Olney on Air Episode 4- Guests Mindy Ash and Christa Credors, Victor Bretting and Jerry Powell

In Episode 4 of Olney On Air, hosts Gina Keating and Kimberly Smith cover the biggest stories from The Olney Enterprise, including Air Tractor's milestone 5,000th aircraft, the Young County runoff election, and the Newcastle Class of 2026.

Our guests this week:

• Mindy Ash & Christa Credors of Lighthouse Therapy in Graham discuss how they've spent a decade serving foster children and rural families through physical, occupational, speech, and feeding therapies — and why early intervention changes everything. Find them at their website: https://www.lighthouse-therapy.org/
• Victor Bretting of B-Tex Ranch shares his journey from a fatherless childhood in construction to building a faith-based hunting ranch that donates hunts to veterans and terminally ill children — and why he wrote his memoir, The Man That I Would Become. For more info on Bretting Texas Ranch head to their website: https://brettingtexanranch.com/
• Jerry Powell of LSPM/Industrial Resourcing breaks down what rural communities need to know before data centers arrive — from road impacts and acoustic health hazards to negotiating tax abatement agreements that actually protect local residents.

Plus: the Food Truck Championship, the Governor's Small Business Summit coming to Graham, Olney in America updates, VBS season, and your complete summer community calendar.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:09

Hello everyone and welcome to Alni on Air, the podcast where we talk about what's happening in Alni and the 3,200 people who make this community special. I'm Gina Keating, editor of the Alni Enterprise. And I'm Kimberly Smith, Executive Director of the Alni Chamber of Commerce. Every week we'll take a look at the biggest stories in the Alni Enterprise, talk with interesting guests from around our community, highlight a local business, and keep you up to date on all the fun things happening around town.

SPEAKER_02 0:40

Yep, we've got a great show today. We'll be talking with Mindy Ash and Krista Kreters of Lighthouse Therapy, our business of the week guest Victor Bretting, and Jerry Powell for our Southern Engineering segment.

SPEAKER_00 0:52

So let's get started with this week's headlines. The biggest story this week was a milestone that put Almy on the international stage. Air Tractor celebrated the completion of its 5000th aircraft, an AT502B agricultural airplane that rolled off the production line right here in Almy. The company hosted its employees, customers, and aviation leaders from around the community and the world for the celebration.

SPEAKER_02 1:19

The aircraft delivered during the ceremony is headed to one of Air Tractor's largest international markets, Brazil, where demand for agricultural aircraft continues to grow. It's hard to overstate what Air Tractor means to this community. Thousands of airplanes built in Almy are working farms and protecting communities around the world, and that's something every resident can be proud of.

SPEAKER_00 1:41

Absolutely. So congratulations to the entire air tractor team on reaching a milestone that took more than 50 years of dedication and craftsmanship. Another big story this week was the runoff election. Voters returned County Judge John Charles Bullock to office. He defeated incumbent Judge Wyn Graham, who served one term.

SPEAKER_02 2:04

In Precinct 4, Bobby Sweatnum won a closely watched race to secede longtime Commissioner Jimmy Wiley, who was retiring after more than 20 years of service. The election was heavily influenced by discussions about growth, economic development, the proposed Project Saltworks Data Center, and the future direction of Young County. And with no Democrat opponents in November, both Bullock and Sweatnam are expected to take office on January 1st.

SPEAKER_00 2:31

We also want to congratulate the Newcastle High School class of 2026. They're on the front page of the paper this week. And as you know, Kimberly graduation season is one of my favorite times as a newspaper editor because we have the chance to celebrate the hard work and accomplishment of our local students, and they have so many. It's just crazy the stuff they do UIL, sports, scholarships. It is just incredible. Absolutely. Whether graduates are headed to college, the military, technical training, or directly into the workforce, they represent the future of Young County.

SPEAKER_02 3:09

Congratulations to all of the Newcastle graduates and their families. It's a tremendous accomplishment.

SPEAKER_00 3:14

At commissioners' court last week, county leaders voted to reinvest a portion of hotel occupancy tax revenue generated by the Wildcatter Ranch back into tourism promotion. Super important for this area.

SPEAKER_01 3:29

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 3:30

Wildcatter co-owners George and Callie Doubleday told the commissioners at their May 26th meeting that international visitors stay longer and spend more money in local communities. So they want to try to attract more of them. The court approved allocating 15% of the hotel occupancy taxes generated by the Wildcatter this year toward future tourism marketing efforts.

SPEAKER_02 3:54

That investment is designed to bring more visitors and more dollars into young county businesses.

SPEAKER_00 3:59

And speaking of visitors, one of the biggest events of the summer, except for Alni in America, yes. Live music and thousands of visitors expected in downtown Graham.

SPEAKER_02 4:21

One special guest this year will be Congressman Roger Williams, who represents this area in Washington and serves as chairman of the House Small Business Committee. Williams is expected to talk about the importance of small businesses and the role they play in driving local economies throughout rural Texas.

SPEAKER_00 4:37

Didn't you have something you wanted to talk about with small regard to small business? And Graham isn't there some sort of meeting?

SPEAKER_02 4:44

Yes, absolutely. Graham was actually chosen to host the Governor's Small Business Summit. That'll be on July 9th from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the North Central Texas College. The Governor Small Business Summit, I know that multiple cities across Texas applied for this, and Graham got chosen. So it's a really big deal. Yeah, it's pretty neat. So this will the summit will aim to help Texas small business owners and aspiring entrepreneurs reach new heights by connecting them with the resources and information needed to start, strengthen, and grow a business. The event will offer a variety of sessions, bringing together local, state, and federal resource partners to provide key insights on critical business topics. It is also an opportunity to network other business owners and meet experts who will share timely, relevant, and actionable advice on a multitude of small business subjects. So go ahead and register. We will have flyers out with a QR code for small businesses to sign up. So get your spot.

SPEAKER_00 5:42

Yeah, that sounds amazing. And it was July 9th, you said? Yes, July 9th from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. Yeah. So anyone who is thinking about starting a small business, has a small business and wants to grow it, this is the place for you, and there is not going to be a better opportunity than to take part in this. So if you've never been to the Food Truck Championship, it's one of those events that really showcases everything that makes Young County special. So that's another reason to go to Graham.

SPEAKER_02 6:10

Yeah. Also come hungry because there are so many different options. I know. One of the one of the real popular ones I heard of is the main lobster. No. Yes. Oh no. Yes. That one, Razzle's Italian ice, they were the winners last year. Yeah. So I love their stuff. I mean, they just have such a massive variety of all the different things. So if you're on a weight loss journey, just skip it. Right. This is the time. Your time to shine.

SPEAKER_00 6:40

That's right, man. Oh, if only I could like five stomachs. But I'm gonna go and take advantage of it. Okay, so finally, congratulations to Alni's Cub Scout pack. I got this story tip from Chris Garcia, who is one of the troop leaders here in Alney. He sent me a bunch of really cute pictures that I absolutely had to run. So look at page three, and you will learn how the newly formed pack traveled to Wichita Falls for Scout Day at Castaway Cove and entered the Northwest Texas Council's annual cardboard boat race for the first time. The scouts entered five boats built entirely from cardboard and duct tape.

SPEAKER_02 7:21

Now that is what I call southern engineering.

SPEAKER_00 7:23

No, and they floated. I have pictures that show that they actually floated.

SPEAKER_02 7:28

Yeah. Do you know floating the river in San Marcos? They do so there is these falls that you go down, and then it sort of the water hits the river, and it's like everybody, even when you're on tubes, everybody always flips. So they actually do something similar, except it's whatever can survive that the falls whenever you hit that eruption. And it's pretty funny to watch those. I would have loved to have seen the scouts at Casway Co. That sounds so much fun.

SPEAKER_00 7:52

Yes. Well, you can you can see their accomplishments on page three of the Enterprise. They entered five boats, but they didn't take home a racing trophy. But Catherine and Charlotte Garcia earned the event's crowd favorite award with their boat, which they called the Valkyrie. Ooh, that's a pretty good debut. Way to go, Catherine and Charlotte. Yes, absolutely. Okay. Any day you can come home with an award and a good story is a successful scouting trip. That's correct. And that's a look at this week's headlines from the Alni Enterprise. Coming up next, we're joined by Mindy Ash and Krista Kreters from Lighthouse Therapy to talk about foster care, children's therapies, and the services that they're providing to families throughout our region. Krista is a Graham native who earned a bachelor's degree in biology from Wayland Baptist University and a Master's of Physical Therapy from Angelo State University. She's built a reputation for working with entire families, not just individual patients, and for mentoring new therapists. Mindy is originally from Mule Shoe and earned a bachelor's degree in family studies from Lubbock Christian University before receiving her Master of Science in Speech Language Pathology from Texas Tech. She has dedicated her career to helping children and families reach their goals through creative and play-based therapies. Together, they've spent more than a decade serving children and families across our region. Welcome to Only on Air. Welcome. Thank you. Okay, so tell us how Lighthouse Therapy got started and what inspired both of you to enter the field.

