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 Beemer 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.

Join us now as we go on the record with Randy Beamer.

Everybody.

And thank you for joining us for on the record, I'm Randy Beamer, and this week we are starting with Sheriff Javier Salazar of Bexar County.

Thank you very much for coming in.

Yes, sir.

Thanks for having me.

Several stories have been in the news we want to get to, first of all, about flock cameras.

That has been a big issue.

People across the state, across the country, not happy that they see the cameras.

They don't know where the information is going.

Now you are a supporter.

You have been using flock cameras.

Why?

What do you tell people?

What?

Concerned about privacy?

Well, we utilize them and they're a valuable tool.

You know, we've got we can count to a bunch of cases where they've helped us out.

You know, homicide cases, domestic violence cases, aggravated aggravated robbery.

Oh, yeah.

One one homicide case recently where all we had was a very vague description of a vehicle to go on based off one of the victims, what they what they'd seen.

They said I think it's a white Volvo SUV.

Sure enough, a few.

One city over in one of the.

In one of the areas they popped a white Volvo SUV had run that time.

And we were able to identify those folks within maybe an hour.

An hour and a half.

But not just because it was a white Volvo that you were looking for.

It was a license plate.

It was no, we didn't have a license plate.

We were just looking for a white Volvo SUV.

And the camera, we typed in white Volvo SUV.

It popped one up.

Turned out it was the shooter's.

We were able to get those people identified and under arrest in just a few hours.

Versus that probably would have taken us weeks of research.

In the olden days, I should say.

You know, for for me, although I believe it's a it's a great tool.

I can see the value in it.

You also have to be able to read the room as a public official.

And I know that there's a lot of anti flock camera sentiment out there.

I think it's based upon bad information.

But with that being said, if the if the community just says no, this is not a tool we want you to have, then we're not going to have.

How wide is that information shared?

People are worried about who's going to see it.

If there's somebody on the inside that gets a hold of it, they can do bad things.

Well, look, it's like any other tool in law enforcement.

Any tool can be misused.

It's making sure that you've got the guardrails in place, which we do.

It's how well do you do you hold people accountable if they misuse the information, which we would you know, we're constantly conducting audits on the users and the reasons why it's being used.

We're using it the right way.

But again, if it's if that's tool that the community says, we just don't want you to have it and we're just not going.

To, but you have to have the guardrails in place at your end because there's a lot of information out there.

What guardrails do you have and what could get out there if people don't?

Well, like for us, you know, we've got a list, a limited list of users that can use it.

It's normally just our investigators that can use it.

You know, some agencies have if you've got a badge in that agency, you have access to it.

We don't do that.

We limit it just to our investigators, and they have to have a specific reason and document why they're using it.

What case is it associated with?

Every day I've got a supervisor that goes through and says and checks case numbers with.

And if he's got anything that looks like maybe example, somebody was in a hurry.

They didn't put a case number, they just put a filler.

One, two, three, four, five.

He'll call them.

Hey, what?

You don't have a case number of case number on yours.

Why not?

Which case is it associated with.

And they fill in that information to make sure that it's being utilized correctly.

How do they use it?

Like you said.

Go ahead.

So now I've seen in other agencies though, one one agency in particular, and the state escapes me.

That I would believe was in another state where a law enforcement officer utilizing flock was married to a federal agent, and she was giving him access to her keyword and password and all that.

So he was able to utilize it.

Well, that went against their their agency's policies.

But of course, that person is most likely going to be held accountable.

And they should be.

You know, again, we've got many valuable tools and law enforcement that need to be utilized the right way.

How does it work, how much information is out there?

And if you have a particular case, what do you have to have before you can get into that?

So what the way it works is it's just it's just taking snapshots of vehicles and license plates as they go.

Every that's it.

It's not running.

It's not running a registration.

It's not telling me the race of the driver.

Most of the time it's not even showing a picture of the driver.

It's just a picture of a car with a license plate.

So I have a certain time in a certain place?

Yes, absolutely.

So I can say, you know, I know that it was a red pickup truck with a big Millerite sticker on the back window.

I can type that information in, and it'll give me pictures of of red pickup trucks with a miller Lite sticker.

So it's not just the license plate.

It can tell you about the truck.

It'll it'll go off the description of the vehicle as well.

