In this podcast episode, Chris CeBallos, the President of the Texas Municipal Police Association, shares his inspiring journey from restaurant management to leadership in law enforcement. He emphasizes the importance of family and community support and talks about his personal challenges and triumphs along the way. The conversation also delves into the critical need for police training and resources, including initiatives like the local Crime Control and Prevention Districts that ensure officers are well-equipped to handle any situation. Join us in this powerful and insightful episode that explores the heart of law enforcement and their unwavering commitment to the safety and service of our communities.
email us at- bluegrit@tmpa.org
In this podcast episode, Chris CeBallos, the President of the Texas Municipal Police Association, shares his inspiring journey from restaurant management to leadership in law enforcement. He emphasizes the importance of family and community support and talks about his personal challenges and triumphs along the way. The conversation also delves into the critical need for police training and resources, including initiatives like the local Crime Control and Prevention Districts that ensure officers are well-equipped to handle any situation. Join us in this powerful and insightful episode that explores the heart of law enforcement and their unwavering commitment to the safety and service of our communities.
email us at- bluegrit@tmpa.org
Join us for the TNPA and FOP joint conference, dallas, texas, july 26th through July 28th. We hope to see you there.
Speaker 2:Things may be tough at times and you know the road of success is always under construction. If you ask me and you just have to do what, what you were brought up to do, stay with it. Yeah, keep fighting.
Speaker 1:Welcome back. Blue grit. Watchers, listeners, voyeurs. I'm your host, tyler Owen and Clint McNeer. What's going on? How are you Good? Good, so I got to say you've been down here. I don't want to call you an Austinite, but you have been in Austin for a couple of days now. Have you established residency yet?
Speaker 3:I'm working on it. The double tree has not evicted me just yet. I think you have to move over 28 days before your homesteading and you have not been a victim of a crime. No no. I don't leave the hotel room, but it's been pretty safe for me so far within my hotel room. That's cool.
Speaker 1:That's cool.
Speaker 3:I feel safe in Austin all the time, as long as I don't leave my hotel room.
Speaker 1:It's not. It's not because of the lack of effort from Austin PD, it's just because of the lack of manpower.
Speaker 3:So when we saw last night that, uh, what is it? They're 500. Yeah, 500 down consolidating shifts.
Speaker 1:They're at a critical point is what Michael Bullock said. Shout out to Michael Bullock, apa and all the Austin Austin.
Speaker 3:In effect, the response to 911 calls.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. So they got that to deal with. And then they got the illustrious leader of the district attorney that I know you are good friends with. I don't want to insult him too much because I don't want to make you upset for this episode.
Speaker 3:So, friends, anyway, at some point, though, he won't be able to indict any more police officers, because there won't be any police officers. That's a great point.
Speaker 1:That's a great point. I never thought of that.
Speaker 3:I never thought of that, it will all work somewhere else. Yeah, they will, travis.
Speaker 1:County, there'll be no cops. We walk around security guards with no guns.
Speaker 3:That'd be a perfect world, so, and you're our guest Today- we got on the president of Texas municipal police association, chris Sabios, longtime Arlington PD and current president L Hefe of team PA Welcome board. Sir. Thank you, sir.
Speaker 1:Thank you for having me Welcome on. Thank you. By the way, I'm wearing Clint Wars hit or his last week on last week's episode. I'm wearing your. Our president loves us so much that he actually got these made from a little defender, these sweatshirts. So thank you. The employees love them, the board loves them. You designed them, I heard stenciled.
Speaker 2:Not quite the colors, so not quite, but they are well deserved for all our employees.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely Appreciate it.
Speaker 2:Welcome to blue grip. Well, thank you, sir, appreciate your drive down this morning. Good, it's a little foggy. Have you hadn't been outside? I noticed that this morning it was very foggy, especially up north. In fact there was accident on 35 going north. Balance here like four in a row. Yeah, when I'm balling 18 wheeler there's obviously an accident or something coming northbound, but I was able to circle around Did you see any deer?
Speaker 1:I did not see any deer. They're. They're running right now. I'll tell you that story after the show.
Speaker 3:All right, so for our listeners that not law enforcement related or may not be as ingrained to have the understanding, team PA kind of has two sides of the house. We have the staff side Tyler and myself or staff Most of the staff here are retired law enforcement or current law enforcement. That's the staff side. They're full time employees. And then we have our eboard, our elected board of directors, who sets the direction, the foundation of where this organization goes, and our elected board of directors are still full time active duty working officers from all over the state of Texas. And so you have an executive director, kevin Lawrence, who's on the staff side, the executive lead executive officer of that, and on the eboard side, of course, is the president, and that's Chris Obios, and in our board sets our direction and they meet quarterly and design policy and in our election legislative strategies the entire mission of the team PA. That's passed on to our executive director to carry out that mission.
Speaker 3:But but that's who sets the tone of that and that's kind of the difference organizational structure of folks that may not be super familiar with it, or we have a lot of non-LE listeners, but so they understand the dynamics in the relationship.
Speaker 2:Yeah, LFA being on. That's correct and I started with the team PA just around 12 years ago. Back from Arlington we had another association that we broke off from was me and about four others started our own association there. Game affiliated with TMPA started with only three members were up to over 450 now. That's crazy man, yeah, it's been a ride.
Speaker 3:Yeah, let's back up. Let's back up. We'd like to start off with who the hell is, chris? Tell us about where you grew up and where you're born in.