SPEAKER_04 9:45

Okay, so really when we started, it was probably it's like 2012, so almost 15 years ago, I guess. But Krista and I didn't even really know each other that well, honestly. We had a mutual person that had owned her own business prior, and she was just kind of came to us individually and talked about what was going on in the area, and we're seeing the same things.

SPEAKER_03 10:07

So I was seeing a lot of kids that were older, like high school, and they had a lot of contractors, their hands turned backwards, those kinds of things. And we felt like that had they received intervention earlier in three, four, those that range, the outcomes for them would have likely been very different.

SPEAKER_04 10:23

A lot of them are going nowhere because to drive over an hour one way is just two days a week is impossible when you have all the other things going on.

SPEAKER_00 10:31

Yeah, so both of you being from rural Texas, you know what those challenges are like. Yes.

SPEAKER_02 10:36

Absolutely. Many people know White House therapy through your work with foster children. How did that part of your practice develop?

SPEAKER_03 10:43

I think just over time, as we were doing insurances and those kinds of things, we figured out as we were navigating that superior Medicaid is the only one in our area. If they are taken in our area, they automatically get superior health plan. And so Which is the most difficult Medicaid to deal with. We actually fought for three years to get in network with them to even be able to service these children. But we felt like they were the ones that were already so underserved and most vulnerable, really. And we weren't able they weren't able to receive any help. And so we really fought for that for three years to be even granted access to be in network with them. So and then from there now we've been able to serve them for 10 years.

SPEAKER_00 11:29

Yeah, so and that's basically what you're celebrating this month, right? You have an event that's gonna be this will come out on Friday, and it'll be the second day of your two-day event. So could you talk about that a little bit?

SPEAKER_04 11:40

Yeah, it's really just the partnership, but it's also just individually, these families. We see we only see a fraction of what they're doing, honestly. They're sacrificing a lot for these children, and the the children who have been in a position where they everything's been stripped from them. And they're to us in our minds, they're just everyday heroes just going through, just trying to help these children. And on the other side, we have these therapists, and we take very seriously who we hire, and the group, the team is very important to us. It's not just the skill and what you do, but also the family team aspect is really important to us. So we have some really incredible, not just skilled, they are highly skilled, but very compassionate and loving therapists. They're everyday heroes to us too. It's the partnership. These therapists are helping these families, and it's just it's really cool to see these therapists pour into these kids and the families, it they become like family to each other. So it's a celebration of just that partnership and working together for the kids.

SPEAKER_01 12:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 12:44

And a lot of these families, they don't just have one foster kid. One of the families we've had them for close to the 10 years, I would say probably eight years throughout, and I think she counted probably 12 kids of theirs that came through. We have two of which that we're still seeing and have seen for years and years and years, and just thinking about the impact that we've made on that family alone is I mean when you have a family like that, the resources are crucial.

SPEAKER_04 13:12

I mean, having access to care close to home is yeah, imperative for them because it's they have so much, it's not it's more than just a typical dynamic, they have so many other things. Yeah, so they're supporting everybody there, it's kind of a virtuous circle.

SPEAKER_02 13:26

And this actually hits really close to home for me. My nephew was diagnosed as autistic when he was, I believe, two years old. My sister had a background in early child development, and if it hadn't been for her, sort of navigating and figuring out he had that early intervention you spoke about, and now he is 22 years old, but at the age of 18, he went back to the exact speech therapist that he went through his whole life, and he ended up interning and working there. And that is such a cool thing that one, he was able to do it, but two, he was giving back to the people that gave him the ability to even he's in college now, and though that would not be possible without people like you. So thank you so much for what you're doing.

SPEAKER_00 14:05

Oh, I love that.

SPEAKER_02 14:06

That's awesome. We love stuff like that.

SPEAKER_00 14:08

Can you talk about the different types of therapy that you do there? What are the services?

SPEAKER_03 14:12

So we have physical therapy, occupational therapy, um, speech therapy, and then feeding therapy services. The feeding therapy aspect can be speech or OT, because there's a sensory component or the actual feeding. And that's for babies, right?

SPEAKER_04 14:27

We or little kids goes up through. I mean, we have some teenagers right now doing feeding therapy.

SPEAKER_00 14:34

Well, no, what is that?

SPEAKER_04 14:35

They just don't it can be picky eating, even that has been just unresolved, or there's a lot of oral components sometimes that people don't know about, like how the mouth works and the muscles work to make and so I think there's a hole, it's just so broad.

SPEAKER_00 14:50

Yeah, that's very interesting because you read about that more and more these days about people who have different um sensations around the way they eat or really limited diets. So that is interesting. I'm glad that's being addressed. So, what's the difference between occupational and physical therapy? I've never really understood that. That's a great question.

SPEAKER_04 15:10

We get that all the time, really, even from doctors.

SPEAKER_03 15:13

We're like, what do the OTs do? So physical therapy, the way I like to describe it in pediatrics, is more a gross motor. So your big movements. So in babies, we're looking at the movements of rolling, sitting, crawling, standing, learning to walk, run, balance, those kinds of things. Occupational therapy is more the fine motor aspects of that. So littler muscles, movements, and or sensory things, components to it. So emotional regulation, some of those kinds of things, a lot of the not all autism, but a lot of the autistic children we serve, they have a lot of sensory components that go with that as well. What's really nice about having all three disciplines is we treat the child as a a whole. So all of our parts, we are very big on collaboration. And so it may be that OT has to see them first so that they can go sit through their speech session, those kinds of things that are.

SPEAKER_04 17:03

Yeah, just I mean, a late talking, a lot of that, feeding issues, swallowing issues.

SPEAKER_00 17:09

What is the talking? I know kids who have talking delays and sometimes won't don't talk or say very few words. Is that something that can be overcome?

SPEAKER_04 17:19

Or oh yeah, yeah, and that's something that we really early intervention is huge for that, just because the just that is it's such a crucial time. Their little brains developing, and so and just to not get further and further behind. But sometimes, and that's with all three disciplines, I feel like the just the general population doesn't understand it, and not that they sh should, they just it's just not, it's kind of until you've gone, you really understand it, it's not something that just comes naturally to you if your child is not crawling appropriately or walking or talking. It's not even me being in the therapy world, if my child has some physical stuff, I'm like, I don't understand it, not anywhere close to how she does. Yeah, so there's just things you can do in the home that parents don't just naturally think of sometimes because it's not something that they've studied, right?

SPEAKER_02 18:11

If you don't have that background, it's hard to know. Yes. What and I think I have four kids, and I measure my kids against my older kids, right? So my daughter, she started walking very early, like eight months, but with my boys, I was sort of expecting them to be a little bit later. But sometimes you can confuse with what maybe just be all they'll just get there eventually with there's an actual issue here.

SPEAKER_03 18:34

So yes, and we I will say the well visits and those kinds of things, we've gone around to a lot of the doctors in our area, and we even have little cards that of what to expect a zero to through five years, and all the doctor's offices have those. But they're good at they know us well enough by now and they trust us, and so even if there's maybe a concern that they're not sure about, they're gonna they refer to us and let us at least look at them and say, Hey, y'all come back in a year if they're not doing this or that, or we need to go ahead and get started with intervention. And so I will say I think educating the providers in our area has been very helpful.

SPEAKER_04 19:12

Those relationships are yeah, so important. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 19:15

Okay, we're kind of getting getting off our question list here because it's pretty interesting. How has the need for children's services changed over the last decade?

SPEAKER_04 19:27

It it has changed, and we we feel um across all disciplines it's changed. But speech in particular, and we've noticed since COVID a shift. And I don't know, we don't know in particular what if that involves less interaction, more screen time, more screen time for the parents or the children. We don't know if it's environmental in that regard or something else, but there's definitely been a shift, I feel like, with the severity of the delays that we're seeing. The evaluations that we're doing on these children are they're more severe and more frequent than used to. There would be some just kind of typical developmental delays, like maybe the child is talking, but they're not exactly where they should be, and they just kind of need a little boost, you know. And sometimes you can do a little therapy, educate the families, and they're they're back to where they're supposed to be. What we're seeing is different than that. We're not seeing much of that, we're seeing a lot more severe delays when they come to us young at young ages.

SPEAKER_00 20:32

So, what does that look like? You know?

SPEAKER_04 20:35

Well, so some of the children are maybe not they're not on the spectrum of autism, but they are presenting that way. And so with communication, very delayed communication, no words, no words, fewer to two words, and three, even up to three or four years old.

SPEAKER_03 20:55

How do they communicate? Sensory OT-wise, they're just kind of everywhere. Dysregulated, very dysregulated. They can't stay to a task for 10 seconds, like they're on just in different things.