Like if I've got a black car with a white driver's side door or where the door got bashed in, they replaced it, but the door is white.

I can actually put that information in and it'll get me now.

It'll say it won't necessarily say it's that car, but say, hey, here's a picture of a car like that in Dallas three weeks ago.

Here's a picture of a car like that in Houston two days ago.

And there's three in San Antonio an hour ago.

It'll it'll tell me things of that nature.

Now, they might be three different cars that we're talking about.

So it's up to the old fashioned police work to determine which one of those is most likely.

And the information from the flock cameras have, what, 33 in the county that is going out wherever?

Well, it's places without guard.

It's only going to the agencies that we willingly share with.

And they're all local agencies and possibly state agencies.

We don't share with our with federal agencies at all with that, with with that information in particular.

And now the state is looking to get rid of these because of the backlash against them.

You say they're going away here kind of just on their own.

Yeah.

So for us, the funding comes through our tag, our Texas Anti-Gang center.

It's basically like a clearinghouse.

All agencies have a representation at Texas Anti-Gang.

Our access to flock comes through that.

It's a state grant that pays for that.

That's the state just recently did away with that funding.

So that goes away I think in February.

February or March our contract dies.

We're just going to let it die a natural death again.

I believe it's a valuable tool, but if it goes away.

Guess what?

The sun is still going to come up tomorrow, and we're still going to have bad guys to catch.

We can't spend a lot of time lamenting the loss of flock.

What happens to those cameras?

I'm going to literally be taken down in some places.

They've shrouded them.

Yeah, they'll be taken down and they'll go away.

It's just it's just another tool that is, you know, no longer going to be available to us.

It is what it is.

How about the information?

Is that going to stay in a database that you have access to or that others have access to?

You know that I don't I don't know.

We'll we'll have to.

Look, I know that there's a retention period that attached to those cameras.

My understanding is that it will go by that retention period.

So if that retention period goes for 30 days, then I guess as I would understand it, 30 days after that contract ends, that information dies and it's gone.

A couple of other things that have been in the news.

Want to get to election security in a minute.

But the Trump rally, the viral videos of people being assaulted there, you're investigating.

Where are you in that investigation?

So we've got about a total of about six cases that we're investigating.

We've had a couple of suspects identified.

We've got at least one case that was filed as a citation in one of the JP courts.

For somebody throwing liquid on one of the one of the folks that we were escorting out.

And again, these are not major cases, right?

These are not aggravated assaults or anything like that where blood was drawn, they're simple assaults.

But but again, a simple assault is still a crime.

It needs to be investigated.

If it's brought to our attention, we have to take action.

So how are you finding out about these?

Sometimes we're identifying folks through social media, through tips online, just like we do with any other crime that we're investigating.

And there were sheriff's deputies out there because that's your that's your venue that you were responsible for taking care of.

Correct.

It's a counting facility.

So we were how many people that you have out there, and were you ready for this kind of thing?

I believe we had about 77,200 people inside the building, and then maybe another couple hundred outside the building, and we were absolutely ready.

We had a lot of assets on the ground set up out there.

DPS came out and helped us out.

There was also some private security that came with the Trump entourage.

So I think I think we had it pretty well in hand.

But again, you're always going to anytime you have big groups of people come together, there's going to be minor incidents and you just have to handle them.

And how did they.

How do you train an officer to deal with something like that?

If somebody gets unruly, they automatically take them out or.

Well, you know, that's that's that.

The Frost Bank, the Frost Center and the Freeman Coliseum, those were there all the time.

Spurs games, concerts, whatever it may be.

So my deputies are oh, they're pretty well versed in how to get an unruly person from, from inside the facility to outside the facility and try to minimize what happens along the way.

If somebody does decide to take things, take matters into their own hands and assault that person, then we're responsible for holding that person accountable.

And some people have seen this viral video and might think it's not a simple assault.

We saw punches.

We saw whatever.

What's the difference between kinds of assault in this case?

Well, like in the for example, when we handled the one that we filed in JP court, that was a lady throwing, I think, a soda or something on a guy.

You know, that's a simple assault.

Now, we did see some other incidents where a young man was pulled down by the hair in that instance.

And I'm not I'm not 100% certain at this point, but that victim of that assault didn't stick around that night.

We didn't know who he was.

So he was actually one of the pictures that we put out helping us identify people.

