Patrick Thompson, Chair of the DPG's Greening Georgia Caucus & Environmental Advocate

The North GA Blue: Getting into Good Trouble podcast covers democratic politics in North GA, the 9th Congressional District, and across the state of Georgia. The podcast is in Q&A/Interview format with various democratic politicos including county chairs, democratic operatives, politicians, and more. It is our mission to deliver crucial information to our listeners in a timely manner as we fight for community values and principles in the 3rd most Conservative district in the state. Our website is: https://www.fcdpga.com/podcasts

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Transcript

Meral Clarke: 0:18

Hello and welcome back to the North Georgia Blue Podcast produced and distributed by the Fannin County Democratic Party. I'm your host Meral Clarke and we're getting into some good trouble today with our guest Patrick Thompson, Executive Director of the Democratic Party of Georgia's Greening Caucus. Welcome to the show, Patrick. We're happy to have you with us today.

Patrick Thompson: 0:40

Glad to be on.

Meral Clarke: 0:41

Let's tell our listeners a little bit about you. Clean energy entrepreneur with a successful career of progressive senior sales and alliance leadership roles with high tech companies Patrick's teams have produced over 12 billion in value to the organizations where he's led in harnessing and democratizing both data and energy. As a committee member of the International Society of Sustainability Professionals and the American Sustainable Business Council slash social Petra circle, he's worked to create a more circular economy through decarbonisation projects, and I do want to ask you what that means that move beyond sustainability to regenerative systems to expand true inclusion and to broaden the definition of success to include all stakeholders. Patrick earned undergraduate degrees from Mary Washington University, a computer science degree and an MBA in sustainability from Green Mountain College. He founded two renewable energy companies and is on the board of several clean energy startups. He consults with global organizations on renewable energy, energy efficiency, and EV infrastructure, which would be electric vehicles. Correct? Right, yes, active with youth through groups like the blue green Alliance and scouting International, he's helping to inspire the next generation to participate more fully in their energy accountability. Patrick also serves as Executive Director of two nonprofits providing advisory services aimed at increasing inclusive investments toward a clean energy and cooperative framework that builds a more resilient economy. Well, thank you, Patrick, for all your hard work. So let's get into it. Tell us more about Greening Georgia's missions and goals. And one thing that we didn't have here is that you are the executive director of Greening Georgia, which is a caucus under the auspices of the Democratic Party of Georgia, just to let our listeners know. So can you elaborate on your mission and goals and tell us what EV infrastructure is and how we built it? Also, what are Georgia's lawmakers doing or not doing in this arena? That's a lot. Alright. So let's start with the mission and goals.

Patrick Thompson: 2:59

Yes. So our mission at Greening Georgia is to develop a team of members from around the state that will talk with consumers and also legislators. Right now, I asked voters and I have a list of things. And this is pretty typical, you have a list of things. If a rep is really good, they'll put a list out and say, Well, what's important to you? And they put their list of things. Sometimes they matter to you, sometimes they don't. But when you ask about the environment, it's always in there. Oh, yeah, I care about the environment, but it's usually at the bottom of their list. And our goal is to put that value at the top of the list. For example, do you guys see what's going on right now, in a faraway country, it's a fight about energy. It's our choice of energy. We made choices that put us in a box, we're in a bad place. And that's an environmental issue. And if you look at Georgia, what are we doing about it? We don't make anything here. We don't make natural gas. We don't make coal, we make a little bit of hydro, but we are completely beholden to importing other stuff. So the amount of money it takes to import energy from other places, other states and other countries for Georgia is equal to about our state budget. So how does that work? How is that getting paid for? It's a typical Georgia fashion nothing's getting paid for is what's happening. So we're looking at trying to help legislators be more responsible to really look at their stewardship of all capital, social, financial, intellectual, and natural. All these have to be tended in order to make the economy productive, resilient, competitive, and really equitable. For businesses in our community. We're in a real bad place right now. Because we have not made energy and in the environment, and equal calling. We're not in a sustainable path. Right now. We're doing things that are good for a few people and good for a few segments of our society, but not really good for everybody. So we believe that everything in our economy is interdependent consumers and producers, earners and spenders and those all have to be in balance. This is what we call the triple bottom line, the Triple P people planet and project. So right now you see companies vying for your attention saying, Hey, we're the most green company out here. Walmart's been running commercials lately. Walmart is not a sustainable company, they are really sustainable for themselves and making profits, but they don't take care of their own employees, they don't take care of the communities in which they do business. So they're really not taking care of the triple bottom line, they're only looking at profit. And they're very efficient at making big profit. But they're very corrosive on the rest of the economy. So we want to tell people to start to invest in those initiatives that are truly sustainable and making us more resilient. And we're lucky here in the US, and that we are able to sustain problems, we have a hurricane, we have a tornado, we have fires, we can bounce back, because we have stuff the other countries cannot afford to do that. And then we end up taking care of them. So that is not a very sustainable environment. So that's what we're doing. And there's been a couple of things lately that have come out that helped us, for example, the Securities and Exchange Commission as just a rule change come out, it's probably gonna go in place. And what it means is, as a company, if you're going to be on our securities exchange, you need to tell us what your carbon use is, we need to tell us how much carbon you're expending to do what you do. And you can hide it, you can say, well, you know, I make this much, but I invest this much in good things. So you can balance it out. But you need to tell your story. And what's happened is consumers, and also investors are asking for that data. They're saying, I'm not going to invest in your company, unless you tell me what your sustainability story is, you have to report that. So that's a huge change that's been coming for a while, but it's now becoming codified, and it's gonna sprinkle down to all companies everywhere, they're gonna have to report on what they're doing to our planet and how they're using their resources to do better. That's a huge change. Huge, it'll change.