SPEAKER_04 21:05

And the interaction, typically developing children that have been exposed properly to social communication will very much be easy to engage with things that are age-appropriate. Bubbles, think anything that gets a child's attention, it's not hard to connect with them pretty quickly. So a lot of what we're seeing is just really a lot of effort on our part to get any kind of eye contact connection and interaction in play where even children that are mildly delayed, there's that component of you can get their their attention and you can interact, and you can they'll play with the barn and animals with you.

SPEAKER_03 21:49

On the floor, they'll they'll play it, roll a ball back and forth. Several components are very delayed.

SPEAKER_00 21:56

Wow, that is crazy. And that and you think that might be screen time.

SPEAKER_04 22:00

We don't know.

SPEAKER_00 22:00

That's an unprofessional thing.

SPEAKER_04 22:03

There's a lot around that. I think there's a lot being talked about with that. Like it that there are these children that aren't they are presenting like they have autism, but it's more just environment, lack of interaction. So we don't know if that's what it is, but there's definitely been a shift. We're seeing that in our evaluations. Right. It is wow. It makes sense to us.

SPEAKER_00 22:24

It's so interesting though, because people talk about this explosion of autism, but perhaps it's just developmental delays in some cases where they're just not developing because of whatever screen time, kids not going outside as much, etc.

SPEAKER_02 22:40

That's my family. My kids don't have screen time on the weekdays. We try to really push them outdoors and I keep them involved in all the things. And during the summer, they get an hour in the morning and an hour in the afternoon, and that's earned. But mostly every purchase that we make now is aimed towards putting them outside. I love that. I mean, it just and also I think with my older kids, because they're always talking, talking, talking. I think my younger babies picked it up faster because they're always playing together and they're getting that interaction from us. And I think even for me, putting my phone down and saying, Let me do like get on the floor with them and play with them. And I think that's been a big difference for because my oldest son, he started talking later, but he also just had his little sister versus my two youngest. My baby's 10 months old, and she's already saying things and way more. I think she's just way more developed and advanced than my boy was in the beginning. And I think a big part of that is taking that time to talk to them and play with them.

SPEAKER_04 23:43

I love that you said that because you are exactly right. I think it's some things, I think that's something that we don't always think about. Like we think about the screen time and we think about how much TV they're watching or the devices that they're on, but I think sometimes we forget how important looking them in the eye and just talking to them and listening or playing, not just watching them play or sort of watching them play while you're distracted. Right. There's something so important about really being present with them and communicating with them, looking at them and playing with them.

SPEAKER_00 24:18

Let's go further into that. And what role do parents and caregivers play in successful therapy?

SPEAKER_03 24:24

This is huge. It's the carryover, we they can come to us one or two times a week and we're not gonna get them where they need to be. We've got to have family and caregiver buy-in. One of the things that we have that is kind of unique to us, we have an app that is where our exercises are or our home programs are for the families. They just log in and it's their child's whole journal. And so both of our children went to speech therapy with another one of our wonderful therapists. And it's one thing I work with Mitzi every day, and she would tell me what she was doing with my child. But then us going home and being able to watch the videos that she had on there of him actually doing the programs, his exercises, we were able to advance and get him off of therapy a lot quicker, I feel like. And so families that do that that they've they've loved it. The families have loved it, the therapist. At first, it is hard during our sessions to video it seems like it takes longer, but when you see the buy-in from the families and how much faster you're able to progress, the kids, it's a game changer for us. Game changer.

SPEAKER_04 25:30

And it's not something that we've seen. We know a lot of other clinics, like bigger clinics and lots of other places, and we don't know anyone that has something like this, and so it's really it's really been amazing.

SPEAKER_00 25:42

So it's like a YouTube video that you watch to see what you're supposed to do.

SPEAKER_03 25:45

It's your own account, and so it's just the kids, and it'll just be like their exercise, whatever they're doing, is on there. Not everything they do in therapy, it's just what we want done at home. Because sometimes if they're doing a lot of compensatory movements and stuff, it's not really helpful. So we have to make sure that they're to a point where they can do it at home, produce that at home, but then we're showing caregiver where we're placing our hands, or for speech, where their tongue placement is supposed to be, and they're and then the child is actually seeing themselves, and so there's a lot of research to the video modeling and them learning that skill faster. And so the families that have bought into that, we've had a much more buy-in, I would say, since we have that.

SPEAKER_04 26:25

It's super easy to use, and then the families can communicate back on the app. So if they want to take a video of their child from home to show the therapist, they just upload it and she can see it and they can text back and forth on it.

SPEAKER_03 26:37

And they've taken it to doctor's offices like they like because it's just on their phone, and so they're able to be like, hey, this is what they're working on in speech, this is what they saw. For PT, we see a lot of babies that have it's called tortocolis, but their necks are from whatever reason, birth trauma or whatever. And so we take a lot of pictures when we get them on the initial evaluation, and then as we progress them through, and that's very helpful for the doctors to see and those kinds of things. Okay. So family buy-in is huge, and we can't progress therapy near as fast, you know, right without it.

SPEAKER_02 27:10

What are the misconceptions for the families who don't buy in? Like, what do you think their misconceptions are?

SPEAKER_04 27:15

I think some people maybe don't they have maybe a negative view of therapy as in it has to be something that's so severe. Do you think like sometimes just being in the world of therapy? If if my child is delayed at all in physical therapy, I want her looking at my child. Because but I think sometimes it's seen as it you need to be severely behind or not doing something.

SPEAKER_03 27:40

So I think that's one thing that parents they're hesitant sometimes too, or sometimes they'll think that's just who so and so is like my child, and it may be different than the other one, you know what I mean? And really, there's a lot of sometimes underlying things if they're not doing the thing with milestones, they build on each other and they get more and more complex as you age and your balance. If you're not doing those things and you've skipped some there's component, there's reasons why that's occurring, and so I think sometimes they just of course don't realize that.

SPEAKER_04 28:08

Yeah, that's just how she is. She doesn't want to do that, which is understandable.

SPEAKER_02 28:12

I think I think one misconception I have heard just being a parent is oh, they're fine, they'll grow out of it, and that is so detrimental to the development and getting them where they need to be. So now you have a high schooler who never grew out of it, you know.

SPEAKER_00 28:28

That's that's gotta be hard for the kid too, among their peers.

SPEAKER_03 28:31

Yes. So the longer they go, the harder it gets to unlearn unlearn that soon.

SPEAKER_00 28:38

Oh, poor babies, that's terrible. What resources are available for families in Alney and Young County for what you do? Also, how do they sign up for you? They you talked a lot about Medicaid, but how how can a family go and pay for this? Because it sounds like it might be kind of expensive.

SPEAKER_03 28:54

So there it's we have private pay, we have private insurance, and then we have Medicaid. But a lot of it starts with the doctors, or if they they can call our office as well, and our front desk staff are amazing, and so they can lead them in the right direction depending on what it might be.

SPEAKER_02 29:11

Okay. And you talked about that relationship with providers, they could go to their doctor and get a reference or from the doctor to see you.

unknown 29:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 29:19

So insurance will cover it, right? Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 29:21

So sometimes people will just walk in and they want to be seen.

SPEAKER_03 29:24

I understand, and then you just say, go back to your doctor and tell them what your concerns are, and then they'll send over the referral for we're also able to call a lot of the doctors depending on what it is, and if we think that they need to be maybe rushed because we have that relationship with the doctors and their staff or something.

SPEAKER_02 29:39

Yeah, that helps. I can only imagine if it's like that for us, I can only imagine what it's like for on your side. Yes. So, what gives you hope when you look at the children and families you serve?

SPEAKER_03 29:52

Just the change. I mean, and it's one of the families, he wasn't speaking at all. And then the first time he was with us were probably at least two years, and when he was able to tell his mom I love you, I mean, and she was crying. It was the first time I have four children, she has three, and you just think about that that he was four years old or so, and being able to say that for the first time after years of work. So those kinds of things make it worth it, or for PT watching parents come to you and they couldn't walk or roll or sit or any of those things, and then just looking back, it takes us time to get there, but when you look back and you're and they're like, they're into everything, and I'm like, Yeah, you're good for that.

SPEAKER_04 30:39

So I mean it's beautiful, it's just and the hope that they have from that because when sometimes when they come and you just feel really defeated. So I think seeing their the shift in the parents is awesome, just as being moms, how all that changes and enhances their lives. The things that they have stacked against them and they they don't let that hold them back from things is just amazing to see. I get emotional. Yeah, that's what anyway.

SPEAKER_02 31:07

That's beautiful. Yeah, it's as a mom, you know, you because there's only so much as a parent that we can do. And so to have people that are I'm gonna cry for advocating for babies and for children, it's giving them the best chance that they have, and that's great.

SPEAKER_04 31:23

Yeah, and when when our children are I know when our children say stuff, or that you see our our home children and you think you your challenges are nothing compared to some of these kids. It creates also a huge sense of gratitude in like what our bodies can do or what our brains can do when they are typically developing, like how much easier that is for us than these children, but they're still just thriving in their own, you know, yeah, in the way God made them to be. So yeah.