Speaker 2:I'm from Texas you know, born in Texas, born in Mineral Wells. I didn't know that. Yeah, that's a cool little place man.
Speaker 2:That's born in Mineral Wells and grew up there, went to high school there. No, I actually went to high school in a little small town called Sanger, texas. Most people would know it because of Lake Ray Roberts. Yeah, I was actually living there and going to high school there before the lake was even built. We used to have a straight road that could drive from Sanger to Pollock Point for the football games, but Kevin said you were the high school prom king.
Speaker 1:Not true. Is that not not true?
Speaker 2:No, I had a good shot out of 64. You know there was 64 in my glass, so yeah, yeah, I guess so.
Speaker 3:Didn't make it. That's cool. The graduating class is 64.
Speaker 1:I wonder what it is now. Glad you're in class of sound.
Speaker 2:The holler is a little bit bigger now.
Speaker 3:Benton's pushed north and Sanger's blown ocean, everywhere.
Speaker 2:Did you have?
Speaker 3:any family in law enforcement.
Speaker 2:I did not. I was the first one ever to go into law enforcement. In fact, I started out at the Pennet Entry. I worked in Huntsville.
Speaker 3:Straight out of high school or going to college. No.
Speaker 2:I was a restaurant manager before I started that.
Speaker 1:All kinds of things. I didn't know about you.
Speaker 2:I was a restaurant manager for probably from the time I was in high school until I was about, I guess, in my early 20s. They work you to death in the restaurant.
Speaker 3:Yeah, they do.
Speaker 2:So I said I got to find something else to do. So that's when I started looking into law enforcement, went to Sam Houston and worked at the Pennet Entry where I promoted to the sergeant before I left there.
Speaker 3:We have a bunch of Sam Houston folks. Come on your high school days, restaurant days. Was Ellie ever in the back of your mind? Was it ever something All the time?
Speaker 2:In fact, one of the restaurants I had worked at I made it intentional because I was the manager, I was able to give the discount, so all law enforcement got the for free. That's cool. So, man, if I ever had an alarm at that restaurant, I had more cops show up than you can imagine.
Speaker 1:Was it like an interaction that you had as a kid, or at the restaurant?
Speaker 2:It was mainly just growing up. I just you know they weren't. I guess you could say you know they were more out and about. You got to see them, got to see them at football games, all that kind of stuff. So you got to talk to them, some of them in the small town that I grew up. I knew I went to high school with some of them.
Speaker 1:Well, it goes back to the point. Aaron. Aaron Slater said this when he came on the podcast several episodes ago. You know, if you think about it, police officers in any community, in every community, has is its own world. Arlington, you have your own world. Garland had its own world. I've got my own world down here now. If we get back to the basics and treat law enforcement like they're superheroes and like their celebrities, that's the way it should be, because that when it I mean look at your it sparked your interest as a kid and look where you're at now. You know what I'm saying. So I mean, I remember as a kid I had all the, all the cards. They still do that now where they hand out the little baseball cards.
Speaker 3:I don't know, then I had canine officers cards.
Speaker 1:I had your card one time, I had it framed one time and Irving, but I mean, I mean it's a give back to the anti law enforcement rhetoric. If we treat our cops like they're celebrities, like as they should, it, you know, rises the awareness of law enforcement and and sparks that interest. Definitely helps with the recruiting efforts. Yeah, absolutely, and we damn sure are in a recruiting crisis, right now we are so so left-singer with Sam Houston.
Speaker 3:Go in college, or what kind of degree we are going to.
Speaker 2:I got my degree in criminal justice, my bachelor's, working at TDC. Working at TDC.
Speaker 3:We started out.
Speaker 2:I was starting out at the East Ham unit, which is down in the middle of Lady Texas. After that I transferred to the Huntsville unit, or what everybody calls the walls Walls.
Speaker 3:No kid, how long were you at walls?
Speaker 2:unit. Oh shoot. I was totaled with the prison about 55 months. I promoted a sergeant and helped open the one at Hutchins State Jail facility down to Hutchins, Texas.
Speaker 3:Dude the walls unit is freaking cool.
Speaker 1:Is this creepy? As they say it is, it is creepy in areas you know cause.
Speaker 2:It was old back then and it's even older now.
Speaker 1:However, we did get started too. You said it's not going to work out.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, that's right 29.
Speaker 1:Yeah, sorry about that.
Speaker 2:But yeah, I did have an interesting thing at the prison happened, and that is they filmed a movie, a Perfect World, yes, which started in Kleeneyswood, Kleeneyswood and Kevin Costner, and we got to meet Clint while he was there cause he was the director. So that was really pretty cool to be able to, you know, get to meet him. Yeah, and a lot of people if they watch that movie, every inmate you see in that movie was a paid correction officer.
Speaker 3:Oh, really they were extras.
Speaker 2:They paid him, I think, 50 bucks a day. It wasn't much, but they paid him to be in the movie Side jobs.
Speaker 1:Was Clint cool.
Speaker 2:Yeah, he was really nice. We got to meet him and escort him around and that kind of stuff, you know not because of his name, just Clint.
Speaker 1:Because it's Clint Eastwood. Because it's Clint Eastwood.
Speaker 2:Well, I grew up watching all the spaghetti Westerns, so you know I was like at all for our listeners.
Speaker 3:If you ever pass them through Huntsville and you have a moment TDC as a museum there, go drive by the walls unit first and look at the old clock tower and the history. When I was a kid we grew up going to the prison rodeos and the arena is falling in, but it's still back there. I'm like the Southeast corner. I thought they did a mallish.