Meral Clarke: 6:43

Well, that's helpful. Correct. And Georgia's leaders don't seem to be doing anything about it. Is there anything that our Unfortunately, our leaders are members of the GOP, who oftentimes don't even believe in climate change? So what can we do to communicate with those leaders to ensure that climate change is an important item on their list?

Patrick Thompson: 7:06

Yeah, so one of the things that I like to do when I'm talking to a legislator or a business leader, or even a community leader, or mayor, anybody is don't believe in climate change. That's your problem. I can't help you. But you must believe in conservative politics, no matter what. So what's our number one business in the state. And I like to catch things in terms of monetary because anybody listen to that even a truck hugger will listen to whether they're going making money or not. So I talked about the number one industry in Georgia being agriculture. That's our number one thing. Live in the city, you don't realize that. But so what are we going to do when the workers don't want to work? Right now you've got people out in the fields, for example, picking plants and working with animals that are really outside the federal guidelines. They're working in whether that's dry and hot, sometimes many times and it's beyond what the federal regulations or guidelines are. And they get away with that, because they're using a lot of imported labor. But we've got people that have been coming here for five generations, and now they're saying, Maybe I won't, maybe I'll stay where I am. Or maybe I'll go to another state, we can't afford to do that. And just your workers in general, the economics department puts out Warnings Don't go out today, it's too hot and pollen is too bad. And they have a color code that they use, don't go out and exercise don't go out and breathe the air. Senior adults shouldn't be out. That's not a good way to live. I know our government likes to brag about the fact that they are I really never wants to stay for business. And I go back to them private again and say, Do you know where that saying comes from? That all comes from a magazine. That's called a site selection magazine. It's based in Georgia?

Meral Clarke: 8:41

Of course, it is no conflict of interest there.

Patrick Thompson: 8:45

Yes. It's based in Cobb County, the same Cobb County that moved the baseball team and didn't ask anybody and making citizens pay for that.

Meral Clarke: 8:53

Yes, I was there. And it was horrendous. Yeah.

Patrick Thompson: 8:57

And we picked a really good spot to put it in, I think, the second worst traffic spot in the area, then they did no studies about is this going to take more energy. Is this going to need more public safety is it's going to need more water. None of that. No transit. Let's just do it. Because we're Republicans getting you elected us to do stuff like this. No, we didn't, especially to taxes. It's a huge tax. So anyway, Site Selection Magazine, when you look at the things that they consider important, we think, how many taxes can we get away with not paying, what regulations can we get rid of? So they're very good at attracting companies and the first thing they do is they brag about what we gave away and I was laughing when Mercedes Benz was a customer of mine, and they were based up in New Jersey and I knew it was getting expensive for them because New Jersey is not a very good tax state. They tax a lot. And those leaders there and Mercedes wanted to come south and play golf. So they made a deal with Kemp to come down here and they put the big logo on the stadium and it's really abusive to people who live in that area. You can look just behind the stadium and it's like the bombed out area of not invested people in In Atlanta, it's just that gulf there. It's just dark between the two. And I think Mercedes, when they asked them, Why did you move here? They didn't say taxes and they didn't say regulations. They said, We think it's a great workforce there. We like the people in Georgia. But none of that came out of the governor's office. They just said, we just put together the right tax package, and we can get anybody here. So that's one of the things that I like to play with Republicans around is Do you understand the costs? Many times our businesses in the state don't pay for stuff, the people and consumers end up paying for stuff? Cobb County is sort of a microcosm Don't be on the stadium is a huge mess with coal ash over there. It's all the coal plants that they have deregulated or closed, they have wasted material that they've left there forever.