SPEAKER_00 31:55

All right, so if a parent is listening today and thinks their child might need help, what should they do first?

SPEAKER_03 32:02

Uh we would encourage you to reach out to a pediatrician and talk with them, talk with them at the well visits. You can also contact our office and we can help you along the way.

SPEAKER_04 32:13

It's a super simple process, really. The paperwork is super simple once you get the referral, and then everyone's very welcoming and it's not an intimidating process.

SPEAKER_00 32:23

I think sometimes parents just I don't know, there might be like some sort of shame component with that a little bit. Like my kid isn't normal or something like that, but children are all different. Absolutely. Even if they never attain some of the things that a quote unquote normal kid, they're still happy. So might as well try to get them to live the their best lives. So, what's the phone number or website or whatever that they can contact you at?

SPEAKER_03 32:47

Our phone number is 940-549-0788.

SPEAKER_02 32:52

Okay, and we'll post in the notes of this. Well, thank you both for joining us and for the work you're doing for children and families across our area. Thank you.

SPEAKER_04 33:00

Yes, thank you for having us. Thank you all.

SPEAKER_02 33:03

All right. Thanks, Gina. My guest today started at the bottom of the construction industry with no father, no connections, and a mother who works 60-hour weeks. Five decades later, Victor Breding has built companies, hunted 140 plus species across six continents, founded a Texas ranch that donates hunts to veterans and terminally ill kids, and written a memoir his grandchildren will read long after he is gone. Today we are talking about faith, failure, legacy, and what it means to build a life worth passing down. Victor, welcome to Alni on Air. Thank you.

SPEAKER_06 33:51

I appreciate it.

SPEAKER_02 33:51

Well, let's start with this. How did you choose Alni?

SPEAKER_06 33:55

So Rhonda and I were looking for a place to retire, and we wanted it to be within a couple of hours of DFW because our kids were still in the Metroplex. Happened to found the property here, fell in love with it, started learning about the community. I actually met Tatum, was the first one I met, and start falling in love with the idea of what this community really stood for. So we we decided this was this was gonna be our retirement home.

SPEAKER_02 34:17

Right. And then I know from your wife Rhonda that she was going to retire, and then she decided never mind, and now she is a teacher at the high school as well as the cheer sponsor, right?

SPEAKER_06 34:28

She is. She actually did retire. She had to stay out a year to keep her TRSA going. So she did stay out for a little bit. And the best thing I think for us about Only is actually her. She loves her job again. She feels like she's appreciated. But the girls text her all the time, Oh, we love you, Miss Brett is her name. Now, I'm Bretting. So, like I said, the the community's been an extremely good blessing for us to be here.

SPEAKER_02 34:50

Absolutely. So tell us about the vision behind BTEX Ranch and how it serves as a destination for healing and mentorship.

SPEAKER_06 34:57

So it was never meant to be that way. We were just going to retire. You know, we found the property I started building, which at that point in time was a house. It really wasn't going to be the lodge. We turned it into the lodge. And we went to an outdoor show and met Gordon Melton, which is the founder, 20-year founder of Hunting with Soldiers. Same place, we met Casey Allen, which is a state director for Cross Trail Outfitters. And I really can't take credit for it, it's really my daughter that was there with us, and she came up all excited and said, You got to go talk to these people. You just have to. So that started a relationship with them, and we now sponsor a lot of their hunts to be able to come out for the combat veterans and and for the Christian youth groups. So it was really a path. I didn't know I was being led on a path. God led me on a path. I ended up where I'm at, so now we're just trying to magnify this path so that we can do more.

SPEAKER_00 35:48

Absolutely. So, in what ways do outdoor experiences facilitate healing for veterans and youth?

SPEAKER_06 35:55

So it's it's kind of a quiet zone. You you watch the veterans come in, you know, some of them are still struggling with their PTSD, and and uh you get them out in the wildlife, and it's just like weights coming off, you know, they they look at what God's created, you know, they look at the stars and the heavens, and and what you find out about the military is they they don't come one at a time, they come two or more together. So as you put them all together, it takes them five minutes and they're brothers again, right? So our all of that is still part of that that healing process. And it's really not about the hunt. It's really about being in the outdoors, having the camaraderie that they're used to, and just being an environment that there's no pressure. And the the kids are the same thing, right? There's no bigger blessing than to be there when a 10-year-old kid gives his life to Christ. So it's something about the outdoors that just gives you some of that peace and and the serenity that that allows you to be able to heal.

SPEAKER_02 36:47

Absolutely. Yep. So, for listeners outside of OLMI, how do you think that faith-based leadership translates into tangible benefits for small-town economies and civic life?

SPEAKER_06 36:58

Well, I think faith-based is a is a need that you have to start with and grow with. I mean, my mom put me in a Lutheran church school since I was in kindergarten. She gave me that that basis and understanding to be able to do that because we believe in right and wrong. We believe in consequences for actions. All of those have to be a basis to be able to survive in today's world because you can't just go out there and expect that nothing's gonna happen. So, in a small society like only, it's nice to be able to come in and feel like that you've got that community that has that basics and you're not worried about it.

SPEAKER_02 37:33

Y'all are really the best hosts. The chamber has gone out there for a couple of our mix and mingles, and it is it is what you say. I mean, when you go out there and you look up at that Texas sky, you can't help but think there is a a wonderful artist and maker here, and how could you deny that looking at this beautiful night sky? I mean, it's yeah, it's stunning out there.

SPEAKER_00 37:53

So you mentioned earlier though that you have given away something like 65 free hunts, is that right?

SPEAKER_06 38:00

By the end of next week, it will be 64 in three years.

SPEAKER_00 38:04

Okay, wow, that is amazing. And you also mentioned trips for girls, trips for boys. Um, can you talk about that a little bit?

SPEAKER_06 38:11

Yes, ma'am. Actually, tomorrow there it's our first girls' camp. So we have a girls ram camp coming through Cross Trail Outfitters. Rhonda's actually leading that, so she'll she'll be in charge, Huntress in charge. And then the week after that, on Wednesday, we've got 10 boys coming from CTO for their camp. So part of what it is is they they have their Bible lessons every night, they sing around the campfire, they they learn how to harvest their animals properly, they learn to give thanks for the animals and God's creations. So the the ecosystem that they're building is around hunting in the outdoors, but it's still their hub is the faith. Yeah, you watch them transition those boys. Phones go away, they're not allowed to have their phones at any point in time where they're at the ranch. It is basically about conversation, about learning about Christ, learning how to harvest animals, and learn appreciation for what you've got.

SPEAKER_00 39:02

Yeah, I'm that's so great. Yeah, I've hunted a little bit, not a lot. About two, three years ago, a friend of mine took me out hunting and I got my first deer. He did help me harvest it and take it to the processor and all that stuff. You know, you don't want to waste anything, you want to take it, use it, appreciate it every time that you eat it, and give thanks back to God for that. So people get a little turned off by hunting sometimes when you talk about that, but it is a very spiritual experience in many ways. So, anyway.

SPEAKER_06 39:35

Well, I don't think that they understand that hunters are the best and biggest conservationist in the world. Yes, on the ranch, we've got uh two species of animals that are extinct in their native land. Wow. If it wasn't for us and the other ranches like us, there wouldn't be anything around.

SPEAKER_00 39:51

You also mentioned a show. Yeah, let's talk about that.

SPEAKER_06 39:54

Yeah, we've we've been blessed to hook up with trekking outdoors. So we're on our third year with trekking outdoors, they're on the Sportsman Channel. So we've done a couple shows with them a couple years ago, two shows again last year, and this year we actually had seven shows. The network has asked us if we want to turn into a series. So when you roll off of the Sportsman Channel, you roll into their streaming channel, which is My Outdoor TV. So the five series on My Outdoor TV are now going to become its own series called The Manage Wild Texas with Trekkin Outdoors and B Tex Ranch. In about two weeks, it should start airing.

SPEAKER_00 40:28

Wow. Okay, so if somebody wants to see that, there they go on a streaming channel.

SPEAKER_06 40:33

My Outdoor TV.

SPEAKER_00 40:35

My Outdoor TV. That's correct.

SPEAKER_02 40:37

Is that available? Is that Roku or what it where can you you can get it in several different places?

SPEAKER_06 40:43

There's like 10 different venues, and I can't remember exactly, and it's not too expensive, but I think it's like a $9 a month investment or something to actually get on the streaming channel. And then the other part of that was we've been on the Pursuit Channel with Decision Point Outdoors. Chappie is a retired 20-year chaplain, and we met him through a guy that we know that does a lot of mission work. So Chappie's come on board, and we've had two shows with Chappie on the Pursuit Channel called Decision Point Outdoors. So he's kind of a relationship we've we've bonded with as well.

