11.70. Okay, so I'm just roughing it out here. You've got 10. And again, roughly though, you'd make 25 grand and that's not even any time value. You'd roughly make about 25 grand, just getting at 25 points for the strike. It would be at least worth that plus whatever because of the defense where it goes there. But that's only 25 points away from where we are at the high today, 4.50, I'm saying. That would be a huge trade. And see, that's the kind of one, remember the day you made 50 grand in one shot really quick? That was great and all. But again, imagine if you had taken that risk and something like this. Like, we'll see where this goes. Yes, and yo, next time, you must also remember I'm trading very conservative at the moment. I'm trading 10 contracts at a time. That's good. I've grown my count to nearly 600,000 already. That's great.  What conserved you become and I like that. It is true.  Like even that T ended up breaking. So you're right. Sometimes being more conservative, the more you make the more conservative you get, that's absolutely true. But there's nothing wrong with that. There's nothing wrong with that at all. It means you're being picky. And there's nothing wrong with being picky. You want to keep your wins. Yeah, so I bought myself a brand new Mercedes Benz. A sports, a sports, a sports GTS car. Wow. Personal plate of ZB trader, like trading bonds. Take a picture of the license plate and send it to me. I'll put it in an email. People would love that. And because, because this thing what I'm doing. That's terrific. Then you learned something else from me this week too. This week I made over $70,000 out of the market. That's terrific. That is just really terrific. That's great. Now what, did you get everything situated with your pre-market data? You got all that square away? Yes, yes, I, to update her, which is company I love very dearly because of the point in figure charts. Half point in figure charts because I've been exposed to them about five years ago. Two feet, which is the most expensive than data feed for that. I can see, not, I can see the pre-market but not just that. It's a, it's a very good combination because of what I want to do. I can start scanning various indexes, assets, bullish percent charts. That's great. Another level where this teach me how the software works and how I can put everything together. That's the long and the short. Well, that's good, you know? I'm still in the interim stages of that, but yes, I've solved that problem. Terrific. That's a big one and I've seen you in the room so that's good too.  So listen, I'll let you go here but congratulations on this one. Don't worry about it the rest of the day. Decided to hold it.  I don't know if you're going to be around. I won't be, yeah, I'm going on holiday. I'm for the whole weekend, bye-bye. Okay, you're sun trading. Melissa, you don't have a clue with all the respect what is happening in our country and what situation we are in. We... In South Africa? We are so pushed into a corner that we've got to improvise, yeah. Thankful for this opportunity of trading that I can, because this is the door that I can teach my family and motivate them and for them to explore themselves one day because at the end of the day they can see where I'm coming from and how I battle to try and make a success out of all. Because we are really stuffed in this country because of the Queen of England, the Freemasons and all the world money powers, they're all gunning for us. They want to take over South Africa cheap again. Wow. I don't want to talk politics to you. No, keep staying motivated. You're doing great. I know you're happy and you like living there because of the climate and everything else and all the wonderful things, just keep training. Like you said, you took advantage of the opportunity. You're doing it. You're listening to me. I think that's great.  I am so thankful for your input in my life, really, because why I can now start seeing things in another way and your option calls is more valuable to me than your trading room because I use my money to trade bonds. I don't use my money actually to trade. I won't trade. If I see the opportunity in the room, I will trade. Okay. Make no mistake. Okay. But my $100,000, I can trade much more money in bonds than in the room with all respect to you. Okay. Also of life, previously, I cannot say that to you because I didn't know the know-how. So I'm not trying to insult you. No, I mean with equity trades, you gotta have the margin and with the options, you don't have to worry about the margin.  But the option calls is like that. You did the Netflix and you made money in that too. How did you end up in that one? The only person who knows this right now is my wife and you, nobody else. I don't talk to nobody. I don't share to nobody. I don't know what they would think. Is that what happened? Now everything is coming together. I don't know why. I'm clicking, things are coming together.  Conviction, you're getting the conviction. It's that you gain that through the skill. The skill is practice. You're doing it, doing it, doing it, doing it.  I mean, how do you think I make the calls?  I've spent thousands of hours in front of the skill. Thousands, thousands.  