That young man is a victim.

He was actually one of those people who were trying to identify and then find out, does he even want to do anything about it?

Do they have to want to press charges for that to happen?

Yes.

If that if that gentleman were to come in, if he hasn't already and say, look, it's not a big deal.

It didn't really hurt that bad.

I didn't want to I don't want to do anything about it.

Then we're dead in the water on that case.

It's not something we're going to pursue.

Kind of related to this election security.

Yes.

This year.

There's a lot of concern about how much security is going to be there.

How do you train for that?

What what are you doing at.

So as sheriff, you know, by law, we're in charge.

I'm in charge of providing election security at the elections.

So, you know, with our folks, it's a matter of making sure that people feel protected, but also not overwhelmed, right?

I don't I could easily put a deputy in each and every polling side, but that's not a good look.

And people are not going to appreciate that level of protection.

So with us, it's a matter of being close but out of sight to where we're not, you know, making people feel intimidated or uneasy.

So where are where are the officers are they're not at the door there.

They're scattered throughout the county, and they're ready to respond if we do get a call.

Most of our calls to this point, because I get a daily report of what what we responded to, most of the calls I've gotten have been for people passing out because of the heat.

You know, a lot of the wait times are long.

It's it's a lot of voters going out this year.

And that's awesome.

That's great.

I'm not on the ballot, though.

There's a lot of folks going out there.

But we're seeing a lot of folks, elderly folks passing out in line because of the heat.

So I would encourage people, if you're going to go out to vote, have a plan that should include sunscreen, protective clothing, and then, of course, water hydrate while you're out there as well.

We had a couple of calls for issues that didn't turn out.

Yeah, we've had a couple of calls for people calling in and saying, hey, there's a bunch of black vehicles over here where lights and sirens, it's got to be ice.

And so of course, I've got a direct line to the special agent in charge.

It's not them we get out there.

There's nothing there.

Nobody's seeing anything.

There's no cell phone videos floating around is.

You know, if I showed up somewhere, there'd be cell phone videos by the hundreds.

What we're finding out is that we believe these are actually false calls being put out just to generate a. You expect any ice?

Have you had any contact with them about what they're going to be doing or federal agents at this?

I've been in contact with the special agent in charge here of the San Antonio office.

Great guy.

You know, I realize he's got a job to do.

He realizes I've got a job to do.

They don't they don't necessarily meet.

So with them, he's assured me that they're going to be that that going to polling sites is not a priority for them.

They're out looking for.

Election Day as well.

I mean, if they get some orders before then or.

Well, he's he's given me the word, his word that he'll give me a call if anything changes.

I don't have any reason to doubt him at this point, so I'll take him at his word, you know, and hopefully he'll keep it free.

Will.

Well, thank you very much for your time, even though you're not on the ballot.

Sheriff Javier Salazar, thanks for coming in.

Thank you, sir.

The city of San Antonio just filed a lawsuit against DHS over that proposed or planned ice facility at a warehouse on San Antonio's east side.

Here to talk about that and more is district ten Councilman Mark white.

Thanks for coming in.

Thanks for having me.

First of all, now you are one of those on council who did not support the resolution protesting the Ice facility and this lawsuit.

Tell me about that.

Why?

Look, taxpayer resources are scarce right now.

We are in a tough spot as a city, but really, regardless of whether we were in that spot or not, the taxpayers don't want us using our money to pay lawyers in Washington, D.C.

to fight a lawsuit.

Frankly, that is unnecessary and is going to go nowhere.

Could we slow down the opening of this processing facility on the east side?

Maybe.

But that's it.

But our residents and I hear it time and again every single week at these neighborhood meetings.

They don't want us fighting these frivolous lawsuits.

They want their tax dollars to go to public safety and to go to infrastructure needs.

And so this is really a misguided attempt by some on council, I believe, to play politics here.

And we shouldn't be doing it.

It is, by some will admit, it is to maybe slow down the process until at least after November.

If the election changes the outcome in Congress.

Is that a reason to do it?

It's not.

And listen, the United States Constitution, of course, gives the purview of regulating immigration and enforcing our immigration laws to the federal government.

And our city government has no role in that.

But I'll tell you this.

We need comprehensive immigration reform in this country.

I think that's something that both Republicans and Democrats can agree to.