Meral Clarke: 10:44

Yes, I'm familiar. It's awful. Yes, there is no excuse for that.

Patrick Thompson: 10:48

So some of that legislation is still working, because we've asked them in the past, from all the environmental groups, we said, number one, could you please not store it on your old property? Because what do you need to make power, all these power plants, nuclear old gas need billions of gallons of water, they cannot exist without water. They basically are 21st century technology, running steam engines from the 17th century. They're all steam engines, a nuclear plant is a steam engine. So they use a lot of water, and they waste a lot of water and water, they do put it back is warmer, and it also has stuff in it. And not all plants, vegetation, people. And animals are really good with that. So we've asked in the past, to not store them, they said know that every once a while they released the stuff in the streams and the rivers. And we said, Could you not do that? No, we will not. Because he said, At least let us know when you're going to do that. So we can warn people downstream that this is happening and don't go into water. Nope, not gonna do it. We've been after them for a long time, they have not had the edict that other states have had other states have had to either to you got to get rid of your coal ash storage. And if you got to put it anywhere, put it in line to pits. So Georgia, we're the biggest state east of the Mississippi. We are huge. We're bigger than New York State. We got all this room, especially in South Georgia, there's nothing they're not even pulling stuff. So we're like, we only have six pits that are lined. So coal ash has been said that coal ash must go in, you gotta dump it, and you're not going to dump it in river, it must go in a line pit, we only have six of those. So who's the number one lobbyists at the Capitol? The number one company is Southern Company, they have more lobbyists to anybody else. And one of the things they lobby for was off, we have to take care of this stuff. First of all, don't make us get rid of it. That's not in our business plan. Right? Can't afford it? Yes. What they'll do is they always use us and they use it now in their commercials. Why is Georgia Power on a commercial radio or TV? Why are they I got no choice? That's, I mean, why are you advertising. So what you hear a lot is how they're really investing in other renewables and things like this. And then never one message you hear from them is reliability. It's a scare word, we have to do these things, then we might not be reliable. And we might have to charge your grandmother more for keeping the lights on. So our costs are gonna go up. And it's all about reliability and affordability. And they'll scare us with those tactics as long as they can. Right now they're getting away with that. And what happened is they actually have what's called a tipping fee. If you're going to put stuff in a line pit by the way, landfills are not just for coal ash, you can dump any kind of trash there. household trash, whatever. So everybody uses these six. Well, these other states were mandated. You got to find a place where so they started looking at the price for tipping. Oh, God, Georgia is a deal. It's only $1 a ton to dot whatever in another state. So North Carolina got mandated. They were like, Okay, we're going down to Georgia, South Carolina had the same thing. Well, Florida was not the one that came north to some of the lower is that we had, and we're even getting coal ash from Puerto Rico. What how does that work? We're so cheap, you can ship it to Savannah, bring it in on truck and put it in a bit cheaper than doing it at all? Oh, my goodness. So it's quite a game. That's the kind of game the ship that our power utility are using. It's really not good for us. And I encourage people if they can, if you're a member or a co op, you know, we have 42 Electric Co Ops in Georgia. It's almost mandated the ones that are up north where you guys are you can get some from TVA, but the Electric Co Ops are probably half the energy in Georgia.

Meral Clarke: 14:12

That is incredible. I did not know that. That's incredible. Yeah,

Patrick Thompson: 14:15

Electric Co Ops are owned by people. They're not my shareholders. So I'm in Cobb, EMC, I own a piece of the company. So I can tell them who I want an office and what I want them to do. So I've been telling them frequently. Why are you buying from Georgia Power? You don't have to buy from them. You can make your own energy. And there are Electric Co Ops in other states that have gone to just make their own. I met a farmer in Iowa last summer. You know, we're all farmers. We got land. We're just gonna go to solar. Why do we have to buy from those guys? We don't have to

Meral Clarke: 14:45

Good for them. That sounds wonderful. We need more of those. Yeah.