Speaker 3:Oh is it. I was thinking some of the walls. It may be gone by now, but I grew up going to the prison rodeos there, but there's so much history there. There's been a couple of escape attempts and shootouts and man, it's so cool.
Speaker 2:If I'm not mistaken, I think Bonnie and Clyde was on the East Ham unit at one time, or Clyde was actually yeah, and then I think they did a shootout trying to get somebody out of walls.
Speaker 3:They were shown there was a hostage.
Speaker 2:There was a hostage situation there at the walls unit several many years back that some inmates had taken some people and for people that don't know.
Speaker 1:I don't know the walls, units where the executions take place, that's correct.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm assuming it's still there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, I don't. I'm not sure about that. And I also read where the prison rodeo might be coming back. Oh, no kid.
Speaker 3:That's so cool man.
Speaker 1:But I saw it on Facebook, so we all know that's going to be true, 100%, right. So yeah.
Speaker 2:Well, I doubt they would bring the prison rodeo back, because if they get injured we pay for their medical bills. We're paying for them anyway. Yeah, well, you know what? When I started there in the nineties, they could smoke. Well, now they take, they've taken back. Then they took out tobacco from all the printers, took print tobacco out of prison and they give it them back.
Speaker 1:Now they can make. You know they can make now in the prison system and have iPads, oh wow.
Speaker 3:One of the things we talk about a lot on here. In fact, the last couple episodes people that worked in the jail looking back now as a tenured person in law enforcement. Was there some value working in the prison on how to communicate and deescalate and become a little street smart on the cons and the lies and body language was? Was their values or did?
Speaker 2:Absolutely, because a lot of the people in the penitentiary, a lot of the inmates are on psych medicines have psych issues that you have to learn how to talk to them and deal with them.
Speaker 3:So, yes, it's, it was valuable and learning how to talk to people that have the mental issues that we see out on the street and probably TDC, even more than a county jail, cause, you know, if they're in there for 40 years, they have nothing but time on their hands to figure out a con to run on a on a guard or a scam or how to lie or manipulate. Probably even more so, I guess, at TDC than a county jail that you guys are having to deal with. Uh, what's the con that they're running on me here?
Speaker 2:the scam or Yep, you have to be careful. You know, basically keeping my arms distance and basically do your job. You know, don't get involved with them personally, don't tell them personal information. You even have to watch your conversations while you're in there Cause they, like you said, they have nothing to do but live by curiously through you and what you're talking about. So you got to be careful what you're saying there as well 55,.
Speaker 3:55 months at TDC, yes, and graduated Sam Houston. I did what was the next step.
Speaker 2:After that I've got hired on with Arlington. Uh, went through there at six months Academy and they're. I think back then the field training was 14 weeks. Anything during your Arlington or just uh, I grew up in North Texas. So I was six flags you know, and I just knew Arlington I was looking at Arlington and Plano at the same time. Yeah, but, uh, I just ended up going to Arlington A year, was that?
Speaker 1:95. Okay, arlington was hopping back then. Yeah, I still is, I guess.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean went to the Academy field training. Where would you roll to after that?
Speaker 2:I went to uh. We had a shift back then called fourth watch, which works at seven PM to three AM. I was on that for about three years. After that I went into a midnight shift where I stayed there for almost 18, 20 years. Oh wow. And then the wife said okay, that's enough, you need to start sleeping at night home with me. I said all right, so I went to day shift back in 2018. I think it was.
Speaker 3:I'm a year's total at Arlington 28.
Speaker 2:No, kid, yep 28, all 28 on patrol. I've never left the streets is what I love.
Speaker 3:That's cool yeah it says a lot. How many more are you going to do?
Speaker 2:Probably two. I'm looking at January 2026. That'll give me 30. By that time I'll be 61. I think it's a 10. Yeah, because the older you get that uniform it gets to weigh in on your little more age here.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you know, 28 years of patrol. Yes, that is freaking cool man.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I've always been in a patrol car and that town has changed so much. Oh, yes, yes, Blown up.
Speaker 1:I mean, talk about that if you want to. Yeah, it's of course we didn't have.
Speaker 2:We had the Rangers, but we didn't have, you know, the Cowboys. We didn't have Texas live or all that stuff we're getting out. We're not now. We're fixing to get the middle of honor museum. They're working on that construction. We just a new hotel opens up this year which is another lowest hotel by Texas live. That's a 880 rooms and they've got hotels just popping up everywhere 28 years ago, what was total sworn at Arlington roughly.
Speaker 2:I want to say it was around 400, maybe 450, something like that. We're up to 709, I think 715. Wow, that's pretty big. Yeah, we still need more. Yeah, we still need more. I don't doubt that Because I can tell you this much in 2008, we had 246 officers been patrol. Well, starting the 8th of January this year, 2024, we'll have 241. Good Lord.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and we've built of course, AT&T.
Speaker 2:We've built a global, I feel. We have global life park, we have Texas live, we have these new hotels open up and we haven't increased the number of officers on patrol in 16 years. God, that's insane. Well, we're going to segue into something to think later on that you'll think that's a great way to start that.
Speaker 1:Kick that thing off. You mentioned a while ago several years ago, many years ago you alone started your associate. You a couple of the guys started your own local association and was affiliated with TNPA. Talk about that and talk about the difficulties you kind of faced. I'm sure there were some. You got chastised for it. What year did you start dabbling?