SPEAKER_00 41:14

Yeah, that is so cool that we have something like that in Alni! Yes, TV show about Alni. Yes, that is so great.

SPEAKER_02 41:21

Yeah, because I know, and y'all also do a number of shows throughout the year, right?

SPEAKER_06 41:25

We do. We we've done uh a lot of the SCI Safari Club shows. Um, we're actually gonna go this year to the largest one, which is gonna be up in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. It's the largest outdoor show basically in the nation. Oh, we're gonna be there for nine days. So I'm going, oh, I hope I can make it.

SPEAKER_00 41:42

I like this retirement.

SPEAKER_06 41:46

I'm not exactly sure I know what that is yet.

SPEAKER_02 41:50

Yeah, absolutely. So let's okay, so we know where listeners can find more about your work, but what is your website? Can you tell us where to find the website, social media?

SPEAKER_06 42:01

Sure. It's BreadingTexanranch.com. If you go there, it has part of our hub. You can actually see the book. The book has a page basically there on the website. If you're not, you can go to Amazon or Barnes and Nobles, any of the any of the publications basically there for The Man That I Would Become.

SPEAKER_00 42:20

Okay, the man that I would become. That's the title.

SPEAKER_06 42:22

That's the title of it that's in there. And then our social media, we're on, we're on Facebook. I actually have a newsletter on LinkedIn that talks about the leaders that give win. So that's another one that we're building. Um is in the then let's see what's the other ones we're trying to remember what are the rest of them are. Instagram, and I'm trying to figure out TikTok. I'm just not sure if I like that on that.

SPEAKER_00 42:46

Goodness to you for figuring it out. I have to rely on Kimberly to do everything for me.

SPEAKER_06 42:53

Well, I'm I'm doing it the hard way, so it's a long curve, let me tell you.

SPEAKER_02 42:58

Absolutely. And um, so when you were writing the book and it was an initially gonna be the memoir, what made you switch? Well, I want other people to read this. Was it one particular, like when you were reading it, you were like, you know, I really want to get this out there. Um, how did that come to be?

SPEAKER_06 43:14

The hardest thing about a memoir is you have two choices. You either have to be brutally honest or you lie. So I don't care how old you are, you're still gonna, there's still change is inevitable, right? So you kind of had to start realizing some things in your life. So after that was published, we had an awareness basically about men's health and it had to do with suicide. I thought the suicide rate was the highest in the military. The suicide rate is the highest in construction.

SPEAKER_01 43:38

Wow.

SPEAKER_06 43:39

Then behind that is the military.

SPEAKER_01 43:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 43:41

So then all of a sudden, you start looking at the book in a different tone. So I look at this also as men's health. So I'm trying to and and Rhonda Rhonda's been the one that's changed me, right? Because you you can't you can't be raised without a dad and have an eight and a ten year difference between your brother and your sister, and your mom supports. On you and not become hard. That's how you survive.

SPEAKER_01 44:02

Right.

SPEAKER_06 44:02

Right. You survive because nothing can affect you, right? You can cut my neck off, I wasn't going to cry. It just didn't happen. And then as you go through life, you start realizing like, well, my marriages didn't work because I had no heart. I couldn't give it. There was nothing to give, right? It was just about my brain. It wasn't my feelings. In fact, I remember the kids one day said, You need to say that again. What are you talking about? Dad, you said I feel. You never say I feel. You say I think. So my transformation has been thirna to be able to let me understand it's okay to cry, it's okay to feel, and you can still be a man at the same time. So I realize that being with these veterans and watching the burden that they've carried, that men's health becomes important because we don't talk about it, right? We're supposed to be the providers of the family, we're going to protect you, we're going to take care of it. We don't talk about it. So it all stays inside. And construction is an extremely hard craft. We have to know everything about everything. We have to know about banking because of our cost. We have to understand a little bit about health care because we have to have our first aid and take care of somebody gets hurt. And I can go down the list. We cover all these different things. And then we handle a thousand problems in every single day. It's a lot of stress. And like you said, God gave me the ability to handle all the stress, but he made me very cold. So trying to find that balance, I realized that as you become softer and feeling and compassionate and emotional, the stress is harder. When I can shut the feelings off, I can handle all the stress in the world. When I bring the feelings back up, it's tougher. So then I started understanding a little bit about men's health. And there's a lot of people that are loving, caring, and compassionate. They just can't handle all of that. But as men, if we can understand that it is okay to feel, it is okay to cry, go cry in a corner. You don't have to. You don't have to necessarily cry in front of somebody, go cry in a corner. But let it out. Talk to somebody because I find out I heal myself just by having communications because you hear yourself talk. How do you have a 10-step program without admitting you have a problem?

SPEAKER_01 45:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 45:56

It doesn't work.

SPEAKER_01 45:56

No.

SPEAKER_06 45:57

So you have to admit there's something going on. And if you can talk about it, sometimes it just releases something inside that just naturally happens. So answer your story without it going through this long drawn-out ordeal. I realized that this was also about men's health. And that if somebody can get an understanding of my transformation of where I came from to where I'm at today, maybe it would help them.

SPEAKER_00 46:17

Oh, I think it would help a lot of people. I mean, people talk about the men's loneliness epidemic, mental health issues, like you said, it's just epidemic. And I think that voices like yours and other people who are calling attention to it are doing an immense service to men by letting them know that you don't have to suffer and not say anything. You can actually, there are places that you can go, and there are people that have the same experience as you, and here's what worked.

SPEAKER_06 46:45

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 46:45

So yeah, absolutely. That is incredible.

SPEAKER_02 46:48

It's yeah, I think I always say with my kids, the hardest thing is a mother is to step back and watch my husband turn my sons into men. That's it's probably one of my hardest things to do. But I think what you said about not having the father there and sort of me being able to fill that that quota of okay, but you can say your emotions and you don't have to be so tough, like you can still tell me. So balancing those two sides, I think, is so important to men as they get older, and understanding masculinity doesn't always have to look so aggressive, or you can be caring and compassionate while still having that firm hand on life. And yeah, that's that's great. I men really need that, and also throwing the faith in there, I think that's where a lot of that softness and compassion can come from.

SPEAKER_06 47:39

It does. I mean, that's that's actually when my mom uh laid the foundation, of course, and you drift off for the next 40 years. You think you're in control and you you realize when you get old I really wasn't in control at all. I just was led on a path and I was too dumb to figure it out.

unknown 47:53

Right.

SPEAKER_06 47:54

So the quicker you get that figured out, the more you can balance your life. Because I've always said when I when the group that I've always raised up within the construction deal, your family and your business is a push-pull. There is no balance. There's not. There's times that you've got to go push on the construction side of things and you're gonna work till 10 o'clock at night. But you can't let your family suffer. So you get up at 3 o'clock in the morning so you can get the work done to be off at 4 o'clock to go to your son's baseball game.

SPEAKER_01 48:19

Right.

SPEAKER_06 48:20

When people start understanding that it is a push-pull and it's not just about one or the other, and they start understanding that you can be masculine and basically still have a heart at the same time, balance becomes a lot easier in your life.

SPEAKER_02 48:31

Absolutely. Okay, when we talk about the the cross-trail outfitters and why do you believe it's important to pass outdoor traditions to our younger generations?

SPEAKER_06 48:41

Well, I think it's several things. Number one, uh, it's my heritage, right? I'm an eighth-generation Texan. We were part of the original 300 settlers that Stephen F. Austin gave land grants to. We hunted back then to survive. So to me, it's a heritage. Number one, it's it's a right. You know, it is a right. God gave God gave us what we have, but it's our responsibility to take care of it. So hunting, again, is a conservation effort. We take care of what we got. We don't shoot everything out and then go, oh yeah, well, I guess there's nothing left, so sorry. So that becomes important. And then just outdoors. We talked about just the healing in the outdoors. So just getting the kids basically in the outdoors. I mean, you just you just see the excitement on their face. I can't tell you how many children have been to our ranch that never have harvested an animal in their life. Never. And it's not about the harvest, right? It's not about the one second you pull the trigger. Nobody's ever come to my ranch and bragged about the one second they pulled the trigger, how exciting it was. They talk about what happened before and what happened afterwards. That's where the story comes from. And getting those kids out there and just watching this big grin on their face and the congratulations, and then you then you teach them what their responsibility is. You will then skin your animal, you will then quarter your animal, you will then process your animal, and we will eat your animal. That is how the full process starts.

SPEAKER_02 49:55

And if parents wanted to get their kids involved with cross-trail outfitters, how would they? Is there a website for them so they could try to get in with them? I would love for my kids to be involved in something like that.

