Call It What You Will Salinas

Hundreds came out to Window on the Bay in Monterey to show their support for the Muslim-American community and protest the Muslim immigration ban.  The event, organized by local groups, Monterey County Nonviolent Action Committee and Solidarity Against Hate.  Listen in to what people have to say at this show of solidarity in our community.  We speak to people young and old, and hear what they have to say about the hatred Muslim-Americans are facing in their community.  We ran into State Senator Bill Monning and we get his thoughts on the importance of contacting your elected officials to make your views heard.  As always, this is a learning experience and we battled the wind that affected the quality of the audio.  We have wind socks on order to help alleviate this problem the next time we are out in the community.  

The Monterey Bay Indivisible group is one of many Indivisible groups that have been formed recently on the Central Coast as a means for people to actively become involved in politics.  With all the recent events of the Trump Administration, many people have been moved to get involved and this meeting saw many come out to get involved.  Dom came out to the meeting to speak to people that came out the meeting to find out what specifically made them want to get involved.  The episode opens with one of the event organizers, Gary Karnes, speaking briefly on the purpose of this group.  Listen in and hear why people are standing up and we even recorded the first 20 minutes of the meeting until a forgetful Dom forgot to hit the pause button to start the recording again.  Catch what people think as the event came to an end and don't forget to like our page and share our episode if you enjoy it!

We talk again with Monterey County NORML.  Ryan Munevar and Joey Espinoza are back to educate us further on the work that NORML does here at home.  Dom recently attended a meeting that was held by NORML and was completely blown away by the level of science, technology, and diversity of people that are coming together as cannabis has been legalized.  This group is nothing like the stereotypical image of a bunch of stoners that just want to get baked and listen to the Dead.  Our discussion touches on topics such as the standards that cannabis will be held to when it is grown, the politics that affect those standards, and the actual development of what standards should be measured.  Listen to the ups and downs the cannabis movement has faced and the utter ridiculousness that small business owners that sell cannabis have to go through in order to deposit their money from sales and pay their taxes.  Listen in to Dom and Raj learn a bit more about what is going on in the cannabis industry here at home.  

We are finally back in 2017 with a new episode!  We talk to Jyl Lutes, schoolteacher and longtime City Council member here in Salinas.  Jyl is a wealth of information on how our local City Council and School Boards operate because of her time there and we try to fit as much as we can into just one hour.  We talk a bit about the hard work that goes into being a member of the School Board and why traffic is so rough around many of our schools.  We touch on the unique situation Salinas has where we have many school districts and a City Council that has to find ways to work together, not always efficiently.  Jyl gives us insight into what goes on in an average week for a City Council member.  Because of her time on the Council, hear about the good times and bad that Salinas has gone through due to the tough economic times Salinas has faced at times.  We briefly had a technical difficulty at about the 39 minute mark and we lost about a minute so hang in there with us because we talk about the difficulty of buildin

This episode features people that live in the Chinatown area of Salinas as well as a lawyer that works to defend them.  We speak with homeless residents of Salinas that share a little bit of how they ended up in Chinatown and how they are receiving help from the community to get back on their feet and what else can be done to improve conditions down in Chinatown.  Hear what residents in Chinatown have to say about the drought, the violence in Salinas, and what they would like people to know about Chinatown, a place that often gets a bad reputation here in Salinas.  Our thanks to everyone for being our guests on this episode.  Thanks to Wes White for his help in organizing the interviews and shout out to the fellas as the Salinas Underground Podcast for letting us use their portable mic to tape this episode.  Hear and enjoy what will be the first of many episodes that come from Chinatown in Salinas.  After listening, if you want to do more, you can always head down there to donate directly or there are other l

This week our discussion is with Herbert Cortez from the Marina Coast Water District. Herbert was a great guest as we made a huge mistake and did not record most of our first interview correctly. He was a champ and stuck it out and answered questions twice.  Listen in to hear what the value to consumers is when they have a public water agency compared to a private company.  Hear why private water companies hope to make their way into local communities like Marina and what it could mean for consumers.  Dom is by no means a water expert so Herbert was great about trying to make this understandable to someone unfamiliar with all the terms that go with water management.  Water is always a huge issue here on the coast, listen in and learn more about the work the Marina Coast Water District is doing.  

4 members of the Sociology Club of Hartnell sat down with the show during finals week at Hartnell to talk about their involvement in social issues at Hartnell and the community.  Hear about the importance of Radio Bilingue, their work on the SalinasAlive program to reduce youth violence in Salinas, and an open mic event called Hartnell Throwdown that they put on.  All those issues and more such as the state of hip-hop today, the Hartnell high reputation vs the reality of students being able to be themselves more fully and become more involved in student groups that they feel speak to their needs on campus.  This was a great interview with students that show they are not disconnected with the world around them as some would think, they are just working on finding their own way through that world.  We will speak to them again at an open mic event to bring you more on what they are doing at Hartnell and in Salinas.