Speaker 3:in in the associate police association business 2003,. I think is when we started our local.
Speaker 2:And it's when we started our local. We had to get our started. It's all intermissile patrolman's association. We had to get that started first and then, once we did that, we got with TNPA and said, hey, we need legal service. Was there an event that took place to kind of kick the ball or?
Speaker 1:was it? Did you just saw something better? We just had the current association at that time wasn't helping officers during disciplinary processes.
Speaker 2:Okay, plus, we had a city attorney that was actually a clean attorney, that was actually a former city attorney, so he kind of knew everybody at the city, oh good, and so we wanted somebody that was, you know, oh, former Arlington city attorney.
Speaker 2:Yes, oh wow, so we wanted to stop that and we wanted to basically take the fight to the city and that's what we started doing. And, yeah, we were met with all kind of, you know, animosity, if you would from. And what year was that? That was 2003. It started with three people, started with about three of us had to sign the articles of corporation and we had several others that were still there that was helping us. I think I was there, dick Brock, I think, started kind of helping you get that help.
Speaker 3:Yes, miss him terribly and yeah, we had Dick.
Speaker 2:Brock and I think Tom Gaylor was also there, and so we had a bunch of people that were coming down and helping us. Like I said, we started out with three and slowly started moving up, gaining more members. After we started, you know, bringing out stuff that the farm was doing, standing by our officers when they were in trouble, much like TMPA does and now we're up to 400 and some odd members. That's insane. It's good stuff, man, this is going to jump ahead and then we can
Speaker 1:jump back.
Speaker 3:We travel around the state, help, support and learn about the state. We travel around the state, help, support and local associations All across the state. Apathy is difficult In in associations ebb and flow. Sometimes they get big and they're they're super strong and then you know it kind of ebbs and flows. But even at the peak for a lot of associations, like at Garland, we had 330, 340 members. You know, if we get 25 members at a meeting it's pretty good size. 25 or 30 is a pretty good size meeting. I don't know if y'all are selling crack, I don't know what you guys are doing, but if, if you've ever wanted to go see what a large, normal, routine local association meeting, what, what is y'alls on average, which y'alls attendance for just a normal meeting with no hot button issue going on, uh, usually we'll have about maybe close to 40 or 50 people.
Speaker 1:That's a, that's a lot.
Speaker 3:Yeah, most of them are bigger than that because it's standing room only.
Speaker 2:Yeah, now we started out just like what you're saying. We started out with only five or six, 10 and 12. And we had to figure out something to bring everybody in. So we also had some people reach out and said hey, chris, you know my, I can't come in because of my family is doing this or my family is doing that. And then we sat down and said let's start including the family. Yeah, bring your wife.
Speaker 3:I bring you so let's feed everybody.
Speaker 2:So what we do is we have it at a local barbecue restaurant, we send it out. We only have our meetings quarterly and we send it out. Uh, we're having a meeting, bring your family foods on us, so everybody will show up. We've had, you know, officers show up with their parents, officers show up, of course, with their spouse, cool brothers and sisters. We have one officer. She couldn't make it so her parents came without her, which we're like. She goes. We're here just to take notes for our daughter. I'm like great, take notes.
Speaker 3:First time I went over there. I walk into the restaurant. I bet there's 120 people in there. There's a lot at times. So I'm asking them. I'm like, hey, what's going on? Cause I'm thinking, oh, they're about to go to war.
Speaker 2:I'm like, hey, what's going on?
Speaker 3:They're like what do you mean? I said what's going on? All these people are here. They're like we're having a meeting. I'm like yeah, no, no, I know, but why is it standing?
Speaker 2:there.
Speaker 3:I'm only there Like we're just having a, we're having a meeting. I'm like how the hell do you get 120 people to show up at a freaking meeting? Man, we have tried giving away a hundred dollar bills. We've tried every. I mean, we've tried everything possible and it's a statewide deal. The recipe, the ingredients of the recipe that you guys got going on, is freaking cool to watch.
Speaker 2:And I think that's what I think involving the families, getting the families involved is what actually helped us. Yeah. So there are all those yeah, the family has welcomed me. Anything we do and we've also made it to where we do everything out in the open A lot of our stuff we do right at city council meetings during the citizen participation point we'll put it out on our website, everything we're doing.
Speaker 3:So that's what we try to do is include, everybody, include the families, and that's another thing that it's been cool to watch, because there's times you all, y'all pick a fight and sometimes, if it's with the chief, I'll show up and they're like, yeah, we're picking a fight and we've invited him to come here and, you know, stand here and answer questions, and so it's not like they're running around trying to plan a ambush or do something in the shadows cowardly, I mean. And sometimes you have to do things, you have to be secure in your communications, but oftentimes they're like oh, yeah, we invited them to show up here and answer for why they did this or account for what's going on, and we have a whole lot better relationship right now with our new chief as opposed to the ones we had previously.
Speaker 2:But we have a new chief that came from Baltimore County and so far the communication lines and communication are open. Real well, we're actually enjoying it.
Speaker 3:And y'all have always been very intentional in building your political capital. Yes, it's hard to. It's hard to act from a position of strength If the only strength you have is what you think you have Within your organization and you don't actually possess it. You guys have always done a good job of building political capital so that when you did need to flex a little bit, people listen, because they knew they should probably listen up to what you guys say.
