On the record is brought to you by Steve and Adele Dufilho San Antonio is a fast growing, fast moving city with something new happening every day.

That's why each week we go on the record with Randy Beamer and the newsmakers who are driving this change.

Then we gather at the Reporters Roundtable to talk about the latest news stories with the journalist behind those stories.

Joining us now as we go on the Record with Randy Beamer.

Hi, everybody, and thank you for joining us for this edition of On the Record.

I'm Randy Beamer.

We hope you've been staying warm this week and we have a lot to talk about, even just with the first guest today, a District eight Councilman Manny Pelaez Thank you very much for coming in.

I appreciate it.

Beamer, first of all, you have been in the headlines recently for the issue of whether or not there should be a city council resolution about the Israeli Gaza conflict.

And where are you?

You signed on to a resolution calling for a vote on that and then you took your name off.

So instead of three people calling for it, there's two.

And so now the vote won't happen.

What?

What happened?

Yeah.

You know, city council is governed by a charter.

The charter says that if three members of City Council sign on to a request that an item be agenda, is that it will be agenda.

I was one of three people who signed on to a request that the city take up the a resolution for an up or down vote that would say, you know, we call for a cease fire in Israel and Gaza and a return of all hostages immediately.

I will tell you that in my district and in only my district, this war in the Middle East has become a geopolitical issue that has very real concrete impacts on the people that I represent.

Now, why only in your district?

Mine is the district that has the highest concentration of Jewish families, Muslim families, Palestina and.

And Asians.

No.

Where else in San Antonio do these families live in such high costs?

But there's also a fact that a couple other council people who called for this and Jalen McKee around Rodriguez, one of them, has been critical of you for pulling your name, very critical of you on your name off the list.

What do you tell those people who say, well, we should have committed to this, You were on the right side of this and then you aren't.

So after we submitted our request, right, I made it a decision to go out and start speaking to some of the groups that were impacted the most by this.

But also a lot of groups that we had just never spoken to.

Right.

People just came out of the woodwork, particularly families who find themselves in very vulnerable situations, who are just afraid of Islamophobia, anti-Semitism, afraid of their temples and their synagogue is getting, you know, destroyed, damaged a real fear of violence.

Because whenever there's a flare up in the Middle East, invariably this happened in some American city and it's happened in San Antonio where people get attacked, you know, windows broken, churches even burned down.

Killings.

And so we started speaking to a lot of these people and they were expressing very real fear.

And having spoken to them and then we started seeing real acts of vandalism around the Jewish community center.

I started talking to teachers who are telling me that kids are getting bullied and that they're seeing a very, very big spike in in bullying.

And also these teachers were prohibited from saying anything about Israel and Gaza.

When these kids ask whether there's a vote on this, whether this is a council resolution.

Does it matter to them?

Does it matter?

Some people say, you know, we have an independent city council.

We don't have Democrats or Republicans.

Why should a city even consider anything outside the purview of the city?

I don't think cities should get involved in geopolitical issues except that this was not outside the purview of the city because it was impacting concretely the people who live here.

There were mental health professionals who were telling us that Jews and Muslims today are being medicated in my district because they can't sleep at night and they can't get through the day because their family members are at risk of imminent death.

Right.

There's no debate in my mind that this was impacting people I represent in a very real way.

However, there were not six votes to get this thing passed.

Right.

And what would this was going to create was a situation where was going to be very traumatizing.

It was going to create a circus at city hall as huge protest actually stopped the meeting at City hall.

And because of this whole thing now, there could be another councilperson that signs on makes it three people.

There's a vote.

What do you do then?

Then the city council takes the vote up and talks about it.

But what I've realized is that sending this up the flag and then losing on a resolution, which is really rather innocuous.

Right.

It says it would be great if you all stop killing each other and stop hurting each other because, you know, it's impacting us locally.

We would send that up the flag and people would vote on it.

The problem is, is that there are not six votes.

The overwhelming majority of council had already announced that they were going to abstain.

Right now, there's profiles in courage for you.

You know, abstention is really not leadership.

But they were planning on on abstaining.

I don't think it would have done anybody any good to put people through the circus in the chaos of what we've been seeing play out at city hall with all those protests and the yelling and the screaming, particularly the people that I was talking about, those vulnerable folks.

So I decided I'm not going to put people through that pain.

I'm going to withdraw my signature, in essence, killing this proposition.

Couple of other conflicts that have come up recently involving high profile city leaders.

City Councilman Mark White.

The council censured him after the DWI arrest before the end of the year.

And also the fire chief, Charles Hood, basically forced out of office to resign after it came out that he had said some things about women, sex and other things.