SPEAKER_06 50:05

Yeah, if you if you just Google cross-trail outfitters, and you need to go ahead and don't do CTO, it comes up different, but if you would just Google Cross Trail Outfitters, they're out of Wichita Falls. Now they're they're a national run group. I mean, they're from Alaska to Mississippi, they're everywhere. But Casey Allen is the state director, and he's actually started like three different other groups within the state now. It was just kind of Wichita Falls when we first started, but he's taken this and expanded into different groups. But that's where you'd want to go. Uh, and a lot of things they do, it's all free to the kids. What they say is the without the landowners, there is no cross-trail outfitters. Right. Because we provide basically the animals in the place for them to go.

SPEAKER_02 50:46

Right.

SPEAKER_06 50:46

We provide the avenue, they provide the kids.

SPEAKER_02 50:49

Absolutely. And is that the same thing with hunting with soldiers? Just go to their websites. I know we have a number of veterans in young counties.

SPEAKER_06 50:55

Same thing. And reach out to Gordon. Don't reach out to me because I will not have a veterans hunt without going through Gordon Melton. Right. That's that connection because honestly, Gordon vets all of the veterans, right? You're not going to come to his place and hunt five times. He's trying to get out to everybody to reach them. Now, the key behind that, too, which is unique and special, is every veteran that comes out to that ranch gets a free set of boots by Justin.

SPEAKER_00 51:21

Wow. Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 51:23

And I just wrote a newsletter basically in my LinkedIn newsletter about Tom. Tom is the one that started this a long time ago. And now Tom does all the prosthetic boots for the wounded. And he's passed the regular boots on to Justin. Justin has stepped up. So again, there's a lot of things behind each one of these causes that we're talking about that dive really pretty deep in what everybody does.

SPEAKER_00 51:45

Absolutely. That's amazing. So, what's the one takeaway you want listeners to remember from this conversation?

SPEAKER_06 51:52

One, you weren't put on this earth to basically take your put on this earth to give. And you need to find what makes you happy. Um, you know, getting to that point in time that death isn't is imminent, right? You can't just sit down and say I'm 67 years old and think I'm gonna live forever because it's not gonna happen. So you have to figure out what do I love? What's my mission in life, what I wake up every morning for. And part of that is a higher cause. And when everybody starts understanding that, I'll promise you there'll be more peace in the world.

SPEAKER_00 52:20

Oh, I totally agree with that. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 52:23

That is a wonderful message. Well, Victor, thank you so much for joining us. And just to go back through there, the book is called The Man I Would Become, available on Amazon and anywhere else?

SPEAKER_06 52:35

Yep. Amazon, Barnes and Nobles, there's a bunch of them. I even looked up something the other day and I think it had Chinese. I don't know, I couldn't read it.

SPEAKER_02 52:42

Great. And you will be you'll actually be on multiple other podcasts as well. So we'll be looking out for you. And the website is breadingtexanranch.com. Please make sure to take a step over there and check them out. And then also we'd love to have you back on any other time to talk about when the show comes out. That show is on outdoor TV. My outdoor TV. My outdoor TV. Okay, great. Well, thank you so much for joining us. Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 53:22

For those who may be new to the phrase, Southern Engineering is the art of solving problems with creativity, determination, and whatever tools happen to be available at the moment. Today's guest is Jerry Powell, a young county resident, landowner, and CEO of LSPM, also known as industrial resourcing. LSPM is a company that supplies workforce solutions to major projects across the country. Jerry recently wrote a guest column for the Only Enterprise talking about how rural Texas might be able to manage the growth of data centers while protecting local communities. Jerry, welcome to Alni on Air.

SPEAKER_05 54:03

Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 54:05

Okay, so let's just dive right in. First, tell us about LSPM and the work your company does and why this makes you the perfect person to talk about this.

SPEAKER_05 54:14

Well, we supply traveling workforces on various projects, actually from small to large. And we have a few global clients, but we stay here in America. And a lot of the things we encounter, probably on a smaller scale, are what I am seeing being encountered, like over in Haskell County, and some of the things I've read about, like in Red Oak, Texas, and in Hood County. And the reason that I even started looking into it was because I wanted my company to maybe come and become involved with supplying workforces to the data centers. Before I do anything like that, then I'm going to do as much market research as I can. And I immediately encountered the stories, the horror stories, and the problems, and realized, wow, they're going into a city or a county that has maybe 5,000 people in it, and they're sending in a 3,000-person workforce. How are they going to handle that? And as a result of that, I did further research and I thought, you know, I'm not going to be able to get involved in this with my workforce, maybe another day, but this is where I live. And let's start taking a look at the either or and find a maybe and make some solutions, come up with the ideas. And I thought, okay, let me toss these out here and let everybody kick it around and actually find a way we can come up with some answers because the type of revenue they'll bring in will attract more people and maybe attract more development. And that sort of thing is something that is clearly needed, at least here in Alney.

SPEAKER_00 56:00

Earlier we visited, and you gave me a ground level look at what it's like when a workforce like the ones that you supply come to a small town or any kind of town and what kind of impact that has. And it's really interesting. Can you talk about that a little?

SPEAKER_05 56:18

Well, the first thing that happens is there's always a concern about public safety. Bringing in 80 people, 500 people into an area where the population is sparse. And that's not every time that we go out. I mean, most of the time our work has been spent in larger cities. But when we encounter that, there's suspicion. There's logistics that have to be handled, where are they going to stay? Uh often in small towns, there's no lodging. So you have to find out find it somewhere. Normally what happens is you find the nearest city, and that's where they stay, and they'll drive an hour, that sort of thing. And that's what's actually happening here with the data centers that are nearby. But when you s have a large workforce like what we're seeing and what we're gonna see, you have the workers driving in their own cars, back and forth to work, creating extra traffic, and over in Red Oak you're seeing a traffic nightmare. And the roads, which are country roads meant for ranchers and tractors and trailers, they're being abused, basically. They're breaking down, potholes appear. Just basically a tough way to get back and forth and work yourself, not to mention hauling cattle for sale. Those are just a couple of the things that you run into. And then you have the workers, where they're gonna eat and that sort of thing. And that has to be planned for. A lot of times we're called in, we need 50 people tomorrow, and we manage that. But because we have a plan, we know what to do and where to go almost immediately. Access somebody that handles hotels for us and that sort of thing. Here, I just imagine, okay, I've never supplied 3,000 people at a time. I think the most we've supplied is maybe 500, probably closer to 300 as far as a large group. How is that gonna happen? And you realize it's not. And so as a result of that, I started looking around at what's happened. I compiled a list, I think you have it, I do, of disasters. And then the thing about this is every day I look for new disasters. Not to because I'm a disaster-loving person, it's because I want to see, okay, what solution would I apply, or what solutions did they apply, or what are they trying to do, in order to be able to protect and prepare Young County for what's going to happen.

SPEAKER_00 58:57

Yeah. We want to give credence to the people who are worried that this is going to be a problem. Well but but it there are solutions.

SPEAKER_05 59:06

Yes. There are worried, legitimately so, but also there's no reason to panic. What's happened since a couple of these disasters occurred is there have been solutions. There are companies out there that can provide housing, that can set up what I call hubs, that's where the workers can stay. You don't put what I think what I call a man camp together from the old oil days, and uh, I guess you even see a man cap on landman. You don't put that together. You have to put together a place to stay that actually feels like home. And I'm not talking about uh three-bedroom, two-bath residence or a luxury home, talking about a nice accommodation where you have a quality bed, it's clean, you have a cleaning service, there's on site, there's a place to get food, a convenience store. And those are the things that are just a start as to what's needed. If you're going to keep 3,000 people at a location or locations that you have constructed for that purpose, you also need, like I said, a convenience store, laundromat, unless you're able to build that into the construction for each room or each home, which could be an RV or it could be a tiny home, that sort of thing.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:33

So do you think that when they come to rural communities, it almost makes it more of a need for them to build these sort of hubs for their workers?

SPEAKER_05 1:00:41

There's no doubt about that.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:42

It helps it more, right? Because they really don't have we're already in a food desert, so then you add 3,000 people, and I don't think our Dollar General and I mean Stewart's does pretty good for us, but well, what happens is when 3,000 people, even when you put them in a hub, they're going to come to Graham.

SPEAKER_05 1:01:01

And if they're staying staying in Graham, going back and forth to Graham, 3,000 more people, that's going to do one thing first, and that's going to destroy the small roads that we have. Then it's going to decrease the grocery stock dramatically. I've read and heard in Haskell of the stores run the stocks run out at the grocery store around six. Now I think they've addressed that. But if you got there at six PM, the shelves are empty. So that is something that we need to address. But there are companies out there that supply cafeteria where rather than going to get groceries, you can go get your food.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:46

So similar to how like Halliburton, how they have it's almost like a whole city. Yeah. They have all it's all there on site, so you're they're not.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:57

I mean, just just imagine if it was a tiny home development, they could just leave it there. We could use it.

SPEAKER_05 1:02:03

Well, that's one of the points I make.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 1:02:06

In negotiating a tax abatement agreement. The developers are required to fund that. Fund building the hub, maintaining the hub, paying for what is necessary, and then when it's over, negotiate a flip back to the county. Sometimes you can do that for as little as one dollar. It's mentioned in there.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:29

Man, that is smart negotiating.