Speaker 2:Well, we weren't. What we did is also was, like I said we'd give them the opportunity to address the issue and if they didn't, we'd go public with it. We'd put it out on our website. If we could find a news outlet that would pick it up, we'd get them to pick it up. We'd go to city council meetings because those are recorded in Arlington so people can watch it later and see our comments. So we would put it out there. So it would stir up some people wanting to ask questions and wanting to find out more, and that's what tends to help us. Got you?
Speaker 1:So you served so 2003. When you started the local, at what point did you see or were you approached to possibly jump on the TNPA board or get elected to the TNPA board?
Speaker 2:So I think we had gotten around uh, I don't know, two or 300 members and I was at the conference in Dallas and I'm not sure what it was when David Russell was president or about to be president. He had asked me hey, when you come to the conference, I'm like sure I'll go to the conference. When is it? He tells me. I show up in Dallas very impressed by everything I saw, and he comes out to me and he goes hey, I want to ask you a question. So okay, because when you run for region 10, board of director, I'm like I don't know what is all that entail, cause I'm still busy with all the stuff back. You revert back to your TDC.
Speaker 3:What's the column here? What's with you up to so?
Speaker 2:I'm still busy with everything in the local, even though I'm not the president of the local at the time Another guy by the name of Frank Smith was, who came from the US Postal Service and was, uh, a rep for for them, so he knew a lot of the ins and outs which was very helpful.
Speaker 2:But he said, oh, it's not going to. You have to come down to Austin for a few board member meetings. It's nothing really big. I said, okay, we'll do it. Okay, well, let me check with the warden. So I called the wife and I said, hey, they want me to run for the TNPA board. What do you think? She goes. Well, what's that going to entail? Cause she's asking to and I kind of told her I apparently have to go to Austin and never so often I have to attend meetings and some other events Shouldn't be that big a deal. She goes okay, well, what's one more call during dinner. So, spoken like a true association, yeah, wife, you know. And I said, well, great, that's a yes. I just said hung up and said, yeah, okay, I'll run. Yeah, Actually I was nominated from the floor. I don't know if y'all knew that or not.
Speaker 1:I didn't know that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I didn't put in a. I was actually nominated from the floor from another Arlington board member that came with me and basically we ended up me and the other opponent ended up tying. I don't know if y'all were that or not. And they had to figure out what are we doing? A tie? Well, the current sitting board gets to a vote and break the tie in, and I won nine to one when they, when the board, voted Nice.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and what year was that? You know?
Speaker 2:I tried 2012. Yeah, so yeah.
Speaker 1:So you were the region 10 director for many years. And then at what point did you? Because at TMP you're the typically you're the director, and then you kind of move up and transition into fourth EP, third EP. It traditionally works yeah. When did that? What? What weird that happened.
Speaker 2:Uh, I don't remember what year it was, but we were all, uh, there was seven of us that came on the board the year that I came on. Oh, wow, yeah, there were seven of us. There are seven new guys on the board. So we were all kind of working together to learn what needed to be done and getting all the the logo down that was being said on the board and me, hey, what's this mean? Hey, what does that mean? Okay, so we were all working together but, um, I can't remember exactly what year it was, I decided to run for you, said there's a director for a while. Oh, yeah, I was a director for many years. I've been on the board, like said 12, 13 years, and I was probably a board of director for at least five or six. Um, where you know, I've seen them change the directions the director of the maps, several times yeah, so but yeah.
Speaker 2:And, um, I ran for vice president, um, which, once I got up there and started learning even more stuff and getting the training that they provide and being able to network, that's the main thing about this organization. This is just a huge network that you have to reach out and talk to people. Hey, this is going on in our department, what's going on in your department? How do y'all handle this in your department? And, uh, you know, you can send out one email and you'll get 18 responses, which is just amazing. Yeah, that's great Because you get. You get all this information within just seconds, pretty much. And uh, so I was really impressed by the network. And then you go to these conferences and you start meeting all these people from other agencies, all these officers from other agencies, and you start asking them about their department and they'll tell you hey, we having this issue. Well, you know what we did, too, a few years ago. Here's what we did. So it's just been phenomenal.
Speaker 1:Touch on conference real quick Cause you cause I had the same feeling. Uh, I don't know about Clint, if you went to a conference probably not with Garland situation whenever you transitioned over to TNPA with Garland POA. Uh, but I was. I think I didn't attend the conference with TNPA until I was an employee and man, I wish I would have been going well before that. And I think the same thing can be said. We talk to so many people who have been on the podcast and even in person, that their first year they're blown away. Talk about your experience, your first time without being elected, I mean, but talk about your first conference and how that, how that looked.
Speaker 2:Yeah, the first conference. I was pretty much blown away. It was. You know, it was packed. There's a lot of people there and they're from agencies all throughout the state of Texas which were fantastic. You know, I got to meet a bunch of people I probably would never met and it's just, it's just amazing how well they put it on. They had guest speakers and training and all this stuff. That is just like. You're just like wow, yeah, wow. And then, of course, you know, there's time afterwards for everybody to meet and greet and hang out and get to know one another. And you know, just this past year, when we had our most recent board meeting, we found out that 95% of people that go to a conference return.
Speaker 3:So that ought to say something yeah, it is.
Speaker 2:And Mitch Landry was able to give us those numbers. And so you know these people that go to the conference and they have a great time, they learn a lot, they get to meet people and they always come back.
