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In this episode of Henry's Dashboard Dialogues I chat with a very special guest, Ms. April Dunbar (Assistant Director of the 911 Communications Center). April has recently been elected as President of the Kentucky Emergency Number Association (KENA). Her leadership extends beyond Kentucky as she serves as a TERT (Telecommunication Emergency Response Team) leader. April shares her eye-opening experience being deployed to Asheville, North Carolina, in the wake of Hurricane Helene. With the local 911 center overwhelmed, April and her team were called to assist, providing much-needed support in a devastated area. Join us as April recounts the challenges faced, from navigating unfamiliar systems to understanding the local dialects, all while coordinating critical emergency responses. She highlights the importance of teamwork and adaptation in crisis situations, sharing insights on the unexpected encounters with wildlife and the heartwarming moments with local dispatchers. April's dedication and expertise shine through as she reflects on her role in helping communities during their time of need. Tune in to learn about the vital work of emergency responders and the resilience required in the face of disaster.
Some of today's top storiesSupervisor Zack Scrivner has resigned from the Kern County Board of Supervisors, effective today, amid allegations of sexual assault. Since 2011, he has represented the county's 2nd District, which includes eastern and central communities surrounding Tehachapi. 17's Jenny Huh has been following the investigation... She joins us in studio now with more on the future of Scrivner's seat. the County released a statement late last night saying Board Chair David Couch received a letter of resignation from Scrivner. Scrivner says he is resigning quote "for significant health and medical reasons."Wasco Mayor Alex Garcia has officially resigned his post, amid allegations swirling around social media. Calls for Garcia to resign came after a video posted by a shadowy group, accused Garcia of attempting to meet an underage boy in Bakersfield. In the video, Garcia is also slapped by those behind the camera, who appear to have set up a sting operation targeting such questionable behavior. 17 News reached out to Garcia unsuccessfully multiple times for comment, but in a statement on his resignation, Garcia writes in part quote "I want to assure you that the accusations made against me are mischaracterized and inaccurate and certainly do not reflect who I am or what I stand for." Details on how to fill the vacancy will be finalized at Tuesday's City Council meeting. the Borel Fire, which has been terrorizing our mountain communities for more than a week now. Firefighters reporting the inferno has now burned nearly 60-thousand acres and is 47-percent contained as of news time.{BANNER} The Sheriff's office now asking evacuees of Havilah to report how many people lived in their homes at the time of the fire and if everyone has been accounted for to the Communications Center at 861-3110. Meantime, some folks are returning to their homes. Evacuation warnings have been lifted in a few of the zones closest to Lake Isabella. And a couple of evacuation orders have been downgraded to warnings...meaning those homeowners can return home...but they must be ready to go if another order comes down. Yesterday evening, the Red Cross closed its evacuation center in Ridgecrest, however the shelter at the Tehachapi Education Center remains open.Countless individuals have reached out looking for ways to help the people who've lost everything in the Borel Fire. So we've teamed up with Kern River Valley Bridge Connection and the Boys and Girls club to collect gift cards for wildfire survivors. We're looking for gift cards from Vons, Dollar General, Walmart, Grocery Outlet, Taco Bell and other places that these survivors can use in the Lake Isabella area. You can drop of those gift cards and any other monetary donations at our studios on 22nd and L in downtown Bakersfield through Tuesday. Distribution is Wednesday at the Boys and Girls Club in Lake Isabella.
In this episode, I'm speaking with Celeste Baldino, Deputy Operations Manager from the Charlottesville-UVA-Albemarle Communications Center. We'll walk through Celeste's 23 year career in emergency communications and learn about current and evolving technology that helps their staff provide stellar service to their growing population.
On today's episode we're joined by Arthur, the National Sales Manager for our sponsor Watson Consoles. He recently did a sit-along at a local Communications Center and came away with definite appreciation for the hard work Dispatchers do every day. He's been supporting those in public safety for many years and has some really great ideas. Although he experienced some technical difficulties towards the end of our episode, he'll be back to talk about his experiences in creating successful teams. We can't wait! Our latest stats show we're rapidly approaching 30,000 podcast plays in over 50 countries, so we're quickly becoming your favorite dispatch program, no matter if you're watching us or listening to us. Our episodes are only about 15 minutes which is perfect for the drive to/from work, or on a break. Watch or listen to us on your favorite podcast platform or YouTube, Facebook, Instagram & even Tiktok www.linktr.ee/WeSpeakDispatch Thanks to our sponsor Watson Consoles – please visit them at: www.watsonconsoles.com #iam911 #wsd2024#911dispatchers #watsonconsoles #followers
April 15-19 is Telecommunications Week, so today we're joined by representatives from our local Communications Center to talk us through what their shifts are like. So join us as we break down what life is like on the other end of the radio! Special thanks to Communications Director Jamie Martin, Call Taker Eloy Robles and Radio Operator/Supervisor Amanda Wilson!
Today's episode features our sponsor Watson Consoles - Quint who has us discussing the on-going issue of staffing in a Communications Center. Many of your favorite WSD Crew has travelled around the country visiting dispatchers in many states, and it's a rarity to find one that is fully staffed. This topic impacts many of us in the public safety business but maybe working together we can find some solutions. What is your agency doing to help your center with staffing? The latest stats show we're coming up on 30,000 podcast plays in over 50 countries, so we're not sure what you're listening to, but maybe you should be tuning into ours and telling all of your friends!! Most episodes are about 15 minutes which is perfect for the drive to/from work, or on a break. Watch or listen to us on your favorite podcast platform or YouTube, Facebook, Instagram & even Tiktok www.linktr.ee/WeSpeakDispatch Thanks to our sponsor Watson Consoles – please visit them at: www.watsonconsoles.com #IAM911#wsd2024#watsonconsoles#followers
Today's episode features our special guest, Christie, who is talking about mental health awareness in the Communications Center. She has some very interesting and important information about her agency who is obviously very supportive and committed to helping with mental health issues. Our latest stats show we're rapidly approaching 30,000 podcast plays in over 50 countries, so we're quickly becoming your favorite dispatch program, no matter if you're watching us or listening to us. Our episodes are only about 15 minutes which is perfect for the drive to/from work, or on a break. Watch or listen to us on your favorite podcast platform or YouTube, Facebook, Instagram & even Tiktok www.linktr.ee/WeSpeakDispatch Thanks to our sponsor Watson Consoles – please visit them at: www.watsonconsoles.com #IAM911#WSD2023#911DISPATCHERS#watsonconsoles
Patrick Carney, the Artiste, is an indomitable spirit who has shared his creative talent with the world in ways that are sometimes beyond measure. No one captures the ‘Essence of Women,' the aura of their souls, the contours of their brilliance in the way this artist can. Carney captures the legacy that these women leave as footsteps on this earth.While attending the School of Visual Arts in New York City, Patrick Carney had the privilege to study with Chuck Close, Marge Anderson, Robert Israel, Burne Hogarth and Milton Glaser; each of these teachers having a profound impact on his life.As a youth he read voraciously – searching for answers which led to more questions. While pursuing studies at Buffalo State, he worked as a specialist in media at the Communications Center. Later he was named the Art Director of the Lafayette Community Center where he taught art to inner city children. For a time he traveled throughout the NY State as an Artist in Residence at underprivileged high schools as a representative of the Arts Council, and volunteered as a art teacher in the state prison system, believing that it was his obligation to give back and “Pass On” his given talents.Starting in 1964 in NY's West Village, Mr. Carney dedicated his time to drawing and painting the world of rock n' roll music, it's passion and creativity caught in real time forever. He traveled throughout the US attending rock concerts and painted whatever star excited him – and thus his work is a varied series of welcome surprises. Hanging out at what he calls “the corner of Art and Soul,” the Artiste Patrick Carney also captures the images of your youth, capturing on canvas the music you grew up with.Not only are Patrick Carney's Acrylics and Pen & Inks purchased by collectors all over the world, many of his paintings are displayed in the personal collections of such luminaries as Dick Clark, John Lennon, Bob Dylan, Stevie Nicks, Bruce Springsteen, JD Souther, Tom Russell, Judy Collins, Al Kooper, Pete Seeger, Sharon Lechter, Frank Shankwitz and Kevin Harrington.Contact Patrick Carney:pcar13@gmail.com Dr. Kimberley Linert Speaker, Author, Broadcaster, Mentor, Trainer, Behavioral Optometrist Event Planners- I am available to speak at your event. Here is my media kit: https://brucemerrinscelebrityspeakers.com/portfolio/dr-kimberley-linert/ To book Dr. Linert on your podcast, television show, conference, corporate training or as an expert guest please email her at incrediblelifepodcast@gmail.com or Contact Bruce Merrin at Bruce Merrin's Celebrity Speakers at merrinpr@gmail.com 702.256.9199 Host of the Podcast Series: Incredible Life Creator Podcast Available on... Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/incredible-life-creator-with-dr-kimberley-linert/id1472641267 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6DZE3EoHfhgcmSkxY1CvKf?si=ebe71549e7474663 and on 9 other podcast platforms Author of Book: "Visualizing Happiness in Every Area of Your Life" Get on Amazon: https://amzn.to/3srh6tZ Website: https://www.DrKimberleyLinert.com
It was the middle of the night in Junction City, OR when residents on Laurel Street were awakened to the sounds of screaming. Outside, a young woman was struggling with a man before being forced into his car. Minutes later, an explosion heard down the road would lead first responders to something unsettling. A double homicide in the small farming town was unheard of. Who killed Julie & Terry Dade? If you have information about the murders of Julie and Terry Dade, please contact the Lane County Sheriff's Office Cold Case Team at 541-682-4513 and reference case # 70-0646, or you may contact the Communications Center at 541-682-4150, then press 1. _________________________________ Method & Madness is researched, written, hosted, & produced by Dawn Gandhi Sound Editing by Brogan Molloy Music by Tymur Khakimov from Pixabay ____________________________________ REACH OUT: methodandmadnesspod@gmail.com CONNECT: Instagram X TikTok DIVE INTO MORE: MethodandMadnessPodcast.com ____________________________________ All sources are listed on the website, under each episode description. MethodandMadnessPodcast.com Thank you for listening! For the month of February, Method & Madness is proudly teaming up with Season of Justice, a non-profit dedicated to working directly with families to fund comprehensive awareness campaigns and other initiatives that can push their unsolved cases forward. Season of Justice also provides grants to investigative agencies that fund DNA testing and forensic genetic genealogy research to solve cold cases. If you're able to make a gift to Season of Justice that is meaningful to you, you'll be helping families find answers. You can join me today in supporting Season of Justice with a donation by texting METHOD24 to 53555. Link to donate: https://givebutter.com/soj_methodandmadness Thank you.
“AI is likely to be either the best or worst thing to happen to humanity.” ~Stephen Hawking Today's episode discusses machine learning (ML) & artificial intelligence (AI) which has become increasingly prominent in Communications Centers. Despite some pushbacks, it has already become an essential part of our daily lives. We are right, however, to slow down and wonder why it is advancing so fast, who has a stake in it, and what we can do to correct its course if necessary. Most importantly, what happens when AI begins to think on its own and becomes self-aware? Some leaders speak of the potential of machine learning (ML) & artificial intelligence (AI), and how it's nothing short of miraculous, but could the blessing be a curse? But as the saying goes, with great power comes great responsibility. What about you, what do you think of ML/AI in your Communications Center. wespeakdispatch@gmail.com With our podcast plays are passing 26,000 in over 45 countries we're not sure what you're listening to, but maybe you should be tuning into ours!! Most episodes are about 15 minutes which is perfect for the drive to/from work, or on a break. We have so many amazing guests, and you could be too - send us an email or DM and we can make that happen. Watch or listen to us on your favorite podcast platform or YouTube, Facebook, Instagram & even Tiktok www.linktr.ee/WeSpeakDispatch Thanks to our sponsor Watson Consoles – please visit them at: www.watsonconsoles.com #IAM911#WSD2023#911DISPATCHERS#watsonconsoles
MDJ Script/ Top Stories for Nov 21st Publish Date: Nov 20th Commercial: Henssler :15 From the Henssler Financial Studio, Welcome to the Marietta Daily Journal Podcast. Today is Tuesday, November 21st and Happy heavenly Birthday to MLB HOF Stan ‘The Man' Musial. ***3000th HIT*** I'm Dan Radcliffe and here are the stories Cobb is talking about, presented by Credit Union of Georgia. Kennesaw Police and Kennesaw Acworth 911 Achieve Re-Accreditation Marietta Recognized By State Department Of Community Affairs Cobb Charities Work to Fight Rising Childhood Poverty All of this and more is coming up on the Marietta Daily Journal Podcast, and if you are looking for community news, we encourage you to listen and subscribe! BREAK: CU of GA STORY 1: Kennesaw Police and Kennesaw Acworth 911 Achieve Re-Accreditation The Kennesaw Police Department and the Kennesaw Acworth E-911 Communications Center have achieved re-accreditation from the Commission on Accreditation for Law Enforcement Agencies Inc. CALEA, established in 1979, aims to enhance public safety services by maintaining professional standards supporting accreditation programs. Kennesaw's qualification for the fifth consecutive time reflects exceptional leadership by Chief Bill Westenberger, officer performance, and community-based policing success. Mayor Derek Easterling commended the 911 Center's exceptional work, highlighting Director Nikki McGraw's flawless leadership. CALEA emphasizes best practices, safety initiatives, crime prevention, fair personnel practices, and community trust-building. The assessment involves proving compliance with approximately 500 standards, and both departments underwent successful re-accreditation, showcasing their commitment to excellence. STORY 2: 'Outstanding': Marietta Recognized By State Department Of Community Affairs Marietta has been newly recognized as one of Georgia's PlanFirst communities by the Department of Community Affairs. This designation, based on outstanding community engagement and successful implementation of the Local Comprehensive Plan for the 2024-2026 cycle, comes with benefits such as enhanced eligibility for incentives like reduced interest loans and Community Development Block Grants for schools. Marietta and Hawkinsville are the latest additions to PlanFirst, joining renewing communities like Bainbridge, Cornelia, and Perry. The designation, lasting three years from January 2024, is available to communities with Qualified Local Government status and an adopted Service Delivery Strategy. Visit www.dca.ga.gov for more information on PlanFirst and application requirements. STORY 3: Cobb Charities Work to Fight Rising Childhood Poverty Childhood poverty in Cobb, as reported by the U.S. Census Bureau, more than doubled from 2021 to 2022. MUST Ministries CEO Dr. Dwight "Ike" Reighard highlighted the significant impact on Cobb's children during a talk to the East Cobb Area Council. MUST Ministries, which gave away one ton of food daily in 2019, now distributes approximately four and a half tons daily, with much going to children. Reighard emphasized the importance of collaboration among local charities to combat poverty. He addressed misconceptions about poverty, noting that many affected individuals work multiple jobs. The Cobb community, with an abundance mentality and collaborative spirit, is working together to address this growing issue. MUST Ministries invites community members to volunteer. Visit mustministries.org for more information. We have opportunities for sponsors to get great engagement on these shows. Call 770.799.6810 for more info. We'll be right back Break: ESOG – ELON – DAYCO STORY 4: Sweetwater Mission, VFW Lead Food Donations For Thanksgiving The Sweetwater Mission, VFW Post 5408 in Acworth, and Combat Veterans Motorcycle Association Chapter 25-8 of Northwest Georgia collaborated to deliver Thanksgiving meals to families facing food insecurities in Acworth. Each family received a substantial selection, including a 10-14 pound turkey, green beans, corn, rice, pumpkin, cranberry sauce, canned vegetables, and stuffing. Approximately 23,000 pounds of food were donated, with a line stretching back to Cedarcrest Church. Chapter 25-8 played a crucial role in traffic control and distribution. The goal is to donate 8,500 turkeys across Cobb County, ensuring a proper holiday for as many people as possible. The event aimed to support those experiencing food insecurity during the holiday season, reflecting the charitable spirit of veterans. STORY 5: Organizers Say Turkey Chase In Acworth May Break Record The 15th annual Turkey Chase in Acworth drew hundreds of runners for a 5K and 2K on a cool sunny day. The potential record turnout, estimated at 800 to 1,000 runners, resulted in a significant number of food donations benefiting the Tackle Hunger program. Pre-registration surpassed last year's total, with approximately 775 participants, and an expected total close to 900. Proceeds from the event will support Hull Heights, a Marietta Housing Authority community, providing canned goods and $10 Ingles gift cards for Thanksgiving. Participants filled a trailer with donated food, contributing to the city's goal of assisting local food pantries during the holiday season. We'll be back in a moment Break: DRAKE – INGLES 8 STORY 6: Georgia Seeing High Flu-Like Activity, Cobb Health Director Says Dr. Janet Memark, the director of Cobb & Douglas Public Health, warns of high flu-like activity in Georgia, with 19 flu-related hospitalizations in metro Atlanta over the past two weeks. Memark emphasizes the availability of flu shots at all CDPH locations as the best defense against the flu. Additionally, she reports 161 new COVID-19 cases in Cobb and 41 in Douglas County over the last two weeks. Memark highlights the availability of the updated COVID vaccine for everyone, stressing its importance, especially for older adults and those with chronic medical conditions. STORY 7: Maker of Hand Sanitizing Machines in Cobb Schools Files for Bankruptcy Carmel-based company 3Oe Scientific, maker of hand-sanitizing machines used by Cobb County School District, has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. The company lists nearly $8.1 million in liabilities and $118,814 in assets. The handwashing machines, known as Iggy, were part of a $12 million initiative in 2020 to combat COVID-19 in Cobb schools. Critics, including the Watching the Funds — Cobb watchdog group, claim the devices have broken at multiple schools, calling it a "complete waste of money." Despite the bankruptcy, the school district maintains a warranty contract with 3Oe Scientific for repairs and replacements to Iggy devices. Break: Henssler :60 Signoff- Thanks again for hanging out with us on today's Marietta Daily Journal podcast. If you enjoy these shows, we encourage you to check out our other offerings, like the Cherokee Tribune Ledger Podcast, the Gwinnett Daily Post, the Community Podcast for Rockdale Newton and Morgan Counties, or the Paulding County News Podcast. Read more about all our stories and get other great content at MDJonline.com. Did you know over 50% of Americans listen to podcasts weekly? Giving you important news about our community and telling great stories are what we do. Make sure you join us for our next episode and be sure to share this podcast on social media with your friends and family. 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In this episode of CEO Perspectives, Ivan Pollard, Leader of the Marketing and Communications Center, joins Steve Odland, President and CEO, both of The Conference Board, to discuss marketing to multiple generations. Tune in to find out: Do the fundamentals of marketing remain the same across generations? How can marketers exploit differences and similarities between generations? Does mass marketing still have a role to play? Why do marketing messages today function more like a “neural network” than a one-way transmission to a target? Are there shared events or universal experiences that marketers can still tap into across generations?
This episode features our latest sponsor - Watson Consoles - we're talking the latest in Communications Center furniture and what's on the horizon as far as technology, ergonomics and what they offer. They have a Special FREE Thank You gift for 911 Dispatchers, simply visit watsonconsoles.com/badge or scan the QR code. It's a limited edition and only available through June 4th, 2023 Don't forget to like our Facebook & Instagram pages and subscribe to our YouTube page for our latest videos. We're on just about every podcast platform, so you have no reason to miss another episode. Want to be a guest or have a topic idea – let us know! Give us 15 minutes & we'll get you talking! Find us on your favorite podcast platform or YouTube, Facebook, & even Tiktok www.linktr.ee/WeSpeakDispatch https://www.facebook.com/watsonconsoles #Iam911 #WSD #911DISPATCHERS #watsonconsoles
In January of 2023, a Tucson area man was having an apparent mental health crisis and called 911. After speaking with a 911 call taker, attempts were made to use a mental health professional to help communicate with the man. Unfortunately upon officer arrival at the apartment complex, them man refused to drop his guns and he fired a shot in an unknown direction. The man's behavior posed a threat to the safety other citizens as well as to the officers. Officers shot the man and immediately began to render first aid. The man was transported to a local hospital where it is believed he is recovering. This call type is frequent in a typical 911 Communications Center, and demonstrates the heavy load that 911 and emergency dispatchers often face, but rarely discuss. The heaviness transitions to the weight that officers feel when dealing with armed suicidal people. Former dispatcher and retired cop Drew, and former officer and current dispatcher Jon will discuss the audio of the 911 call. They will also review the officer bodycam footage and the apartment's surveillance footage to help discuss the police response. If you're tired of taking calls and hearing everyone's complaints, this is the show for you. Whether you're a dispatcher, a cop, or a firefighter/paramedic, this is your chance to sound off and be part of the problem for once. Call our non-emergency line at ******(848) COMM-911****** ******(848) 266-6911******** SPONSORED BY: Ghostbed | Use Code: WOLFPACK - Save 35% Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Having the right mindset is important for achieving success in any area of life. It involves cultivating a positive and proactive attitude, an openness to learning and growth, and the ability to adapt to changing circumstances. Here are some tips for developing a positive and productive mindset:Practice gratitude: Focus on the things you are grateful for, rather than dwelling on negative thoughts and experiences.Set clear goals: Having specific and measurable goals can help you stay motivated and focused on what you want to achieve.Stay positive: Try to maintain a positive outlook, even when faced with challenges or setbacks.Practice self-care: Take care of your physical and emotional well-being by getting enough sleep, exercising regularly, and engaging in activities that bring you joy and relaxation.Seek support: Surround yourself with supportive people who can help you stay motivated and focused on your goals.By cultivating a positive and proactive mindset, you can increase your chances of success and lead a more fulfilling and rewarding life.ABOUT PATRICKPatrick Carney is a professional artist, networker, keynote speaker, and referral training consultant.Specialties: Pen & Ink, Acrylic portraits, Mastermind facilitator, DISC, Referral Trainer, NetworkerAs a young art student at the School of Visual Arts in New York City, Patrick Carney had the privilege to study with Chuck Close, Marge Anderson, Robert Israel and Milton Glaser. Each of these teachers had a profound impact on his life and he has many fond memories of each one. While attending Buffalo State, he worked as a specialist in media at the Communications Center. Then later, he was named the Art Director of the Lafayette Community Center where he taught art to inner city children. And for a time, he traveled through out the state of New York as an Artist in Residence at underprivileged high schools, as a representative for the Arts Council. Patrick also volunteered as an art teacher in the state prison system, believing that it was his obligation to give back, "pass on" his given talents. Such a diversified background at a very young age, however, he was always drawn to the music and those talented individuals who spoke to his soul.Born and raised in New York, Patrick started hanging out in NY's West Village around 1964, and dedicated his time to drawing and painting the world of rock n' roll music where he soon became an influential documentary artist of rock's most celebrated musicians. He traveled throughoutFOLLOW ME
With over 50 years of service, there's not much that this 3rd generation first responder hasn't seem. Barry Furey started his firefighting career when he was just 18 years old. And some of the things he saw early on in his career quickly prepared him for the rest of his life. Of course he has funny stories, dangerous stories and just downright heartbreaking stories. But in the end, he's just a good guy that's dedicated his life to helping others. He's also an author of two books and has contributed to numerous magazine articles. What a wonderful treat it was to share time with Barry Furey. You can learn more about the 9-1-WHAT? Podcast and see videos at https://www.91what.com Be sure to support our sponsors: Eric Buchanan & Associates - https://www.buchanandisability.com/ Carlos Bail Bonding - https://www.bailbondsmanchattanooga.com/ If you'd like to be a sponsor, email us at 91what.podcast@gmail.com.
Ep. 35 A special episode in reaction to the devastation of Hurricane Ian and the impact on first responders. Joining me for the second time on the podcast is Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office retired Lt. Drew Breasy to talk about this response, in particular the first responders we don't see – the 911 Call Takers and Dispatchers, the “first” first responders as Drew calls them. Drew lives in the Tampa area which was initially in Hurricane Ian's direct path. Drew started his career as a Dispatcher and 911 Call Taker and later returned to the Communications Center as a lieutenant. He has insight into the very specific trauma these first first responders experience. He also continues to lobby for better treatment of Communications specialists who are categorized as clerical staff without the pay, benefits or wellness training that first responders receive. Info on how you can help is below through the 911 Saves Act. In his 29 years in LE, Drew has seen his share of hurricanes in the Tampa area. We talk about how all first responders leave their own families and homes behind to rescue those caught in the storm, not knowing what they will return to. LE has the added challenge of policing while saving lives. Many of the LEOs I've spoken to in the course of the podcast have worked through natural disasters ranging from wildfires to hurricanes, tornadoes, blizzards, earthquakes and more. It's part of the job most of us don't often think about. I'm glad I was able to cover some aspects of these particular challenges. And take a moment to thank all first responders, those we see, and those we don't for what you do in extreme circumstances like this. And for what you do every day to protect the rest of us. Drew and I also talk about the important work of Team South Florida, an all-volunteer, non-profit organization. Their primary mission is to honor and remember those Law Enforcement Officers who have been killed in the line of duty while supporting their agencies and their families. Their secondary mission is to bridge the gap between Law Enforcement and the communities they live and work in. In response to the Hurricane, Team South Florida has stepped up to support first responders through donations that cover everything from food and water, to diapers, flashlights, toiletries and other services they need. You can find them on their website and social media and if you are so inclined, make a donation. https://www.teamsouthflorida.org/ (https://www.teamsouthflorida.org/) https://www.facebook.com/TmSouthFlorida (https://www.facebook.com/TmSouthFlorida) https://www.instagram.com/teamsouthflorida/ (https://www.instagram.com/teamsouthflorida/) Twitter: @TmSouthFlorida Here is the flyer with specific needs that Drew mentioned: https://mcusercontent.com/affe9705f31024d1058eab6f8/files/e3825dfd-b06c-4e9b-42f8-bfa44a334684/Flyer_Final.pdf (https://mcusercontent.com/affe9705f31024d1058eab6f8/files/e3825dfd-b06c-4e9b-42f8-bfa44a334684/Flyer_Final.pdf) The 911 Saves Act we discussed: The 911 SAVES Act is bipartisan legislation to reclassify 911 dispatchers from “Office and Administrative Support” to “Protective Service Occupations” in the Office of Management and Budget's Standard Occupational Classification (SOC) catalog. Get involved by writing to your representatives in support of this legislation. Here is a press release with details: https://torres.house.gov/media-center/press-releases/torres-fitzpatrick-include-9-1-1-saves-act-amendment-ndaa (https://torres.house.gov/media-center/press-releases/torres-fitzpatrick-include-9-1-1-saves-act-amendment-ndaa) Where to find Andrew Baxter a.k.a. Drew Breasy Instagram: drew_breasy Facebook: Drew Breasy Uncuffed https://youtube.com/c/DrewBreasy linktr.ee/Drew Breasy LinkedIn: Andrew Baxter Failure To Stop on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCShU5ZCwvbeFZ5zADRzrlhQ...