SPEAKER_05 1:02:32

That's true. And that's why whoever handles the tax abatement agreements needs to be a skilled negotiator.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:42

Exactly.

SPEAKER_05 1:02:42

And I think we have leaders now that are able to do that.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:46

I do, I do too. We have so much to talk about and so many things that you've thought about already that I want you to talk about. So let's go right to you said there were five areas where the counties can negotiate protections. And then you also came up with some potential legislation that we could pass at the state level to protect us. So can you first of all start talking about the fact that we are pretty unprotected as a county in terms of, I mean, it's great for property owners, you can buy land and do whatever you want, but when it comes to a major project like this, we don't have a lot of say in what happens, right?

SPEAKER_05 1:03:22

That's correct. At this point, we don't. And that's why our say has to be in the tax abatement agreement, because that's all we have at the moment. And Texas, of course, is a a state that's highly beneficial to projects like this coming in. So you do need some laws that kind of balance that out. And the thing about that is the state legislature doesn't meet until January of 27. About six months away or so. And uh so we have to wait on any laws that we would like to see that will protect us and still allow it to to uh to work, I guess. And that's why I suggested a task force for District 68, which are twelve counties. They're not all next to each other, it's more like a a chain, I guess.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:14

That's along the high lines. Yes.

SPEAKER_05 1:04:17

Once that's done, uh they can come up with the solutions, not just that I've suggested, but others are gonna come up with creative solutions that actually work and maybe apply to their county. And so you have twelve counties that are saying, This is what you're gonna do before you put a foot on the ground that protects us. And some of those can be converted to laws. But the sooner we can get that together and come up with those solutions and put that into a proposed agreement that everybody would agree to, right, then we want to put those into law. And rather than waiting seven months to get that to happen and then until September first or whenever to implement it, we need a special session.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 1:05:05

I don't know whether the governor would be willing to do that, but I think with the hue and cry that I'm hearing, he may be pressured into doing so. But it would be nice to hand him something reasonable that he that would allow him to say, okay, we can do this. Yeah. And let's make it happen fast. And those are just some things that I've tossed out there. I don't know whether a task force could would work. The counties are all different. That's just basically my suggestion as a path to get that done. Public safety is a big issue. Fire is a big issue. Yes. Our departments are gonna have to be expanded, there's no doubt about that. The three thousand workers aren't gonna be be here for thirty days. They're gonna be here closer to three years.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:48

More than that, don't you think? Oh, it could be five. And then and then it could be a decade if they if it takes them that long to build out all the buildings that they're talking about.

SPEAKER_05 1:05:57

Yeah, there's we're only talking about phase one. If phase one isn't over and they decide to start phase two, then there's going to be even more people in. Or as they fade into phase two, that amount of people is going to remain. And you're right, that could be ten years. Haskell County has two giant Google data centers coming up. As you know, they're using mostly green energy, wind and solar. But in addition to that, what I've been able to determine is they're building many nuclear reactors that are modular. Right. And who knows how long that's going to take. And then those are all just phase one projects. Yeah. And they're going to be more. And that pattern is what you're seeing. Yes.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:44

So basically, it it doesn't matter what happens in Young County. We're going to be seeing the effects of this for a long time because the mini nukes, a lot of people are in favor of those. They want those here because our grid needs to be upgraded and we need more capacity no matter what happens. So I I love everything that you talked about. So you talked about road preservation already. You said require developers to finance base hardening of critical corridors before the first truck arrives. And then let's talk about acoustic integrity because people talk about that a lot, that there's some noises that come from the data center that need to be abated. So, what was your idea about that one?

SPEAKER_05 1:07:26

Well, I don't know whether you ever felt an acoustic vibration or not, but with some people and some animals, it drives you insane.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:34

Yeah. Is this kind of like the Havana effect that people talk about from those?

SPEAKER_05 1:07:39

Actually, it may be, I don't know. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:40

Do you know what I'm talking about? It's the people that were in Havana in that hotel and they had like brain damage from it. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 1:07:47

And there's a lawsuit. Uh, I think it's in Hood County, where that very thing affected a residential neighborhood. And many of them have shown health problems that doctors are saying this is what caused that. And that's because they use just a standard cooling system, an evaporative cooling system, which is basically a bunch of fans, giant fans, and that boom, boom, boom is coming out of there. What they tell you now is well, we're going to use a closed liquid system to cool it, and so therefore, we won't need to use a lot of water, and it won't be loud. But what happens is it's requires most of the cost and the noise to be generated by the power that it will take to supply that. Right. There's been a development that's fresh in 2026 where a lot of that is rectified.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:50

You said in the in the in your piece, you said mandating verified low frequency DBC weighted standards protects neighboring homes and livestock from the drone and vibration generated by massive cooling arrays. So what is that exactly? Low frequency DBC weighted standards?

SPEAKER_05 1:09:11

Well, the DBA is the rated standards that you mostly get when either a law or an agreement is entered into.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:21

Is that decibels? That's decibels, yes.

SPEAKER_05 1:09:24

And DBC it addresses a different kind. It addresses that vibration. And that's generated by the standard cooling systems, and of course, the closed closed liquid system is supposed to alleviate that. And that's not entirely true because you have to generate more power, and then the power stations will cause that same loud humming noise. Plus, it'll cause an increase in the usage of electricity. They've developed something beyond that. It's a system that was developed, I believe, in Europe, to where the temperature of the water is raised to a little over a hundred to a hundred and fifteen degrees, and that somehow reduces the power usage. It continues with the closed loop, but it reduces the power usage dramatically. And as a result, the HUM is countered. And by requiring that to be measured on a constant basis, if they exceed that, if they exceed the parameters that are set, you can block the tax abatement and say, okay, no more tax abatement, and this is what we need you to do. And add some penalties into that.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:47

So there is a way that you've found for them to abate it. So you know, because it's one thing to say, oh, you don't get your tax abatement and we're going to fine you, but it's another to restore the environment to what people can use and be healthy in. So if they yeah, so if they can enjoy their property just the same as they did before, and also have the data center, that's that's a win-win.

SPEAKER_05 1:11:14

Whatever is available to maintain the environment or restore it after construction is what needs to be updated daily for your negotiations and then placed in there. And then in the negotiation saying if any future advances are available, whether a new development comes up, there's always some new surprise, then the developers, the builders, or whoever is involved, no matter what who it is, has to take care of that. Because that new development is something that was unanticipated. And as you can see how outraged people are as a result of just not anticipating that, by avoiding that cost up front, by not telling someone or not having the knowledge or not having someone do the research, it winds up costing them 10 to 20 times as much. I made a guesstimate on that too, on how much that would cost.

SPEAKER_00 1:12:31

Wow, look at this. Okay, so this is interesting. Are you seeing this? So the collaborative model, upfront investment for public safety and law enforcement, $461,000 upfront investment in jails, two municipal police departments, traffic control, other local ordinance enforcement, and the reactive disaster when we decide that we're not going to negotiate and we have to deal with the fallout. And that's $2.5 million. Yeah, I think that you're right.

SPEAKER_05 1:13:03

A lot of that's pretty low. Yeah. Right. It can be as high as I don't know. It could get as high as a hundred million if you have litigation and someone in a jury really wants to punish somebody for the damage that they inflicted. Yeah. Those are the kind the kind of things that they also need to think about.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:27

Yeah, I mean that's true, but at the same time, you know, we're a small county. So the idea that we would have money to wage a really long legal battle against a huge corporation. No, it's not realistic. We will lose or we'll go broke trying to fight them.

SPEAKER_05 1:13:45

And that's why there needs to be some sort of penalties placed into the agreement. They cannot agree with it, but if they don't, they're not going to get their data center or they're not going to get their tax abatement. They may throw the data center in there in there anyway. Right. But it also makes common sense. The sooner we react to that, the sooner we get together a plan, whether it's just young county or multiple counties or multiple districts, the better off we're going to be.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:16

Now that we have the evidence and we can see what has gone wrong before, the this would be the chance to sort of put these solutions in place because people have learned it the hard way in other communities.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:30

Why is it important that all of the counties have to get together for that?

SPEAKER_05 1:14:35

Well, it tells the developer you have a large part of Texas, especially if you can get just more than that. Any county that's identified as a target for them, I mean, uh it gives them unified strength. We want the business, we need the revenue, we want to increase the value of what we have, and we want to increase the quality of life of our citizens. In order for us to do that, we need you to create a sp call for a special session so we can get this done. That gives us more power than even a 312 abatement agreement with all the things that are mentioned in there. I think I might have mentioned a 1500-foot setback. In reviewing that further, it needs to be one mile. I think I set it up like if it's a historic farm or a legacy farm where it's been in the family for more than 50 years, and maybe we need to make it more than 25 years. All of those are subject to variation. That one mile setback protects them. One of the things that being back a mile, if there is some sort of hum or anything new that developments, usually it won't reach that far. You want to set it up where the neighbor doesn't even know it's there.