And I still make mistakes. Stupid, they're mistakes. Now I've blown myself down. I'm forcing myself. Okay. Because I know my weakness. And I know I'm forcing myself not to make the mistakes that I used to make. And I'm forcing myself to wait, to wait, to wait, to wait. Say, but now is the, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But don't wait too long.   This is probably going to go over the high today. Look at it. Look at it now. Look how strong it's holding. It's only one o'clock. Three hours left is probably going to go over 425. So, you know, this never pulled back. This never pulled back at all today. No, it just learned. Yeah. But that's the power of money coming in. That's the power, that's the power of money that I talk about in the class. That's the power of money. That's the institutional money. They're buying this. So there's, like you were talking about, I mean, the only selling you would have in this is anybody that bought it as a day trade that wanted to sell as a day trade, which is this small red bar here. And it's small red bar here. You're not, I mean, no big institution will sell this stock or short the stock today at CMG. It's a new entry point. And that's why it was such a great call. And that's why I said, take it. Take it no matter what the price. Take it no matter if it's late. Take it even if you get it late. But I'm excited that you did this and I'm excited that you're learning. I think that you don't need to be that active. I mean, I think you had a lot of positions on the last time we had talked. And so if you've slowed down, that's probably good because you can manage things better if you only have a couple things on. Yes. I don't mind losing on a trade. That's fine. As long as I understand where the levels are and I can see, okay, I'm committed to lose at that level or climb out at that level. But at the end of the day, if you make a call, as I said, I came from the grocery store.  Yeah, go ahead. Or if you just look at it, if you're out and about or Monday, if you're back in the room, we'll see where this goes. I think 450 is very realistic though and that'd be a huge trade for you, huge. Bless you so much and thank you for your hospitality and everything. As I said, we've got a long weekend here and we're going away. I want to bore you further with- Yeah, I think you're doing terrific, Liz. I'm so glad you're in a good place. And you can enjoy now the summer with your family. Yeah, they were in manifestation. I've learned manifestation years ago. And in a religious way, besides the religious way, religious person, and then I love the Lord and I besides the point, yeah, I cannot describe to you, joy, the victories of these small little wars that we are fighting in this game.  You mean with the market? Yeah, yeah. When do you finally get it and you're making money, you mean? Yes. And sure, when you're making a loss, okay, it's fine, that's also fine. When we're coming back to the manifestation, that is, I don't know whether you remember when I asked you a while ago, your wealth manifestation class isn't boring. And you asked me, well, I ever, do you think I will ever present something boring? Yes. Did you think it was boring? No, no, no, not at all. But I thought, I've asked you the wrong question, but That's funny. Into myself, into manifesting the biblical way. And that is awesome. Because when you manifest the biblical way and then you manifest, because that is true. We've been given the right to manifest. First of all, there's no such thing as, forgive me, as the universe is gone, the Almighty, and one must acknowledge that. But I don't want to go there. That is not what I wanted to say. What are we going to say? I just want to say, when I walk into my training office, every morning, I manifest God's love, God's way.  It was a bad trade. Don't do that. It's awesome. And I, let me bear it down in your psychological being that you've experienced this. That was a bad trade. And now it comes up back to you. And your psychological being reminds you and says, sure.  This is the same one. Watch it. That's right. And you gotta learn from your experiences. And you learn from your experiences so you don't, so you manifest what you really desire, not something that you don't want. I'm happy that you're taking all the stuff within and you're using it and you're listening and it's having a great effect on you. You gotta keep the momentum going, keep the hard work up. And I mean, you're doing it, you're doing it. What else is there to say? You're there, you're doing it. I just want to tell you, I love you with the love of the Lord. You were so cute. Thank you so much, Lewis. You're so sweet. I'm just so happy that I have met up with you. Again, I don't remember how you found me. Somewhere on the internet, because you're so far away, but you know, it was meant to be. It was meant to be. You were meant to find me. Amen, amen. We'll have a wonderful weekend. And you're a wonderful person and you are making a lot of people open their minds and keep on doing the good work. And thank you for what you are meaning to me and my family and helping making me rich. Thank you. You're welcome, Lewis. Thank you so much for saying so and have a great day. Bless you and keep well and enjoy your weekend. I want I'm off to the races tomorrow. I won't be in your room. Okay, I'll see you Monday. Sure, keep well. Okay, bye-bye.