I am happy to work with my colleagues to go to the state level, go to the federal level, and push for comprehensive immigration reform.

We need border security.

We need more immigration judges to process the asylum cases much quicker than than they're being done now.

But with all of that said, let's put our focus there and not on spending taxpayer money on lawsuits.

But in the meantime, these kinds of lawsuits have delayed.

And in some cases, apparently, DHS has, you know, they are selling some warehouses, including three, I think, in El Paso, that we're going to add up to 8500 beds.

They scrapped those plans because of opposition from the public.

Right.

But people should know what this facility actually is.

It's a processing facility where people that are in this country illegally will be held so that they can be more quickly returned to their country of origin.

And yes, you're right, in some cities across the country, DHS has decided to pull out and hasn't done anything there.

But look, my opinion is the federal government needs to be allowed to enforce the immigration laws of this country as they see fit.

If they believe this processing facility can more quickly move people back to their countries of origin, we shouldn't stand in the way of that.

Now, the city could look at this, and others I've heard say this as a kind of lobbying the federal government to change that policy, that the city does spend money on lobbying in Austin, that this is money spent for that kind of thing, because it will affect what happens on the streets of San Antonio, that thousands of people here could face more scrutiny from Ice.

Well, I think who's going to face more scrutiny from the federal government is going to be our city government.

And so many people in this city rely on federal funds for their day to day quality of life.

And one of my fears here is that the federal government isn't going to be pleased with us getting in the way here, and may take it out on us in terms of not providing us some of the grant money and things that we've been accustomed to receiving.

But I'll tell you this, I think it's a small minority of the San Antonio population that is making a lot of noise on this.

From what I hear out in the community, people are supportive of our law enforcement officials, both our local ones and the ones that the federal level.

I think these immigration enforcement activities, when done properly, help keep the community safe.

And again, it is the purview of the federal government to do this.

City government has no role in this, and we shouldn't get involved.

All right.

Let's move on to the bond issue, because I know that's another big thing City Council is enjoying dealing with right now.

What's a bond issue going to be finally and what will it include.

Yeah.

So in past years we've had a billion or more than that for our bond, $1 billion.

This year, as everybody knows, we're in a tough financial spot in the city manager has told us we should do nothing more than a $442 million bond, and I am fighting hard to make sure that we live within our means.

We listen to that recommendation of the city manager, and we keep it at 442 million.

However, there are some on council that want to do the billion dollars again, but doing so would require another tax increase on our citizens.

You know, we just passed the 2026 next year.

We just passed a 2027 budget.

I fought hard against the tax increase associated with that budget.

But again, for the first time in 33 years, City Council raised the property tax rate on the citizens of San Antonio.

We should not one month later do that again, just because we want to take on more debt and spend more money on the 2027 bond, we need to keep it to the 442.

That's plenty of money to do projects all around the city, necessary infrastructure projects that need to be done.

But let's stop there.

Let's not be greedy.

Let's not take more money out of people's pockets in terms of another tax hike.

How about people who are supportive of the arena and voted for that?

You voted for that.

Originally, that bond was going to include more than $200 million for infrastructure around that area.

Now it's down to 30 or 35 million.

Will that hurt the Spurs arena project?

Well, let's.

Be clear.

It was the mayor that was out there that was saying, oh my goodness, you know, to do this new arena is going to require a couple hundred million dollars of infrastructure money from our city.

Well, it turns out that that wasn't true.

The actual number is about $35 million, and yet that's 35 million will be included in that 442 number.

I just spoke of.

One more thing I want to get to before we're out of time.

Shovel ready program here in San Antonio.

You've announced that you want that.

What is that?

Yeah.

So I put forth a council consideration request for other colleagues signed on to it.

It passed it made it through governance committee and is on to our economic Development Committee.

Look, we are in a fight with not only other Texas cities, but cities around the country to attract companies to come here.

And what do we know?

Time is money.

The quicker a company can get into business and start making money, the more attractive a particular site is.

So what I want to do here in San Antonio is take some land sites, prepare them with the permitting, the zoning and all the utilities that they need.

So companies will choose San Antonio rather than some other city to relocate.

It also should help our companies here that want to expand.

If they can expand more quickly here, that means more revenue for the city, more jobs for our citizens.

All right.

Well, thank you very much for coming in and explaining all that.