First of all, tell us about that, where we are on that, because there there is talk that more could come out about, say, the culture.

Yes.

So, look, the fire chief and his entire team, you know, really weren't making any headlines because our fire department was doing all the things that they're supposed to do, putting out fires, saving people and being the most professional fire team and department in the entire nation.

Right.

And we really were ranked and admired by almost every fire department in the nation.

And we are the benchmarked right, a standard against which they measure themselves.

The problem is, is that it turns out that the chief was saying some really knuckle headed, obscene and hurtful things that quite honestly in 2023 are number one against the law.

Right.

You can't speak the way the chief was speaking and saying sexually charged things and creating a hostile work environment.

You can't say those things.

You know, in in the United States in an employment environment.

But to just a complete failure in leadership, nobody should be talking that way, especially the pinnacle leader.

And you all surprised by this because one would think that word of this or complaints about this would have bubbled up before now.

In fact, some had gone to their superiors about this.

Yeah, I'm always surprised when leaders think it's okay to behave the way that this gentleman behaved.

Right.

But yeah, we found out that these complaints were starting to bubble up.

What Eric Walsh and our city attorney did and our head of human resources did is they acted very, very quickly.

They investigated at lightning speed, determined that these allegations were true.

And the next thing we know, Chief Hood announced his retirement.

How long is it going to be before there is not just an interim chief anymore?

How are you going to name a chief as long as it takes.

We are not in a hurry.

What we need to do is make sure that we get it right.

Right.

So right now, the interim chief is excellent.

He has the full faith and credit and the the support of everybody in the organization.

What we need to do right now is is cast a wide net, do a national search.

But nothing, nothing will interfere with our delivery of services to the people.

How about the faith in one of your colleagues, Mark White, after the city Council censured him for the DWI?

What does that really mean?

And he's taken off some committees.

But practically, how is the council dealing with this?

Well, the council, again, is limited by the governing document, which is the charter.

The charter is silent as to what the council can do to police its own.

The only thing that can be done in the event of very specific crimes and DWI is not one of them is an expulsion.

Right.

But we don't have the power to expel for a DWI.

Right.

Until the charter changes, then that remains.

Are you satisfied with his response?

Came out right away, said I'm sorry for my actions.

I regret what happened.

He did the three days, right?

He apologized.

He held himself accountable and he accepted the reality of what was coming his way.

Right.

Which is a unanimous scolding from council.

However, the most important thing that he did was he's the one that made a request for a unanimous censure from city council.

Right.

You never see leaders do that anymore.

And, you know, he made a very knuckle headed mistake by drinking and driving.

That is not something that I'll be up here defending.

But I will say that if the world had more leaders that step up and say, I screwed up, I insist on being held accountable.

I don't want this to distract us any further.

That's admirable.

And lastly, there's been talk and it's early, but speaking of leadership, that you will run for mayor.

When are you going to announce?

That's what I keep hearing.

It announced right here on the record.

What I'll announce right here on the record is that my mother in law still has veto power over some of these big decisions in my life, and so does my wife and true leadership.

And I'm a small business owner and I still have to speak to my staff and my partners at my law practice.

And once they and I reach some sort of consensus, then I will make a big announcement here when I win.

Well, what's the timeline for that and how easily convinces your mother in law?

I think that the convincing that I need to do is probably going to be sometime in April.

Okay.

Well, thank you very much, District eight, councilman.

Manny Pelaez.

Good luck with everything there on the council.

We hope all the business gets done that needs to get done.

And thanks, Tony, and I appreciate it.

Thanks, Randi.

Thanks.

You might have heard that the future of the building that houses the Institute of Texan Culture is down to the hemisphere of the old Texas pavilion from hemisphere.

Well, that is kind of up for debate right now.

It's just this past weekend, members of the Conservation Society got the Texas Historical Commission to start the process of getting that building designated as a national or is on the National Register of Historic Historic Places.

And joining us to talk about that is longtime member of the society and retired director of the Bureau of Heritage and Parks Department, Betty Bueche Thank you very much for coming in.

Well, thank you.

Tell us about why you're pushing to get this building from 1968, designated as a historic place.

Well, there's two reasons.

One is that it deserves it.

There's a lot about this building that is highly significant.

It actually meets probably three of the criteria, but was approved under two of the four criteria.

But then in addition to that, its current custodian, UTSA, wants to and needs to make plans for it.

And getting this designation will help them for the property itself and for the building, because some have tagged that as a place for the, say, a new Spurs arena.

Correct.