Speaker 1:We, we do put all our training is great for our conference, the after hours events are great, but the one feeling that I get, even as an employee but just as a cop, our conference almost feels like and y'all can correct me if y'all don't feel the same way but it almost feels like a family reunion. Yeah, yeah, that's exactly how, and I, we, me and Clint talked about this the other day. This, yes, this is an association, but but is it? It almost feels like a just a big ass family. We're a 33,000 member family and going to that conference it's, it's like a huge family without the potluck and, ms Martha's, you know, apple pie. But that's what it feels like when I go to the conference.
Speaker 2:Yep and, like I said, because everybody returned, you see those people at least once a year and you know, you get to know some of their kids, you can get a spouse, you get to know all this kind of stuff. That's that you know. It's just, it's fantastic.
Speaker 3:Yeah, the other thing I'm super proud of about our conference, about our organization Thousand person agency is important to us. Dallas County we have probably eight or 900 members there. They're super important to us. Dps we have probably 1100 members there. They're super important to us. The rural East Texas and West Texas we may have a one person constables office or a four man police department. There is equally as freaking important to us and welcome at our conference and we'll go fight for them, just like we'll go fight for any other agency. Yeah, and you can come to conference and talk to the president of Houston police officers association, who's three or 4,000. You can come talk to the president of Dallas, who has three or 4,000, or you can come talk to a sheriff that may have seven employees in rural West Texas and find out how they do things. I mean, there is a anything that you would want to find out about law enforcement and networking, no matter the size of the department. Yeah, they're all represented there and they're all equally important.
Speaker 2:And one thing I learned at the conference that I know I think it was the first or second, probably second one, it was um, I was complaining about how Arlington's pay wasn't just enough and Dick Brock overheard me and said you know, chris, I can do a pay study for you. I said what he goes? Yeah, we do pay studies all the time. I was like, yeah, let's do one. So he did a pay study. Then I found out that I was a pay study. Then I found out that we do the management studies and all this other stuff that TMPA does for our members and for their local associations.
Speaker 2:It's just a phenomenal what you get to learn while you're there and just if you're having a problem, you need to come to the conference, because somebody there is probably facing that same problem in their organization and they can probably give you some pointers on how to handle it.
Speaker 1:Yep Well, speaking of networking and speaking of learning of other situations. There was a situation down in New Bromphill.
Speaker 3:Oh, you said it right. You liked that Two days early, you liked it and at a scosa Wow.
Speaker 1:You're all right so they had a situation a couple of months ago where they tried to pass some legislation locally. Talk about what, what? Some situations are going on in Arlington with the crime, crime control, crime control district and so what that means.
Speaker 2:Yeah, what we did is we actually approached our city council just back in December 5th. I attended the meeting. I gave them a copy of local government code 3 36, which governs the crime control prevention district. And what people need to understand about that is not a tax increase, but it's merely a for Arlington. It would be merely a reallocation of our current sales tax. So kind of an earmark, yeah, kind of an earmark that goes to police for training and equipment. We are in desperate need of this crime control prevention district for for the revenue to provide us with our trainings and with all the equipment we need for all the venues we have there in Arlington. As a 28 year veteran, I can tell you that I have yet to participate in a joint training exercise with police firing EMS for a mass casualty event at any of our venues. God bless America.
Speaker 2:AT&T the global outfield six flags.
Speaker 3:Water parks.
Speaker 2:None of them. We have not trained together. We have no foundation. If something was to happen tomorrow. We're going in there blind and you know it's going to be absolutely chaos.
Speaker 3:And AT&T holds a hundred thousand people.
Speaker 2:Yes, and even though you know you might think evacuating AT&T is pretty simple it probably would be, but what do you do with those 85,000 or a hundred thousand people once you get them out on the street, Wow, and then they're starting to get in their cars. How are we going to? We should be setting up places for a triage for the sick and injured. We should be having an alternate traffic route to where we can get emergency vehicles in and out of that area to transport these people. We need to be having a foundation and we don't even have a foundation.
Speaker 1:And that's just one example.
Speaker 3:That's just one example and the Crown Control Prevention District can provide that revenue so that we can start that training with the amount of revenue with the entertainment districts that you guys have in the sports agencies, with all of the facilities you guys have. That should be flush with cash and over prepared, because another World Cup is going to be coming soon. There's a lot of massive venues that come there. That.
Speaker 2:Well, we were really lucky on the Rangers parade. You know MLB requires that you have the parade within 48 hours. Well, we didn't have the staff for that. We managed. We had almost these estimated about 750,000 people in Orange and we just lucked out that we did have one shooting. Luckily the guy shot up in the air and not into the crowd. I think that's when they said he happened. We had guys climbing up light poles. They had range of flags on some of the light poles. They were still in those range of flags.
Speaker 3:Standing on squad cars.
Speaker 2:Standing on squad police cars. Yes, I mean we could not. And that whole area, that whole entertainment district. If officers needed help and take it, we'd have to go in on foot because the traffic was just terrible, just terrible. So yeah, we lucked out on on the parade.
Speaker 3:Y'all should be flush with cash, with the amount of money that comes into that community and the preparedness that people should demand and expect, yeah, yes, when they come there.
Speaker 2:And that's why we started those talks. They have until February 16th to put it on the ballot. And the reason why we're trying to get the city to put it on the ballot is if you, if the city does it, they can put it on the ballot right away. If we have to do a referendum, then it's a two vote process where you first have to create the commission crime control prevention district commission that oversees the money, and then the set that commission will then put together how much tax should be given, whether it's how it should be spent and all that stuff and they have to send that proposal to the city council. Then it has to prove it and then that has to be voted on too by the voters.
Speaker 1:What was the city's response whenever you handed them?