The work of Durham's Emergency Communications Center, better known as 9-1-1, is critical. How quickly a call is answered, the information they provide, as well as the information the caller provides, can mean the difference between life and death. In this CityLife episode, host Beverly Thompson talks with Randy Beeman, Emergency Communications Center Director, and Assistant Director Tangela Walker, to talk about the work of the center and what its staff is doing every day to ensure that Durham is a safe and secure community. About CityLifeCityLife, a talk show that features information on current City issues and upcoming events, airs daily on Durham Television Network (Spectrum ch. 8, Frontier ch. 70 and AT&T U-verse ch. 99) and on Roku, Apple TV and Amazon Fire TV on the free Boxcast app. For more information about the City of Durham, call (919) 560-4123, like on Facebook, and follow on Twitter, Instagram, and Nextdoor. City Life is now an audio podcast! Find it on iTunes or wherever you get your podcast.
Sheriff Will Akin has over 27 years of combined experience in the military and law enforcement. With over 8 years of active duty service in the United States Army, Will gained leadership and management experience as both a Non-Commissioned Officer and as a Chief Warrant Officer. He enlisted in the Army in October 1994 and after working four years as a Parachute Rigger; he attended the Army's flight program and spent the next four years as a pilot flying the UH-60 Blackhawk Helicopter. After being honorably discharged from the Army in February 2003, he began his law enforcement career when he attended the Arizona Law Enforcement Academy in April 2003. As a Police Advisor in Afghanistan from 2009 to 2012, Will assessed, monitored, advised, and mentored local police in order to ensure that law and order were maintained effectively and impartially according to the principles of policing. Topics under advisement during his time overseas included logistics, training, finance, case management, and operations. Will worked closely with the Department of Defense, Department of State, United Nations, and his Afghan counterparts to address issues concerning gender and human rights violations and worked toward solutions that were compatible with Afghanistan's culture. Sheriff Will Akin joined the Clay County Sheriff's Office in January 2013 as a Lieutenant in Field Operations. After his promotion to Captain in June 2015, he served as the Division Commander of the Emergency Preparedness Division and oversaw operations for Emergency Management, the 9-1-1 Communications Center, Public Information, and Media Relations. Will was also the appointed Director of Emergency Management for Clay County and served in that capacity until December 31, 2020. On January 1, 2021, Will assumed his new duties as the 42nd Sheriff of Clay County's 200 year history. Will is an active member in the community as well. He serves as the Post Commander for the Liberty Memorial VFW Post #4043, is a member of the American Legion Post #95, and the Liberty Rotary Club #6040. Originally from California, Will has lived in many states throughout the U.S. as well as South Korea and Afghanistan. Will earned an A.S. in Behavioral Science from Georgia Military College, a B.S. in Criminal Justice and his M.B.A. in Management from California Coast University, a Graduate Certificate from the University of Virginia in Criminal Justice Education, and his Doctor of Education (Ed.D.) from Olivet Nazarene University in Ethical Leadership. Will is also a graduate of the FBI National Academy Session 264 thewashdownpodcast@gmail.com #NeverAloneAlwaysForward
Sheriff Will Akin has over 27 years of combined experience in the military and law enforcement. With over 8 years of active duty service in the United States Army, Will gained leadership and management experience as both a Non-Commissioned Officer and as a Chief Warrant Officer. He enlisted in the Army in October 1994 and after working four years as a Parachute Rigger; he attended the Army's flight program and spent the next four years as a pilot flying the UH-60 Blackhawk Helicopter. After being honorably discharged from the Army in February 2003, he began his law enforcement career when he attended the Arizona Law Enforcement Academy in April 2003. As a Police Advisor in Afghanistan from 2009 to 2012, Will assessed, monitored, advised, and mentored local police in order to ensure that law and order were maintained effectively and impartially according to the principles of policing. Topics under advisement during his time overseas included logistics, training, finance, case management, and operations. Will worked closely with the Department of Defense, Department of State, United Nations, and his Afghan counterparts to address issues concerning gender and human rights violations and worked toward solutions that were compatible with Afghanistan's culture. Sheriff Will Akin joined the Clay County Sheriff's Office in January 2013 as a Lieutenant in Field Operations. After his promotion to Captain in June 2015, he served as the Division Commander of the Emergency Preparedness Division and oversaw operations for Emergency Management, the 9-1-1 Communications Center, Public Information, and Media Relations. Will was also the appointed Director of Emergency Management for Clay County and served in that capacity until December 31, 2020. On January 1, 2021, Will assumed his new duties as the 42nd Sheriff of Clay County's 200 year history. Will is an active member in the community as well. He serves as the Post Commander for the Liberty Memorial VFW Post #4043, is a member of the American Legion Post #95, and the Liberty Rotary Club #6040. Originally from California, Will has lived in many states throughout the U.S. as well as South Korea and Afghanistan. Will earned an A.S. in Behavioral Science from Georgia Military College, a B.S. in Criminal Justice and his M.B.A. in Management from California Coast University, a Graduate Certificate from the University of Virginia in Criminal Justice Education, and his Doctor of Education (Ed.D.) from Olivet Nazarene University in Ethical Leadership. Will is also a graduate of the FBI National Academy Session 264 thewashdownpodcast@gmail.com #NeverAloneAlwaysForward
Dispatchers, call-takers, emergency communications officers – our 911 communications staff are our first first responders. They work to ensure that patients receive the right resources for their emergencies. But sometimes, it goes wrong. According to a recently filed lawsuit, a Pennsylvania dispatcher refused to send an ambulance to a patient, resulting in the patient's death. The incident was allegedly so egregious that the local district attorney filed criminal charges against the dispatcher and his leadership. In this episode, Nick and Samantha discuss the case of Titchennell v. Greene County, Pennsylvania, and explore the liability issues for 911 centers. Please like, comment, and subscribe! Links: Kelly D. Titchenell, Administratrix of the Estate of Diania L. Kronk, deceased v. Greene County and Robert J. “Jeff Rhodes”, individually and as an employee of Greene County Emergency Management/911 Communications Center; and Leon Price, individually and as an employee of Greene County Emergency Management/911 Communications Center, Individually and Severally, United States District Court, Western District of Pennsylvania, No. 2:22-CV-890. CBS Interactive. (2022, July 22). 3 More Charged After 911 Operator Accused of Not Sending Help. CBS News. Retrieved September 1, 2022, from https://www.cbsnews.com/news/911-operator-accused-of-not-sending-help-three-more-charged/ Mark Scolforo | The Associated Press. (2022, July 8). Pa. 911 Dispatcher Charged with Manslaughter After Failing to Send Ambulance. Pennlive. Retrieved September 1, 2022, from https://www.pennlive.com/news/2022/07/pa-911-dispatcher-charged-with-manslaughter-after-failing-to-send-ambulance.html See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
One of the nation's best known Sheriffs, Brevard County Sheriff Wayne Ivey, says his department and law enforcement throughout Florida will take immediate action to save lives should a school shooting incident happen in the Sunshine State.His comments come in the wake of the Uvalde, Texas school massacre that left many questioning why law enforcement officers did not storm the school and save more lives. Sheriff Ivey gives detailed information to Sam Yates, the anchorman for the Florida Business Forum Podcast using his employees as examples of what kind of response could have and should have taken place.Sheriff Ivey, who is also developing law enforcement training programs for Florida, also takes us inside the operations of his 9-1-1 Command Center as he details the importance of the Communications Center on the wellbeing of his citizens and his employees and first responders. Please feel free to share and subscribe to the Florida Business Forum Podcast so you can continue to stay informed and grow your business.
Ep. 31 Joining me is Andrew Baxter, a.k.a., Drew Breasy, creator and host of the popular social media channel “Drew Breasy Uncuffed” which he launched after retiring a year ago. It is, in his words, “the unapologetically honest opinion of a retired police lieutenant.” First, we look back on Drew's 29 years with the Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office (Tampa area). We talk about why he knew “come hell or high water” he would become a deputy with HCSO. We then jump into his resume which is so impressive, I focused on what, to me, is the stuff of TV shows including his work both as a detective and a supervisor in undercover narcotics, informant handling, wire taps, and much more. Drew started in the Communications Center as a 911 Operator and Dispatcher and returned there later in his career as Lieutenant. We talk about the trauma specific to dispatch and call takers and their importance as “first” first responders. All of this experience informs “Drew Breasy Uncuffed.” He addresses widely distributed but often inaccurate reporting on law enforcement, whether it's issues or incidents. He does his research and digs through all the details on LE's involvement for cases that range in nature, but which have captured traditional and social media attention – from Gabby Petito and Brian Laundrie, to Breonna Taylor, Jacob Blake, to the tragedy in Uvalde. As Drew says, he is now able to speak freely, something active LEOs can't do. He comes from “a place of healing,” and his goal is to give a voice to those who don't have one. That's a goal we share. Here is where you can find him: Instagram: drew_breasy Facebook: Drew Breasy Uncuffed https://youtube.com/c/DrewBreasy linktr.ee/Drew Breasy LinkedIn: Andrew Baxter Please don't forget to follow or subscribe to the podcast. Feel free to leave a review. And find me on my social or email me your thoughts: Facebook: On Being a Police Officer Twitter: @AbbyEllsworth13 Instagram: on_being_a_police_officer Abby@Ellsworthproductions.com ©Abby Ellsworth. All interviews, editing, production done by Abby Ellsworth. Music courtesy of freesound.org
Carolina smoked Florida State on Saturday, but ahead of a Wednesday match-up with Pitt, the question remains: just how good are the Tar Heels? (4:15)The Media & Communications Center in Chapel Hill is officially being dedicated as the Woody Durham Media & Communications Center...Wes Durham joins to discuss the honor for his family and talk a little ACC basketball (26:15)Plus: could the "baseball rule" work in basketball? (58:20), should "lucky" pieces of clothes be worn if you are watching a recorded version of a game (1:11:33), great 1982 #Storytime (1:23:35) and women's tennis wins its third straight (and sixth in 10 years) indoor National Championship (1:32:37)See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
The Conference Board's timely annual survey of C-Suite Executives is out and it provides fascinating insights for marketers and communicators. What are C-Suite executives focusing on and how will it help marketers navigate what lies ahead with more certainty? Join Ivan Pollard, Leader of The Conference Board Marketing and Communications Center, and Denise Dahlhoff, Senior Researcher as they unveil the data from this year's C-Suite Outlook through the lens of Marketing & Communications.
Ever since the mass adoption of all things digital, the job of a Chief Marketing Officer has become increasingly complex, changeable, and challenging. In 2008, Professor Christine Moorman at the Fuqua School of Business, launched “The CMO Survey” to quantify these challenges and understand how CMOs around the world were feeling about them. To discover the good news from the latest CMO Survey, join Christine and Ivan Pollard, leader of the Marketing and Communications Center at The Conference Board, as they discuss the new results and what lies ahead for marketers.
Calls for help are sometimes meeting long delays as the city's 911 system finds itself understaffed and overwhelmed.It is a potentially critical collapse in Seattle's public safety net and it could be months before the problem is solved. Until then, a balancing act is underway to better prioritize emergency calls.For every call taker who fills a chair at Seattle's Community Safety and Communications Center, there is an empty seat right next to the person. Chris Lombard, the department's interim director, said more than half the call taker positions are currently vacant.“We were not able to hire and train as fast as we were losing people all summer long,” Lombard said.https://komonews.com/news/local/staffing-crisis-impacting-response-to-911-calls-in-seattleSupport the show (https://www.patreon.com/seattlerealestatepodcast)
As hundreds of unvaccinated city employees are placed on leave or facing termination, the city of Seattle will start offering hiring bonuses to Seattle Police Department and 911 dispatch hires to address “critical ongoing staffing challenges,” Mayor Jenny Durkan's office said late Friday. Durkan announced an emergency order that would provide hiring bonuses of up to $25,000 for laterally hired and $10,000 for newly hired officers and staff to the SPD and the Community Safety and Communications Center.“When residents call 911, they expect an officer to show up — and when they call the 911 emergency line, they expect that someone will answer the phone,” Durkan said in a news release. “Hiring, recruiting and training takes months, and we need to act now to ensure we can have trained and deployable staff. Seattle cannot keep waiting to address the real public safety officer hiring and retention crisis we are experiencing in Seattle right now.”Join your host Sean Reynolds, owner of Summit Properties NW, and Reynolds & Kline Appraisal as he takes a look at this developing topic.https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/seattle-to-offer-hiring-bonuses-of-up-to-25k-to-attract-more-police-officers-911-dispatchers/Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/seattlerealestatepodcast)
Episode 44: 911 Communication Center Challenges in Active Shooter Events (Part 2)In Part 2 of this week's podcast, we are continuing our topic of 911 and the dispatch center during an active shooter event.Bill Godfrey:Welcome to the Active Shooter Incident Management Podcast. My name is Bill Godfrey, your podcast host. Today we're picking up part two coming back to our topic of 911 and the dispatch center during an active shooter event. I've asked our three instructors that were here for part one to come back and join us again. We've got Ken Lamb from the law enforcement side. Ken, thanks for coming back.Ken Lamb:Yes, sir. You're welcome.Bill Godfrey:Tom Billington from fire EMS.Tom Billington:Glad to be here again. More good information to cover.Bill Godfrey:Fantastic. And Leeanna Mims. Good to see you again.Leeanna Mims:Glad to be back.Bill Godfrey:All right, so let's get into part two. Let's talk about the non 911 phone calls that have to be made and come in. I'm talking about, I need mutual aid but I don't have an automatic CAD connection so I have to call this agency on the phone. Then the agency has to check with a supervisor, they've got to call me back. I've got every supervisor in the agency calling in because they think they're important enough to get a personal briefing on what's going on, on the incident. I've got a handful of notifications I've got to make to all of the off duty chiefs that don't, well, we used to all wear pagers, but don't respond to their notifications. We're required to give them these notices. I need to call EOC, emergency management, all these activations.And then you've got the media calling in. First of all, did I miss anything in that windup? And then what are some of the tips and suggestions we've got on how to manage that volume of calls coming in and out that are not 911, but still somewhat, I wouldn't call them all essential, but they're certainly related to the call.Tom Billington:I think one of the things that I've experienced in my career is you have to have systems in place, whether it's a reverse 911, automatic paging, automatic phone messaging, where instead of calling nine or 10 supervisors, the dispatcher pushes one button, it sends a message to nine or 10 supervisors - here's what's going on. Again are you talking about like systems like Everbridge, IPAWS, all those?Bill Godfrey:Yes.Tom Billington:That way. You don't have one dispatcher making multiple phone calls. And also you're going to get the politicians and the higher-ups calling you and you don't want to hang up on the mayor, that's not always a good job. So you want to make sure that you have a dispatcher that can handle that type of pressure, a separate person, just for that. We used to call it rumor control. It's phone calls that were not 911 intentive, but they were about the incident and they needed to talk to somebody to get an update.Ken Lamb:Yeah, just to add on to what Tom was saying, I think an idea as far as who to bring in to be the conduit to some of those communications would be your local EOC. Who is going to be more than willing and able to assist in these incidents and they have the contacts established. And letting them know exactly the need to know information, as well as plugging in your PIO, public information officer, and utilizing social media to get that information out to the public. Because presumably there's going to be some intelligence that comes in through some of those phone calls from the public at least, and you want a way to funnel some of that information.And when we talk about some of those internal contacts, I think that you can solve a lot of heartburn by having a notification system, to what Tom was saying, and making sure that you're putting out that information to the internal contacts, as well as the media, so that everyone's getting the same information. Because the last thing you want to do is start providing different information to different people. You want one clear and consistent message.Tom Billington:And, Ken, a good example of that through our history is the Amber alert. There is now a system in place where somebody types in a couple of words, push a button and thousands of people hear the right information that they all agree on and it goes out. So that's a real good example.Leeanna Mims:Well, and you know in advance who some of those calls are going to be from that are going to overload your system. And you have to have those discussions with them ahead of something happening and let them know what kind of procedures that you have in place. And one way to do that is with status updates, over whatever system that you have, and making sure ahead of time they know we are going to tell you as soon as we can what it is it's going on. On certain things this is how we have it categorized or broken down. Trust you're going to get an automatic notification. You're going to get an automatic notification again when we hit certain benchmarks.And for the most part, in a lot of those calls that are coming in, if they know that ahead of time, that's going to be all that they need. They need to be able to answer questions that they're receiving. And, in some cases, depending on who it is in your system, they have reason to know. They really do. But you don't want to make 50 phone calls. And then again, what Ken brought up, too, is the PIO. Your PIO in those cases really can serve as a liaison officer in helping field those calls, help dispatch sort what is immediate and what can wait till later.Ken Lamb:And I think in the context of this conversation, when we were talking about the call center dispatch center is recognizing that you need someone to start working on all this information that's making it into the dispatch center or the call receiving center, and reaching out to either the officer or the incident commander on the ground and saying it would be helpful for you send an officer up here to start sorting this information. Or reaching out to a comm center supervisor and saying we need someone else over here to start sorting through this information. Because the reality is there's nothing stopping this information from making it to the communication center. The important aspect is having a process in place to organize it, synthesize it, go through it, find out what's necessary and what's not. And then get it to the people that need to know in an efficient manner. So that if it's important and you need to act on, you can as quickly as possible.Bill Godfrey:And I don't want to leave this without distinguishing between two things. So one is the need of the incident itself. And when I say that I mean the idea that the intelligence officer needs to be able to go through the CAD notes, go through the incoming 911, go through the incoming text messages that came through the 911 texting system, and be able to process that for any actionable information related to the incident. So that's one bucket. The other bucket and the one we were just talking about that I think is, I don't want to say this in relation of importance, but certainly in terms of volume, is the bucket of all of those, what I'll call utility calls. Calls that the dispatchers have to make to get mutual aid moving, the notification calls, the calls that are coming into them.And, Leanna, you mentioned making arrangements for plans ahead of time, and I think part of that needs to be the supervisory staff at the comm center, having some discussions with the chiefs and with their higher-ups, to let them know there's a habit of people calling in and we get it, but when we have something like this, we're going to be slammed. What can we do? Can I say to you, when you call in, I don't have time to talk, but I need some additional people here. Can you send me a couple additional bodies just to kind of handle those what I'll call utility calls. You don't necessarily need to know how to use the CAD system. Because quite frankly, if you're a field responder and you've never been in 911, you walk in and sit down one of those consoles and you're lost. You don't have a clue how to use the radio, how to use the CAD system. Quite frankly, even how to use the phone.But at least with that bucket of utility calls, someone from the chief ranks or the supervisory ranks or just some additional line personnel, can come in and begin to handle some of those phone calls. We didn't specifically talk about texting on the 911 system, so I do want to mention that before we leave it. Many dispatch centers, not all, but many have implemented the ability to receive text messages sent to 911. And some more successfully than others. Part of what I want to hit on here is dispatchers, because they're so overloaded are, I think it was Tom earlier that said how quickly can I get them off the phone? How quickly can I say we've got that information we need to get off the phone, and move on to the next one.They're moving so quickly that they might move right over a key piece of information that really matters. And unfortunately we've seen this on a couple of after actions where it was discovered that there was some fairly actionable information that could have really mattered on the scene. And it just got missed because there was one person on duty or two people on duty trying to handle all this stuff. And so it's not like anybody did anything wrong. It's just the reality of it. But I didn't want to leave this topic without kind of talking about that.Tom Billington:And, Bill, I agree totally with the texting thing. There are rural areas of the country, which we teach at, they don't have all this technology.Bill Godfrey:Or more than one dispatcher on duty.Tom Billington:Right. So they have what's called a chain letter calling where the dispatcher calls one person, a fire officer or law enforcement officer, and that person's position is responsible for calling other positions, et cetera, et cetera. And so it's interesting how even the rural areas, they're very small, one or two dispatchers, three or four deputies, maybe volunteer fire department. There are things you can do if you practice it and put these systems in place.Bill Godfrey:Yeah. I think I've heard it called call tree before. Anybody else heard it called anything else? Okay. All right. Very good. Let's move on now. Let's talk a little bit about, so we're past the initial call, so we've got the call dispatched, the units are there, we're starting to move through the incident. Maybe the suspect is in custody or down, we're at the 10 minute mark moving into it. One of the things that I wanted to take a minute to talk about was kind of the typical timeline of these things and some of the key benchmarks, including elapsed time notifications. And so I want to talk about those for a minute.Ken Lamb:Right. I think one of the first critical benchmarks is for the arriving officer to identify the hot, warm, and cold zones. And it can be so difficult to forget because of the amount of information that that person is taking in who is on scene. I mean, you just think about the chaos that's going on, the yelling, the screaming, just everything that's going on. And then trying to report back the number of casualties and survivors and whatnot, for the dispatcher to prompt what is the warm zone, what is the hot zone, to the original officer, their first arriving officer, or tactical, so that we can have a more efficient and safe approach I think is so critical. Because the last thing anyone wants is A) an over-convergence on the target and B) officers getting engaged while they're in their cars. That's terrible. And the way we fix that is for the first arriving officer and the following officers to identify those hot, warm, and cold zones. And if they haven't done it, then the dispatcher having the knowledge to prompt that information on the radio from those officers.Bill Godfrey:Yeah, absolutely. I'd be happy if they just hit the hot zone. Honestly, I would be thrilled if in their size-up report, they got a quick size-up report, and just hit the hot zone.Leeanna Mims:That's absolutely true. And keeping in mind that warm zone, we need to know where it's at, too, for establishing that casualty collection point. We're trying to stop the bleeding, right? Stop the dying. We have to know where we're going to put people. And if we don't know where those zones are, that's really the starting point of where we're going to put that casualty collection point.Bill Godfrey:Yeah. So I think right there, and this is going to be a repetitive thing, we advocate very strongly that dispatchers should have the authority and the autonomy, of course along with the training, to know what these key benchmarks are. And when they're not hearing them to be able to gently prompt, and then prompt again, and then as necessary not so gently prompt. But Ken mentioned the opening the size-up report, that first officer's report, when they get there. What are they seeing? What are they hearing? Where's the hot zone? What are they doing? Are they going in? I think those are key elements. Obviously we want to make sure that somebody is taking charge. Somebody is taking a command.Ken Lamb:And we want to know when the suspect is engaged, what is the status? Understandably, an officer that just engaged the suspect is going to be going through a traumatic event and may not be putting all the information that's needed on the radio for an efficient and effective response. So if the officer puts over the radio that they've engaged the suspect and that's all, we need to know the status. Is the suspect still mobile? Is the suspect down? Where is the suspect? And that is information that the dispatcher can prompt from the officer to really streamline that response.Bill Godfrey:Yeah, absolutely. And I think so next up after that, so we got that initial arriving officer, we want to get that size-up report. We want to get the post engagement report if there is one. Staging? Need a staging location. If we're not hearing that, we want to ask. Hey, tactical, where were you going to set staging?Ken Lamb:The staging is so important. And I know there's been a number of podcasts on staging. I'm just a huge fan. And I'm a huge fan of a dispatcher understanding the importance of staging and prompting the location. And then after that, when you have various units that are coming up on the radio channel advising they're en route, the dispatcher advising them where staging is, putting it in the CAD so that officers can find it themselves. And in the newer CADS, in our jurisdiction, they update automatically. So it attempts to keep officers off the radio asking where do you need me? If we could just get rid of the officer coming on the radio saying, I'm on scene, where do you need me? I think we've achieved a monumental goal there.But I do think in working towards achieving that goal, the dispatcher can be a critical piece by advising every so many minutes that the staging location is here, or when officers are advising they're en route, reminding the officers to report to the staging location so that we can synchronize that spot, that response, and keep people from over converging on the target.Leeanna Mims:Well, and I think with that comes along with educating dispatch as to why we want to know. Not just because it's on our checklist, but because of just that. When that staging is created, it is there to prevent that overload of coming into the scene and that convergence onto the scene that creates the chaos and things that we've seen in multiple case studies when there is no staging, no gatekeeper. And I don't know that we do the right job of helping dispatch understand why that benchmark is so key for them to hit, and why they should push if they haven't heard where's it at and what's the location.Tom Billington:And Leanna, you just touched on a very important part. When we do our trainings, we incorporate dispatchers obviously into our training sessions. And so many times the dispatchers will thank us for involving them, they had no idea why we do this. Why we have to have staging and what is a rescue task force? Why did you do that? They had no idea. It was sort of like out of sight, out of mind. Where the dispatchers are sometimes forgotten and if they're not involved, they're not going to know what is needed on scene. So a good point, Leeanna.Bill Godfrey:They ought to be included in the training all the time.Ken Lamb:Absolutely. And I think that goes back to the original point that we started this, as many of them are short-staffed. So it's a challenge of leadership.Bill Godfrey:It is. And it's a budget hit. I get that. Because now you've got to pay overtime to have somebody. And I get it. But all right, so you don't have room in the budget this year. You're working on your budget for next year, put a number in there. Make that argument to the city manager, the county manager, we've got some gaps here and need to fill these gaps with training and it's going to cost a little. And if you don't want me to spend overtime for it, then give me an additional staffing.I realize it's not the easiest argument. Everybody at this table has had to make those arguments in budget meetings and we didn't win them all. But you win some of them, and you won't win any of them if you don't try. And there, I'm going to exit my soap box.So before we leave, let's talk about some of the other benchmarks. So we got the arrival report, we got staging. What are some of the other key marks? I like the suspect down report is a big benchmark, I think.Tom Billington:Well, Bill, something on that though we hear so many times on after action reports, the suspect is down. At five minutes later, a dispatcher is giving the description