Patrick Thompson: 14:49

So this is where we tried to tell people this is a huge movement. So the environmental movement is bigger than just taking care of the environment is taking care of people. I mean, look at what's going on. Look at the electric vehicles, what do you have smack dab in the middle of electric vehicle, you have a big TV screen that's giving you feedback on your driving habits. People start to change their habits and they get excited about, hey, look, I'm not having to buy as expensive gasoline, and they love it. So it's democratizing people over their energy use has become a big thing. 10 years ago, when we started our solar company, we could not put solar on people's houses, because it was against law. Georgia has a territorial law, where you cannot make your own energy. So you have to connect and create you have to give them whatever you make. Unless you live in a place like where you guys already have a cabin. And that's too far for them. Put a line in there like hey, you can do your own thing. We've been able to use Department of Agriculture money. USDA has great programs, they will give you almost your entire budget. We've done buildings in North Georgia, we've done wineries, we've done farms, about 80% of the cost is paid for through USDA money. Same thing for if you want to weatherize your home, and you really don't want to buy new equipment, you can actually get USDA to fund your stuff. This is like the early days of electrification. Reason why the USDA has evolved is because long time ago, people didn't have electricity. Now, what did they don't have? I mean, 40% of Georgia doesn't have broadband. So guess who's there? USDA and now, with Biden to the Biden administration that's putting up money that Kemp's gonna take credit for,

Meral Clarke: 16:23

As they always do with any of these initiatives.

Patrick Thompson: 16:26

Hey, look what I did for y'all. I got broadband, look at this.

Meral Clarke: 16:30

So tell us about E V. Infrastructure. What does that mean? And how do we ensure that Georgia turns into more of a climate friendly state? What is EV infrastructure? Tell us that first

Patrick Thompson: 16:45

EV infrastructure is kind of a misused term today, and EB infrastructure just means that you've got to have this like we have gas stations today, you need to have EV stations. They're not very obvious, because a lot of times they're in garages, they're in parking lots, or they're out there by themselves. They're more visible now because you've probably seen Electrify America stations out there. That's Volkswagens sin, Volkswagen. Manny just walked it to him. Basically, they were saying, If you gotta cheat on the diesel stuff, and they were they thought they could get away with it. They had some bad players in Germany. Well, they got wiped with several billion dollars in fines. But Volkswagen was tasked with putting these stations out in as many places as possible. You'll see him in parking lots because they get together a lot with people who own parking lots. And we'll just put them in some places like city of Atlanta actually has a law that says if you've got to build a new building, you got to have at least five spaces for electric vehicle charging. That was an ordinance that was put in. A lot of cities have this I think Atlanta is the only one in Georgia that has this, but you're gonna see the building code start to change everywhere, because it involves permitting its electricity. I was at the show a couple of years ago, it was in Orlando. So all these fleet managers are coming in and they were like, yeah, we'll look at electric cars, but still kind of in a toy stage. We'd like to have all our fleet maybe go to that because they know it's maintenance free. If you get a Nissan LEAF, for example, there's 40,000, less car ports on electric Nissan LEAF, of course, we're here in the home of NAPA. So it's just one of those industries, NAPA car parts someday going to be possibly out of business, because I don't need all those car parts.

Meral Clarke: 18:20

And that's really where the problem lies. Correct. The fossil fuel industry and their lobby, how do we fight that? I mean, it's so powerful. We have Joe Manchin at the federal level, who's obstructing all climate change initiatives and all clean and renewable energy initiatives because he's beholden to the coal industry. So how do we fight that?

Patrick Thompson: 18:43

So I'm calling you this evening from West Virginia. I'm actually a refugee from the coal mines. I grew up in a coal mining town. And I've seen what happens when the coal runs out. There's no jobs so people can't afford to move. They can't sell their homes. Nobody wants to live where they live is the worst conditions. I was lucky that my parents actually when we were growing up, they were putting tons of coal together. Everybody talks and they were all told, yeah, it's gonna be bad. And my father was paid with script not even paid with American money. That's like fake money that you can all us were at the company store. If you want to see what the world looks like I'm sitting here, this entire state of Joe Manchin is run by two industries chemical and it's called both are dying industries. And we're trying to get to Manchin and it's really tough because he owns a coal mine and his children on coal mines, so they make a living on owning coal. It's really not a profitable business. Even the Chinese used to buy a lot of West Virginia coal have stopped because like, you know, we have a pollution problem here in China, the stuff that you're selling us makes really bad smoke. It's really bad for our air quality. We can't buy it anymore. So it's a losing game. And what's the number one industry in West Virginia today? It's tourism. I'm a Scoutmaster. Everybody wants to go to West Virginia for the new Scott center that was built up there and they still remove mountains to get coal. Now, you're destroying the reason why people go to your state. So it's a really bad practice still going on. So the only way we can talk to Joe, again is talk to him about what he could be doing. If he was really interested in the people of West Virginia. It's one of the poorest states in the nation. Here's how you can set things loose. And we're working on a workforce board with him right now to transition coal miners, because there's just not enough coal work. A lot of people were stuck in that as a job and there's nothing for them, you need to turn on some new industry. So we're trying that as a last resort.