Speaker 2:Well, I'm speaking to them during the. It was called the citizens participation, so they cannot respond back to me. But after that meeting I did get a call from a couple of city council members that were very interested in it. I wanted to learn more about it. So they were going to start asking questions. And that's what I. That's why I do that. I do that from the city council so I can spark them to start asking questions. Exactly that's why I gave them a copy of the local government code so they can read it for themselves and then start asking questions.
Speaker 2:So, and I did talk to one of our city managers and, of course, anytime you talk to them, the first thing they want to point out is that you know, well, our tax rate is at max, we don't have any taxes left. Well, that's true. But we also know they give a quarter of a cent to the street maintenance fund and we want to split that quarter of a cent Eighth for the streets, eight for PD. Because if we had 8% or eighth of a cent of sales tax coming to the police department, how much we would have made on that parade? How much would we make on any given, you know, cowboy game or ranger game. We would have enough money to help pay for the training and equipment that we need and in for clarification on to our listeners.
Speaker 3:this these earmarked funds is not just so that they can go blow it on whatever they want it is. It will be focused for specific items, training equipment, their specific items. It's not just a windfall purse that they could that you can just go blow it on.
Speaker 1:I think they can use it for pay, can they Like?
Speaker 2:I mean they can use it for overtime, I think, for it's it's, it's your there's mainly for training and equipment you can get you can have the voters include some and for hires, new hires for new officers. However, there is, like I said, there is a commission that sets up that oversees that money to make sure it is it is spent the way the code allows it.
Speaker 3:It is yeah, but just clarify for non listening folks or folks that may not understand. It's a little bit more in depth than we've explained. We've kind of surface given an explanation, but it's not just this giant windfall chunk that cops suddenly just have more money than they can spend and go buy stupid stuff or do stupid things with it. It's a. It's a targeted effort to improve the community's safety and protection, like we've described.
Speaker 2:Yes, and it pays for police cars, uniforms, anything and everything we need. So it would save the city a lot of money.
Speaker 2:Cool yeah, at least free up some money in the general fund so that you know if we're not having to pay our training budget with, you know, the general fund, we're paying it with this tax. Well, that frees up that money in the general fund they can use for other things, hopefully to hire more officers. Yeah, we're going to try to get it passed. Yep, we're working on it and, like I said, I'm going next week to the city council meeting again to speak to them and see what happens. You know any citizens out there want to get involved. They can reach out to me, or or you know they can find us.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and they can find us on the website Nice.
Speaker 3:Well, you got anything else, big dog, what do we not hit on El Presidente?
Speaker 2:Well, I do want to point out that you know, as president here, I've been pretty busy. I got to attend the the Clay shoot, which was a very good success.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I enjoy that. I hope people will come out next year for that. That's a fun time for everybody. Yeah, I got to go to the peace officers angels foundation where I got to accept award for TMG as a loyalty member. That organization basically helps families have fallen off. Yeah, great organization. And I want to say give a shout out to Irving POA. They donated $10,000 to the big chunk of change friends of the Texas peace officer moral and I was able to go and accept that that check on behalf of that group.
Speaker 1:So shout out to them and you're going to be the Texas peace officer Morals. Going to be late April.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:And historically we the president, sitting president in TNPA always speaks at that event. So we're kind of getting geared up for that system. He's here in a couple of weeks.
Speaker 3:You've. You're Carter, again picked out for that event.
Speaker 2:Yes, you know what it's an April. I'm hoping I don't need one.
Speaker 1:You might never know I have a fan, texas, I want your, I want your hair to be blowing in the wind.
Speaker 2:I like the one you got on. Oh yeah, this is the actual official TNPA Again relentless defender.
Speaker 1:I like that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, past president Tovore, you know, was able to finagle for those, for those that don't know our listeners, as long as I've known him, he always Chris, always shows up with some type of sweater. They don't really ever get plan boy or crazy, they're always just generally a dark color or just kind of a you know, just a sweater. And so it became kind of a joke several years back. And so this past year, past president Joe Tovar presented this president with a actual official TNPA sweater of the entire board got one as well. It was pretty, uh, it was pretty funny at the at the dinner.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was at the conference, so I had it all planned out I had. I was going from vice president number one to be president. I told my wife I'm taking my cardigan with me and I had a cardigan that she made me. It's black and it's got the thin blue line going around me.
Speaker 3:Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's cool.
Speaker 2:And so I was going to put that on Once I got pinned as president. I was going to put that on at the conference. Well, after I get sworn in, after we uh does all the pen exchange and everything we go down to get sworn in, he looks at me and says hey, take off your jacket. That's a what. Take off your jacket. And he takes off his jacket, all the board members take off the jacket and they're all wearing this cardigan.
Speaker 3:I'm like Holy moly, they just stole my thunder.
Speaker 2:Every one of them, and they gave me this and put it on me and I'll never forget it. Joe says man, I was sweating to death under this thing.
Speaker 3:I'm going to get this other thing off me.
Speaker 2:That's awesome To where did shenanigans. But I will tell you this when I started wearing them, I caught a lot of grief from everybody. Hey, grandpa, hey, mr Rogers, there's some, there's some. Mr Roger, pictures of me out there. If you don't know, some of them were put up on the bulletin board at the conference. But I tell you what, since they've gotten these, I've seen a lot more of these at the board meetings. When we're sitting in the board, many of the board members are wearing them.