of a suspect and that they're on the loose still. So we have to make sure that that information is updated to all the dispatchers to save crucial time, looking for somebody that's already in custody.Ken Lamb:Right. And I think what happens right there is that's where the misinformation comes in. Because I've seen that firsthand on an incident that I responded to where the suspect was neutralized very quickly. And those calls were still making their way into the communication center. And that information was still being put out on the radio. So it instantly started this idea of maybe there's a second suspect. So you spend so much time and resources running down the ground, whether or not there's a second suspect. And it does take some really switched on people to realize that this is the same one. And it takes a leap of faith, right? To say, no, there isn't a second suspect. But if we know the percentages, and I think that one of the awesome values in this course is walking through some of that information and understanding that 99% of these have one suspect. And knowing that ahead of time I think equips you really run this down to ground before we put this out to the officers that there may be a second suspect.Bill Godfrey:Yeah, absolutely. So I think the other one, and I'm not sure we explicitly said that, though I think somebody touched on it earlier. When we get the staging location, everybody who's not on the scene, we want to update where they're going to be to that scene, especially the mutual aid. That's one of the ones I think you make that initial request, you make that first phone call to the state police or to county XYZ telling them about an active shooter at this location. Once a staging location is set, you need to update that phone call and say send them to this location now. Update the location and that'll help avoid the over convergence.Ken Lamb:Well, not only that, but there's one thing that I think it's commonly overlooked is the ability to send out the MDT message. So you just continue sending out that message to all the responders on the MDT or MDC, whichever acronym you want to use, and you can eliminate being on the radio. You can just keep sending that message out every five or 10 minutes. So when responders log on and they're going to that call, they don't even need to get on the radio to ask, they have a message on their MDT telling them if you're responding to this incident, this is the staging location. And if you don't have an assignment, go to this location.Tom Billington:And as soon as possible, we need to tell the media where to go. That is a whole nother issue. Your PIOs, you want to tell him.Bill Godfrey:I always want to tell the media where to go.Tom Billington:They're going to call in and ask what's going on? And if you can say to them, there is a joint information center set up at the Sear's parking lot at such and such street, go there right now. They will go there. And that takes a lot more stress off the responders and people just showing up.Bill Godfrey:All right, what are the other benchmarks?Leeanna Mims:I just want to say I'm following up to what Tom just had said about the media. That's one of the calls that overloads your communication center. So if that information is out there where they need to go, hopefully that will help them, too, as far as cutting down on the number of calls they've got to filter.Tom Billington:Where's the command post? That's another big one.Bill Godfrey:Oh yeah, big one. Command post location.Ken Lamb:Yes, you definitely want to give the brass a location to go.Bill Godfrey:Somebody in command.Ken Lamb:Yes, absolutely. Who's in command?Bill Godfrey:Who's in charge?Ken Lamb:Right, because we know when we read these after actions, that's one of the biggest common after action item is - I didn't know who was in command. Well, if the dispatch knows that and they can, again, either say it on the radio or send out messages and say this person's in command, I think it clears up that. But I think another benchmark is, have you transported those survivors? Or those who have been impacted? Those who have been injured? Have they been transported off the scene?Bill Godfrey:First patient transported and then last patient transported?Leeanna Mims:What else is important through all of that too is we want to know when the scene's secure. And it used to be for fire we didn't go in at all until we heard a scene secure report. Well, now we're already there. We might be part of an RTF or wherever we are in the command structure, but we all want to know when everything has been neutralized. Whether it be one suspect, two suspects.Bill Godfrey:That's another one, suspect neutralized, suspect left the scene. I think one of the big gaps is that a lot of law enforcement agencies don't realize how important it is to relay that information to the fireside dispatch. Suspect descriptions. Suspect is down. Those are important things to be relayed over. The other one is the command post. There's nothing magic that says law enforcement has to set the command post or fire has to set it. We call out in our checklist for the law enforcement side to begin structuring that. But in some cases, fire department may set a command post location. That needs to be relayed to law enforcement so that we don't end up with two command posts. And if there's a problem with where somebody set it, then we fix it together and everybody moves. All right, any other benchmarks that are the critical ones that you can think of?Ken Lamb:I have a critical one, in my mind, that's not on our list, but that I think would be valuable. Have you co-located with fire rescue? I think it's so common.Bill Godfrey:That is on our list, Ken.Ken Lamb:But what I'm asking, is dispatch asking this, right? As a dispatcher, am I asking this of the supervisor on scene? I know we teach the importance of it. No doubt. And I hope and believe that anyone going through this course at the end of the two or three day course understand the value in doing that. I do believe that. But what I think would be valuable is if a dispatcher prompts the supervisor, the police supervisor, or the FD supervisor, have you co-located with either the police or have you co-located with fire rescue. So that we're stressing the importance of that, because it's easy to forget. You're focused on what you're trying to accomplish with your people and you forget because we don't practice this every day.Bill Godfrey:And for the dispatchers that are listening to this, I'll give you the big tip off, that they're not co-located. When whoever's in charge for law enforcement is asking you to relay things to whoever's in charge for fire? They're not in the same spot. When whoever's in charge of Fire-EMS is asking you to relay things to cops? They're not in the same spot. And that's a problem that we need to get fixed. Okay. The other thing before we leave benchmarks, it's kind of tied in and related, and that is elapsed time notifications. I want to kind of talk about that. So we recommend that starting at the 10 minute mark dispatchers, both on law enforcement and the Fire-EMS side, broadcast just in the blind real quick, the elapsed time notification. All units 10 minutes elapsed time, 10 minutes elapsed time. And then every five minutes or after, 15 minutes elapsed time, all units, 20 minutes elapsed time, 20 minutes elapsed time. And just to kind of keep that present, let's talk a little bit about why that's so important.Ken Lamb:The first thing that comes to mind with me is that you want to get those patients to the hospital within that golden hour. And unless you've gone through this course in law enforcement, that's not one of the initial concerns that you have. Initial concern is stop the killing, all right? And then we get to stop the dying. But you really don't understand the timeframe that you want to stop the dying, right? We're focused on providing that critical treatment that we can provide as police officers. But as a supervisor, you've got to start looking big picture and you understand I have an hour that I need to solve this. At least the immediate priorities, that being an active threat and the rescue. So it's a good reminder to me that I'm 20 minutes into this. Where am I at? Have I got these individuals transported? Am I working with my fire rescue EMS partners to get an ambulance down range? And I think when you ask that question, that's the first thing that came to mind for me.Bill Godfrey:Absolutely. If you're 20 minutes in and nobody's been transported, there's a problem. You need to get on it. Yeah. Tom, how about you? You got anything you want to add on the elapsed time notifications?Tom Billington:I agree totally there. Unless you take this course, which everybody should, stop the killing, stop the dying. Once that threat is neutralized or the threat may have left, having somebody remind you, 10 minutes, there's no stimulus we can find somebody. Let's start saving people. Let's start the tourniquets and let's start getting the rescue task forces and let's set up the CCP. So it does remind you. And so many times I've been on scenes in my career where I feel like I've been there for three days. It turns out it was only there for a couple of hours. So it kind of brings you back to reality check of how much time is going on. What can you shave off time to save some people? And what should you be doing?Leeanna Mims:Yeah. And I'll really pose this to Ken because it's really his wheel. I would think that on the law enforcement side, when you're caught up in the adrenaline of trying to catch an active shooter, you're not thinking about the clock. And when you hear that and if 10 minutes has gone by, 20 minutes has gone by and 30 minutes and nobody has yet reported that the suspect has been shot or neutralized, I would think that there's a whole nother thought process that you have to go through. Where has he gone? Is he still on the scene? Did he move to someplace else? And if he did, where would that might be? And really I don't know what all those questions would be, but I would think hearing that 10 minute prompt, 20 minute prompt, would help you start to switch the mindset.Ken Lamb:Oh, absolutely. And you should, as a police officer, have the ability to switch gears the entire time. You're never stuck in concrete. And that's the name of the game in active shooter response for law enforcement is being flexible. And when you don't have that active stimulus, realizing that my next important priority is rescue. So do I have individuals that I can provide that critical life safety medical response as a police officer? And for the initial responders, is it as important to hear the timeline? Probably not. The first arriving are solely focused on finding the active threat and then providing that rescue.I think the time prompts are very important to the supervisors to understand, to remind them, you are under a time crunch, you don't have all day on this. You have an hour to knock out the first two priorities. And if you don't have an active threat, then the rescue is the most important priority. So you need to start focusing all your efforts into beating that clock. And that's why I believe we start our presentation on that clock because the reality is if the suspect is not currently shooting at them, then the clock is killing them. So that needs to be our intention. And I think it's a good reminder that if the suspect is not shooting them, then the clock is our biggest enemy. So start focusing on beating the clock.Bill Godfrey:You have to keep the clock in front of everybody. It's the critical piece of this. We teach in class when you're the supervisor on one of these things, what you're listening for and looking for is active threat is neutralized. RTF's downrange. Ambulance exchange point is set. We're transporting patients. And there's an expected timeline really that you should try to have in your head. I mean, the goal is try to get everybody transported in 20 minutes. Now that's easier said than done. It's achievable. But it's easier said than done. But as I commented earlier, if you're at the 15 minute mark or the 20 minute mark and the RTF's are not down range, that's a red flag. Why? What has gone wrong? What do we need to do? I'm hearing the 25 minute benchmark, my RTFs have been down range for 10 minutes and I've got no ambulance exchange points set up. That's going to be a problem. That's going to catch up with me real soon.Because in just a minute or so, RTF's are going to start telling me they're ready to transport and we've missed that extra step. And so I think keeping that clock in front of everybody, the reality is study after study has shown when you're in cognitive overload, time plays a funny game in your head. It can get very elastic. It can seem very slow. It can seem very fast. And Tom said he can feel like he's been there three days, and it's only been a couple hours. I've experienced the reverse of that, where somebody has said you've been at for 20 minutes and it seemed like only five or six minutes has gone by. And so I think that's one of the really, really important reasons to provide those elapsed time notifications.Ken Lamb:And I'll just wrap it up on this. I also think that it provides an opportunity for every member of the team to recenter their focus. So if tactical is so focused on what's going on in the inner perimeter, inside the target, which he or she should be, then the first arriving supervisor can say 20 minutes, we don't have ambulances downrange. Hey tactical, are we getting ambulances down there? Do we have the CCP established? So it's just a good reminder, I think, for the entire team.Bill Godfrey:Yeah. And let me be clear. There may be a really good reason why that stuff hasn't happened by that timeline, but you better at least be asking the question and having it. Okay. So we talked a little bit earlier about getting additional resources in the dispatch center. And Tom mentioned the call tree a call down tree or some sort of notification. That was one of the things that we wanted to talk about. Just make sure that you've got a procedure or policy for being able to call in some additional help that can help you with move ups and community coverage, backfill, those kinds of things. Can also start going through the data with intelligence, whoever comes in from intelligence to kind of go through the stuff with you.But lastly, before we wrap this up, I want to talk a little bit about, and I hate to use the word trend, but the very real possibility that a suspect is going to call 911 and have a conversation with a dispatcher. And how our lack of training and preparing dispatchers, people can throw all kinds of reasons at it, but at the end of the day, this is happening. I want to talk a little bit about that reality and some of the things that we might suggest to make that better.Ken Lamb:Right. So I believe it occurs because there's a void in communication from when the incident starts into what we presume is a hostage taking situation or there's some time there where they have the ability to make a phone call, and it stresses the importance that our dispatchers understand what questions to ask and what information to gain so that we can get it to either the responders who are on scene or the hostage negotiators who are going to be responding, 20-30 minutes later, whatever that timeline is. To quickly spin them up as quick as possible.And I think there's really critical things such as I'm going to shoot these individuals in 10 seconds. If you don't understand the necessity of that information and getting it to the responders, that could be tragic because that will launch a group of trained responders in order to go neutralize the threat. Okay. So just having a good understanding of what information needs to make it to those responders immediately, I think is critical. And it really goes back to stress the importance of training with these dispatchers when we have these scenarios or these exercises, whether it's a tabletop or in person, so that they see the necessity to get that information. Because it seems like we plug in hostage negotiators, but we don't always plug in our communication dispatchers. And that's really important.Leeanna Mims:Hostage negotiators are trained and experienced. And, sure, it's hard to convey all of that in training to dispatchers. But I think what is critical is that we teach them what not to do. What not to do, what not to say. Because all they have to do is make one error that they don't even recognize and you don't know where it's going to send that shooter. You don't know where it's going to send them.Tom Billington:And it's happening more and more. I read more after action reports and more than ever, the bad guy calls 911. They want to give their signed declaration, or they want to say what they're doing. They want to talk about hostages. And the poor dispatcher is caught answering the 911 call, if they have not had any kind of training, like Leeanna just said, what should the dispatcher say? What kind of pointers do we give dispatchers? And obviously we know that there are training abilities to the FBI for telecommunicators on the negotiation, but also just some tips.Such as if you're talking to somebody on the phone who's a bad person, you don't want that person hearing what's going on over the radio. We're making entry or we're doing this. So just some tips about telling the dispatchers that if you do get a call, you want to seclude yourself. You want to make sure that the other dispatchers know what you're doing and they're supporting you so you're not having to do multiple tasks. There's all sorts of things, but again, it's happening more and more. And if it's not the bad person calling, it's the hostages themselves. We've had so many incidents in the last few years where somebody calls 911 and says I am one of the hostages, what should I do? And it kind of puts the 911 dispatcher in a dilemma. What should they tell this person?Bill Godfrey:I think all of that is great stuff. And I'll say this doesn't have to be something that costs you a lot of money. Most agencies have a hostage negotiator. Even fairly small police departments typically have somebody that plays that role, or they partner with an agency that does. Ask them to come in and spend a day training. Spend a day with a dispatch crew and run them through some training and some scenarios and kind of help them with it because the stakes are too high. It's not fair to the dispatchers to know that this is a possibility they're going to get put in this role and then provide them no training, no help. That's just really not, not acceptable anymore.All right. Well, I think we have come to a good place to wrap this up. I want to say thank you very much to all the listeners who've stayed with us through this two-part series. And I want to especially thank my instructors for doing this in two pieces, because we just had so much here to cover. It was more than we wanted to do in a single podcast. So thank you very much, Ken, Tom, Leeanna, thank you for being here. Thanks to our producer, Karla, for putting this together as always. Until next time stay safe.
Episode 43: 911 Communication Center Challenges in Active Shooter Events (Part 1)In Part 1 of this week's podcast, we talk about some of the challenges in the 911 dispatch center during an active shooter event. A few topics we cover are the best sense of location, radio traffic, and recognizing when the active shooter event happens.Bill Godfrey:Welcome to the Active Shooter Incident Management Podcast. My name is Bill Godfrey, your host of the podcast. Thank you for being with us today. We are going to be talking today about what it's like in the 911 dispatch center during an active shooter event and some of the challenges that go with that. Thank you for joining us. I got three of the C3 Pathways instructors with me today. Ken Lamb from law enforcement. Ken, thanks for being here.Ken Lamb:Yes, sir. Happy to be here.Bill Godfrey:All right, we got Tom Billington back in the house. Tom, it's been a minute since you were in. Good to have you back.Tom Billington:Good to be here, Bill.Bill Godfrey:All right, and Leeanna Mims, also from... Like Tom, I didn't mention. Tom from the fire service. Leeanna Mims is also from fire service. Leeanna, good to have you back.Leeanna Mims:Thank you. Glad to be here.Bill Godfrey:All right, so today's topic, we're going to be talking about some of the challenges that occur in the Comm Center in 911 and dispatch areas during an active shooter event. And I think probably ought to just start right off the bat with what some of the challenges are and recognizing that the 911 calls coming in are actually an active shooter event recognizing the event. Tom, you want to lead us off? What are your thoughts on that?Tom Billington:Well, a little background. I started out as a dispatcher in 1979 and dispatching was a paper map and a rotary phone and one microphone. So it has progressed over the years to be such an important position. I like to call the, I'm one operators, the true first responders because in an active shooter event or any other event, they're going to be overloaded immediately. They're going to have victims or survivors calling them. They're going to have bad people calling them. They're going to have texting. So it's a whole new realm that we have to deal with now. And then the active shooter incident adds a whole nother layer of issues that are going to be faced by the 911 center.Bill Godfrey:So Ken, when it comes to that first couple of 911 calls coming in, what are some of the things that jump out in your mind just from your experience in the law enforcement side and a couple that you've dealt with that might be the tip offs that the dispatchers are looking for or listening for I guess, I should say?Ken Lamb:Right, well, first and foremost is the shootings still occurring and how many individuals have been impacted because that's going to necessitate not only how large the response we have, but also where we're responding, the exact location. And what the shooter is wearing, what they look like, that information is so critical. And the common understanding that there's going to be multiple colors and the deconflict some of that information so that you understand as best as you can how many shooters are involved because oftentimes, four or five people may be calling in the same person. And if you're requesting information such as what are they wearing, what do they look like, then you can oftentimes deconflict some of that information so you understand how many shooters there actually are because that's going to be very important to the responding officers.Bill Godfrey:Sure, Leeanna, from the medical side, what are the things that you think are real the important things to get in those first few moments, those first few calls?Leeanna Mims:Yeah, so we, just following up on what Ken said, we need to know how many people have been injured if they can gather that in the front end. We need to be thinking about letting our hospitals know that it's occurring, that we're probably going to be giving them a surge of patients. So and that there's something else that dispatch has to consider obviously a little bit further down into the incident. And when we talk about all of the information that is coming into them, making sure that dispatchers are relaying what's needed for the safety of all the first responders that are going into that law enforcement, fire, medical because they're taking in a lot of information that has to be sorted and put out to those unit center responding in.Bill Godfrey:Yeah, I think all of that make sense. It would seem to me some of the most critical things to get right off the bat is the best sense of the location, especially if you've got multiple callers that are calling in with what may seem like different information, how many locations are involved or what was location trying to narrow down where the injured are, where the suspect was last seen or last known or where the shooting is going on, which often, Ken, can sound more than one incident. You got different callers calling in, but it's just a person moving around. And that sense of the numbers, how many people have been shot. And I like what you said about how many shooters, what are the suspect descriptions and things like that. Anything else, before we leave this one, anything else that is the kind of tip-offs that low-hanging front that dispatch may want to watch out for?Ken Lamb:Absolutely, so when you mentioned location, I thought that was an excellent point. And I think that point that is commonly overlooked because we just think, oh, location. Yeah, that's simple. We should be able to explain to other people an exact location, but anyone that share directions with their spouse on the phone can understand describing a location can be very challenging. So-Bill Godfrey:That's why they invented Google Maps to save marriages.Ken Lamb:.... Absolutely, so what I like to encourage folks to use is a common location language and that can be a number of things. You could get really technical and use US National Grid coordinates or dare I say, GPS coordinates even harder. But I like to simplify things and just say points of interest. So if you're trying to get a point of interest from the individual, the call taker and they can look around and say, well, there's a bell tower here or we're in parking lot next to a street lamp or we're next to a concession stand, anything that could specifically identify to streamline that approach for officers. And it would also assist in identifying the hot and the warm zones, but it will be a more specific common location language so that we can really get the resources to that area as quick as possible.Leeanna Mims:And Ken, you're exactly right about getting there as quickly as possible. And it's also about the responding units be able to determine the route that they go in. So the sooner that they can have that information in advance, it gives them what they need to help them figure out the best way to gain access depending on where the shooter is and whether or not there's multiple locations or are they moving, that tells to both law enforcement and other responders and in which way to go.Bill Godfrey:Yeah, and I would kind of piggyback on both of those and Ken, I really like... You made my eyes gloss over US National Grid. But the points of interest I think is a really good one because people immediately assume north, south, east, west, I'm in the Northeast corner of this and that actually turns out in practice to be a terrible way to describe locations. The directional indicators are just not reliable. Most people very easily get turned around. They get confused. Either don't know the area that well or they're confused about where they are. They get mixed up. It's just not a good reliable indicator.But what you're saying, points of interest, I think are really good way to do it. And Leeanna, you talked about the route of coming in. I think also the streets, especially in a larger building. I'm in the back of the building by fifth court. I'm near the alley in the rear or I'm on side street over here to give a description on what side of the building they're on or things like that. And so I think that would be one of the things I would encourage dispatchers to think about is to try to avoid, when you're trying to get those locations bend down, don't waste your time with directionals because they're not reliable from the callers or quite frankly, even with law enforcement, fire EMS in the field.Tom Billington:I mean, Ken, do you imagine responding to a shooting in a parking lot at Disney and saying, "I'm in the parking lot at Walt Disney World?"Ken Lamb:Right, super helpful, yeah.Tom Billington:I mean, there's a reason why they label the parking lots, Goofy, Mickey, Minnie and that's because it's easier to identify exactly which part of the parking lot is.Bill Godfrey:Yeah, absolutely. All right, so let's move on to the next topic. So Tom kind of mentioned this when he made his opening comment there about the overload and the overload is inevitable. I don't think it really matters how big your Comm Center is or how small it is. You only got enough staff for the typical load of calls that you've got. There's nobody wasting money putting extra dispatchers on just in case and we all know that. Most Comm Centers are barely staffed adequately as it is. Some of them are chronically understaffed. And so an event like this is going to come up and be a real kick in the teeth on overload. So let's talk a little bit about that. Tom, talk about the volume of 911 calls, especially today in the light of cell phones and how that can impact their ability to process the call and get it out.Tom Billington:Well, it should be able to... Yeah, we're finding out today with cell phones and texting that many large 911 systems overload and get shut down or break down. It's not uncommon to get thousands of calls. So like you said, even if it's a big agency or a smaller agency, there needs to be procedures in place. I know there's some smaller agencies that have procedures in place where they have a message that they give out when they answer 911. If you're calling reference the shooting on West Street, we already have units in route, things like that. How do I explain giving the 911 call or off the phone? And again, the larger jurisdictions, they have a lot more people, but usually that means there's a lot more population calling 911 and they can be overloaded immediately. So like you said, it doesn't matter on the size, but you need procedures in place ahead of time and you need to practice those.Bill Godfrey:Yeah, and you also mentioned one that hasn't come up recently that I can remember over the one things we've talked about and that is if your 911 trunk, I mean, let's face it, it's the phone company providing that service. There's only a limited capacity, whether it's a small center, a medium center or a large center, the 911 trunk coming into service, that center has a limited capacity for so many simultaneous calls. And if it gets overloaded or it fails, it's going to go to whatever the setup fail-over program is. And I wonder how many dispatchers actually know who gets their failure recalls? Leeanna, do you remember, was that part of the dispatcher training when you were on the job?Leeanna Mims:It absolutely was. They had to know and have procedures in place for what to do if we went into just various sorts of failure. I mean, there's different ways that a system can fail. And with that, echoing what Tom had said about having the procedures in place, it's critical not only for the failure, but also for success to make sure that you're able to sort those calls that are coming in to find the information in there that's meaningful because you can't just disregard all of those calls that are coming in. We've got to find a way to be able to screen it because some of that stuff that's coming in might make the difference in saving an officer's life on where they're going in.Bill Godfrey:Sure. Yeah, absolutely, it could. Ken, what about you, your job? Because you actually work at a place that's got a pretty large Comm Center, do those dispatchers have a good handle of where those calls dumped to if their trunk gets overloaded?Ken Lamb:They do. We have unit procedures and policies in place as a contingency in the event that that were to occur. And I would also stress the importance of having that contingency for the radio traffic. I mean, we had the incident in Fort Lauderdale where their radio traffic was overwhelmed and there were officers that weren't able to get on the radio because so many agencies in the area tuned in to listen to that incident. And to have a contingency in place so that if that happens because we know it has so that you can change to a different channel so that you can have the responders on scene be able to communicate and not lose critical information that's occurring because I think that it wouldn't stand or it would stand the reason that if we had an effective communication in any incident where you would lose that communication over the radio, that it would speed up our response instead of being detrimental.Bill Godfrey:Yeah, since you've segwayed over there, let's talk about the radio traffic because obviously that's going to be a huge load, not only on your own jurisdiction, but as you start to have your other neighboring jurisdictions coming in and they're jumping on your channels, the amount of radio traffic is going to go through the roof. Tom, are there anything that jumps out in your mind on how to