SPEAKER_00 1:15:57

Yeah. In a 900-square mile county, you would think that you could do that.

SPEAKER_05 1:16:01

I would think so. There has to be a way to welcome the data centers, at the same time, protect the environment, protect our neighbors, and protect the citizens. And really the best way to do that is to teach the developers that they should be proactive and magnanimous when it comes to investing into a certain county to put their data center, because their data center is going to be extremely profitable. And there's no reason why we can't do that. You want them to have the attitude, hey, this is what you need to do. What we need are our leaders, like Wynne Graham, John Bullock, when he becomes judge, city council, city manager, city attorney. All of them need to be thinking about this.

SPEAKER_02 1:16:50

The thing is, it's is nobody really wants a data center. I mean, it's I mean, we it's just not it's not something that was like on the top of the list for oh, we'd love to have a data center. I don't think any town really wants it, but they are coming. You can't really stop them in that way, but you can put it to where it's that there are these protections in place for Young County and for Grant and for Alney. And I would think that the data centers would want to do everything they can to one fix their horrible public relations, they have the worst reputation now because of all these disasters. So this is their chance to prove that they can be an asset and not just a complete depletion on resources. It's a great starting off point though, to look at these things with the lessons they've learned. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:17:41

Well, if there's anything we can do, we will definitely do it. We've hosted other task forces before, and we'd be love to do it. So everybody who's listening who's interested in the data center, let us know if you want to come to a task force meeting and we will set it up. But we'll be reaching out because these are great ideas, and and I think you're right. I think this can be a win-win. Thank you so much for coming.

SPEAKER_05 1:18:06

You're welcome. Thank you.

SPEAKER_02 1:18:17

Now it's time for our community calendar and summer fun around Alney and Young County segments.

SPEAKER_00 1:18:23

The Alney Senior Cubs Center continues to offer activities throughout June. If you look in the paper, we have in our page two calendar section all the times for their chair yoga, their bingo, movie night. The next movie night, movie day, sorry, featuring the Forge is going to be June 10th at 12:45 p.m. after lunch. A granny squares craft day is planned for June 11th. On June 18th, participants can create patriotic star crafts. The center will also host a potluck game night on June 18th at 5:30 p.m. And June birthdays will be celebrated with a special party on June 25th. Awesome.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:08

Looking ahead, Almy America returns July 2nd at 6 p.m. at the Almy Country Club. Our musical acts, we have the opening acts will be Foster Sullivan and Daniel Latham. They are local to Almy. So they'll be our openers. And then our headliner is King George. They are a George Strait tribute baby. This is gonna be amazing. Yeah, so we're gonna even in the front of the stage, we'll have a dance floor area. We'll have them roped off so people can dance. Love it. Also, VIP tents are now up for up for reservation. Tents are $400. Um, they come with four VIP parking passes, as well as we put a cooler with some ice and water, and then you get your reserve seating that's all along the side. So that's a pretty great one. We will also be selling VIP parking passes like we always do. And what that does is it gets you right up front, and then we will cart people, transport people up to the top of that hill with the country club.

SPEAKER_00 1:20:10

Yeah, that'll be that's always a good deal.

SPEAKER_02 1:20:12

Yeah, we are very excited about that. In other news, we have the vacation Bible season. It Bible school is in effect. So First Baptist Church had their first BBS on Sunday. There's Illumination Station Vacation Bible School. So it's May 31st through June 4th from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. grades kindergarten through sixth grade completed. Sunday was their first night, and they had 152 children and 105 workers. So that's a total of 257 in that building. Wow. On Monday night, they had 165 children and 103 workers for a total of 268 on campus. These are the highest numbers that they can ever remember being there. That's fantastic. They are also working with fewer rooms, no parking lot, different dismissal progress process, and warm temperatures in the building, but the Lord is still blessings.

SPEAKER_00 1:21:06

There you go. Absolutely. That's so great.

SPEAKER_02 1:21:08

The kids can all get together and enjoy that. Yeah, my kids love it. And they always make last night was one of the fan favorites, is their nachos that they make. They do like the cheese sauce, the hamburger, and my kids just love it. Also, the refuge has started their summer feeding program. So that is actually from June 1st to July 24th. They pick up the kids, they'll pick up your kids around 11:45, and then they stay there. I'm gonna say, I'm not sure on the time, it's just about an hour and a half. And so they get a meal, they get to hang out with everybody for a little bit, and then they bring your kids home. So that's something you're interested in. Make sure to do that. Their camps start on June 8th. This year, they actually opened up two classes for four and five-year-olds, and those are it's a sensory camp. Yeah, that's gonna be really neat. My four-year-old is so excited. He's been left at home for all the things his big brother and sister get to do. So he's really excited. So their camps vary from a cooking camp, an art class, science camp. They also do Christmas in July for the first through sixth graders. So that's pretty cool. And my kids always come home with their crafts and all the things, and yeah, so that's really neat that we have something like that here in town for the kids to go to.

SPEAKER_00 1:22:24

Yep, and I think Southside Baptist starts their BBS. I believe you said next week.

SPEAKER_02 1:22:29

Yeah, on the June 8th. Yeah, don't worry about there's just register whenever you get there, just get what they say get there maybe 15 minutes earlier.

SPEAKER_00 1:22:36

Right, which I think was what was it, 5 45? Because it's a nighttime. Yes, I believe so. Yeah, so um, yeah, so lots for the kids to do over the summer. Yeah, as well as the library also has their different days that they're doing.

SPEAKER_02 1:22:51

Oh, they always do so much fun stuff. Yeah, I know they have Lego days, game days, and I think that's on Tuesdays and Thursdays. And for those of us who have the kids home, yes, this is a way to break up the day. Yeah, so they have the annual pet show at 10 a.m. on June 3rd, June 8th is Lego Day, they have a science guy on June 10th, June 15th is game day, June 17th, wildlife on the move, June 22nd, Lego Day, June 24th, Nick Waters Storyteller. I love him. He's so good. Yes, and then the last one is June 29th, Game Day. If you um have questions about times, please go to the Alni Community Library and Art Center Facebook page. They have the dates and times listed for all their cues. That is so fantastic.

SPEAKER_00 1:23:39

Yes. All right, well, it's shaping up to be a memorable summer across Young County. If your organization has an upcoming event you would like included on Alni on Air, contact the Alni Chamber of Commerce or the Alni Enterprise, and they can reach me at editor at alnyenterprise.com.

SPEAKER_02 1:23:58

And you are yes, I'm Kimberly Smith. My email is alny txchamber at gmail.com. Please let us know. This is everybody in Alney show too. So we would love to have you on. We forgot to talk about the young counties preparing for a very special independence day celebration on the 4th of July as America marks its 250th. They say anniversary, I say birthday. Yes. Happy birthday, America. Happy birthday. So activities begin at 8 a.m. And we actually have Ollie's own Preston Crow from House of Mercy Enterprises. He will be the prayer leader starting the day. So that's awesome. That is super awesome. All right, Preston. And veterans and community leaders will be honored during the ceremony beginning at 9 a.m. And at 10 a.m., the community independence day parade will roll through downtown Graham. If you want to get signed up, I know Gina, you said they were looking for floats.

SPEAKER_00 1:24:54

Yep, they're looking for entries. So if you want to get involved in that, which would be pretty awesome, you can contact them on their website, which is stars and stripesinyoungco.com. We'll have that in the description, but it's just basically one long word, stars and stripesinyoungco.com. And there's a sign-up link in there somewhere. And didn't you say that we that the chamber is going to do something to delay our 4th of July parade? Or yes.

SPEAKER_02 1:25:27

Typically on 4th of July, we do the parade downtown and then we go to the little park right here and have watermelon and water. This year, because of the big parade that's happening in Graham, we want to give people the option. Well, we don't want them to have to choose. So the one in Graham will be at 10, and we'll do ours later in the day. We don't have a time picked just yet, but we are gonna have to push it to later just this year, just so we can accommodate for the Graham one as well.

SPEAKER_00 1:25:54

That sounds like a good idea. So stay tuned here and on the chamber Facebook page and website, and you'll know all about that as soon as Kimberly knows about it. Absolutely. And that's all for this week's edition of Alni on Air. Thank you to our guests, Mindy Ash and KristaCreaters from Lighthouse Therapy, Victor Breiding of B Tex Ranch, and Jerry Powell of LSPM. Thank you for spending part of your day with us. We enjoy it every single time. Yeah, we do. Be sure to pick up this week's edition of the Alni Enterprise and visit the Alni Chamber of Commerce to stay connected with what's happening in our community. Until next time, I'm Kimberly Smith. And I'm Gina Cating. We'll see you next time on Alni Lair.