Speaker 1:They do get cold. The board meetings do get cold, that's a bunch of old guys I haven't seen Brett war. Here's the Brett warming, oh Brad, on their war If you wear one, he'll have short One who have short?
Speaker 3:Yeah, a shirt.
Speaker 2:That's right, that's right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, short shorts on over there. Well, man, me and Clint were just talking about this the other day and not saying that the other past presidents have been challenging to work with or hard to work for, but, man, you've been an absolute dream to work with. You've always had a good head on your shoulders, easy to work with, and I just want to commend you for that from the employees side. So thank you so much.
Speaker 2:I really appreciate it. Thank you very much. But I think you know what. I think we have such good employees that it makes it easy. Yeah, oh, our staff is phenomenal level. I put them up against any other organization. Yeah, our staff circles around anybody and they're all dedicated. They all love what they do. They all are dedicated to law enforcement and their family. So I have the great admiration for all of them.
Speaker 3:And all the so. Thank y'all very much. I think that's what has been the bright spot of this organization to be a part of is, whether it's board or staff side, the passion. I would not want to stand in front of this organization and pick a fight because there are so many passionate people from across all kinds of law enforcement experience, board side or staff side you can't I challenge anybody to match the amount of passion this organization has. I don't think you'll find anybody.
Speaker 2:I don't think you'll find anybody. Yeah, you know, after 12 years on the board, I can tell you if this organization wasn't doing what it's doing and if we didn't have the staff, then it wouldn't be the same and I don't think you'd have people like myself, joe Tovar, some of the others that have sit on this board for many years and, you know, gave their time, energy and effort. But we all believe in this organization, we all supported 100% and we're all thankful that it's here. Yep.
Speaker 1:Awesome. We typically end each episode with three rapid fire questions you ready?
Speaker 3:Hang on, I'm going to go first. Okay, all right, what has been your very best day and what's been your very worst day?
Speaker 2:Very best was probably when I was elected president. I'm very proud and honored to be able to do this for law enforcement and for the organization, and I think one of the worst days was the loss of Dick Brown. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:That was a tough day, that was a weird that whole day.
Speaker 3:it was weird hard yeah. What would your 42 years old? What would 42 year?
Speaker 2:old.
Speaker 3:Chris, tell 17 year old Chris Whoa, that's a tough one.
Speaker 2:Um, you know I you know that was pretty tough. I'd probably have to tell my you know what? Do what mom and dad always said do the right thing. You know things may be tough at times and you know the road of success is always under construction. If you ask me and you just have to do what, uh, what you were brought up to do, stay with it. Yeah, keep fighting, dude. I like that.
Speaker 3:The road to success is always under construction, and that's a good one, I free and like that yeah. I like that. All right, well, hit it Rapid fire, rapid fire, favorite cop car.
Speaker 1:Favorite line from a cop movie or cop movie and favorite drink of choice. Favorite cop car for me would have to be Caprice Clark.
Speaker 2:Oh, my God.
Speaker 1:Thank you all for tuning in. We can end on a high note.
Speaker 3:Yes, we can end on Chevy Caprice. Oh wait a second, I want to know what yours.
Speaker 1:Oh, mom, I'm a Crown Vic guy. You're a Crown Vic guy. Yeah, award fixed or repaired daily, oh yeah. And what was the thing? Favorite cop movie or line from a cop movie oh, favorite cop movie.
Speaker 2:Well, I'm, I don't know. I have a favorite cop movie, but it's a favorite cop movie. I don't have a favorite cop movie, but it's so many. Their favorite series was, of course, hill Street Blues.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah.
Speaker 2:And the best line ever was you'll be careful out there, yeah, that's. You know. That always is stuck with me. Yeah, even especially when. Especially when you're a new officer and you go into that briefing room for the first time and you sit down there and you see all these cops in there and you're just now. They don't get to watch Hill Street Blues unless they watch Reavans. But I remember Hill Street Blues the minute I sit down in that chair. It's pretty cool, you're like I finally made it in the game.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I'm finally here, yep.
Speaker 1:Yep, yeah, favorite drink of choice.
Speaker 2:Oh, of course bourbon, blanton's Eagle Rare, and then there's a good one. There you go Neat, or on a rock, on a rock On a rock.
Speaker 1:I like it.
Speaker 3:That's.
Speaker 1:Clint, that's Clint's favorite too, I think.
Speaker 3:Bourbon on a rock. Yep, yep, I like it. You got anything else? Nope, I cannot thank you enough for coming down.
Speaker 2:And I appreciate the impact.
Speaker 3:Yeah, the leadership, the friendship has been invaluable and sincerely, sincerely appreciate it.
Speaker 2:Thank you all for having me and I appreciate y'all, everything you do for the organization.
Speaker 1:Appreciate you, man. Thank you so much. Thank you you guys. Stay safe out there. It's getting hopefully starting to warm up this little bit by the time this episode airs, nothing else.
Speaker 3:No Springtime be coming up pretty quick. We'll have a Texas Peace Officer Memorial on the horizon. We'll have police week in DC on the horizon.
Speaker 1:Save the date for our conference, which is the.
Speaker 3:July 26th through 28th, I believe, dallas will be back at Hyatt reunion Yep Hyatt Regency reunion tower.
Speaker 1:I'm gonna put it right here there I'll put a link to the conference Joint.
Speaker 3:TMPA FOP conference. That's correct.
Speaker 1:Yep, it's gonna be a good time, good time, so all right. Well, this wraps up this episode. You guys take care, stay safe and, as always, god bless you and God bless Texas. We're out.