prepare or manage for that?Tom Billington:Well, the main thing is being able to have the dispatchers, have them be able to adjust responses. Obviously on a normal day, if you have a structure fire, I know in the fire service, you may send five or six units to every structure for. When you have an active shooter event going on and other people would call 911 for other incidents, you have to be able to level that dispatch procedure out and make it lot less so you have less units on the road, less traffic. And hopefully, that's one strategy you can use. The other thing is radio discipline in training. Making sure people understand that you got to get off the radio, only important information should be transmitted and the less is better definitely.Ken Lamb:And to add on to what Tom was saying, I think that the dispatcher has the ability to recognize when an additional channel is necessary and can prompt that to the supervisor. So say for instance, we have the perimeter group that wants to be on the normal radio channel, but the dispatcher realizes we have all this information that's being shared on the regular channel. I think it would be great if a dispatcher would say, "Hey, perimeter group, group Sergeant, I can secure you a channel on a tactical channel if you would like to utilize that so you could just talk to your people and have the airspace to do so obviously in a clear and concise way." But prompting that would have that supervisor go, "Oh yeah, that would be great. So let's go ahead and switch to another channel, which would free up some airspace for some more necessary information over the normal channel."Tom Billington:And Ken, here's the challenge for supervisors. They need to start empowering these disruptors.Ken Lamb:Absolutely.Tom Billington:So many times you tell a dispatcher or ask this special, what would you do? And they might say, "Well, I'm not allowed to do this or I'm not allowed to do that." We need to let them know that when things are really busy, it's getting out of hand, they have the power and they should be assertive. They should be able to get on there and do some directives and ask some questions. A lot of times they're afraid they're going to have some repercussions from the upper leadership. So upper leadership has to let the reigns loose a little bit, let these folks do their job.Ken Lamb:Right, and so empowering those dispatchers to make those decisions I think is critical. And just as critical is us as police officers is being humble and understanding that we can't handle this on our own, we have to work together with our dispatch partners, our fire and EMS partners in order to solve the puzzle.Bill Godfrey:I think it's a good point about taking the active shooter incident and moving things to other channels where we can. As we address that in the curriculum and training, the two ones that are very good functions to carve off is the transport operation on the medical side is a nice fit to go to an alternate channel because you've got transport and triage standing in the same location with tactical sharing information. And I think that's a good one. That's a natural fit. Perimeter group is another one. Now the perimeter group supervisor ends up still having to have a second...The perimeter group supervisor needs two radios on their ear. One to talk to their troops on their separate channel and then the other one to be able to listen in to what's going on with tactical on the command channel and also be able to talk to staging. I think the one hesitation I have about dispatchers prompting that, I think it's a good idea in so much as it's coming from dispatchers, who've had some training in this material and know what are those good functions to carve off versus suggesting something that doesn't make sense and could just interrupt the operation. But even before that, I would suggest and I think this almost gets into a preincident thing is what channels are going to be used how?So we've got our regular day-to-day radio traffic and maybe that normally runs on the main channel. So when you've got your main channel with your regular traffic and then you get a big incident, who moves? Does the big incident move, which is problematic or do you move everything else, which can also be problematic? And that's not something you really want to have to figure out at the time of an incident. That's something I think that really needs to be worked out and have a plan ahead of time. But I think one of the things that you can do to carve down that radio traffic is to have that plan for shedding the load. I mean, Leeanna, what have you seen done on that for procedures to how to manage that when you get a major incident?Leeanna Mims:Of course, I mean, all of your assignments are pre-made and that's all done through policy procedure, IMS as to what channels that you're going to go to. And then another thing that gets kicked into place is a priority radio procedure, which in actuality, we should be operating in a priority radio procedure all the time where your communication is limited and you only say what you have to say in order to make sure everybody can get the communication in.But depending on what groups are running, they switched to other channels and that's predetermined what channels that they're going to go to. And everybody knows that upfront and it makes the communication a little bit seamless. But in those cases, we're talking about maybe not the initial response happens a little bit down the road because in fire, we build out a little bit slower in our command structure. And I think when we teach and talk about an active shooter incident management, the most crucial time is in the beginning.We pretty much know that in those first few minutes, that's the most crucial time versus on a fire. A little bit further deeper into the fire, that becomes the most crucial time because we're at a risk for flashover and so on. But I think maybe what we could talk about more is in that critical time, in that critical time of an active shooter, how important dispatch is, how important dispatch is in that, that realm of those first few minutes of making sure that the scene is secured and that shooter is neutralized.Ken Lamb:Sure, so I feel like we got the whole in-depth discussion on how to manage the radio because it's such a challenge in incidents like this. But when you spoke about some preplanning that could go into place as far as using which channels and how to operate on the radio, it kind of reminded me of what some instructors here put in place in my agency, Michelle Cook and Adam Penley, that a great job developing a script. And the script was how the active shooter response should go and then incorporated the dispatchers. So we all got in a room and each person had the script and it sounds really basic and you just run down the script of your position.But at the end of it, you had an idea of who was supposed to say what and when and where. And it provided I think context for a dispatcher to understand, okay, this is how this is supposed to sound and look. And if it's not, then I have a good common understanding of when I can come in and say, "Have you established a staging area? Could you use another channel?" When you have those opportunities. And I thought it was a great idea and I think one that is of value when you're incorporating your dispatchers into the Active Shooter Incident Management process.Bill Godfrey:I think one of the other things that you can do in the dispatch center to begin to cut down traffic and manage that, dispatch has already have a way of talking that, certain cadence, a certain tone and flection and they manage their stuff pretty well in terms of what they've got to say and saying it succinctly, but many, many dispatch agencies, both on law enforcement and fire EMS do an echo thing where the dispatcher echoes back what they've heard. And day in day out, that works pretty well. But when you get one of these fast moving incidents, the attempt to echo everything can tie up a lot of radio traffic and create unnecessary noise.However, there are some key things that should be echoed. So what I'm going to suggest here is the idea of selective echoing. So when you get a suspect description, when somebody says, "We're looking for this guy. He was last seen this location." That's probably a good one to echo. You get a report suspect down. That's a good one to echo. You get a report of 12 down in the lobby. That's a good one to echo. So those kinds of things. Where's the staging location? That's a good one to echo. The command post location, but not every little transmission. And that probably takes a little bit of thinking ahead of time and some selective stuff.The other tool I think dispatchers have at their disposal that the field folks don't is the ability to push the button and do the alert tone. Most radio systems, not all, but most, the dispatcher trumps everybody else in priority. So when they key up, they're the ones that almost everybody's going to hear. And those tones that they have available can be useful for essentially, it's almost like, hey, everybody, shut up and listen, when you hear those tones and be able to put them out. Any other, before we leave radio traffic, any other thoughts or tips?Tom Billington:Well, Bill, you mentioned staging. I know Ken, you did earlier also. That is a major important dispatch procedure telling everybody where staging is. Once we get the core group on scene, we do not want people showing up on scene. And the dispatcher being able to say, "Respond to staging. Do not respond to the scene. Here's the address of staging." Very important. That stops it over conversions and stops the freelancing.Leeanna Mims:And just to follow-up in what you had mentioned, Bill, emergency radio procedures is what you're referring to there and dispatchers have that ability. And if the radio traffic is overwhelming to where they can't get that critical information out that the front end law enforcement needs, especially responding into an active shooter, absolutely, that's where they have the power if you would to take control of that radio channel and make sure that only the proper information is being relayed as long as they're trained and their procedures allow them to do it. And that goes back to what Tom had said about empowering dispatchers to make those kinds of critical decisions that only they can make.Ken Lamb:Yeah, and I think everyone feels like when they get on the radio, what they're about to say is super critical and they get frustrated when they can't get on the radio. But I think everyone involved understanding that we need to share the radio traffic and we need to all make sure that the information we're putting over the radio is clear, concise and purposeful. And I feel like if everyone has that common understanding and they're all trying to achieve that goal, then there will be more space on the radio to talk.Bill Godfrey:It certainly improves with practice. I mean, we see that even in training usually day one is a bit of a cluster on the radio. And as people get used to and familiar with the sequence of events and what the important stuff is, what's not. And quite honestly, they get reminded a little bit of radio discipline, shorten it up, does that really need to be said? I think those are all really good things. Before we leave radio traffic, I also kind of want to mention, larger dispatch centers, you've already got almost all the agent. You've got all the units on common channels and things like that. And so this doesn't necessarily apply.But in medium and smaller sized organizations, it's fairly common to have mutual aid or agencies or other jurisdictions come onto your channel. Now in some cases, when you interoperate with people closely, they have your frequencies in their radios. They changed the bank, change which channel they're on and they get onto your frequency. And that's great. But in other instances, the procedure on paper is to start trying to patch channels together. We're going to patch this channel to this channel and we're going to patch this channel to this channel.By the way, just so everybody knows because you don't have the video on this, I've got three instructors shaking their heads at me no, no, don't do that. And that's why I brought this up is that on paper, patching channels sounds like a good idea. And there are some occasions when patching channels can be tremendously useful and appropriate, but I'm not sure active shooter events is one of those cases. On the technical side, years ago in a different lifetime, I served on a number of these interoperability technical groups and I know that we can technically patch.They're not all created equal. Some of them work really well. Those are few. Some of them, I'm trying to think of another word other than sucks. Some of them do not work well and just kind of... I mean, they can almost render the channel useless. So I wanted to kind of bring that up and just get the reaction. I mean, I already gave it away because everybody shook their head no. But Leeanna, you were the first one to shake your head no, what's your thoughts on patching?Leeanna Mims:Patching takes practicing the skill pretty regularly. And if you have any kind of a turnover in dispatch, it's hard to keep that level of expertise up and it doesn't always work. It just doesn't always work. My experience has been that patching just wasn't the answer and it definitely isn't going to be the answer in a situation where you're in a hurry.Bill Godfrey:Yeah, that was my feeling too. Tom, what about you?Tom Billington:Definitely the same thing. I think that it looks good on paper, but we don't practice it. And maybe once or twice a year, we may need to use it and that's the wrong time to learn how to use it because nobody's going to remember. So if it's not something you practice continually, I would advise against it. There's other ways to handle communications as far as having communications through teams, contact teams or rescue task forces all sharing one radio, things like that. But patching has never been successful in my experience.Leeanna Mims:And in some cases too with patching, you're not talking about just one agency. So your agency has to be able to know what to do with their side of the patch, another agency has to know what to do with their side. So that makes it even more problematic.Bill Godfrey:Yeah, it takes some thought, it takes some training, it's a little time consuming. As they would say up north, just forget about it.Ken Lamb:Yeah, so I have zero experience on how to patch radio channels. I can tell you that recently, we had an incident at our airport where there was a bomb threat on an airplane and we had the airport police, us and as well as the fire rescue department and a myriad of other agencies and oh, one of the fire rescue folks were like, "Well, let's patch these radio channels together." And I'm like, "That sounds like a great idea. We'll all be on the same radio channel." And it was a nightmare because everyone has... The different disciplines have different ideas of what radio discipline is.And it was next to impossible to get on the radio at that point. And it was just... And you nailed it in that on paper, it looks great, but the practical use of it is very problematic and I'm a bigger fan of comm aides or as our instructor Don Tuten calls it, go and fetch, fetch and go. That's to me, you can cut out some of the nuances of communications between different disciplines by just having someone who's a subject matter expert in your field, being with that person and just telling you what you need to know right now as opposed to all this kind of other stuff that you really don't need to know.Bill Godfrey:Yeah, before we leave this, I also don't want to leave it with... Well, okay, you said patching isn't good. What's the answer? Well, we teach in training, the place to solve interoperability problems is in staging. When you're forming up your teams, you've got, I need four cops and they're all mutual aid. Okay, do you have this channel? Do you have this channel? Do you have this channel? None of them got the channel. Okay, who has this channel? You do. All right, I'm going to put one guy in this team of four and he's got the channel and you guys are good. Go, deploy them.And so that's kind of our recommended answer is to solve that problem in staging. And if you've got a resource that doesn't have the ability to do communications, set them to the side and move on to the next one so that you fulfill your request, fulfill the assignment that you need to and then work on that problem as time moves on. All right, well, I think we're going to pause there and wrap up part one and then we've got a number of things we're going to come back to on part two of this. So Ken, Tom, Leeanna, y'all good to come back and do part two with me?Ken Lamb:Absolutely, looking forward to.Tom Billington:Oh, definitely.Leeanna Mims:Absolutely.Bill Godfrey:All right, well, thank you all for being here today with me. This was a great stuff. I'm looking forward to part two of this conversation. Karla, our producer, like to say, thank you to her for putting this together. And until next time, stay safe.
Welcome to episode 17, I am wicked excited to speak Anne Camaro, Asst. Director of Operation for the Cambridge, MA 9-1-1 Communications Center. Join us as we discuss how we met back in 2007, the power of peer support, and the effect of the 9-1-1 profession on family and how we both learned to say no, recently! Thank you to our premier sponsor RapidSOS, for more information on how you can become RapidSOS Ready and connect to the world's first Emergency Response Data Platform visit RapidSOS today and tell them Tracy sent you.
In the first part of our Musicians Spotlight Series, we bring you John Kay from Steppenwolf Fame which brought us such great hits as Born to be Wild, Magic Carpet Ride, The Pusher and 50 years of John Kay music and his work with NGOs helping Elephants survive as they, too, were Born to be Wild. John Kay: from Rock Star to Elephants, We Were All Born To Be Wild #Steppenwolf to #MaueKayFoundation Show Summary (Full Text Transcript Below) John Kay reveals his journey from escaping the Iron Curtain, getting on with limited vision, his passion for music and his love and commitment for wildlife and especially elephants. Ironically, I first learned about John Kay being legally blind from Dan Gausman, a librarian at State Services for the Blind of Minnesota. A client requested to have the Communications Center record an audio copy of John Kay's 1994 autobiography, Magic Carpet Ride. This is a service provided to people who are blind, visually impaired, dyslexic or have difficulty in reading the printed word. Dan mentioned that John was legally blind. This I did not know. John Kay explains his vision and how it led him from behind the Iron Curtain to the freedoms of West Berlin, his adventures as a youth and his days at Sight Saving school in Toronto. Canada. Most importantly, John talks about feeding the fire, feeding his passion for music and for the protection of wildlife. John Kay is transforming from Rock Star to Wildlife Advocate as his touring days with John Kay and Steppenwolf come to a well-deserved rest after 50 years since the release of the first Steppenwolf album. John is ready to make this transition as he has been devoting his time and proceeds from his touring over the last 10 years towards John and his wife Jutta's Maue Kay Foundation, and NGOs, Non-Governmental Organization, similar to a Non-profit organization, that focus on the protection of wildlife. Image of Elephants provided by MKF Join Jeff Thompson and Pete Lane as they sit down with John Kay and learn about John's continuing soundtrack of his life, his experiences and his focus on the years to come. This podcast is over 80 minutes long and we suggest kicking back and enjoy this epic interview with one of the great social and political voices with us today. My son asked me while he drove us home from the John Kay and Steppenwolf concert September 29 in Prior Lake, MN, why don't today's bands make statements about causes anymore? I thought to myself and wondered… is John Kay one of the last? Maue Kay Foundation Logo Here are some links that will let you know more about his music and his foundation. I suggest starting here, Steppenwolf.comwhere you can dive in and find out about everything Steppenwolf, purchase their swag, read articles and more about John Kay. Be sure to get their latest release, a 3 CD set titled, John Kay and Steppenwolf-Steppenwolf at 50. Included in this 3-disk set is an entire CD of John Kay and Steppenwolf live. You will learn and enjoy this collection of hits, and somewhat over-looked songs from 1967 to 2017. That is where you will find all the music used in this podcast, John Kay and Steppenwolf-Steppenwolf at 50. Follow John Kay and Steppenwolf on Facebookand on Last.FM Be sure to check out John Kay's web site. Where you can find links to articles, interviews, his solo music, the elephant sanctuary and the Maue Kay Foundationand learn about the passion and selflessness that John and Jutta and others are doing to protect wildlife around the world. And an Elephant size Thank You to John Kay for taking time to conduct this interview and to Charlie Wolf for all that you do and whom I met at the concert in Prior Lake, Minnesota. Glad I could support the band and I love the T-Shirts. By the way, the concert was Great! Thanks for Listening! You can follow us on Twitter @BlindAbilities On the web at www.BlindAbilities.com Send us an email Get the Free Blind Abilities App on the App Store. Get the Free blind Abilities App on the Google Play Store Full Transcript John Kay: From Rock Star to Elephants, We Were All Born To Be Wild #Steppenwolf to #MaueKayFoundation John Kay: To become aware of how special they are. I'm a big elephant lover you might say. Jeff Thompson: Blind Abilities welcomes John Kay, wildlife activist. John Kay: My vision got me probably out of Communist East Germany and my vision very definitely kept me out of Vietnam. Jeff Thompson: Who happens to be a rockstar. John Kay: They were all telling her, “You got a legally blind, penniless musician, and that's your future? I think you can do better than that.” Jeff Thompson: John talks about his limited vision, his band, Steppenwolf, one's inner voice, and following your passion. John Kay: There's an old snide remark, what do you call a musician without a girlfriend? You call them homeless. Jeff Thompson: I would like to thank Dan Guzman of the Communication Center at State Services for the Blind of Minnesota, as Dan informed me that a client had requested the autobiography of John Kay to be converted into audio format. Dan also informed me that John Kay was legally blind, and this started the process that led me to the interview of John Kay. John Kay: Hey, we all got stuff to deal with, kid, just get on with it. You learn how to figure out workaround solutions for what you're dealing with. Jeff Thompson: Hello, John Kay. I'm Jeff Thompson, and with me is Pete Lane. Pete Lane: Good morning, John. It's an honor. I'm Pete Lane. I'm in Jacksonville, Florida. Jeff is in … Jeff Thompson: Minnesota, Pete. Pete Lane: Yeah, Minnesota. John Kay: I'm in Santa Barbara. Jeff Thompson: What's the tie to Tennessee then? John Kay: I lived there for 17 years. In '89 my wife and I were a little tired of Los Angeles beehive activity. We said, “If not here, then where?” To spare the other boring details, we wound up just south of Nashville, Tennessee. In our travels with Steppenwolf we had played there several times. We'd met a lot of friendly people. It's a beautiful area. Lots of music, obviously. We were out in the country, and lots of privacy, and had a recording studio and our tour bus. We just relocated what we called Wolf World out there. For the following 17 years that was home. It was a good period during our life to be a little bit away from large cities. Jeff Thompson: Great. Pete Lane: Do you have an elephant reserve, do you not, still in Tennessee? John Kay: I don't, but Tennessee certainly does. While we lived in Tennessee, we became aware of the elephant sanctuary in Hohenwald, Tennessee, which was about, I don't know, maybe 40 minutes drive from where we lived, which was near a little town called Franklin, Tennessee. John Kay: Anyway, one thing led to another. Eventually my wife got involved with the board of directors of the sanctuary, and then they're after our daughter, who's all about animals, so from childhood wound up becoming a caregiver to three large African elephants. She was there for several years. It was like the Peace Corps slogan, the toughest job you'll ever love. She did love it, but she's rather slender in build and developed arthritis. The doctors told her she should quit, which she had to do very reluctantly. John Kay: However, the sanctuary of course continues doing very well. It's a wonderful place for often abused, neglected, sick, old circus and zoo elephants to finally live amongst their own kind without any human intrusion. They have 2,700 acres of rolling hills and woods and waterholes for them to swim in. Once you get to know elephants, because our foundation is involved with African elephants-focused NGOs in Africa, in Kenya, Tanzania, and the like, once you get to spend a real amount of time with them out in the wild, in those places where they aren't traumatized by poaching, you become aware of how special they are. I'm a big elephant lover you might say. Pete Lane: I was reading on your website where you posted the awareness of the elephant sanctuary in Tennessee and how they live a lifestyle that they never get to live when they're held in captivity. John Kay: Exactly. It used to be this way, and I don't suppose that has changed, the number one killer of captive elephants was foot rot, because unlike in the wild, where they walk up to 50 miles on relatively soft, sandy soil, in captivity they are often forced to stand on a solid concrete floor, and that's not good for them, so eventually they … One of the rescues, Tina, which came from the Vancouver Zoo, when she arrived, they had to … I was gonna say, one of the sandal makers, I can't think of the name of the brand right now, they actually made a pair of very soft boots for her because she was suffering so badly. Unfortunately, she died a couple of days before those boots arrived. I saw the bottom of her feet, which were just terrible situation. John Kay: They don't belong in captivity unless you can have a relatively good number of elephants together in a large area where they can at least simulate the kind of life they would have in the wild. Pete Lane: 2,700 acres is a large area. Do you know how many animals are on the preserve? John Kay: I think at the moment they have somewhere in the neighborhood of close to a dozen Asian elephants. They fenced off a section of the 2,700 acres for the African elephants, which are much larger, and thank goodness in relatively good health. They're larger and younger and very active, so they keep them away from the Asians, that are older and more docile. I believe right now they have about four Africans, because the Nashville Zoo I think has two of them that are there at the sanctuary now. I don't know whether they will stay there long-term, but that's what's going on there right now. John Kay: It's quite an amazing place, and so much has been learned about how to look after these creatures, and from the standpoint of veterinarian care. The research, both in the wild and in places like the sanctuary, on elephants continues, because there's still much to be learned, even though people like Joyce Poole has been studying their communication skills and language and rumbles and all of that for over 40 years. They're still working on figuring out what goes on that's beyond the grasp of science right now. Jeff Thompson: We'll be sure to put a link in the show notes for that. John, your story is quite interesting. I'm doing some research, and I just came across Feed the Fire. I was wondering, hearing about that elephant sanctuary, your foundation, it seems like you stuck to your passions. John Kay: Yeah. That's quite observant and quite spot-on, because long ago as a child, the first time I became aware of something that is I suppose related to passion or rooted in passion is when I discovered the power of music. That oddly enough was … John Kay: My father had been killed in Russia a month before I was born. When the Russian Army advanced on the area where my mother and I lived, I was just a few months old, she took me, and we got on a train headed west, and wound up eventually in a little town that wound up behind the Iron Curtain, and hence we were living under Communism until I was five. When we escaped, my mother and I, by paying off some people and getting through the border, which was patrolled with soldiers and all of that, anyway, we made it. John Kay: The point is that I was about eight or nine years old, living in West Germany, under democracy and freedom, and my mother took me to hear, of all things, an all-male, a Russian choir, the Don Cossacks. This was in a church with great acoustics. It was just a concert. Some of these ancient, incredibly sad songs that these 15 guys with these amazing voices were singing reduced me to tears, even though I didn't understand a word of Russian. I still don't. In fact, my mother was somewhat concerned. It introduced me to the power of music when it connects with your internal core. John Kay: Oddly enough, less than maybe four years later, I had a similar but very opposite experience when I first heard on American Armed Force Radio Network the likes of Little Richard and Elvis and all the rest of the rock-and-roll pioneers. I just had goosebumps, chicken skin from head to toe. Once again, I didn't understand a word of what they were singing, but the music was so primal, so intense, so full of just joy of living I'd say. That was just something that I had to have more of. John Kay: I became obsessed with trying to find this music wherever I could, and of course at a certain point started to have the delusion that someday I could be on the other side of the ocean and learn how to speak English and get a guitar and do this sort of thing myself. Obviously conventional wisdom and the adults were saying, “Yeah, sure, kid. In the meantime, pay attention in school.” Jeff Thompson: It's quite obvious you didn't lose that glitter in your eye. John Kay: Yeah. That's I think very important. It's one thing that concerns me with regards to young people that are raised with constant sensory stimulation and having a virtual life through their little screens that they're attached to all the time. John Kay: I remember once talking to university students, and I asked them, “Be honest. How many of you fear silence?” A number of hands went up, because a lot of them, from the time they're toddlers, whether it's TV or the background music of the supermarket or wherever, whenever there's silence, it astounds them, and it concerns them. I finally said, “I'm here to tell you that unless you learn to find some quiet spots, you may never hear a voice that's in you that is trying to tell you there's more out there. In other words, if you don't hear that voice, you may live a totally external life all your life, instead of finding something that is … ” John Kay: That is the humbling experience that I've had, running into people who all their lives have not been seeking the spotlight, but have been from early on moved by a passion to work on behalf of something greater than themselves. I'm specifically talking about the various people that in the last 15 years, through our efforts in various parts of the world, we've had the great pleasure and honor even to rub shoulders with. It's a humbling thing to see people who are not about themselves, but on behalf of others. You learn from that sort of thing. John Kay: There are a lot of young people who have that capability also. I'm often wondering whether they aren't so barraged with constant Twittering and social media and whatever else is going on that they never have a quiet moment. That's not necessarily a good thing in my opinion. Jeff Thompson: I was talking to Pete earlier, and I was dissecting your song, but you just answered the question for me, that solitude is no sacrifice. John Kay: That's right. You picked up on that. That song has been used by a number of people who wanted to play something for their daughter or son that were about to leave home and go to university or go far afield to do something on distant shores. That's basically it. “Solitude's