I don't I'm really not politically savvy so so this is gonna be a stupid question for me to even attempt to answer because I'm sure so many people out there could do so much better with this than me but my off the top of my head there are a few things like that I would personally love to change I would I would go after the FDA I can't stand the FDA like they've got it you know they've got a copyright on the word cure and you know they just it bothers me they pay researchers and they pay scientists to make stupid things like you know create diseases so that they can create a drug for that disease so that they can sell the drugs and then they can make more money and then they can blame this on a chemical imbalance or blame that you know things like that really bother me I know I I know that there are there's there's been vaccines for HIV treatments for cancer and things like that which the FDA will not release will not approve of the government won't you know is backing them because they're paying huge amounts of money to the government the FDA will not release will not approve of the government won't you know is backing them because they're paying huge amounts of money to the government and and we'll never know because so there's such a profit to be made off of the drugs and the pills and all the stuff you know that you have to buy and spend money on every year when you have HIV or when you have cancer so that's one thing that I would definitely I think in that respect we are an incredibly immoral country we don't so much care about the health and happiness of everybody we care about making money at the expense of the deaths of millions of people so you know America we've got some things that we can maybe clean up


You know, you talked about the kinds of things that leadership needs to do and can you talk a little bit about how leaders need to be able to act differently, the role of leadership, the CEO, the executive team, how leadership should change as we go through the transformation and as they operate in this new environment. So maybe to put it a bit in a broader picture for me, it's not only the leader, the leader is super important but it's more than the leader, maybe just to give the full picture. On the one hand side I think you need to think about the structure because if you have the wrong structure you can have the best leader but you will not be successful and therefore it's important that you separate this new world from the old world and that you make sure that they have the freedom, that they have the autonomy to really thrive and to do whatever they want. And just basic things that they have like can use a different IT system than the core organization is using, that they can use different employment contracts and the core organization is using because they need to have more flexibility, different incentive schemes etc. So that's the whole structural part and then also you need to set up the processes to make sure that everyone is heard in the organization and like corporate accelerators but in a good way so to make sure that even the intern that just started a couple of months ago if he has a great or she has a great idea that there is a way that those ideas are kind of channeled upwards to the top management and what a lot of companies do and now and then this is linked to leadership that the top management team really takes the time to listen to those pitches and one guy and it's also someone I really admire in terms of his leadership skills so he really travels around the world and listens to the pitches of everyone in the organization and he spends 20 days of his busy schedule to travel around to listen to those pitches and even if it's the intern then the CEO listens to him or her and if it's a great idea this this person has the possibility to to build on it and so and what they do they kind of have it in this and this internal kind of innovation competition and they first of all they have those pitches and then they select some of them and then it's also nice then those that are selected they put them on the intranet and then different employees or all employees are invited to kind of give their votes on the good ones or not as good ones and then the ones that come in the next stage they ultimately they can then pitch their idea in front of the top management team and then the nice thing is the ones who win they can either go three weeks to Harvard for an executive course or they can spend three months just out of their job and focus on their ideas what do you think they have done that for the last 10 years that's how many went to Harvard what do you think zero no nobody went to her because they are so inspired they wanted to continue their exactly because their idea maybe it's there it's their thing and they want to push that forward and that's for me great leadership coming to your question so making sure that you inspire the people making sure that you empower them that they that they drive it because you need the people to drive this transformation also to drive this ecosystem and only if you are a great leader then you are able to to make that happen yes creating the environment to be able to ensure that there is engagement that it's fun even you know what you just talked about you know it creates a sense of excitement that I no matter where I am in the organization no matter what my role is I can exactly so it's inspiring just to create an environment create an environment that's one thing but then and then even more difficult when this thing is not successful and I've I've seen a lot of cases where they were not successful obviously because not everything is