Meral Clarke: 20:32

I cannot imagine how frustrating it is for Democrats on Capitol Hill trying to deal with him just a normal basis on a daily basis. It must be horrendous.

Patrick Thompson: 20:44

I will say this, he will not win another election. I think he knows its end of life rim. He's just scorching the Earth. People wants to be really upset with him. Yeah, they've been playing with people, they play with the teachers really badly. They took a lot of benefits away. And that is one group you do not want to mess with

Meral Clarke: 21:00

It's unfortunate. It truly is. So is it too late to mitigate climate change? At this point? So many scientists have stated that we're at the point of no return Do you agree with that?

Patrick Thompson: 21:13

Used to have a thing in the mines we call a canary in a coal mine? So right now, if you compare that to the climate, we look over the birdcage, and that bird is on the bottom of the cage. He's on his last gasps, right? It's not to scare people. But people don't realize I can't talk about two and a half degrees because they don't get it to undergraduate degrees doesn't mean anything. But when I say do you enjoy the cancer that you're getting you enjoy your health care rates going up? Do you enjoy things like your property values, that's a big one a want to build a pipeline in your backyard or you built your house over next to the coal ash place? Well, your house values are going down and not going to go up. So you have to just laid out to say if you choose this path and continue this path is what you're going to get it's going to cost it is costing you money that could be put towards better things. At some point. I think in Georgia, especially we're going to hit a point where companies are not going to come here, companies are being tasked now with finding sustainable solutions and opening sustainable businesses. And if your state is not doing that, now look to our neighbors, North Carolina, North Carolina has put their sustainable building plan in place about 12 years ago, because they realized that they were losing everything. They lost tobacco, they lost furniture, they lost timber, all these industries. And then they said, Oh, we're going to be the big backing center in a calf straight into that area. And then the big bank said not and you're not going to be the Bank of Erie, so there's no industry. So people in North Carolina were like, What are we going to do? Well, we're going to be a sustainability state. And we're going to be the state in the south, that leads the way. So they do have some leading programs. And there's a guide Appalachian State that is responsible report to the state on all the jobs that we get from our sustainability story. Companies who moved here, companies who want to come here, report on that. And they were very lucky. And they got their universities kind of spun up with their policymakers in the companies all together. And I said, let's move this thing in the same direction. That was one way to make sure that it actually happened. And it's actually happening,

Meral Clarke: 23:09

Were the Republicans on board in North Carolina with that plan? Sure. I am thrilled to hear that.

Patrick Thompson: 23:16

Yeah, I would say it wasn't everybody, of course, again, what one the day was the financials? Oh, Mr. Mrs. Conservative, here's an opportunity for you to make money, right.

Meral Clarke: 23:26

So as we celebrate Earth Day, this month, tell us what it means to you both personally and professionally. And additionally, what's your goals be? And how can individuals make a real difference?

Patrick Thompson: 23:38

So yeah, I think for us, we have to set an example for our communities and for our children to practice good things like in my family, for example, I don't throw away anything. I have a great system that feeds my garden, all my stuff goes into my garden, I have a tiny amount of real garbage at the end of the month. And it's usually because of stuff that I can do nothing with. But I recycle everything. And I use as an example for my kids who say, you know, this started when I was a kid, they started introducing it in our school system, and now the Agricultural Department introducing to our kids, they're introducing, well, we're wasting all this food, we need to save that or there's other animals that what you just there's other people that we just we need to save what we can, and that's the way you get it is through the children. When the children start to do it, they come home, I used to come home and say Hey, Mom and Dad, why aren't we saving this stuff? Why am I paying money to waste management? That's just a small piece. But I think it's an example of showing people how we can take care of things. It starts small, it gets big, because it's infectious. And some people you can't help but I think more we get into the habit of practicing good things using less energy. A lot of our products now are giving us feedback, how much we're using to run our home how much we're using to run our cars. This is all going to I think snowball, it's not fast enough. So we're gonna need changes like the SEC Rule I just mentioned. Public Service Commission is still playing around. There is a meeting this week, and they're starting to set the resource plan for the next next few years, they need to hear feedback from people.