no sacrifice, to catch a glimpse of paradise.” Jeff Thompson: That's an awesome song. I really like that song. Pete, you've got some questions I'm sure. I've been jumping in here. Pete Lane: John, I'm just honored to be speaking with you. I'm in my late 60s and of course grew up with you and your music and of course Steppenwolf. Until recently I had no idea of how enduring you have been and how diverse you are in your view of the world and society. I just want to compliment you on that for starters. John Kay: Thank you. That's very kind of you and generous. I would hope and think that I will continue to be still in a lifelong learning process of clumsily following the footsteps left by others that have preceded me with their examples of how to nurture their humanity and how to have a purpose in life beyond just mindless consumption and amusing themselves, as the book once said, amusing ourselves to death. It's something that keeps the inner flame burning, and been very, very fortunate in many different ways, currently still healthy, thank goodness. Any day when you remain vertical is a good day. Pete Lane: Absolutely. John Kay: There are so many out there who lead with their example. I have met some of them who have been inspirational. Every so often, some young people come along, say, “Hey, I came across your music, and it has given me some stuff to listen to when I have to get over one of the speed bumps of life, and thank you for that.” It's a generational thing. I'm still focused on the ones ahead of me. There are younger ones that have found something in what we have to offer of a value that went beyond just musical wallpaper, but with no real substance that you can use for your own. John Kay: There's so many out there who have written songs and played music practically all their lives, which has given sustenance to the rest of us, or the listeners, and have had personal little anthems that we go to when we need to have a moment of rejuvenation through music. John Kay: I sometimes talk to people who say, “You're talking about all these other people doing great work, making music that gives great pleasure and joy to people. It's not a bad way to make a living either.” While I agree with that, music will continue to be something that I do on occasion, meaning once in a while I have a desire to write a song or two, irrespective of whether they will ever be recorded and commercially released. I've performed at fundraisers and things like that. Music continues very definitely to be part of my life. John Kay: By the same token, I am very much now focused on bringing the word to a lot of people, who once they know what we are losing, meaning wildlife, we've had this number of times, we're talking to people who are well-educated, quite engaged, very successful in what they do, and when we talked about that an elephant was being killed every 15 minutes for their tusks and that we, at this rate, 15 years from now, may no longer have any living in the wild, and the same holds for the rhinos and numerous other species, they're aghast. They're, “I didn't know that. This is terrible. Who's doing anything about it?” Then further to that, “Who can I trust with my money if I want to help?” John Kay: That's really what our little foundation is about. We have been supporting various entities. I think at this point we're at 16 different NGOs we support annually for about 15 years. We're the ones who are a little bridge between the boots on the ground who are fighting to preserve what remains, and those who are willing to help provide it, there's some assurance that their money will go to the boots on the ground. We're the ones who can vouch for a number of wonderful people at NGOs. Because we have born witness to the work they do, we're going to back to Africa next year to look in on several of the NGOs again. That's my role of both my wife and I. John Kay: In fact, this year's the last year that Steppenwolf will be performing. We have six more engagements to play, the last one October 14, and after that the wolf will go into hibernation, if you want to put it that way. My emphasis is now on … I assume both of you are familiar with TED Talks. Jeff Thompson: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Pete Lane: Yes. John Kay: With that in mind, although the following is not a TED Talk per se, because those talks are limited to 18 minutes in length, mine is more like an hour and 15 minutes, but what it is, it's similar to a TED Talk, in the sense that I'm up on stage giving my story, while behind me on a screen there are many, many still images and short video clips and so on. The whole thing is called Born To Be Wild: From Rock Star To Wildlife Advocate, John Kay of Steppenwolf and His Journey of Transformation. John Kay: It basically starts with my early life and how I got out from behind the Iron Curtain and was enthralled with American rock-and-roll when I grew up as a teenager in West Germany and made it to Canada as an immigrant, got my first guitar, and then got into music more and more, and of course the story of Steppenwolf, and then how gradually over time we, my wife and I, through our travels, went to Cambodia, where we saw the killing fields, and we got involved with building a school there, which was the start of our foundation, and then Africa and so on down the line. John Kay: Basically at the end of this presentation, towards the end, after having shown what we do, where, and who is doing what in Africa and Asia and Borneo and so on, it's basically a pitch of saying, “Now that you know, if you didn't know already, you can use our website as a gateway to other NGOs or you can support what we do directly, but do it for your grandchildren's sake or do it to honor the 2,000, almost, African rangers that have been killed by poachers in the last 12 years, or do it simply because our fellow living beings have very little left to call their home, and they too have a right to exist.” Pete Lane: Unbelievable. Jeff Thompson: That's awesome. I love the way you talk about your passion that you even have today. Pete and I both met because we had a passion for recording. One story that really caught my attention is when you were in Toronto and you received your reel-to-reel, and I don't think you listened to the books as much as you wanted it for recording music. John Kay: You got that right. It was a scam from the get-go. I said, “I don't need talking books. I can read books, even though I gotta read them with my nose.” I said, “I could use it for something else.” I was just simply appalled at what came out of that dinky little speaker that was built into that Wollensak tape recorder, because when I tried my hand at recording my first efforts of playing guitar and singing, I said, “I don't sound like that, do I? This is terrible.” It was sheer ego that kept me going, said, “One way I can get better if I keep at it.” Hope springs eternal. Sometimes you simply have more luck than talent. Pete Lane: John let's talk a little bit more if you don't mind about your eye condition. Talk about that a little bit. Let's start if you don't mind a little bit in your early years and maybe focus in Toronto when you were moved into is it Deer Park, that Deer Park school? John Kay: Yeah, that was the sight-saving classes. It's a strange thing, with respect to my eyes. When I was still a baby, lying in one of these carriages that back in those days were typical, I think the English call them prams or whatever, living in this tiny little town in what was then East Germany, I would cry whenever the sun was in my eyes. John Kay: When I was older, my mother took me to an ophthalmologist, and he said, “He obviously has very, very poor vision and he's very light-sensitive.” The only thing he could think of at the time was that, “His condition might improve if he had a better diet,” because at that time we were on food rations, and because of where we were, we were eating herring morning, noon, and night, boiled, fried, stewed herring, coming out of the ears. I never touched a fish again after that until I was 40-something years old. John Kay: This is the important point about this. My mother took that as a, “Maybe the doctor's right.” It was that that caused her to take the risky chance of getting caught, imprisoned, or shot by, in the middle of the night, together with about half a dozen other people, getting smuggled by a couple of border guides that worked for the railroad and knew how to time the searchlights from the watchtowers and the dog patrols and everything else. John Kay: We got through, and then it turned out that, this was in Hanover, Germany, West Germany, and of course this was after the war, there were still schools in short supply, having been destroyed, and so there were classes 50 children large, two shifts, one in the morning, one in the afternoon. I was not doing well. It was my mother who was working as a seamstress who managed to get me into the Waldorf school, the private school, which was banned under Hitler because it was far too humanitarian, but which looked after me. There I blossomed, and the eyes didn't play as big a role. John Kay: It wasn't until I came to Toronto that I was back in public school. I didn't speak English yet and couldn't read what was on the blackboard. The school officials got in touch with the CNIB, Canadian National Institute for the Blind, and they said, “We have these sight-saving classes in a, it's just one large schoolroom segmented into two or three different grades, at a public school called Deer Park School, in the northern part of Toronto.” That's where I went for about two years. John Kay: The primary benefit was that, yes, they had textbooks with extra-large print and all that, but I learned English during those years, not just in school, but because of my obsession with listening to the radio all the time, looking for music that connected, I was always having to try and make out what these speed-rapping DJs were saying, because they were yakking a mile a minute. Between radio and the Deer Park School, I got to the point where I got a handle on things. Of course during that period at that school, I was also given this tape recorder on loan. As I mentioned before, I immediately pressed that into service. Jeff Thompson: That's really impressive, just the journey. John Kay: One thing I should add, by the way, was that nobody really knew what was the matter with me. I went to a Toronto University I think, the medical department, ophthalmology I think it was. There I was treated like a guinea pig. They brought in all these medical students and take a look in my eyes and everything. They said, “Oh, you're totally colorblind. Let's see here.” John Kay: They had one of those books where every page is made out of these little mosaic little pebbles with different colors.” Embedded amongst them, so to speak, would be a combination of these colored tiles that spelled something, a letter or a number or something. At the beginning of the book, the contrast between the primary colors versus whatever the number or the letter was very stark. I said, “Yeah, that, it says six, okay.” As we went from page to page, the differences in terms of contrast became more and more subdued to the point where by page whatever, I don't see anything other than just one page of all these little mosaic tiles and pebbles. They would say, “No, actually there is a light yellow whatever something or other.” John Kay: They figured out later down the line that I was an achromat, achromatopsia, that as an additional bonus with that condition comes extreme light sensitivity. Then finally, I also have a congenital nystagmus, which is the eyes shaking all the time. You do the best you can with what you have. John Kay: Now in '63, and this has a point with respect to my vision, my vision got me probably out of Communist East Germany, and my vision also probably, in fact very definitely, kept me out of the U.S. Army and probably out of Vietnam, because when in '63 at age 19 my mother and stepdad, my mom had remarried, decided to move from Toronto to Buffalo, New York, because my stepdad had something going on business-wise, and I joined them there, the first letter that hit our mailbox was from the draft board. Of course I had to show up. Jeff Thompson: Welcome to the States. John Kay: Of course somebody once said that the military intelligence is an oxymoron. I'm not the judge on that, but I will tell you that I had something that made me scratch my head, namely when I was there and I was to have a complete physical, I tried to tell the man that I was legally blind, and of course he said, “We'll get to that, son.” After a very, very thorough, top to bottom, in and out physical examination, he said, “Now read those letters on that chart on the wall.” I said, “What chart?” He said, “You can't see the chart?” I walked a little closer, said, “I see it now.” “What do you see?” “If I can step a few steps closer … ” “Yeah, you can.” “Okay. I think there's a large capital A at the top, and the rest is guesswork.” He harrumphed about, “You could've said … Never mind.” My designation was 4F. I asked him, “What does that mean really?” He said, “Son, in your case it pretty well stands for women and children first, before you. Nobody's gonna put a rifle in your hands.” John Kay: It was one of those things where during those times, because in short order I went to the Newport Folk Festival in Rhode Island, to hear the greats, and I was amongst tens of thousands of young people my age, of course many of them, at least 50% or more, being young men. The draft in the Vietnam War was very much on everybody's mind. I could relate to their concerns about going off to a foreign land. This case, I would imagine my eye condition did me a service. Jeff Thompson: That was probably a baptism into the social issues of the United States coming from Toronto for you. John Kay: That's very true. That is very true. Sometimes you have the aha moment decades after it was already rather obvious. In certain ways, what makes up my musical background in terms of my self-taught things, is to some extent rooted in the early '60s folk music revival, in my visits to not just the 1964 but also the 1965 Newport Folk Festival. '65 of course I saw Dylan go electric. That is that I had already, because of my baptism with rock-and-roll, by the early '60s rock-and-roll had lost a lot of its punch and we had the pretty boy Philadelphia singer syndrome, like Frankie Avalon, Fabian, and the like. There wasn't much on the radio that I could really sink my teeth into. Here comes the folk music revival. John Kay: While living in Buffalo, a folkie says, “If you really want to know the roots of all this stuff, go down to the main library, they have a music department, which has all of the Library of Congress recording that John and Alan Lomax made in the field. You can listen to Appalachian Delta music. You can hear Delta blues, whatever.” I did that. They would let you take a few albums home every week and trade them out for other ones. I went through the entire thing and gave myself a bit of an education. John Kay: Then when I went to the Newport Folk Festival and saw some of those still alive, those recordings I'd heard, I didn't know that McKinley Morganfield, who was recorded in the Delta by the Lomaxes, was actually Muddy Waters. Here he was with his band playing at Newport, and all of those kind of things. John Kay: The blues, which as Muddy once said, “The blues had a baby and they called it rock-and-roll,” so the blues immediately spoke to me, particularly when I came across some of the lyrics of the chain gang songs and other things. There's a powerful song about … The lyrics go, “Why don't you go down ole Hannah.” Hannah was the name they gave to the sun, “And don't you arise no more, and if you rise in the morning, bring judgment day,” because these are guys, they hated her, because the sun came up, they were forced to work in the field, out of the prison, the chain gangs, and they didn't get any rest until the sun went down. I learned that the blues had a lot more to offer than just, “Woke up this morning, my chicken walked across my face,” and all the rest of the stuff they'd write. John Kay: The other thing was great, was that the likes of Dylan and numerous others of the times were following in the footsteps of Woody Guthrie and writing new songs about the here and now that was of interest to our own age group, because this was the time when the three civil rights workers were killed in Mississippi. I remember hearing, let's see, I can't think of his name right now, it'll come to me later, he was just like Dylan, a topical, as we called them, we never called them protest songs, topical songwriter. I remember he sang it, had just written it, about the killing of these three, at a topical song workshop in the afternoon. His name was Ochs, Phil Ochs. Jeff Thompson: Phil Ochs, yeah. Pete Lane: Phil Ochs, of course. John Kay: Suicide some years later. The refrain of the song was, “And here's to the land that you've torn the heart out of. Mississippi, find yourself another country to be part of.” Jeff Thompson: That rings through with your Monster song. John Kay: Yeah, because the thing that became obvious to me was that songs can have content which is reflective of what's on people's minds. One of the first things we experienced as Steppenwolf was a baby band, when we went on our first cross-country tour and we were still approachable, so to speak, by long-haired kids in bellbottoms who wanted to say hello after the show, a lot of them said, “Those first two albums of yours we got, you're saying on our behalf some of the things that worry us or that we are concerned with.” John Kay: That's the first time we had positive reinforcement that what we were writing about was not just our own individual personal opinions, but it was reflective of what was on the minds of many of those in our own age group. Of course I had experienced that at Newport. It was a galvanizing experience to be amongst 20,000 young people, and they're listening to somebody like a Phil Ochs or a Bob Dylan, and others who were writing about what was going on in our country in the world. Like JFK once said, “And that's the role of the artist, to remind us of the potential we have yet to reach,” in terms of being a just society and all the rest. John Kay: When it came time for us to start writing our own songs, we had of course witnessed, in fact I'd played in a couple of the same coffeehouses as a journeyman folk musician solo act in Los Angeles with the likes of David Crosby and then still called Jim, later Roger, McGuinn and the rest, who formed of course The Byrds. Jeff Thompson: The Byrds. John Kay: Their first album was by and large electric versions of Bob Dylan songs. In fact I was at Ciro's nightclub when The Byrds played, when Dylan showed up and played harmonica with them. That was a photograph on the back of their first album. John Kay: The point is that I took from there, why couldn't even rock music have lyrics that go beyond “oowee baby” and the typical? That's why our first album had songs like The Pusher and The Ostrich and Take What You Need, which was really about the environment, and later, things like Don't Step On The Grass Sam and None of Your Doing, which was on the second album, which was about a Vietnam soldier coming home and nobody understands him and he can't deal with what he had witnessed. Then of course eventually came the Monster album. John Kay: The thing with the Monster album, which was very, very successful, popular on the college campuses, were all these demonstrations which were going on against the war in the campuses, and then of course the horrific Kent State shooting. These were things where what we had to say resonated with a lot of young people. John Kay: What I found interesting was that we after so many years were no longer playing that song as part of our show. Then came the Great Recession, 2007-08, and all of a sudden, a couple of things happened. I can't think of his name right now, he's been a stalwart writer for Rolling Stone for several decades, from the early days on, and he had posted a thing, something like, “I went back to listening to Steppenwolf's Monster album and I was astounded how appropriate it is in the here and now.” John Kay: That coincided shortly with getting more and more requests on our website via email primarily, “Please start playing Monster again.” From about 2009 onward, we've been playing it ever since. It's rare that that song does not get a standing ovation in the middle of the show. Of course it's aided and abetted by visuals that accompany our live performance, not every song, but many. In the case of Monster, it is a 10-minute film that illustrates pretty well what the song, line by line, lyrically is about. John Kay: I remember when we did it for the first time in 2009, our sound man, who's been with us now for over 30 years, and he said, “John, I had the most weird experience tonight, because there was this strange situation with Monster. It was like I was watching a movie that had a soundtrack that a live band was playing, and instead of a narrator telling me what the story was, you were simply singing the story. It was just a really intense experience.” It's been like that ever since. John Kay: Sometimes you write something, and it goes out there like a kid leaving home, and you have no idea what it's doing out there, and then all of a sudden it comes back and say, “I'm still here.” Jeff Thompson: The prodigal song. John Kay: It's been like that for the last 10 years. It's a song that seems to very much resonate about what we are dealing with right now. Pete Lane: It's funny, John, Jeff and I, again, were speaking before you connected with us this afternoon, and I had prepared a question along those lines. As you did earlier in this interview, you've answered it. Let me ask you this question. It's a slight variation on what we just spoke of. For those of you who don't know, Monster is just a dynamite song. It chronicles the country, the United States from its inception to what was then modern-day U.S. back in 1970 I believe, '71, early '70s. John Kay: Correct. Pete Lane: My question is this. If you were to write that song today, would you title it anything different? John Kay: No, because in my opinion the Monster has almost taken human shape now. Donald Trump: The American Dream is dead. Richard Nixon: I'm not a crook. Donald Trump: We will make America great again! Richard Nixon: I'm not a crook. I'm not a crook. I'm not a crook. Pete Lane: Just a dynamite song. Jeff Thompson: There's another long big song. It was big on the album I bought. You had over I think it was 20-minute long, The Pusher. John Kay: Yeah, that thing. There's a story to be told about that, I'll tell you. You're referring to the so-called early Steppenwolf album, a vinyl album obviously, back in those days. One side was that 20-minute version of The Pusher. That whole thing came to be because it was really a performance done by the band The Sparrow, which I had joined. John Kay: When I was in the early '60s, like so many others, with a guitar, hitchhiking around, playing wherever they'd let me, in coffeehouses and the like, when I returned after a year of being in Los Angeles, hanging out at the Troubadour, doing various things, meeting Hoyt Axton, learning The Pusher from him, etc, and wound up in Toronto again, and York Village at that time, section of Toronto had exploded into this area of just coffeehouses and clubs, all sorts of things. While I played at a coffeehouse as a solo act, I bumped into this Canadian band called The Sparrows, with an S, plural at the time. We joined forces. I started to perform The Pusher with an electric band instead of just acoustically. John Kay: The Sparrows eventually left Canada, because in those days most people did, where there was Joni Mitchell and Neil Young or others, and wound up in the States. We played in New York for a while, got a record deal that went nowhere. I kept badgering them that having seen the formation of The Byrds in L.A., that we ought to go to California. That's what we did eventually, and wound up, through various reasons I won't take time to explain, in the Bay area. There we played on the weekends usually the Avalon Ballroom or the Fillmore Ballroom. During the week we would play different clubs. One of them was a permanently beached paddle wheeler ferry boat in Sausalito called The Ark. John Kay: We were now amongst all of these Bay area bands that liked to stretch out and experiment and jam and do different things. We said, “Hey, we can play songs that are longer than four or five minutes.” We started to do different things. One of them was this ad-libbed version of The Pusher, which was preceded by us doing different instrumental experiments. Steve Miller would come by and sit in and play all the different things. One of the things we'll always remember is that regularly the Hells Angels would come, drop acid, lie down on the dance floor, and stay all night listening. John Kay: We also played a club called The Matrix. Unbeknownst to us, the manager of the club had a couple of microphones suspended in the ceiling. When Steppenwolf later were moving forward into the '68 and '69, when we were quite successful with our first couple albums, we were being badgered to go back into the recording studio, because the label was always hungry for a new product. We had a couple record contracts that obligated us to deliver two albums a year, which was in hindsight ridiculous. John Kay: Anyway, the point is that the label said, “This young man, or this guy showed up, and he has these tapes that he recorded, unbeknownst to you, when you guys were still called The Sparrows, from a show you played at The Matrix in San Francisco. We would like to put it out as a collector's item called Early Steppenwolf.” We listened to it. Of course you can imagine that with a couple of microphones suspended from the ceiling, this was, yeah, a collector's item for those who must just for bragging rights have to have one of everything, to be able to say, “I got everything they ever did.” We hated that. We hated it then, but it bought us time. It bought us time in the studio, because when that thing was released, we got busy on writing and eventually recording what became the Monster album. That was a major step forward. Jeff Thompson: Yes, it was. Pete Lane: Fascinating story. Jeff Thompson: John, I want to go back to you told a story about how kids in school would bully you, but you took their names, you remembered, and you would get them back somehow. John Kay: It wasn't so much in school. What would happen is, like just about everywhere in the world, including the States these days, soccer, what they called football, every kid plays it. They play it barefoot in Africa. Whatever. We did too, meaning the kids in the street in West Germany when I was young. There was a vacant lot next to our little apartment building, and that's where we played. John Kay: During the day, with the sun in my eyes, even with my dark glasses, that wasn't so cool, but the moment the sun started going down, during twilight hours, I'm like a nocturnal creature that can make do with very little light. My eyes open up. I don't squint. I can see much better, not further, just more comfortably I can see things. John Kay: I would join the kids playing soccer. When they figured out that I couldn't always see what was going on, there's an 11-meter penalty kick that's part of the rules, and so when it was my turn to make that kick, some wise ass would put a half a brick in front of the ball, so I wouldn't see it. I'd come with just regular street shoes, no special athletic shoes, and take a run at shooting this ball, and of course, wham, would run my toes right into that brick- Jeff Thompson: Ouch. John Kay: … holding my foot and hopping around on one leg, doing a Daffy Duck, “Woo! Woo!” That did not go down well with me. I was fairly big for my size always, tall. They then of course saw that I was gonna come after them. They also knew that if they managed to run a certain distance, I could no longer find them. I had to learn to say, “This is not the time.” Two or three days would go by, and they would have forgotten about it, and whoever the instigator was would be doing something, and then I would go over there and deck them. They would be, “Oh man, what was that for, man? I didn't do … ” “Yes, you did, and I did not forget, but I hope you will remember this,” and they did. Jeff Thompson: I remember seeing your album covers. I collected albums. There was one of you leaning back, and you're very tall, the way the angle was on it. You wore the sunglasses. When I thought of artists, musicians, I go through Roy Orbison and other people that wore the sunglasses on stage and stuff, I never thought of you. When someone brought it to my attention, State Services for the Blind here, some client wants your book recorded, so they'll take volunteers, record chapter by chapter for the person to listen to. They contacted me, said, “Hey, John Kay, he's visually impaired.” I went, “Oh, that explains the sunglasses,” maybe for the lights on stage or something. John Kay: Absolutely the case. I had learned over time, since I wore dark glasses during the day, certainly outdoors, I got in the habit of keeping them on, because I went, “Spotlights and stage lights, they're pretty bright, and sometimes it's difficult for me to see the guitar fret board, where my fingers go and everything, and so I'll just keep the dark glasses on. Besides, some pretty cool people seem to be wearing them, and so that's just part of the persona.” Over time, meaning literally decades, I learned that I could avoid, provided the spotlights were mounted high enough with a downward angle, I could look under them in a sense, look at the audience rather than up into the bleachers. Gradually I was able to dispense with them on stage, although the moment we play outdoors they go right back on. In fact I have one pair that's damn near as dark as welding goggles when things get really super sunny, Africa's sun is very bright, or the snow is very reflective, that sort of thing. John Kay: Of course I remember one time, we were never the darlings of Rolling Stone, and so there was a negative review of one of our albums. The guy said, I'm paraphrasing, “As far as John Kay's jive sunglasses are concerned,” he went on about something else. Actually, one of our managers felt compelled to write them a letter and point out that those glasses have a purpose for being on my face. He's just like everyone else. John Kay: When I was a kid in West Germany when we first got there, I had a key around my neck, because my mother was a seamstress in other people's homes, so making a living until she remarried, and I had to learn how to get around, to get on this streetcar to get to there, because I was at a daycare center run by the Swedish Red Cross and I had to make my way back home and I couldn't read the street signs. You figure things out, there's this kind of a building on that corner, and markers that you imprint into your memory banks. John Kay: You have to remember, this is a time, post World War II, the Soviet Union alone lost 20 million people. In Hanover in 1949 and '50 and '51, there were tons of people, legs and arms missing and crutches and this and that, those who managed to survive the war in some semblance. It was basically a mindset of, “Hey, we all got stuff to deal with, kid. Just get on with it.” You learned how to figure out workaround solutions for what you're dealing with. I'm certainly one of millions who are having to make adjustments. John Kay: I remember we had a dear neighbor in Tennessee was a Vietnam veteran, Marine Corps, and he was in a wheelchair. He had to overcome his anger and started to meditate and do other things. He said to me, “Hey John, it's not the hand that's dealt you, it's how you play the hand that's dealt you.” He married, had a wonderful daughter. He became a cotton farmer and somehow got onto his tractor, and like so many out there, that okay, he's not perfect, but what are you gonna do with what you got? Jeff Thompson: John, regarding your visual impairment these days, do you use technology, computer, smartphone, anything along those lines? If so, do you use any kind of adaptive tools or screen enlargement features, anything like that? John Kay: I'm lucky enough in the sense that most standard issue devices have features that work just fine. I have a fairly large flat-panel monitor on my PC. Of course with the zoom feature and other things, I can make the