And there's no reason why a Spurs arena couldn't live right there and coexist with this building and be repurposed to do something for perhaps for the Spurs on the same property is that, yes, there's about 14 acres there.

You need about 3 to 5 acres for an arena.

So certainly they could live together.

And now some say this building needs millions of dollars worth of work.

Leaky pipes, old electricity, it's outdated.

The the whole atmosphere here is not conducive to pedestrians.

These are the arguments that I've heard for possibly demolishing the building.

What do you say to those arguments?

Well, Randi, I'd say you need to read the actual report from Robert Kisner, Engineers.

2500 pages concludes that it's in good condition and it has a maintenance backlog of around $7 million.

But 155,000 square feet, $7 million is a bargain.

And it also protects an asset that taxpayers have already paid for.

What do you do with that big brutalist architecture building that's in the middle of a park with not much parking?

It's untenable for the Institute of Texan Cultures right now because they have had so many few visitors in recent years and they need a different location.

Well, there's a couple of things.

So let me and you've asked two things.

One is UTSA and how they deal with it.

UTSA has not yet acknowledged the treasure that they have and they need to market it.

And position it positioned themselves as a destination.

It is a destination because of the importance of the building.

Tom Frost said Everybody thinks 1836 was the most important date in Texas history, but it was actually 1968 because hemisphere is what changed all of our collective futures.

And this building was actually the idea and constructed on behalf of a request of Governor John Connally for his report to the 59th state legislature said, I proposed this building and that legislative action actually states that it will be a permanent building with permanent exhibits.

Now, UTSA is not accustomed to handling these kinds of facilities and these kinds of programs.

So our team of volunteers is here to help them move forward and figure that out.

And we had a representative of UTSA on here last year talking about that, getting public input and and why it's up in the air.

Is there is it still, you think, possible for this designation to make a difference in what happens to the future of the building?

Well, of course.

And that's in part because if it is finally decided that the Institute of Texan Cultures needs to move, that building, can be repurposed and this designation comes with it, 45% tax credits for whoever redeveloped that property.

What would but again, what could it be repurposed as?

Because you talked about it as a destination and it was for years and the school kids went down there.

But the institute people at UTSA people says they just can't get people to go down there anymore, that it's not the destination.

What would it be turned into or could it be turned into that would make it that destination?

If it turns out that a sports venue is constructed and co-located with the building, that building could be repurposed as headquarters and offices for the Spurs locker rooms.

A sports bar restaurant.

It too, could become a designation, a designated place that the fans who were interested in the Spurs could go to.

And while they are there, appreciate the culture and history of all the civilizations that made up Texas, as I understand it, the designation as being on the Register of Historic Places wouldn't necessarily prevent it from being demolished because the state is UTSA owns it.

Even with that designation, they can go ahead and do that as well.

With the designation, there is a process that they need to follow.

And your comment about receiving public comments.

They've done that over the Internet, but they have not had any public hearings.

This meeting that we went to in Galveston, held by Texas Historical Commission, is the first public hearing about the fate of this building.

And so we also believe that the best time to make a change in a plan is when it's on paper.

And now's the time to actually get the input from the public and the taxpayers and find out what they would like to see and what they think is important.

What have you heard?

If you talk directly to the people at UTSA and what the timeline is for this decision and and and for the designation, they have indicated their timeline is approximately March.

I don't want to speak for them because they may extend to that.

But we were encouraged in Galveston that UTSA representatives came to us after the Board of Review approved the nomination and said that they do want us to be involved and they want to reach out to us and work with them.

And so we were very happy about that and want to be involved in the future.

But they didn't want this designation necessarily.

That's right.

They us said they would limit then they opposed the designation and they still do as as I understand it, they still do.

However, we think that if they learn more about what the designation means, they will actually embrace the idea as something that could help them with their future plan.

And I go back to this 45%, up to 45% in tax credits.

That's not tax deductions.

That's tax credits that could be made available to a private owner should they decide to put out an RFP or an RFI to developers to help them redevelop the property.

Have you yet talked to anybody, say, with the city or the Spurs about them getting together and whether that could be feasible?

Because the Spurs as the high profile project everybody's talking about right now?

Well, Randy, I can't speak for the city and the Spurs either.

Well, but I understand your organization.

Have you gotten together with them?

Not the conservation Society, but a different group, The Conservation Society president, executive director and members of our coalition jointly met with the city manager.

And so he is fully aware of our interests and concerns.

And he, of course, says, well, the building belongs to UTSA and he's correct about that.

Well, thank you very much for explaining that.

A conservation society long time member and retired director of the Bear Heritage and Parks Department or Foundation Park Department.

Yes.

Betty Bueche, thank you very much for coming.