successful but then it's also critical that the leader steps in and that the leader make sure okay if my team is or if this great project is not successful because either it's too early or whatever the reasons are so that the leader make sure that all those different people that are working on this project and they're so inspired yeah that they see that somebody cares about them exactly that they have a future in the organization yeah for me that's safe exactly it's a safe and for me the great leaders are those that really go last so to me that they they really look for different new jobs for those people that ventured into those new projects and if they were not successful the leader has the responsibility to make sure that they have a career afterwards they are not the guys while you failed and I don't want to have you on my team because you were not successful with this project no in a different way so you are the most valuable resource in the organization because you have the experience you have the knowledge they took the risk exactly they took the risk and you want to be able to ensure that it's recognized it's not not only for that individual but everyone else in the organization sees that exactly how you reacted to that and that creates even more engagement of the organization to say I can take risks too exactly yeah but it's still a difficult thing and a lot of organization especially in the big organizations because your career were basically based on successes and now if you are not successful what does it mean for your career and that's again leadership that the leaders make sure that those people are protected and that they are kind of still can make their career in the organization


Up until now, we've been using the term system quite loosely, and people often use it as a kind of catch-all phrase. But in this section, we're going to get a bit more rigorous to clearly define what exactly a system is and what it is not. There are many definitions for a system out there, so let's take a few quick examples. Wikipedia tells us that a system is a set of interacting or interdependent components forming an integrated whole. Or according to the Oxford Dictionary, a system is a set of things working together as parts of a mechanism or an interconnecting network. So firstly, a system is a group of parts, that is to say it is a composite entity being composed of a number of things. In the language of system theory, we call these parts elements. Next, these parts are interconnected and interdependent in some way, that is to say there is a set of relationships between the elements. Lastly, that through these relations, the elements are arranged in a particular way in order to perform some collective function that defines the system as a whole. So let's take an example of this. A business organization is a type of system. It has a number of parts or elements that are the business departments, such as production, R&D, sales, accounting, and so on. All of these departments are interconnected. They exchange information, resources, personnel, etc. And through this exchange, they are organized to perform some collective function, that is producing some good or services. There are of course many examples of systems from transportation systems to agricultural systems and healthcare systems. Not everything is a system though. If we have a group of things that are not interconnected and do not work together, then this is not a system. It is what we call a set, a simple set of elements. An example of a set might be a pile of bricks or a group of people waiting at a bus stop. These compositions have not been designed to work together. Thus, we describe them by simply describing the properties of each element in the set and that tells us everything we need to know. There is nothing more to a set than the simple sum of their elements. This very important feature to sets helps to make dealing with them relatively simple. Now say we took this pile of bricks and we build a house out of them. We would no longer describe them as simply a set of bricks because by building our house, we have now added a set of relations. A particular arrangement to them that allows them to function as an interdependent entirety and this entirety of the house is the system. This helps to illustrate one of the key features to systems and systems thinking, that is what we call emergence. Next we will be discussing in greater depth later on in the course, but for the moment we will note that a system is not a thing. In contrary to the elements within a system that are things like bricks, cars, people, planets, etc., a system is what emerges out of the interaction of these things when they work together as an entirety. This makes systems and systems thinking a little bit more abstract because we can't really touch, grasp or hold the system. Think of an urban transportation system. We might be able to see a bus or walk on a road, but it is difficult for us to grasp the whole that is the system. Whereas the elements within a system have well defined boundaries, the system as a whole is a much more open and nebulous thing. Thus it is not surprising that we often resort to using analytical methods, whereby we simply describe the system by describing all of its parts, thus reducing it to a simple set. When we are dealing with sets, we use what is called set theory. Set theory is essentially the foundations of contemporary mathematics and thus by extension, contemporary science, which both represent the analytical method of reasoning. And not surprisingly, when we are dealing with systems, we need to use systems thinking that is based upon synthesis.