font, what I'm reading, as well as what I may be writing, email and Word documents or whatever, whatever I want. The iOS, I have a phone, I have a iPad, they have a zoom feature that's just marvelous. I use that when needed. Some things with Siri or Chicano or something, in the PC world you can actually just ask for certain things to be brought to the screen. I'm learning how to do that more and more. It's a great convenience. John Kay: I really don't have any problems. I've flown all over the world to meet my band mates on my own. I've learned to do … That was a big deal for me, because of … One of you mentioned you had been to our foundation's website. There are a number of videos about the things that we support, and we have witnessed and the wildlife that we see and so on. All of that was shot by me, edited by me, and then narrated by me. Now granted my wife, who is a fine photographer and had no colorblindness like I do, I ask her sometimes, “What about this?” “We can tweak that a little, whatever.” Other than a little color assistance, I do all that myself. John Kay: The reason I can do it primarily is because there are several brands of prosumer or even professional camcorders that have up to 20x optical zoom lens, which gives you an incredible reach from where you are to get a closeup of whatever's in the distance, an elephant, whatever it may be. I use it like a pair of binoculars, because I remember one time we were in Africa and our guide was asking my wife, “He's constantly looking through that thing. Is he always shooting?” She says, “No no no. Instead of picking up a pair of binoculars, then finding something he wants to shoot, putting down-” Jeff Thompson: Good for you. John Kay: “… the binoculars, picking up his camera, he just uses that zoom lens of his like a pair of binoculars, and when he sees something, he just pulls the trigger and starts recording.” Jeff Thompson: That's great. That's neat. John Kay: That's my workaround solution for that. Jeff Thompson: John, there's so much information on your website. I was going through it. That's how I found out about the elephants and your foundation. I also was reading your question and answer, which any of the listeners who are out there, go to his website and check it out, the question and answer, because it answers so many questions. One of them was when someone mentions you are a legend, I loved your response to that. You would say it to if you met Chuck Berry or someone else or something. It was just such a humbling thing that you … Then I believe you met your wife in … John Kay: Toronto. Jeff Thompson: Yeah, in Toronto. Usually when you hear about rock stars and these legends, they've gone through wives, divorces. You're still together. John Kay: We are still together. I was a member of the aforementioned Canadian band in Toronto called The Sparrows. We were playing Downtown Toronto at a place. Between sets, our bass player said, “Hey, my girlfriend is here, sitting over there at that table, and she brought her girl friend. Why don't you join us for a drink or something?” I went over there, and I met this young woman by the name Jutta, spelled J-U-T-T-A. She was from Hamburg, Germany, where she had already as a teenager seen the band that later was to name itself the Beatles and numerous American rock-and-roll stars at The Star-Club in Hamburg. We had some things in common. I liked her a lot. I followed her home that night and moved in with her. We've been together ever since. Jeff Thompson: The longest one-night stand. John Kay: Yeah. The thing is that I, like so many others in the rock-and-roll world, being in our early 20s when we caught a wave as Steppenwolf and we were out there on the road, there's a degree of too much ego, testosterone, drugs, and temptations out there. When my wife sometimes, particularly women ask her, “Was it all roses and rainbows? You guys are still together. What's the secret to your marriage's longevity?” She'll look them straight in the eye and say, “The secret is not getting a divorce.” Jeff Thompson: Rocket science. John Kay: We're very much lifelong partners. We have much, much in common in terms of our interests and where we direct our energy and passion and time. The other hand, rather, she has certain intuitive traits that for whatever reason elude me, and I'm more analytical and more logical in some ways. We're a good fit. It's the yin and the yang together. We hope to remain like that until we are no longer vertical. Jeff Thompson: I have a question about this. When you met her, was your eyesight at the time, did you have to explain to her you won't be driving or something like that? John Kay: Yeah, you're right. Just like my thing that I mentioned earlier, when you're a 12-year-old and you're fantasizing about becoming a rock-and-roller on the other side of the ocean and being told, “Sure, kid,” when I moved in with her, she was a very young, desirable, good-looking woman, some of her friends, there's an old snide remark in the industry, which is, “What do you call a musician without a girlfriend? You call them homeless.” John Kay: When I went back to this other girl that I had been living with, to get some of my belongings to bring those over to Jutta's place, when I showed up at this other girl's place, there was another guy sitting there already, playing the guitar. I said, “Hello, who are you?” He says, “My name is Neil Young. I just came in from Winnipeg and I'm joining this band called The Mynah Birds.” I said, “Oh, cool. I just joined this band called The Sparrows.” In other words, all of us folkies were always looking for a kindhearted woman to put a roof over your head. John Kay: When I moved in with Jutta and we had been together for a while, they were all telling her, “You got a legally blind, penniless musician, and that's your future. I think you can do better than that.” Of course the conventional wisdom, they were absolutely right. The chances of all of this working out the way it did, you'd probably get better odds winning the lottery, if you go to Vegas, they would give you better odds for that, but like I said earlier, sometimes you just have more luck than good sense. It all worked out just fine. Jeff Thompson: That's great. How did you keep your focus? How did you, I keep going back to that song, but your eye on the chart, through all that has gone on with the early Steppenwolf to John Kay and Steppenwolf? What kept you focused? John Kay: That's an interesting story, question rather, because I've had to contemplate that before. I've never felt the need to go see a shrink. I seemed to always get over whatever emotional speed bumps there were. I suspect that the same deeply rooted passion for certain things, be it music, be it a sense of justice, being easily enraged by injustice, that I think is also the touchstone of other things where anger is the motivator and the engine. In the case of Steppenwolf, was very successful, we had various albums, some more commercially successful than others. It wasn't all roses and rainbows, but on the whole, it was a segment of my life that was pretty special, obviously. John Kay: Then came time when the obligations to the band, because of being its primary songwriter and lead singer and front man and all that, became such that I wanted time for the private me, which meant my family, our daughter, who was hardly ever seeing me. John Kay: When I pulled the plug on Steppenwolf in the late '70s, after a rejuvenating period in the mid-'70s on a different label, our little family went in our little family van all over the Southwest. We spent a lot of time in Hawaii, on Maui and stuff. That was quite nurturing and very good for me, but I was also, “Okay, I'm gonna do a solo album, this and that.” It was on pause to a certain extent. John Kay: Then the news reached Jerry Edmonton, the original drummer and co-founder of the band, and friend, that a couple of ex-members of the band were out there using the name Steppenwolf. Then all sorts of boring details as to lawsuits and other things involved, but the news that reached us was generally from fans, saying, “We went to see what was called Steppenwolf, and it was horrible. People were throwing stuff at them. They're trashing the name.” John Kay: We tried to put a stop to these activities, using the legal system, lawsuits and so on. Again, it would take too much time to go into the details. Let's just say that the results, I kept saying, “This legal system is limping along like a turtle with a wooden leg. We're not getting anywhere here with these lawsuits.” It was like whack-a-mole. You'd go after them in this state, they'd pop up in another state. John Kay: Finally, out of sheer desperation and anger, I had a number of musicians with whom I had been playing as the John Kay Band, I called Jerry and I said, “Man, I want to go out there as John Kay and Steppenwolf, because I want to resurrect the name and rebuild it. We'll work out something, so you participate financially.” He was already into his photographer and artist mode. That was fine. John Kay: In 1980 I went out there, driven by the outrage and anger of, “You guys are destroying something that you didn't build. I was the one who called everybody up to see if you wanted to what became Steppenwolf, and I'm going to go out there and compete with you guys on the same low-level clubs you guys have played the name down into, see who wins.” John Kay: We from 1980 on went out there 20 weeks at a time, five shows a week, overnight drives 500 miles, playing in the toilet circuit of bars, where some of them, you wouldn't want to enter those clubs without a whip and a chair. It was just horrible. John Kay: The mantra was, “Yeah, three years ago we were headlining in arenas. That's not the point. If there are 300 people here tonight at this club who are not above being here to hear us play, and we're certainly not above us playing for them, so the mission is every night we gotta send people home smiling and telling others, ‘You missed a really good show,' and all you can do is grit your teeth that that will eventually,” because we ran into, we distinctly remember, a club on the outskirts of Minneapolis, St. Paul. During the soundcheck time, relatively young guy came over and looked me straight in the face, said, “You're not John Kay. He wouldn't play a shit hole like this.” That was the level to which the name had been played down into. John Kay: That really got me aggravated. I said, “I'm gonna kick their butt, not by … The lawyers are still fighting over this and that, but in the meantime, we're getting great reviews and we're going town by town, state by state.” By 1984, after relentless touring in the States, also twice in Canada, by that time we had also released a couple new albums, twice in Europe, once in Australia, we in essence put what we called the bogus Steppenwolf bands out of business. John Kay: While we were at it, since we were somewhat damaged goods, we said, “Then we're gonna learn how to mind the store ourselves.” That's when we had our own music publishing company, our own recording studio, our own merchandise corporation, our own tour bus, huge truck with a triple sleeper, 105 cases of gear, and on and on. To give you an idea of how tight a bond was formed, our entire crew, all four members have been with me for over 30 years. Jeff Thompson: Oh wow. Pete Lane: Wow. John Kay: We took the reigns into our own hands and learned. I did not want to become a paralegal or para-accountant or any of those other things. Almost everybody in our 12-member organization, bus drivers, everybody, wore multiple hats, selling merchandise during the show or whatever. They were all quality people, and we learned how to fend for ourselves, and not just survive, but at a certain point, thrive. We knew exactly where the money was coming from and where it went. Nobody was running off with our loot to Ecuador. Jeff Thompson: What suggestions would you have for someone today who is interested in music like you were, driving your passion from Little Richard, Chuck Berry, all those people that inspired you to follow your passion? What suggestions in today's music world would you give to them? John Kay: Unfortunately, I wish I had some kind of a magic formula to impart to them, but obviously every situation is vastly different, is really I think in the end, I know people who are tremendously talented, vastly more talented than I am, who are not necessarily doing well. I've experienced in the early days where someone whose primary talent was to show up at every opportunity to pitch what they had to offer. It's one of those, “Did you go to that audition yesterday, this morning, or whatever?” “I had a really late-night last night. I'll go to the next one.” How many opportunities are gonna come your way? It's one of those. John Kay: The other thing is, do you have the fire in your belly to handle the ego-destroying rejections, because there are probably hundreds, if you were to take a poll of … Well-known singer-songwriter Nora Jones, that first album, which I love, was rejected I think by every label in town twice. There are stories like that all over the place. John Kay: How do you pick yourself up every morning after, “I'm sorry, it's just not radio-friendly,” or, “You don't really fit into our whatever.” You need to have a pretty intense flame of passion about what you are and what you have to offer. You need to be able to handle … John Kay: You may be the one that wins the lottery, where the first attempt reaches the right set of ears and you've got a partner in your career moving forward, but most likely you will be like so many of the baby acts these days, and some who have been around already for 10 years plus, which is you have to learn how to wear a lot of different hats, the social media stuff, the pitching your music on YouTube or whatever, to endlessly tour in clubs, to build a following, four of you sleeping in the van with the gear, whatever. It'll burn you out if you're not made of something that can handle those rigors. John Kay: Meantime, you have the temptations of, “I want to have a private life too,” depending on whether you're a female or male, an artist, “I met somebody I want to share my life with. At some point we want to have children. This band isn't getting me anywhere.” There are all these things that are strikes against your ability to prevail in this, unless you are one of those who's willing to take those beatings out there, in terms of the rejection and being often the response that you get from reviewers or whatever is not always positive, particularly if you're still in the process of really finding and tweaking who you are and what you have to offer. John Kay: If you're a singer doing other people's stuff, that's one thing. If you are a writer and you really have something to say, that may be an advantage in the sense that if it resonates, you may find what we found in the early days, which is, “Wow, you've become our musical spokesperson. When I play that song, it is my inner voice, having been give voice, by your voice.” If you're one of those who's able to put in words what moves you most, and there are lots of others out there that take your music as their personal soundtrack, then it may still be a long slog uphill, but usually that sort of thing spreads readily on social media. John Kay: We have the Wolf Pack. When we played our official 50th anniversary, celebrating the 50th anniversary of the formation of the band, when we played that official concert to commemorate that at the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville, Tennessee last August, and the Wolf Pack fan club was notified of that. We had over 300 Wolf Pack fan members coming from all over North America and at least close to 70 or 80 of them coming all the way from Europe. They all know each other. They're all like the Dead Heads. They have a passion that they share with others. John Kay: If you are able as an artist to reach people in that kind of way where what you have to offer becomes more than just sheer entertainment, then I think your chances of making a go of it are pretty good. Some of more or less my contemporaries that are still writing, still out there, still loved, John Prine, John Hiatt, if you are one of those, or you're aspiring to become one of those, I wish you a lot of good fortune. John Kay: Sarah McLachlan song Angel, it has moved millions to tears. One of the verses that basically I'm paraphrasing, about when you're always being told you're not good enough, you're basically having the door slammed in your face all the time, and the self-doubt creeps in and nobody seems to get what it is you have to offer, those kind of things, they're hard on you. John Kay: You wouldn't want to be a writer, artist, player, whatever, singer, if you didn't have some degree of ego that says, “Hey, I've got something to offer, something to say. I'm up here. Do you like what I got?” That's rooted to some extent in your ego. If you have that ego under co
Kenny Tedford Jr. was born almost totally deaf, partially blind, and with brain damage. He has also survived cancer, heart attacks, and temporary paralysis from breaking his neck. Despite all of these challenges, Kenny has accomplished an enormous amount as a man of many talents: An author, humorist, life coach, motivational speaker, counselor, teacher, ambassador, master storyteller, actor, and entrepreneur.Kenny was told by his teachers, counselor, and the Board of Education that he would never pass the 3rd grade. He proved them wrong by graduating with honors and then attending Gallaudet University for the Deaf in Washington, D.C. He later transferred to the University of Tennessee in Knoxville, TN., earning his B.A. in Theatre and then went on to earn a Masters Degree in Storytelling from East Tennessee State University. Kenny has served as the Executive Director of both the Tennessee Council for the Deaf & Hard of Hearing and the Communications Center for the Deaf & Hard of Hearing. He has also worked as a career counselor and employment specialist for the disabled, and was appointed as a Red Cross Ambassador representing the United States around the world.Kenny will inspire you with his compelling storytelling, his hilarious sense of humor, and his strong faith - even in the face of adversity. He has shown by his life that disabilities, heart attacks, falling off a cliff, and cancer can all be used for good.For more on Kenny or to book him to speak:https://www.calentertainment.com/portfoliotype/kenny-tedford/Love the show? Subscribe, rate, review, and share! https://www.calentertainment.com/virtually-speaking/
Programs Manager Mary Binford and Assistant Supervisor Sierra King from the Emergency Communications Center join DO and Elliot in The Box! You'll get to hear all about their crucial job and how dispatchers play an important role in the emergency response system! Sound like the career for you? Apply here: chesterfield911.com!
Join the We Speak Dispatch panelists as we discuss Communications Center security -- are you planning or prepared for security issues facing your center - listen as we discuss this interesting topic with our friend Cheryl. Its time for real talk that's real good!! . www.linktr.ee/WeSpeakDispatch
Robin is joined by Casey Stevens, Emergency Management Director Lincoln County EMA to discuss how they moved their Local EMA Directors, Fire Chiefs, Law Enforcement, Schools, and the Communications Center from flip charts over to D4H, managing severe weather events, road closures, and damage assessments centrally.
Moving through the rest of the Communications Center, the party ends up with a rather abrupt surprise, and thus ends the introduction to our world of Nethotera. From virtually nothing, and thrown into the firey pits of hell, our party now wanders, completely their own masters. About Nethotera ► Nethotera is a world built on the Pathfinder system by Blazewing and the adventurers in her campaign. Pathfinder materials are copyright of Paizo. All characters, adventures, and other things within this world are fictional. Any resemblance to any person, living or dead, is purely coincidental. https://blazewing2010.wixsite.com/nethotera ~~~~~ Affiliate Links ► Production Crate: https://productioncrate.grsm.io/ginabennett5228 Nova Energy Drink: https://novaenergydrink.com/- Use code BLAZE at check out for 10% off all tubs and shakers. ~~~~~ Support ► Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/TrailBlazerMedia- Patreon Subscribers get access to the podcast episodes 2 days earlier than anyone else. ~~~~~ About the Khaos Krew ► The Khaos Krew Pathfinder Podcast is produced by Trail Blazer Media and Blazewing Firebird, also known as Gina. You can find all of Blazewing's current projects on the net here: https://blazewing2010.wixsite.com/trailblazer The Khaos Krew Pathfinder Podcast is available on the following platforms: Anchor.fm: https://anchor.fm/khaos-krew Breaker: https://www.breaker.audio/khaos-krew-pathfinder-podcast Google Podcasts: https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9hbmNob3IuZm0vcy8yZTI1NjRlOC9wb2RjYXN0L3Jzcw== Pocket Casts: https://pca.st/269fdj9k Radio Public: https://radiopublic.com/khaos-krew-pathfinder-podcast-WR2gmj Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/00vY5sPTVbbPXhyW35LHCj
Join hosts Sarah Stewart and Trooper Eric Foster as they talk about the vital lifeline to Troopers in the field, dispatch. Communications Lieutenant Katie White and Communications Sergeant Renee Martinez discuss their very different backgrounds and how they got started with OHP Communications. Hear stories of trials and triumphs as they discuss why dispatchers are incredibly important to the Patrol.
In response to the spread of COVID-19, public safety agencies looked for ways to keep personnel safe while continuing to serve their communities. The Arlington County Emergency Communications Center in Virginia launched remote call-taking, dispatching, and supervision capabilities. Telecommunicators are able to work from home or other locations with a setup that includes a FirstNet hotspot.
Kenny Tedford is one of only two deaf people in the world with a master's degree in storytelling, which he earned at 55, almost half a century after being told by teachers and psychologists that he would never complete the third grade. Oxygen deprivation in utero resulted in him being born deaf, partially blind, partially paralyzed on his left side, and unable to speak clearly until the age of 10. Kenny has served as the Executive Director of both the Tennessee Council for the Deaf & Hard of Hearing and the Communications Center for the Deaf & Hard of Hearing, and has also worked as a career counselor and employment specialist for the disabled. Together with author and speaker Paul Smith, Kenny is the author of the book “Four Days With Kenny Tedford.”
Ready For Takeoff - Turn Your Aviation Passion Into A Career
Brig. Gen. Paul W. Tibbets IV is Deputy Commander, Air Force Global Strike Command and Deputy Commander, Air Forces Strategic-Air, U.S. Strategic Command, Barksdale Air Force Base, Louisiana. AFGSC provides strategic deterrence, global strike and combat support to USSTRATCOM and other geographic combatant commands. The command comprises more than 33,700 professionals operating at two numbered air forces; 11 active duty, Air National Guard and Air Force Reserve wings, the Joint Global Strike Operations Center and the Nuclear Command, Control and Communications Center. Weapons systems assigned to AFGSC include all U.S. Air Force Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles and bomber aircraft, UH-1N helicopters, E-4B National Airborne Operations Center aircraft and the U.S. Air Force NC3 weapons system. The command organizes, trains, equips and maintains combat-ready forces that provide strategic deterrence, global strike and combat support to USSTRATCOM and other geographic combatant commands. The command is comprised of more than 33,700 professionals operating at two Numbered Air Forces and 11 active-duty, Air National Guard and Air Force Reserve wings. Weapons systems assigned to the command include Minuteman III Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles, B-1, B-2 and B-52 bombers, UH-1N helicopters, the E-4B National Airborne Operations Center aircraft and the Nuclear Command, Control and Communications systems. General Tibbets received his commission through the U.S. Air Force Academy in 1989. Following graduation, he served in a variety of operational assignments as a B-1 pilot, and subsequently as a B-2 pilot. The general has commanded at the squadron and wing levels, and flew combat missions in support of operations in Southwest Asia, the Balkans and Afghanistan. His staff assignments include Executive Officer to the Commander, Eighth Air Force, Chief of the Nuclear and CBRN Defense Policy Branch at NATO Headquarters, Deputy Director of Operations for AFGSC and Deputy Director for Nuclear Operations at U.S. Strategic Command. Prior to his current assignment, he served as the Commander of the 509th Bomb Wing at Whiteman AFB, Missouri. General Tibbets is a command pilot with more than 4,000 flying hours.
Patrick Carney, the Artiste, is an indomitable spirit who has shared his creative talent with the world in ways that are sometimes beyond measure. No one captures the ‘Essence of Women,’ the aura of their souls, the contours of their brilliance in the way this artist can. Carney captures the legacy that these women leave as footsteps on this earth. While attending the School of Visual Arts in New York City, Patrick Carney had the privilege to study with Chuck Close, Marge Anderson, Robert Israel, Burne Hogarth and Milton Glaser; each of these teachers having a profound impact on his life. As a youth he read voraciously – searching for answers which led to more questions. While pursuing studies at Buffalo State, he worked as a specialist in media at the Communications Center. Later he was named the Art Director of the Lafayette Community Center where he taught art to inner city children. For a time he traveled throughout the NY State as an Artist in Residence at underprivileged high schools as a representative of the Arts Council, and volunteered as a art teacher in the state prison system, believing that it was his obligation to give back and “Pass On” his given talents. Starting in 1964 in NY’s West Village, Mr. Carney dedicated his time to drawing and painting the world of rock n’ roll music, it’s passion and creativity caught in real time forever. He traveled throughout the US attending rock concerts and painted whatever star excited him – and thus his work is a varied series of welcome surprises. Hanging out at what he calls “the corner of Art and Soul,” the Artiste Patrick Carney creates the images of your youth, capturing on canvas the music you grew up with. "OMG! You can't even imagine...the colors are so brilliant, expressions are so captivating and the descriptions are so thoughtful expressed. And the people he brings together are a bundle of joy, an inspiration rolled into one. You have to experience Patrick's awesomeness Live and In Person. Will take your breath away and surround you with love!" -Vizion Uni, Art Collector Not only are Patrick Carney’s Acrylics and Pen & Inks purchased by collectors all over the world, his paintings are displayed in the personal collections of such luminaries as Dick Clark, John Lennon, Bob Dylan, Stevie Nicks, Bruce Springsteen, JD Souther, Tom Russell, Judy Collins, Al Kooper and Pete Seeger.
As soon as the Seneca Nation heard about the coronavirus, non-essential staff were sent home and a COVID-19 response taskforce comprising of several stakeholders had been swiftly formed. The Nation with its sprawling five territories in Allegany, Buffalo, Cattaraugus, Oil Spring and Niagara has combatted the coronavirus across their entire reservation. Jason Corwin, the executive director of the Seneca Media & Communications Center located in Salamanca, candidly speaks to these obstacles, especially how his community has dealt with shutting down their tribal casinos.
Today, we find ourselves in one of the most disruptive periods in modern history. Public discussion about ESG has taken the backseat to surviving and getting through the COVID-19 pandemic. Part two of this podcast further explores how corporate communications can support your company’s ESG initiatives, and how to use ESG to guide your company through the COVID-19 crisis response. Host: Craig Carroll, Communications Institute Leader, The Conference Board Guests: Kelly Semrau, former Senior Vice President, Global Corporate Affairs, Communication and Sustainability, at SC Johnson and Senior Fellow with the Marketing and Communications Center at The Conference Board Devry Boughner Vorwerk, former Corporate Vice President, Global Corporate Affairs, CEO of DevryBV Sustainable Strategies, former CCO and Global Corporate Affairs, Cargil, and Senior Fellow with the Marketing and Communications Center at The Conference Board Jessica Adelman, former Group Vice President of Corporate Affairs for The Kroger Co. and Senior Fellow with the Marketing and Communications Center at The Conference Board
Today, we find ourselves in one of the most disruptive periods in modern history. Public discussion about ESG has taken the backseat to surviving and getting through the COVID-19 pandemic. This podcast explores how corporate communications can support your company’s ESG initiatives, and how to use ESG to guide your company through the COVID-19 crisis response. Host: Craig Carroll, Communications Institute Leader, The Conference Board Guests: Kelly Semrau, former Senior Vice President, Global Corporate Affairs, Communication and Sustainability, at SC Johnson and Senior Fellow with the Marketing and Communications Center at The Conference Board Devry Boughner Vorwerk, former Corporate Vice President, Global Corporate Affairs, CEO of DevryBV Sustainable Strategies, former CCO and Global Corporate Affairs, Cargil, and Senior Fellow with the Marketing and Communications Center at The Conference Board Jessica Adelman, former Group Vice President of Corporate Affairs for The Kroger Co. and Senior Fellow with the Marketing and Communications Center at The Conference Board
On today’s episode, we meet Melanie Morris, Senior Director of Carilion Clinic’s Transfer & Communications Center, based in Roanoke, VA. Melanie currently manages bed placement for two of the system’s six facilities, but will soon take over communications for all locations with the help of TeleTracking. What you'll learn today: • Lessoned learned while expanding (1:16) • The importance of an EVS liason (2:25) • Managing an off-site Command Center(4:38) • Details of starting a Command Center from scratch(6:53) • Getting support from key players(8:26) • Top 3 Tips to Command Center success (10:49)
Every year, the Orange County Sheriff's Office Communications Center receives more than a million phone calls. The center, located in east Orange County, is where more than 200 operators answer both emergency and non-emergency calls. This week, Behind the Star host Jon Busdeker talks with Cynthia Jefferson, a manager and 20-year veteran of the Communications Center. Jefferson talks about what happens when a resident calls 9-1-1, how information is relayed to OCSO deputies and how operators handle the stress of the job.
On this week’s 51%, hear from a sports reporter and columnist about the state of her profession and we meet a woman whose brother’s suicide prompted her to try and help others, even just a little. On this week’s 51%, hear from a sports reporter and columnist about the state of her profession and we […]
The employees at the Philadelphia International Airport and the Northeast Philadelphia Airport are one big family. So, it should come as no surprise that when over 1,000 of our family members are hurting from the government shutdown, the PHL community has joined together to help. Whether it’s our weekly “Meals on Monday” program, a sit-down lunch for all federal government workers at the airport, or opening the doors to a new food pantry, the outpouring of support and people wanting to help has been overwhelming. In this special episode, you’ll hear about what we're doing at PHL and how you can help, whether you're a member of the PHL community or a Philadelphia-area resident. If you are a federal employee in need in the Philadelphia region, we encourage you to visit our Food Pantry in Terminal E by Frontier Airlines between 7:30am-6pm. And if you want to make a donation, please pull up to the Communications Center (located between Terminals C and D) for drop-off between the hours of 9am - 9pm.