Thank you, Randy.

On the Reporters Roundtable this week, we had talked earlier with city councilman many about a couple of controversies, including that council resolution that they wound up not voting on about the Israel-Hamas conflict.

Joining us now to talk about this, maybe a different perspective, the man who's been covering it for the San Antonio Current, Michael Karlis, staff writer.

Thank you very much for coming in.

It's great to be back.

And now you've you've maybe have a different perspective or perspectives in talking with people about what happened with this resolution that at least for now, they're not voting on.

Right.

So to understand what happened at City Hall last week, you really have to go back to October, where this all kind of began about a week after Israel began its ground offensive in Gaza.

There was a public comment session on a Wednesday and in mid-October.

And at that public comment session, there was about 30 to 50 people there to express their desire for the city council to one end San Antonio's friendship status with Tel Aviv and for the city council to vote on a resolution to call for a cease fire.

During that meeting, Ron Nurnberg walked out while people were speaking and he wasn't the only one.

Manny Pillai also walked out.

And so by the end of that meeting, there were only four council members left listening to citizens concerns.

And this was publicized by District two.

Jason Mickey Rodriguez, who tweeted that he was rather disappointed that only so few council members remained.

And since that point, I think because of the actions of some of the council members, these pro-Palestine advocates have organized and have protest at it ever since then.

And I think that was kind of the turning point in this entire as have some Jewish leaders in response to this.

And so what happened in the city council a while back when they had to shut down the meeting?

Right.

It wasn't just one group.

Right.

So so time goes on.

And Jalen, Mickey Rodriguez and Terry Castillo, both of which have been vocal advocates for the Palestinian cause on social media, Write a memo, a special memo calling for a special meeting in January.

Now you need three members for that meeting to happen.

Surprisingly to me and to other reporters, I talked to Manny Pillai signs on to that memo.

So there will be a special meeting in January.

And that was rather surprising, considering he's one of the more conservative members of the council.

And he also published an op ed in the Express News in November advocating for the importance of San Antonio's friendship with Tel Aviv.

So time goes on about four days or I'm sorry, about a week before the meeting is supposed to take place in January.

Manny comes out and says, Well, I'm going to be busy in February or in January, I'm going to be out of town.

Let's reschedule for February.

Everyone says, okay, four days before the meeting is supposed to take place.

He backs out completely and removes his signature from the memo and from the people I've talked to, the people in the San Antonio Justice for Palestine Group and the Party for socialism and liberation.

You know, I think there would be less anger and I don't I think things would have played out at City Hall differently last week if Manny Polite just hadn't signed the memo to begin with.

I think it's the way in which he did it and his excuse for doing so, saying that he didn't realize that signing something like that would cause controversy and potentially cause harm to the community.

Will they push for a vote and could it come up for a vote?

I think if you had the vote and it didn't pass, things would calm down.

How about another controversy you were reported on?

Councilman Mark White, we also talked about earlier in his arrest for DWI and his censure by the city council.

Right.

So that's a very interesting case that I've been covering.

So Mark White, as we all know, was arrested for DWI on December 29th.

So immediately Nurnberg says we're going to have a special meeting.

You strip some of his committee assignments and then on this past Sunday, they vote to censure him.

Well, Nurnberg stripped him of his committee assignments before the body cam footage was released.

And from at least three defense attorneys, including one of which is a former district attorney, have come out and publicly said to the current and News four say that Mark White appears pretty sober in that body cam footage.

And one attorney I talked to, Shannon Locke, said that he wouldn't be surprised if we never even get the blood test results because he argues that the state didn't have enough evidence to warrant a blood draw.

So the issue coming up could be taking him off the committee assignments before he is convicted and may not be convicted.

Yeah, I mean, the big difference between what happened to Clayton Perry and Mark White's incident is that the evidence is there's a lot less evidence to hold different.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Any reasonable person would agree that Clayton Perry embarrassed City Hall and drove away from an accident.

And the city as a whole, even before he was convicted, were Mark White.

There's a lot of questions.

And the issue isn't so much the censure since that doesn't really do anything.

I think the problem that people have is that Nuremberg stripped him of his committee assignments, which impairs Mark White's job to represent his district and the people of San Antonio.

And I know you'll be covering this in the coming days and weeks and a whole lot more.

Thank you very much for coming in, Michael.

Karlis, great to have you, as always.

Great to be here.

And thank you for joining us for this edition of On the Record.

You can see this show again or any previous shows.

You can also download the podcast.

at KLRN.org I’m Randy Beamer.

We'll see you next time on the record is brought to you by Steve and Adele.

Dufilho.