Councilman Mark white, district ten.

Appreciate it.

Yeah.

On reporter's roundtable.

This week, you probably heard the VA is installing the green and silver lines, the advanced rapid transit lines, into and out of downtown.

Well, here to talk about that.

And some tax breaks the city is considering James McCandless, a reporter for the San Antonio Business Journal.

Thank you very much for coming in.

Thanks for having me back.

Now, the city council, just looking at these tax breaks for property owners within, what, a quarter mile of this area?

It's a quarter mile within the Green and Silver line.

What it would do is it would give developers a 50% tax rebate for for development projects within transit oriented development stations, and an additional 20% is possible if you are showing that you support local business in some way.

And this is just for new businesses, or what they would have to add to what's there, right?

If you want to build on, say, a vacant site that you own along San Pedro or Navarro or however the Green Line runs, you have to apply through the Economic Development department for these tax breaks.

What kind of sentiment do you think the council has for this?

There's a lot of support for it, especially with cars.

She's district one.

She represents most of this green line.

She really wants to spur affordable housing development along this corridor.

And for the people who don't know, the Green Line runs from the airport south to Brooks.

That's correct.

Through downtown.

Yeah.

How do you describe this thing?

It's kind of compared to light rail, but on a bus it's a dedicated lane.

It's dedicated lanes for faster busses.

And it's supposed to be like, you won't have to stop at the lights, or they won't have to stop at the lights.

Right.

They've been they've been working on giving on San Pedro recently.

You've seen what they've been working on those roads for for a couple of months now.

And now that one's in the works.

They haven't started yet on the Silver Line that goes east west from where.

That goes from the Frost Bank center through downtown and the Our Lady of the Lake area on the west side.

How much money do you think, or do they think that they can get from, or that it would cost from this property tax break?

Developers are always looking for ways to to help out their what's called the capital stack.

It's the money from any which source it takes to to develop these projects.

I think one thing that that it also could help is I know people talk a lot about the Lone Star development that's been.

South of downtown.

Yeah.

South of downtown, the former Lone Star Brewery, it's changed hands a couple of times in the past few decades.

There's a new owner who bought it this year.

That land sits within the quarter mile of one of the stations, so that could help that development get off the ground as well.

A lot of people been waiting.

For that development, come and gone and come and gone.

And do you think this could make the difference?

It's more than what?

Than what some developers were able to access before.

So.

So I think like I said, developers are always looking for ways of support from public and private partnerships.

Can't hurt.

Definitely can't hurt.

What about parking within that quarter mile?

Because if I want to take the Green Line, I would kind of want to park and ride if I don't live along that green line.

Sure.

That is an interesting detail to the the codes say that that if you're developing within this quarter mile, you don't have to have as much parking as you would if you were developing outside of that quarter mile.

So there would be less parking than.

Theoretically there.

Now, theoretically, yes.

That's not something that is is it's not required that you don't build enough parking, but you just don't have to.

And businesses affected by this, their land, their property values could go up.

Or if you're a homeowner within that quarter mile.

That's possible.

It's tough to tell right now because nothing's been passed, nothing's been applied for.

But that time will tell on that one.

What is the timeline for this?

City Council will consider passing these measures, along with the yearly slate of of economic development incentive updates in November.

And then if they pass it, it will be in effect January 1st.

What about other cities within that area?

You say almost park.

There are some other areas that people wonder how they are affected.

I think they are concerned that the code technically allows for buildings up to 12 stories.

I don't think anyone's going to try and build a 12 story building in Almost Park.

I think they're going to save that for.

Well, that I don't think almost Park would let them.

Yeah, yeah, I think they're going to save that for possibly San Pedro or the South Side.

What about the effect on downtown, especially traffic from the airport?

I think that is what the city has been trying to solve for is, is or especially has been trying to solve for is cutting that traffic.

Well, thank you very much.

James McCandless, reporter for the San Antonio Business Journal.

Everything you want to know about the new silver and green lines, and a lot more you can read about in the San Antonio Business Journal.

Thanks.

Thank you.

And thank you for watching on the record.

You can watch the show again.

Any previous shows go to our website.

That's KLRN.org where you can download it as a podcast as well.

I'm Randy Beamer --- and we'll see you next time.

On the record is brought to you by Steve and Adele Dufilho.