Show Summary (Full Text Transcript Below) John Kay reveals his journey from escaping the Iron Curtain, getting on with limited vision, his passion for music and his love and commitment for wildlife and especially elephants. Ironically, I first learned about John Kay being legally blind from Dan Gausman, a librarian at State Services for the Blind of Minnesota. A client requested to have the Communications Center record an audio copy of John Kay’s 1994 autobiography, Magic Carpet Ride. This is a service provided to people who are blind, visually impaired, dyslexic or have difficulty in reading the printed word. Dan mentioned that John was legally blind. This I did not know. John Kay explains his vision and how it led him from behind the Iron Curtain to the freedoms of West Berlin, his adventures as a youth and his days at Sight Saving school in Toronto. Canada. Most importantly, John talks about feeding the fire, feeding his passion for music and for the protection of wildlife. John Kay is transforming from Rock Star to Wildlife Advocate as his touring days with John Kay and Steppenwolf come to a well-deserved rest after 50 years since the release of the first Steppenwolf album. John is ready to make this transition as he has been devoting his time and proceeds from his touring over the last 10 years towards John and his wife Jutta’s Maue Kay Foundation, and NGOs, Non-Governmental Organization, similar to a Non-profit organization, that focus on the protection of wildlife. [caption id="attachment_4001" align="aligncenter" width="300"]Image of Elephants provided by MKF[/caption] Join Jeff Thompson and Pete Lane as they sit down with John Kay and learn about John’s continuing soundtrack of his life, his experiences and his focus on the years to come. This podcast is over 80 minutes long and we suggest kicking back and enjoy this epic interview with one of the great social and political voices with us today. My son asked me while he drove us home from the John Kay and Steppenwolf concert September 29 in Prior Lake, MN, why don’t today’s bands make statements about causes anymore? I thought to myself and wondered… is John Kay one of the last? [caption id="attachment_4002" align="aligncenter" width="200"]Maue Kay Foundation Logo[/caption] Here are some links that will let you know more about his music and his foundation. I suggest starting here, Steppenwolf.comwhere you can dive in and find out about everything Steppenwolf, purchase their swag, read articles and more about John Kay. Be sure to get their latest release, a 3 CD set titled, John Kay and Steppenwolf-Steppenwolf at 50. Included in this 3-disk set is an entire CD of John Kay and Steppenwolf live. You will learn and enjoy this collection of hits, and somewhat over-looked songs from 1967 to 2017. That is where you will find all the music used in this podcast, John Kay and Steppenwolf-Steppenwolf at 50. Follow John Kay and Steppenwolf on Facebookand on Last.FM Be sure to check out John Kay’s web site. Where you can find links to articles, interviews, his solo music, the elephant sanctuary and the Maue Kay Foundationand learn about the passion and selflessness that John and Jutta and others are doing to protect wildlife around the world. And an Elephant size Thank You to John Kay for taking time to conduct this interview and to Charlie Wolf for all that you do and whom I met at the concert in Prior Lake, Minnesota. Glad I could support the band and I love the T-Shirts. By the way, the concert was Great! Thanks for Listening! You can follow us on Twitter @BlindAbilities On the web at www.BlindAbilities.com Send us an email Get the Free Blind Abilities App on the App Store. Get the Free blind Abilities App on the Google Play Store Full Transcript John Kay: From Rock Star to Elephants, We Were All Born To Be Wild #Steppenwolf to #MaueKayFoundation John Kay: To become aware of how special they are. I'm a big elephant lover you might say. Jeff Thompson: Blind Abilities welcomes John Kay, wildlife activist. John Kay: My vision got me probably out of Communist East Germany and my vision very definitely kept me out of Vietnam. Jeff Thompson: Who happens to be a rockstar. John Kay: They were all telling her, "You got a legally blind, penniless musician, and that's your future? I think you can do better than that." Jeff Thompson: John talks about his limited vision, his band, Steppenwolf, one's inner voice, and following your passion. John Kay: There's an old snide remark, what do you call a musician without a girlfriend? You call them homeless. Jeff Thompson: I would like to thank Dan Guzman of the Communication Center at State Services for the Blind of Minnesota, as Dan informed me that a client had requested the autobiography of John Kay to be converted into audio format. Dan also informed me that John Kay was legally blind, and this started the process that led me to the interview of John Kay. John Kay: Hey, we all got stuff to deal with, kid, just get on with it. You learn how to figure out workaround solutions for what you're dealing with. Jeff Thompson: Hello, John Kay. I'm Jeff Thompson, and with me is Pete Lane. Pete Lane: Good morning, John. It's an honor. I'm Pete Lane. I'm in Jacksonville, Florida. Jeff is in ... Jeff Thompson: Minnesota, Pete. Pete Lane: Yeah, Minnesota. John Kay: I'm in Santa Barbara. Jeff Thompson: What's the tie to Tennessee then? John Kay: I lived there for 17 years. In '89 my wife and I were a little tired of Los Angeles beehive activity. We said, "If not here, then where?" To spare the other boring details, we wound up just south of Nashville, Tennessee. In our travels with Steppenwolf we had played there several times. We'd met a lot of friendly people. It's a beautiful area. Lots of music, obviously. We were out in the country, and lots of privacy, and had a recording studio and our tour bus. We just relocated what we called Wolf World out there. For the following 17 years that was home. It was a good period during our life to be a little bit away from large cities. Jeff Thompson: Great. Pete Lane: Do you have an elephant reserve, do you not, still in Tennessee? John Kay: I don't, but Tennessee certainly does. While we lived in Tennessee, we became aware of the elephant sanctuary in Hohenwald, Tennessee, which was about, I don't know, maybe 40 minutes drive from where we lived, which was near a little town called Franklin, Tennessee. John Kay: Anyway, one thing led to another. Eventually my wife got involved with the board of directors of the sanctuary, and then they're after our daughter, who's all about animals, so from childhood wound up becoming a caregiver to three large African elephants. She was there for several years. It was like the Peace Corps slogan, the toughest job you'll ever love. She did love it, but she's rather slender in build and developed arthritis. The doctors told her she should quit, which she had to do very reluctantly. John Kay: However, the sanctuary of course continues doing very well. It's a wonderful place for often abused, neglected, sick, old circus and zoo elephants to finally live amongst their own kind without any human intrusion. They have 2,700 acres of rolling hills and woods and waterholes for them to swim in. Once you get to know elephants, because our foundation is involved with African elephants-focused NGOs in Africa, in Kenya, Tanzania, and the like, once you get to spend a real amount of time with them out in the wild, in those places where they aren't traumatized by poaching, you become aware of how special they are. I'm a big elephant lover you might say. Pete Lane: I was reading on your website where you posted the awareness of the elephant sanctuary in Tennessee and how they live a lifestyle that they never get to live when they're held in captivity. John Kay: Exactly. It used to be this way, and I don't suppose that has changed, the number one killer of captive elephants was foot rot, because unlike in the wild, where they walk up to 50 miles on relatively soft, sandy soil, in captivity they are often forced to stand on a solid concrete floor, and that's not good for them, so eventually they ... One of the rescues, Tina, which came from the Vancouver Zoo, when she arrived, they had to ... I was gonna say, one of the sandal makers, I can't think of the name of the brand right now, they actually made a pair of very soft boots for her because she was suffering so badly. Unfortunately, she died a couple of days before those boots arrived. I saw the bottom of her feet, which were just terrible situation. John Kay: They don't belong in captivity unless you can have a relatively good number of elephants together in a large area where they can at least simulate the kind of life they would have in the wild. Pete Lane: 2,700 acres is a large area. Do you know how many animals are on the preserve? John Kay: I think at the moment they have somewhere in the neighborhood of close to a dozen Asian elephants. They fenced off a section of the 2,700 acres for the African elephants, which are much larger, and thank goodness in relatively good health. They're larger and younger and very active, so they keep them away from the Asians, that are older and more docile. I believe right now they have about four Africans, because the Nashville Zoo I think has two of them that are there at the sanctuary now. I don't know whether they will stay there long-term, but that's what's going on there right now. John Kay: It's quite an amazing place, and so much has been learned about how to look after these creatures, and from the standpoint of veterinarian care. The research, both in the wild and in places like the sanctuary, on elephants continues, because there's still much to be learned, even though people like Joyce Poole has been studying their communication skills and language and rumbles and all of that for over 40 years. They're still working on figuring out what goes on that's beyond the grasp of science right now. Jeff Thompson: We'll be sure to put a link in the show notes for that. John, your story is quite interesting. I'm doing some research, and I just came across Feed the Fire. I was wondering, hearing about that elephant sanctuary, your foundation, it seems like you stuck to your passions. John Kay: Yeah. That's quite observant and quite spot-on, because long ago as a child, the first time I became aware of something that is I suppose related to passion or rooted in passion is when I discovered the power of music. That oddly enough was ... John Kay: My father had been killed in Russia a month before I was born. When the Russian Army advanced on the area where my mother and I lived, I was just a few months old, she took me, and we got on a train headed west, and wound up eventually in a little town that wound up behind the Iron Curtain, and hence we were living under Communism until I was five. When we escaped, my mother and I, by paying off some people and getting through the border, which was patrolled with soldiers and all of that, anyway, we made it. John Kay: The point is that I was about eight or nine years old, living in West Germany, under democracy and freedom, and my mother took me to hear, of all things, an all-male, a Russian choir, the Don Cossacks. This was in a church with great acoustics. It was just a concert. Some of these ancient, incredibly sad songs that these 15 guys with these amazing voices were singing reduced me to tears, even though I didn't understand a word of Russian. I still don't. In fact, my mother was somewhat concerned. It introduced me to the power of music when it connects with your internal core. John Kay: Oddly enough, less than maybe four years later, I had a similar but very opposite experience when I first heard on American Armed Force Radio Network the likes of Little Richard and Elvis and all the rest of the rock-and-roll pioneers. I just had goosebumps, chicken skin from head to toe. Once again, I didn't understand a word of what they were singing, but the music was so primal, so intense, so full of just joy of living I'd say. That was just something that I had to have more of. John Kay: I became obsessed with trying to find this music wherever I could, and of course at a certain point started to have the delusion that someday I could be on the other side of the ocean and learn how to speak English and get a guitar and do this sort of thing myself. Obviously conventional wisdom and the adults were saying, "Yeah, sure, kid. In the meantime, pay attention in school." Jeff Thompson: It's quite obvious you didn't lose that glitter in your eye. John Kay: Yeah. That's I think very important. It's one thing that concerns me with regards to young people that are raised with constant sensory stimulation and having a virtual life through their little screens that they're attached to all the time. John Kay: I remember once talking to university students, and I asked them, "Be honest. How many of you fear silence?" A number of hands went up, because a lot of them, from the time they're toddlers, whether it's TV or the background music of the supermarket or wherever, whenever there's silence, it astounds them, and it concerns them. I finally said, "I'm here to tell you that unless you learn to find some quiet spots, you may never hear a voice that's in you that is trying to tell you there's more out there. In other words, if you don't hear that voice, you may live a totally external life all your life, instead of finding something that is ... " John Kay: That is the humbling experience that I've had, running into people who all their lives have not been seeking the spotlight, but have been from early on moved by a passion to work on behalf of something greater than themselves. I'm specifically talking about the various people that in the last 15 years, through our efforts in various parts of the world, we've had the great pleasure and honor even to rub shoulders with. It's a humbling thing to see people who are not about themselves, but on behalf of others. You learn from that sort of thing. John Kay: There are a lot of young people who have that capability also. I'm often wondering whether they aren't so barraged with constant Twittering and social media and whatever else is going on that they never have a quiet moment. That's not necessarily a good thing in my opinion. Jeff Thompson: I was talking to Pete earlier, and I was dissecting your song, but you just answered the question for me, that solitude is no sacrifice. John Kay: That's right. You picked up on that. That song has been used by a number of people who wanted to play something for their daughter or son that were about to leave home and go to university or go far afield to do something on distant shores. That's basically it. "Solitude's no sacrifice, to catch a glimpse of paradise." Jeff Thompson: That's an awesome song. I really like that song. Pete, you've got some questions I'm sure. I've been jumping in here. Pete Lane: John, I'm just honored to be speaking with you. I'm in my late 60s and of course grew up with you and your music and of course Steppenwolf. Until recently I had no idea of how enduring you have been and how diverse you are in your view of the world and society. I just want to compliment you on that for starters. John Kay: Thank you. That's very kind of you and generous. I would hope and think that I will continue to be still in a lifelong learning process of clumsily following the footsteps left by others that have preceded me with their examples of how to nurture their humanity and how to have a purpose in life beyond just mindless consumption and amusing themselves, as the book once said, amusing ourselves to death. It's something that keeps the inner flame burning, and been very, very fortunate in many different ways, currently still healthy, thank goodness. Any day when you remain vertical is a good day. Pete Lane: Absolutely. John Kay: There are so many out there who lead with their example. I have met some of them who have been inspirational. Every so often, some young people come along, say, "Hey, I came across your music, and it has given me some stuff to listen to when I have to get over one of the speed bumps of life, and thank you for that." It's a generational thing. I'm still focused on the ones ahead of me. There are younger ones that have found something in what we have to offer of a value that went beyond just musical wallpaper, but with no real substance that you can use for your own. John Kay: There's so many out there who have written songs and played music practically all their lives, which has given sustenance to the rest of us, or the listeners, and have had personal little anthems that we go to when we need to have a moment of rejuvenation through music. John Kay: I sometimes talk to people who say, "You're talking about all these other people doing great work, making music that gives great pleasure and joy to people. It's not a bad way to make a living either." While I agree with that, music will continue to be something that I do on occasion, meaning once in a while I have a desire to write a song or two, irrespective of whether they will ever be recorded and commercially released. I've performed at fundraisers and things like that. Music continues very definitely to be part of my life. John Kay: By the same token, I am very much now focused on bringing the word to a lot of people, who once they know what we are losing, meaning wildlife, we've had this number of times, we're talking to people who are well-educated, quite engaged, very successful in what they do, and when we talked about that an elephant was being killed every 15 minutes for their tusks and that we, at this rate, 15 years from now, may no longer have any living in the wild, and the same holds for the rhinos and numerous other species, they're aghast. They're, "I didn't know that. This is terrible. Who's doing anything about it?" Then further to that, "Who can I trust with my money if I want to help?" John Kay: That's really what our little foundation is about. We have been supporting various entities. I think at this point we're at 16 different NGOs we support annually for about 15 years. We're the ones who are a little bridge between the boots on the ground who are fighting to preserve what remains, and those who are willing to help provide it, there's some assurance that their money will go to the boots on the ground. We're the ones who can vouch for a number of wonderful people at NGOs. Because we have born witness to the work they do, we're going to back to Africa next year to look in on several of the NGOs again. That's my role of both my wife and I. John Kay: In fact, this year's the last year that Steppenwolf will be performing. We have six more engagements to play, the last one October 14, and after that the wolf will go into hibernation, if you want to put it that way. My emphasis is now on ... I assume both of you are familiar with TED Talks. Jeff Thompson: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Pete Lane: Yes. John Kay: With that in mind, although the following is not a TED Talk per se, because those talks are limited to 18 minutes in length, mine is more like an hour and 15 minutes, but what it is, it's similar to a TED Talk, in the sense that I'm up on stage giving my story, while behind me on a screen there are many, many still images and short video clips and so on. The whole thing is called Born To Be Wild: From Rock Star To Wildlife Advocate, John Kay of Steppenwolf and His Journey of Transformation. John Kay: It basically starts with my early life and how I got out from behind the Iron Curtain and was enthralled with American rock-and-roll when I grew up as a teenager in West Germany and made it to Canada as an immigrant, got my first guitar, and then got into music more and more, and of course the story of Steppenwolf, and then how gradually over time we, my wife and I, through our travels, went to Cambodia, where we saw the killing fields, and we got involved with building a school there, which was the start of our foundation, and then Africa and so on down the line. John Kay: Basically at the end of this presentation, towards the end, after having shown what we do, where, and who is doing what in Africa and Asia and Borneo and so on, it's basically a pitch of saying, "Now that you know, if you didn't know already, you can use our website as a gateway to other NGOs or you can support what we do directly, but do it for your grandchildren's sake or do it to honor the 2,000, almost, African rangers that have been killed by poachers in the last 12 years, or do it simply because our fellow living beings have very little left to call their home, and they too have a right to exist." Pete Lane: Unbelievable. Jeff Thompson: That's awesome. I love the way you talk about your passion that you even have today. Pete and I both met because we had a passion for recording. One story that really caught my attention is when you were in Toronto and you received your reel-to-reel, and I don't think you listened to the books as much as you wanted it for recording music. John Kay: You got that right. It was a scam from the get-go. I said, "I don't need talking books. I can read books, even though I gotta read them with my nose." I said, "I could use it for something else." I was just simply appalled at what came out of that dinky little speaker that was built into that Wollensak tape recorder, because when I tried my hand at recording my first efforts of playing guitar and singing, I said, "I don't sound like that, do I? This is terrible." It was sheer ego that kept me going, said, "One way I can get better if I keep at it." Hope springs eternal. Sometimes you simply have more luck than talent. Pete Lane: John let's talk a little bit more if you don't mind about your eye condition. Talk about that a little bit. Let's start if you don't mind a little bit in your early years and maybe focus in Toronto when you were moved into is it Deer Park, that Deer Park school? John Kay: Yeah, that was the sight-saving classes. It's a strange thing, with respect to my eyes. When I was still a baby, lying in one of these carriages that back in those days were typical, I think the English call them prams or whatever, living in this tiny little town in what was then East Germany, I would cry whenever the sun was in my eyes. John Kay: When I was older, my mother took me to an ophthalmologist, and he said, "He obviously has very, very poor vision and he's very light-sensitive." The only thing he could think of at the time was that, "His condition might improve if he had a better diet," because at that time we were on food rations, and because of where we were, we were eating herring morning, noon, and night, boiled, fried, stewed herring, coming out of the ears. I never touched a fish again after that until I was 40-something years old. John Kay: This is the important point about this. My mother took that as a, "Maybe the doctor's right." It was that that caused her to take the risky chance of getting caught, imprisoned, or shot by, in the middle of the night, together with about half a dozen other people, getting smuggled by a couple of border guides that worked for the railroad and knew how to time the searchlights from the watchtowers and the dog patrols and everything else. John Kay: We got through, and then it turned out that, this was in Hanover, Germany, West Germany, and of course this was after the war, there were still schools in short supply, having been destroyed, and so there were classes 50 children large, two shifts, one in the morning, one in the afternoon. I was not doing well. It was my mother who was working as a seamstress who managed to get me into the Waldorf school, the private school, which was banned under Hitler because it was far too humanitarian, but which looked after me. There I blossomed, and the eyes didn't play as big a role. John Kay: It wasn't until I came to Toronto that I was back in public school. I didn't speak English yet and couldn't read what was on the blackboard. The school officials got in touch with the CNIB, Canadian National Institute for the Blind, and they said, "We have these sight-saving classes in a, it's just one large schoolroom segmented into two or three different grades, at a public school called Deer Park School, in the northern part of Toronto." That's where I went for about two years. John Kay: The primary benefit was that, yes, they had textbooks with extra-large print and all that, but I learned English during those years, not just in school, but because of my obsession with listening to the radio all the time, looking for music that connected, I was always having to try and make out what these speed-rapping DJs were saying, because they were yakking a mile a minute. Between radio and the Deer Park School, I got to the point where I got a handle on things. Of course during that period at that school, I was also given this tape recorder on loan. As I mentioned before, I immediately pressed that into service. Jeff Thompson: That's really impressive, just the journey. John Kay: One thing I should add, by the way, was that nobody really knew what was the matter with me. I went to a Toronto University I think, the medical department, ophthalmology I think it was. There I was treated like a guinea pig. They brought in all these medical students and take a look in my eyes and everything. They said, "Oh, you're totally colorblind. Let's see here." John Kay: They had one of those books where every page is made out of these little mosaic little pebbles with different colors." Embedded amongst them, so to speak, would be a combination of these colored tiles that spelled something, a letter or a number or something. At the beginning of the book, the contrast between the primary colors versus whatever the number or the letter was very stark. I said, "Yeah, that, it says six, okay." As we went from page to page, the differences in terms of contrast became more and more subdued to the point where by page whatever, I don't see anything other than just one page of all these little mosaic tiles and pebbles. They would say, "No, actually there is a light yellow whatever something or other." John Kay: They figured out later down the line that I was an achromat, achromatopsia, that as an additional bonus with that condition comes extreme light sensitivity. Then finally, I also have a congenital nystagmus, which is the eyes shaking all the time. You do the best you can with what you have. John Kay: Now in '63, and this has a point with respect to my vision, my vision got me probably out of Communist East Germany, and my vision also probably, in fact very definitely, kept me out of the U.S. Army and probably out of Vietnam, because when in '63 at age 19 my mother and stepdad, my mom had remarried, decided to move from Toronto to Buffalo, New York, because my stepdad had something going on business-wise, and I joined them there, the first letter that hit our mailbox was from the draft board. Of course I had to show up. Jeff Thompson: Welcome to the States. John Kay: Of course somebody once said that the military intelligence is an oxymoron. I'm not the judge on that, but I will tell you that I had something that made me scratch my head, namely when I was there and I was to have a complete physical, I tried to tell the man that I was legally blind, and of course he said, "We'll get to that, son." After a very, very thorough, top to bottom, in and out physical examination, he said, "Now read those letters on that chart on the wall." I said, "What chart?" He said, "You can't see the chart?" I walked a little closer, said, "I see it now." "What do you see?" "If I can step a few steps closer ... " "Yeah, you can." "Okay. I think there's a large capital A at the top, and the rest is guesswork." He harrumphed about, "You could've said ... Never mind." My designation was 4F. I asked him, "What does that mean really?" He said, "Son, in your case it pretty well stands for women and children first, before you. Nobody's gonna put a rifle in your hands." John Kay: It was one of those things where during those times, because in short order I went to the Newport Folk Festival in Rhode Island, to hear the greats, and I was amongst tens of thousands of young people my age, of course many of them, at least 50% or more, being young men. The draft in the Vietnam War was very much on everybody's mind. I could relate to their concerns about going off to a foreign land. This case, I would imagine my eye condition did me a service. Jeff Thompson: That was probably a baptism into the social issues of the United States coming from Toronto for you. John Kay: That's very true. That is very true. Sometimes you have the aha moment decades after it was already rather obvious. In certain ways, what makes up my musical background in terms of my self-taught things, is to some extent rooted in the early '60s folk music revival, in my visits to not just the 1964 but also the 1965 Newport Folk Festival. '65 of course I saw Dylan go electric. That is that I had already, because of my baptism with rock-and-roll, by the early '60s rock-and-roll had lost a lot of its punch and we had the pretty boy Philadelphia singer syndrome, like Frankie Avalon, Fabian, and the like. There wasn't much on the radio that I could really sink my teeth into. Here comes the folk music revival. John Kay: While living in Buffalo, a folkie says, "If you really want to know the roots of all this stuff, go down to the main library, they have a music department, which has all of the Library of Congress recording that John and Alan Lomax made in the field. You can listen to Appalachian Delta music. You can hear Delta blues, whatever." I did that. They would let you take a few albums home every week and trade them out for other ones. I went through the entire thing and gave myself a bit of an education. John Kay: Then when I went to the Newport Folk Festival and saw some of those still alive, those recordings I'd heard, I didn't know that McKinley Morganfield, who was recorded in the Delta by the Lomaxes, was actually Muddy Waters. Here he was with his band playing at Newport, and all of those kind of things. John Kay: The blues, which as Muddy once said, "The blues had a baby and they called it rock-and-roll," so the blues immediately spoke to me, particularly when I came across some of the lyrics of the chain gang songs and other things. There's a powerful song about ... The lyrics go, "Why don't you go down ole Hannah." Hannah was the name they gave to the sun, "And don't you arise no more, and if you rise in the morning, bring judgment day," because these are guys, they hated her, because the sun came up, they were forced to work in the field, out of the prison, the chain gangs, and they didn't get any rest until the sun went down. I learned that the blues had a lot more to offer than just, "Woke up this morning, my chicken walked across my face," and all the rest of the stuff they'd write. John Kay: The other thing was great, was that the likes of Dylan and numerous others of the times were following in the footsteps of Woody Guthrie and writing new songs about the here and now that was of interest to our own age group, because this was the time when the three civil rights workers were killed in Mississippi. I remember hearing, let's see, I can't think of his name right now, it'll come to me later, he was just like Dylan, a topical, as we called them, we never called them protest songs, topical songwriter. I remember he sang it, had just written it, about the killing of these three, at a topical song workshop in the afternoon. His name was Ochs, Phil Ochs. Jeff Thompson: Phil Ochs, yeah. Pete Lane: Phil Ochs, of course. John Kay: Suicide some years later. The refrain of the song was, "And here's to the land that you've torn the heart out of. Mississippi, find yourself another country to be part of." Jeff Thompson: That rings through with your Monster song. John Kay: Yeah, because the thing that became obvious to me was that songs can have content which is reflective of what's on people's minds. One of the first things we experienced as Steppenwolf was a baby band, when we went on our first cross-country tour and we were still approachable, so to speak, by long-haired kids in bellbottoms who wanted to say hello after the show, a lot of them said, "Those first two albums of yours we got, you're saying on our behalf some of the things that worry us or that we are concerned with." John Kay: That's the first time we had positive reinforcement that what we were writing about was not just our own individual personal opinions, but it was reflective of what was on the minds of many of those in our own age group. Of course I had experienced that at Newport. It was a galvanizing experience to be amongst 20,000 young people, and they're listening to somebody like a Phil Ochs or a Bob Dylan, and others who were writing about what was going on in our country in the world. Like JFK once said, "And that's the role of the artist, to remind us of the potential we have yet to reach," in terms of being a just society and all the rest. John Kay: When it came time for us to start writing our own songs, we had of course witnessed, in fact I'd played in a couple of the same coffeehouses as a journeyman folk musician solo act in Los Angeles with the likes of David Crosby and then still called Jim, later Roger, McGuinn and the rest, who formed of course The Byrds. Jeff Thompson: The Byrds. John Kay: Their first album was by and large electric versions of Bob Dylan songs. In fact I was at Ciro's nightclub when The Byrds played, when Dylan showed up and played harmonica with them. That was a photograph on the back of their first album. John Kay: The point is that I took from there, why couldn't even rock music have lyrics that go beyond "oowee baby" and the typical? That's why our first album had songs like The Pusher and The Ostrich and Take What You Need, which was really about the environment, and later, things like Don't Step On The Grass Sam and None of Your Doing, which was on the second album, which was about a Vietnam soldier coming home and nobody understands him and he can't deal with what he had witnessed. Then of course eventually came the Monster album. John Kay: The thing with the Monster album, which was very, very successful, popular on the college campuses, were all these demonstrations which were going on against the war in the campuses, and then of course the horrific Kent State shooting. These were things where what we had to say resonated with a lot of young people. John Kay: What I found interesting was that we after so many years were no longer playing that song as part of our show. Then came the Great Recession, 2007-08, and all of a sudden, a couple of things happened. I can't think of his name right now, he's been a stalwart writer for Rolling Stone for several decades, from the early days on, and he had posted a thing, something like, "I went back to listening to Steppenwolf's Monster album and I was astounded how appropriate it is in the here and now." John Kay: That coincided shortly with getting more and more requests on our website via email primarily, "Please start playing Monster again." From about 2009 onward, we've been playing it ever since. It's rare that that song does not get a standing ovation in