Meral Clarke: 25:03

I honestly don't believe that anything climate wise will change here until Democrats are in charge. So I could talk to you all day, Patrick, you are a thought of information. And we so appreciate your being here. But unfortunately, we're running very low on time. So if someone wants to learn more about Greening Georgia, your initiatives and what you're doing to help our environment, both legislatively, and through getting out there and just speaking with regular folks, where would you send them?

Patrick Thompson: 25:33

A couple things, if you ever want to have me come to any of your North Georgia in person meetings now that they're starting again, be glad to number two, we're trying to build a better site that GreeningGeorgia.com, we're keeping track of all the stuff that you can't keep track of. And it's probably about 35, to 40 things that has something to do with air quality or water quality or erosion. Now, how many of them are passing? Very few, a lot of them have been put on Study Committee. I love those. But we have a review of all bills that are out there, Senate and House and also committees, and another good place to find them all on what the progress is the League of Conservation Voters, I'm on the board of the Conservation Voters, we are supposed to be middle of the road, we're supposed to let independents conservatives and Democrats know about what's out there and what the status of these bills are and who's sponsoring them. And and also to try to put them in English.

Meral Clarke: 26:23

Yes. So people can understand it.

Patrick Thompson: 26:26

Yes, Lee Conservation voters as a whole legislative site that I'm a contributor to we try to put everything on there. Because you can't keep track of this. It's possible.

Meral Clarke: 26:34

I do want to thank you for all the work that you and your group are doing. And finally, and I ask all my guests this question, tell us upon fact about yourself something not necessarily having to do with your work in your passion for the environment. And thank you for that. Oh, something interesting, just about Patrick

Patrick Thompson: 26:53

Goes to reach in my troop, which I've been running for about 20 years, 100 Eagles. So we're putting young people out into the world with all kinds of leadership skills for the next generation, summer in college. Now a few of them are married, been doing this for a while. And I'm doing it because I did it when I was a kid. When I was in college, I worked every summer for the park service. A great job didn't pay very much. But I was a park ranger got training. And in my last summer and when I was in college, I was apprentice way in forest, which is in Northern Virginia situated between the FBI Academy and Quantico Marine base, so it was very protected. That's what the President when I have meetings, sometimes they go there because they're very protected space. So we were tasked with hosting the Reagans one day, they were having a meeting and then they were going to visit some of the black children from Washington, DC area. And it was kind of a photo op for them. So we were to cook hot dogs over the fire pigs in a blanket if you know what those are. I had made a sticks and made these up and whatever. And I was assigned to Nancy Reagan for the day. And it's the first time she had ever seen a ferret because I had animals there for the kids first time she had ever got hot dog over fire. She mangled it, she was just like sticking it on the stick like end to end like none of them actually just poke it on there. So that was a really unusual thing getting her to teach. And so as a result of that Ron and Nancy were like, we need some people like you around the White House because they don't ever talk to the public and say your service people don't talk to the public. So they're like, why don't you come work for us next summer at the White House. You can take care of all of our guests, people who come visit us different places, different countries, different states. So I picked them up on it. And I did that the next summer it was so I make conservatives heads come off. I'm sure they have this narrative like Oh, st. Reagan, the Reagan's were saying I'm like you realize they didn't do anything for themselves at all. None of their own meetings, didn't make their own food, didn't pick out whatever they're gonna wear that they everything was done for them. He was a good communicator, but he was not this great guy. It's great to have grown up that way and to have seen these people and seen them at home and to be asked about hey, Patrick, what's his book you're reading right now to be asked just normal questions and be able to my conversation with them. And ask Nancy how her horoscope was going. They were not these gods that the Republicans tried to make them be. They're just ordinary people. As far as I know. Wroclaw has passed the same way. I do. Use them put them out.

Meral Clarke: 29:22

Exactly. Well, thank you, Patrick, for joining us today and sharing more about your critical work to support environmental policy and mitigate climate change. I'm Meral Clarke and on behalf of our team, I'd like to thank everyone for listening to the North Georgia Blue Podcast. To learn more about us and the work that we're doing, please visit us online at Fannin County, Georgia Democratic party.com Share the North Georgia Blue Podcast with your friends and family. Be sure to subscribe and follow and if you enjoy our podcast, be a founding patron and friend of the show at North Georgia blue podcast.com/ patron now with three different giving levels to choose from offering cool swag recognition on the show and website and valuable gift cards to help us continue getting into more good trouble.