the middle of the show. Of course it's aided and abetted by visuals that accompany our live performance, not every song, but many. In the case of Monster, it is a 10-minute film that illustrates pretty well what the song, line by line, lyrically is about. John Kay: I remember when we did it for the first time in 2009, our sound man, who's been with us now for over 30 years, and he said, "John, I had the most weird experience tonight, because there was this strange situation with Monster. It was like I was watching a movie that had a soundtrack that a live band was playing, and instead of a narrator telling me what the story was, you were simply singing the story. It was just a really intense experience." It's been like that ever since. John Kay: Sometimes you write something, and it goes out there like a kid leaving home, and you have no idea what it's doing out there, and then all of a sudden it comes back and say, "I'm still here." Jeff Thompson: The prodigal song. John Kay: It's been like that for the last 10 years. It's a song that seems to very much resonate about what we are dealing with right now. Pete Lane: It's funny, John, Jeff and I, again, were speaking before you connected with us this afternoon, and I had prepared a question along those lines. As you did earlier in this interview, you've answered it. Let me ask you this question. It's a slight variation on what we just spoke of. For those of you who don't know, Monster is just a dynamite song. It chronicles the country, the United States from its inception to what was then modern-day U.S. back in 1970 I believe, '71, early '70s. John Kay: Correct. Pete Lane: My question is this. If you were to write that song today, would you title it anything different? John Kay: No, because in my opinion the Monster has almost taken human shape now. Donald Trump: The American Dream is dead. Richard Nixon: I'm not a crook. Donald Trump: We will make America great again! Richard Nixon: I'm not a crook. I'm not a crook. I'm not a crook. Pete Lane: Just a dynamite song. Jeff Thompson: There's another long big song. It was big on the album I bought. You had over I think it was 20-minute long, The Pusher. John Kay: Yeah, that thing. There's a story to be told about that, I'll tell you. You're referring to the so-called early Steppenwolf album, a vinyl album obviously, back in those days. One side was that 20-minute version of The Pusher. That whole thing came to be because it was really a performance done by the band The Sparrow, which I had joined. John Kay: When I was in the early '60s, like so many others, with a guitar, hitchhiking around, playing wherever they'd let me, in coffeehouses and the like, when I returned after a year of being in Los Angeles, hanging out at the Troubadour, doing various things, meeting Hoyt Axton, learning The Pusher from him, etc, and wound up in Toronto again, and York Village at that time, section of Toronto had exploded into this area of just coffeehouses and clubs, all sorts of things. While I played at a coffeehouse as a solo act, I bumped into this Canadian band called The Sparrows, with an S, plural at the time. We joined forces. I started to perform The Pusher with an electric band instead of just acoustically. John Kay: The Sparrows eventually left Canada, because in those days most people did, where there was Joni Mitchell and Neil Young or others, and wound up in the States. We played in New York for a while, got a record deal that went nowhere. I kept badgering them that having seen the formation of The Byrds in L.A., that we ought to go to California. That's what we did eventually, and wound up, through various reasons I won't take time to explain, in the Bay area. There we played on the weekends usually the Avalon Ballroom or the Fillmore Ballroom. During the week we would play different clubs. One of them was a permanently beached paddle wheeler ferry boat in Sausalito called The Ark. John Kay: We were now amongst all of these Bay area bands that liked to stretch out and experiment and jam and do different things. We said, "Hey, we can play songs that are longer than four or five minutes." We started to do different things. One of them was this ad-libbed version of The Pusher, which was preceded by us doing different instrumental experiments. Steve Miller would come by and sit in and play all the different things. One of the things we'll always remember is that regularly the Hells Angels would come, drop acid, lie down on the dance floor, and stay all night listening. John Kay: We also played a club called The Matrix. Unbeknownst to us, the manager of the club had a couple of microphones suspended in the ceiling. When Steppenwolf later were moving forward into the '68 and '69, when we were quite successful with our first couple albums, we were being badgered to go back into the recording studio, because the label was always hungry for a new product. We had a couple record contracts that obligated us to deliver two albums a year, which was in hindsight ridiculous. John Kay: Anyway, the point is that the label said, "This young man, or this guy showed up, and he has these tapes that he recorded, unbeknownst to you, when you guys were still called The Sparrows, from a show you played at The Matrix in San Francisco. We would like to put it out as a collector's item called Early Steppenwolf." We listened to it. Of course you can imagine that with a couple of microphones suspended from the ceiling, this was, yeah, a collector's item for those who must just for bragging rights have to have one of everything, to be able to say, "I got everything they ever did." We hated that. We hated it then, but it bought us time. It bought us time in the studio, because when that thing was released, we got busy on writing and eventually recording what became the Monster album. That was a major step forward. Jeff Thompson: Yes, it was. Pete Lane: Fascinating story. Jeff Thompson: John, I want to go back to you told a story about how kids in school would bully you, but you took their names, you remembered, and you would get them back somehow. John Kay: It wasn't so much in school. What would happen is, like just about everywhere in the world, including the States these days, soccer, what they called football, every kid plays it. They play it barefoot in Africa. Whatever. We did too, meaning the kids in the street in West Germany when I was young. There was a vacant lot next to our little apartment building, and that's where we played. John Kay: During the day, with the sun in my eyes, even with my dark glasses, that wasn't so cool, but the moment the sun started going down, during twilight hours, I'm like a nocturnal creature that can make do with very little light. My eyes open up. I don't squint. I can see much better, not further, just more comfortably I can see things. John Kay: I would join the kids playing soccer. When they figured out that I couldn't always see what was going on, there's an 11-meter penalty kick that's part of the rules, and so when it was my turn to make that kick, some wise ass would put a half a brick in front of the ball, so I wouldn't see it. I'd come with just regular street shoes, no special athletic shoes, and take a run at shooting this ball, and of course, wham, would run my toes right into that brick- Jeff Thompson: Ouch. John Kay: ... holding my foot and hopping around on one leg, doing a Daffy Duck, "Woo! Woo!" That did not go down well with me. I was fairly big for my size always, tall. They then of course saw that I was gonna come after them. They also knew that if they managed to run a certain distance, I could no longer find them. I had to learn to say, "This is not the time." Two or three days would go by, and they would have forgotten about it, and whoever the instigator was would be doing something, and then I would go over there and deck them. They would be, "Oh man, what was that for, man? I didn't do ... " "Yes, you did, and I did not forget, but I hope you will remember this," and they did. Jeff Thompson: I remember seeing your album covers. I collected albums. There was one of you leaning back, and you're very tall, the way the angle was on it. You wore the sunglasses. When I thought of artists, musicians, I go through Roy Orbison and other people that wore the sunglasses on stage and stuff, I never thought of you. When someone brought it to my attention, State Services for the Blind here, some client wants your book recorded, so they'll take volunteers, record chapter by chapter for the person to listen to. They contacted me, said, "Hey, John Kay, he's visually impaired." I went, "Oh, that explains the sunglasses," maybe for the lights on stage or something. John Kay: Absolutely the case. I had learned over time, since I wore dark glasses during the day, certainly outdoors, I got in the habit of keeping them on, because I went, "Spotlights and stage lights, they're pretty bright, and sometimes it's difficult for me to see the guitar fret board, where my fingers go and everything, and so I'll just keep the dark glasses on. Besides, some pretty cool people seem to be wearing them, and so that's just part of the persona." Over time, meaning literally decades, I learned that I could avoid, provided the spotlights were mounted high enough with a downward angle, I could look under them in a sense, look at the audience rather than up into the bleachers. Gradually I was able to dispense with them on stage, although the moment we play outdoors they go right back on. In fact I have one pair that's damn near as dark as welding goggles when things get really super sunny, Africa's sun is very bright, or the snow is very reflective, that sort of thing. John Kay: Of course I remember one time, we were never the darlings of Rolling Stone, and so there was a negative review of one of our albums. The guy said, I'm paraphrasing, "As far as John Kay's jive sunglasses are concerned," he went on about something else. Actually, one of our managers felt compelled to write them a letter and point out that those glasses have a purpose for being on my face. He's just like everyone else. John Kay: When I was a kid in West Germany when we first got there, I had a key around my neck, because my mother was a seamstress in other people's homes, so making a living until she remarried, and I had to learn how to get around, to get on this streetcar to get to there, because I was at a daycare center run by the Swedish Red Cross and I had to make my way back home and I couldn't read the street signs. You figure things out, there's this kind of a building on that corner, and markers that you imprint into your memory banks. John Kay: You have to remember, this is a time, post World War II, the Soviet Union alone lost 20 million people. In Hanover in 1949 and '50 and '51, there were tons of people, legs and arms missing and crutches and this and that, those who managed to survive the war in some semblance. It was basically a mindset of, "Hey, we all got stuff to deal with, kid. Just get on with it." You learned how to figure out workaround solutions for what you're dealing with. I'm certainly one of millions who are having to make adjustments. John Kay: I remember we had a dear neighbor in Tennessee was a Vietnam veteran, Marine Corps, and he was in a wheelchair. He had to overcome his anger and started to meditate and do other things. He said to me, "Hey John, it's not the hand that's dealt you, it's how you play the hand that's dealt you." He married, had a wonderful daughter. He became a cotton farmer and somehow got onto his tractor, and like so many out there, that okay, he's not perfect, but what are you gonna do with what you got? Jeff Thompson: John, regarding your visual impairment these days, do you use technology, computer, smartphone, anything along those lines? If so, do you use any kind of adaptive tools or screen enlargement features, anything like that? John Kay: I'm lucky enough in the sense that most standard issue devices have features that work just fine. I have a fairly large flat-panel monitor on my PC. Of course with the zoom feature and other things, I can make the font, what I'm reading, as well as what I may be writing, email and Word documents or whatever, whatever I want. The iOS, I have a phone, I have a iPad, they have a zoom feature that's just marvelous. I use that when needed. Some things with Siri or Chicano or something, in the PC world you can actually just ask for certain things to be brought to the screen. I'm learning how to do that more and more. It's a great convenience. John Kay: I really don't have any problems. I've flown all over the world to meet my band mates on my own. I've learned to do ... That was a big deal for me, because of ... One of you mentioned you had been to our foundation's website. There are a number of videos about the things that we support, and we have witnessed and the wildlife that we see and so on. All of that was shot by me, edited by me, and then narrated by me. Now granted my wife, who is a fine photographer and had no colorblindness like I do, I ask her sometimes, "What about this?" "We can tweak that a little, whatever." Other than a little color assistance, I do all that myself. John Kay: The reason I can do it primarily is because there are several brands of prosumer or even professional camcorders that have up to 20x optical zoom lens, which gives you an incredible reach from where you are to get a closeup of whatever's in the distance, an elephant, whatever it may be. I use it like a pair of binoculars, because I remember one time we were in Africa and our guide was asking my wife, "He's constantly looking through that thing. Is he always shooting?" She says, "No no no. Instead of picking up a pair of binoculars, then finding something he wants to shoot, putting down-" Jeff Thompson: Good for you. John Kay: "... the binoculars, picking up his camera, he just uses that zoom lens of his like a pair of binoculars, and when he sees something, he just pulls the trigger and starts recording." Jeff Thompson: That's great. That's neat. John Kay: That's my workaround solution for that. Jeff Thompson: John, there's so much information on your website. I was going through it. That's how I found out about the elephants and your foundation. I also was reading your question and answer, which any of the listeners who are out there, go to his website and check it out, the question and answer, because it answers so many questions. One of them was when someone mentions you are a legend, I loved your response to that. You would say it to if you met Chuck Berry or someone else or something. It was just such a humbling thing that you ... Then I believe you met your wife in ... John Kay: Toronto. Jeff Thompson: Yeah, in Toronto. Usually when you hear about rock stars and these legends, they've gone through wives, divorces. You're still together. John Kay: We are still together. I was a member of the aforementioned Canadian band in Toronto called The Sparrows. We were playing Downtown Toronto at a place. Between sets, our bass player said, "Hey, my girlfriend is here, sitting over there at that table, and she brought her girl friend. Why don't you join us for a drink or something?" I went over there, and I met this young woman by the name Jutta, spelled J-U-T-T-A. She was from Hamburg, Germany, where she had already as a teenager seen the band that later was to name itself the Beatles and numerous American rock-and-roll stars at The Star-Club in Hamburg. We had some things in common. I liked her a lot. I followed her home that night and moved in with her. We've been together ever since. Jeff Thompson: The longest one-night stand. John Kay: Yeah. The thing is that I, like so many others in the rock-and-roll world, being in our early 20s when we caught a wave as Steppenwolf and we were out there on the road, there's a degree of too much ego, testosterone, drugs, and temptations out there. When my wife sometimes, particularly women ask her, "Was it all roses and rainbows? You guys are still together. What's the secret to your marriage's longevity?" She'll look them straight in the eye and say, "The secret is not getting a divorce." Jeff Thompson: Rocket science. John Kay: We're very much lifelong partners. We have much, much in common in terms of our interests and where we direct our energy and passion and time. The other hand, rather, she has certain intuitive traits that for whatever reason elude me, and I'm more analytical and more logical in some ways. We're a good fit. It's the yin and the yang together. We hope to remain like that until we are no longer vertical. Jeff Thompson: I have a question about this. When you met her, was your eyesight at the time, did you have to explain to her you won't be driving or something like that? John Kay: Yeah, you're right. Just like my thing that I mentioned earlier, when you're a 12-year-old and you're fantasizing about becoming a rock-and-roller on the other side of the ocean and being told, "Sure, kid," when I moved in with her, she was a very young, desirable, good-looking woman, some of her friends, there's an old snide remark in the industry, which is, "What do you call a musician without a girlfriend? You call them homeless." John Kay: When I went back to this other girl that I had been living with, to get some of my belongings to bring those over to Jutta's place, when I showed up at this other girl's place, there was another guy sitting there already, playing the guitar. I said, "Hello, who are you?" He says, "My name is Neil Young. I just came in from Winnipeg and I'm joining this band called The Mynah Birds." I said, "Oh, cool. I just joined this band called The Sparrows." In other words, all of us folkies were always looking for a kindhearted woman to put a roof over your head. John Kay: When I moved in with Jutta and we had been together for a while, they were all telling her, "You got a legally blind, penniless musician, and that's your future. I think you can do better than that." Of course the conventional wisdom, they were absolutely right. The chances of all of this working out the way it did, you'd probably get better odds winning the lottery, if you go to Vegas, they would give you better odds for that, but like I said earlier, sometimes you just have more luck than good sense. It all worked out just fine. Jeff Thompson: That's great. How did you keep your focus? How did you, I keep going back to that song, but your eye on the chart, through all that has gone on with the early Steppenwolf to John Kay and Steppenwolf? What kept you focused? John Kay: That's an interesting story, question rather, because I've had to contemplate that before. I've never felt the need to go see a shrink. I seemed to always get over whatever emotional speed bumps there were. I suspect that the same deeply rooted passion for certain things, be it music, be it a sense of justice, being easily enraged by injustice, that I think is also the touchstone of other things where anger is the motivator and the engine. In the case of Steppenwolf, was very successful, we had various albums, some more commercially successful than others. It wasn't all roses and rainbows, but on the whole, it was a segment of my life that was pretty special, obviously. John Kay: Then came time when the obligations to the band, because of being its primary songwriter and lead singer and front man and all that, became such that I wanted time for the private me, which meant my family, our daughter, who was hardly ever seeing me. John Kay: When I pulled the plug on Steppenwolf in the late '70s, after a rejuvenating period in the mid-'70s on a different label, our little family went in our little family van all over the Southwest. We spent a lot of time in Hawaii, on Maui and stuff. That was quite nurturing and very good for me, but I was also, "Okay, I'm gonna do a solo album, this and that." It was on pause to a certain extent. John Kay: Then the news reached Jerry Edmonton, the original drummer and co-founder of the band, and friend, that a couple of ex-members of the band were out there using the name Steppenwolf. Then all sorts of boring details as to lawsuits and other things involved, but the news that reached us was generally from fans, saying, "We went to see what was called Steppenwolf, and it was horrible. People were throwing stuff at them. They're trashing the name." John Kay: We tried to put a stop to these activities, using the legal system, lawsuits and so on. Again, it would take too much time to go into the details. Let's just say that the results, I kept saying, "This legal system is limping along like a turtle with a wooden leg. We're not getting anywhere here with these lawsuits." It was like whack-a-mole. You'd go after them in this state, they'd pop up in another state. John Kay: Finally, out of sheer desperation and anger, I had a number of musicians with whom I had been playing as the John Kay Band, I called Jerry and I said, "Man, I want to go out there as John Kay and Steppenwolf, because I want to resurrect the name and rebuild it. We'll work out something, so you participate financially." He was already into his photographer and artist mode. That was fine. John Kay: In 1980 I went out there, driven by the outrage and anger of, "You guys are destroying something that you didn't build. I was the one who called everybody up to see if you wanted to what became Steppenwolf, and I'm going to go out there and compete with you guys on the same low-level clubs you guys have played the name down into, see who wins." John Kay: We from 1980 on went out there 20 weeks at a time, five shows a week, overnight drives 500 miles, playing in the toilet circuit of bars, where some of them, you wouldn't want to enter those clubs without a whip and a chair. It was just horrible. John Kay: The mantra was, "Yeah, three years ago we were headlining in arenas. That's not the point. If there are 300 people here tonight at this club who are not above being here to hear us play, and we're certainly not above us playing for them, so the mission is every night we gotta send people home smiling and telling others, 'You missed a really good show,' and all you can do is grit your teeth that that will eventually," because we ran into, we distinctly remember, a club on the outskirts of Minneapolis, St. Paul. During the soundcheck time, relatively young guy came over and looked me straight in the face, said, "You're not John Kay. He wouldn't play a shit hole like this." That was the level to which the name had been played down into. John Kay: That really got me aggravated. I said, "I'm gonna kick their butt, not by ... The lawyers are still fighting over this and that, but in the meantime, we're getting great reviews and we're going town by town, state by state." By 1984, after relentless touring in the States, also twice in Canada, by that time we had also released a couple new albums, twice in Europe, once in Australia, we in essence put what we called the bogus Steppenwolf bands out of business. John Kay: While we were at it, since we were somewhat damaged goods, we said, "Then we're gonna learn how to mind the store ourselves." That's when we had our own music publishing company, our own recording studio, our own merchandise corporation, our own tour bus, huge truck with a triple sleeper, 105 cases of gear, and on and on. To give you an idea of how tight a bond was formed, our entire crew, all four members have been with me for over 30 years. Jeff Thompson: Oh wow. Pete Lane: Wow. John Kay: We took the reigns into our own hands and learned. I did not want to become a paralegal or para-accountant or any of those other things. Almost everybody in our 12-member organization, bus drivers, everybody, wore multiple hats, selling merchandise during the show or whatever. They were all quality people, and we learned how to fend for ourselves, and not just survive, but at a certain point, thrive. We knew exactly where the money was coming from and where it went. Nobody was running off with our loot to Ecuador. Jeff Thompson: What suggestions would you have for someone today who is interested in music like you were, driving your passion from Little Richard, Chuck Berry, all those people that inspired you to follow your passion? What suggestions in today's music world would you give to them? John Kay: Unfortunately, I wish I had some kind of a magic formula to impart to them, but obviously every situation is vastly different, is really I think in the end, I know people who are tremendously talented, vastly more talented than I am, who are not necessarily doing well. I've experienced in the early days where someone whose primary talent was to show up at every opportunity to pitch what they had to offer. It's one of those, "Did you go to that audition yesterday, this morning, or whatever?" "I had a really late-night last night. I'll go to the next one." How many opportunities are gonna come your way? It's one of those. John Kay: The other thing is, do you have the fire in your belly to handle the ego-destroying rejections, because there are probably hundreds, if you were to take a poll of ... Well-known singer-songwriter Nora Jones, that first album, which I love, was rejected I think by every label in town twice. There are stories like that all over the place. John Kay: How do you pick yourself up every morning after, "I'm sorry, it's just not radio-friendly," or, "You don't really fit into our whatever." You need to have a pretty intense flame of passion about what you are and what you have to offer. You need to be able to handle ... John Kay: You may be the one that wins the lottery, where the first attempt reaches the right set of ears and you've got a partner in your career moving forward, but most likely you will be like so many of the baby acts these days, and some who have been around already for 10 years plus, which is you have to learn how to wear a lot of different hats, the social media stuff, the pitching your music on YouTube or whatever, to endlessly tour in clubs, to build a following, four of you sleeping in the van with the gear, whatever. It'll burn you out if you're not made of something that can handle those rigors. John Kay: Meantime, you have the temptations of, "I want to have a private life too," depending on whether you're a female or male, an artist, "I met somebody I want to share my life with. At some point we want to have children. This band isn't getting me anywhere." There are all these things that are strikes against your ability to prevail in this, unless you are one of those who's willing to take those beatings out there, in terms of the rejection and being often the response that you get from reviewers or whatever is not always positive, particularly if you're still in the process of really finding and tweaking who you are and what you have to offer. John Kay: If you're a singer doing other people's stuff, that's one thing. If you are a writer and you really have something to say, that may be an advantage in the sense that if it resonates, you may find what we found in the early days, which is, "Wow, you've become our musical spokesperson. When I play that song, it is my inner voice, having been give voice, by your voice." If you're one of those who's able to put in words what moves you most, and there are lots of others out there that take your music as their personal soundtrack, then it may still be a long slog uphill, but usually that sort of thing spreads readily on social media. John Kay: We have the Wolf Pack. When we played our official 50th anniversary, celebrating the 50th anniversary of the formation of the band, when we played that official concert to commemorate that at the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville, Tennessee last August, and the Wolf Pack fan club was notified of that. We had over 300 Wolf Pack fan members coming from all over North America and at least close to 70 or 80 of them coming all the way from Europe. They all know each other. They're all like the Dead Heads. They have a passion that they share with others. John Kay: If you are able as an artist to reach people in that kind of way where what you have to offer becomes more than just sheer entertainment, then I think your chances of making a go of it are pretty good. Some of more or less my contemporaries that are still writing, still out there, still loved, John Prine, John Hiatt, if you are one of those, or you're aspiring to become one of those, I wish you a lot of good fortune. John Kay: Sarah McLachlan song Angel, it has moved millions to tears. One of the verses that basically I'm paraphrasing, about when you're always being told you're not good enough, you're basically having the door slammed in your face all the time, and the self-doubt creeps in and nobody seems to get what it is you have to offer, those kind of things, they're hard on you. John Kay: You wouldn't want to be a writer, artist, player, whatever, singer, if you didn't have some degree of ego that says, "Hey, I've got something to offer, something to say. I'm up here. Do you like what I got?" That's rooted to some extent in your ego. If you have that ego under control, wonderful. The ego also gets damaged and gets hurt when they
The Coffee Break is the daily Christian talk and local events program on Hope Radio KCMI 97.1FM serving the Scottsbluff, NE area. Tune in for interviews with authors, musicians, pastors, and others in the Christian community and our local area! Visit our website: www.kcmifm.com Like us on Facebook: www.facebook.com/kcmifm Theme Music: "Life of Riley" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
SP067 - Interview mit Tim Ehling, Inhaber der Agentur Phoenix 4.0 über sein Sidepreneur-DaseinDu findest das Interview auch als Blogartikel mit allen Links unter https://sidepreneur.de/interview-sidepreneur-tim-ehling oder sidepreneur.de/067Tim arbeitet in Vollzeit beim Communications Center der Fraport AG in Frankfurt am Main, ist zweifacher Vater und ist Inhaber der Agentur 4.0, die Websites erstellt und Social Media und SEO-Dienstleistungen anbietet. In dieser Episode erzählt uns Tim, wie er sich organisiert, welche Ziele er verfolgt und wie das Gespräch mit seinem Arbeitgeber ablief, als er sich entschied, sich nebenberuflich selbständig zu machen.Tim Ehling findet du im Internet unter folgenden Links:https://phoenix-vierpunktnull.de/https://www.facebook.com/tim.ehlinghttps://twitter.com/tim_ehlinghttps://www.linkedin.com/in/tim-ehling/https://www.xing.com/profile/Tim_Ehling3https://www.facebook.com/phoenix.vierpunktnull/
SP067 - Interview mit Tim Ehling, Inhaber der Agentur Phoenix 4.0 über sein Sidepreneur-DaseinDu findest das Interview auch als Blogartikel mit allen Links unter https://sidepreneur.de/interview-sidepreneur-tim-ehling oder sidepreneur.de/067Tim arbeitet in Vollzeit beim Communications Center der Fraport AG in Frankfurt am Main, ist zweifacher Vater und ist Inhaber der Agentur 4.0, die Websites erstellt und Social Media und SEO-Dienstleistungen anbietet. In dieser Episode erzählt uns Tim, wie er sich organisiert, welche Ziele er verfolgt und wie das Gespräch mit seinem Arbeitgeber ablief, als er sich entschied, sich nebenberuflich selbständig zu machen.Tim Ehling findet du im Internet unter folgenden Links:https://phoenix-vierpunktnull.de/https://www.facebook.com/tim.ehlinghttps://twitter.com/tim_ehlinghttps://www.linkedin.com/in/tim-ehling/https://www.xing.com/profile/Tim_Ehling3https://www.facebook.com/phoenix.vierpunktnull/
This week's show starts with Executive Producer Chase Crispin presenting his weekly technology Update. Bill McCann from Dancing Dots introduces us to products from Dancing Dots and demonstrates their software package that allows a blind musician the ability to read and compose music on their Windows based computer with all the features and flexability of some of the best music composing software on the market. MainMenu staff member David Woodbridge from Vision Australia shows us the Light Detector app for your Apple iOS device that gives the blind person an excellent light probe on their device. MainMenu listeners in the Minneapolis/St Paul twin cities area who listen to MainMenu through Minnesota Radio Talkingbook will need the new digital receiver supplied by Minnesota Radio Talkingbook starting on June 25th in order to hear MainMenu from that service starting next week. If they do not have the new digital radio they should contact the Communications Center at Minnesota State Services for the Blind to request that a new digital radio be sent to them at (651) 642-0500. Meantime they can also access MainMenu through the MainMenu page at www.mainmenu.acbradio.org or through www.mnssb.org and take the link in the Communications Center to Radio Talkingbook, and finally login at the listen live link where they can find the latest MainMenu link for on demand listening! It's all on MainMenu this week on ACB Radio Mainstream! Main Menu can be first heard on Fridays at 9:00 pm Eastern time. It airs throughout Saturday on ACB Radio Mainstream. http://www.acbradio.org/mainstream It is also available in the iTunes store, in the iBlink Radio app for IOS and Android devices, and is available to Radio Reading Services around the world. Subscribe to the Main Menu podcast feed at: http://mainmenu.acbradio.org/rss.php Follow MainMenu on Twitter at: http://www.twitter.com/mainmenu Subscribe to a list where you can interact with other Main Menu listeners and the Main Menu staff by sending a blank email message to: mm-friends-subscribe at acbradio.org
The controversy over the 911 Center and who pays (the City of Madison or Dane County) for personnel handling non-emergency parking calls is addressed at this meeting.
The controversy over the 911 Center and who pays (the City of Madison or Dane County) for personnel handling non-emergency parking calls is addressed at this meeting.
The controversy over the 911 Center and who pays (the City of Madison or Dane County) for personnel handling non-emergency parking calls were discussed at this meeting.
The controversy over the 911 Center and who pays (the City of Madison or Dane County) for personnel handling non-emergency parking calls were discussed at this meeting.
Ever wonder where your 9-1-1 call goes? Who is answering the phone? How they know what, and how many, fire trucks and ambulances to send to your emergency situation? Join host Bill Delaney and special guest Captain Patrick J. Stanton, who is the Communications Training Supervisor for our 9-1-1 Center, for the answer to these and other questions. Calls and email questions will be taken.
Ever wonder where your 9-1-1 call goes? Who is answering the phone? How they know what, and how many, fire trucks and ambulances to send to your emergency situation? Join host Bill Delaney and special guest Captain Patrick J. Stanton, who is the Communications Training Supervisor for our 9-1-1 Center, for the answer to these and other questions. Calls and email questions will be taken.
John Ankele, B.A., M.Div., started out as Program Director for the NYC Council of Churches, doing public affairs programs for WABC radio, WNBC-TV, and WCBS-TV. He then spent six years teaching at the Communications Center of the All-Africa Conference of Churches in Nairobi, Kenya. Back in the U.S...
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