This week, we welcome Alex Schumacher to the XL Publichouse.  Alex is a local cartoonist/writer/dude on his grind.  He shares with us his projects that can be found at AlexSchumacherArt.com and they have a little something for everyone.  We hear about the work goes into writing a non-traditional, illustrated narrative called Decades of (in)Experience.  They follow the life and times of one Luke Carlin, and you might find some familiar themes that we have all experienced in retail 9-5s.  We get into another project of Alex's, Mr. Butterchips, and Dom is excited to find that he can purchase Mr. Buttercups merch.  Word to the wise, if you get some merch, he will include a hand-drawn sketch, bonus!  If you are trying to break into the comic/graphic novel biz, you can even check out Alex's column, Bread Crumbs From the Void, in Five2One Magazine.  There he offers up tips and advice on what it takes to put out your own work and do it consistently.  Listen in and share this episode of Call It What You Will with our

Back at the XL Publichouse, Dom speaks with Miranda from Our Gente, an LGBTQIA+ program at the Epicenter.  Miranda does a great job walking Dom through what LGBTQIA+ stands for, twice, as he was slow to get it.  Hear about some of the great activities Our Gente offers, such as Queering the Holidays that will be coming up next week, December 8th.  Learn about some of the volunteer opportunities available so if you're interested, you can find out how to volunteer for Our Gente!

This week we speak to Joey Espinoza from Monterey County NORML about the various cannabis measures on this upcoming ballot and what NORML does on the Central Coast to lobby effectively for the legalization of cannabis.  Listen in and find out how this group has worked throughout the state to establish other chapters and become a voice for legalized cannabis use here at home.  For more info, check out montereycountynorml.org

Mayor Joe Gunter sits down with us to talk about his time in office the past four years and what he hopes to accomplish if re-elected.  Our conversation included the much talked about Yes and No on Z campaigns, building affordable housing, and the upcoming medicinal marijuana proposition.  Listen in on the possibilities of wine tasting coming closer to home and what the city can do to improve the cultural offerings in downtown Salinas.  The Mayor also educated us on local tequila production that escaped our attention.  We finished up our talk with an update on what is going on with the homeless services that will be coming to Chinatown.  Don't forget, if you want to voice your concerns to the Mayor and the City Council, go to the City of Salinas website and find out when the next council meeting is to voice your concerns.

This was our most difficult episode to date, as we gave ourselves the task of attempting to interview two guests at once, that are in competition for office.  We probably shouldn't have tried to host a discussion in only our second month, but this race is important and we hope that our attempt to have a serious discussion on this race helps to inform you.  Furthermore, we tried to ensure the discussion was accurate and so we asked to verify points that we thought needed to be checked.  This added to the time it took to publish both parts of this episode, but we hope you enjoy the finished product.  We definitely found areas we need to improve on if we ever attempt to do an episode like this again.  Our thanks to our guests, Jose Castaneda, and Brian Contreras, for providing information when asked to clarify statements.  We hope this clears up any confusion you might have from listening to the discussion.   Points of clarification in this episode: It was said by Mr. Castaneda that the City manages the money of

This week we interview Amit Pandya on why he believes he can be a force for positive change here in Salinas as he runs for Mayor of Salinas.  Mr. Pandya is a local small business owner that has been an active member in the community as a leader of the Oldtown Salinas Association and an activist in other areas such as public safety spending here in Salinas.  Listen in to learn more on a candidate running to be Mayor of Salinas.

Listen in as 2 of the 4 candidates for the District 1, Salinas City Council race discuss the issues facing their area.  Our thanks to Jose Castaneda and Brian Contreras for coming in to discuss their ideas on how they would serve the needs of the District 1 constituents.  This is the 1st of a 2 part episode.  One clarification from this episode is Brian Contreras would like to clarify that a majority of his donations came from District 1.

Dom, Walter, and Raj speak with Adam DeLeon about the interesting combination of politics, podcasts, opinions, and beer that you will find at the XL Public House.  

We speak to Stephen Swift, a two-time Cancer survivor and traveler that has been biking around the US, Mexico, and Canada to raise awareness and simply talk and listen to people on the way.  These past few weeks he has been camping out at the protest encampment at City Hall and shares some of his experiences here in our town.  One hour certainly isn't time enough to hear this man's story, but this is the start to a story we will be coming back to in the future as Stephen finally starts his journey home to Oregon after his epic ride.  

Dom, Raj, and Walter speak with Angela Dorado from The Salinas Crime Watch Facebook page to talk about the use of social media to inform the public about local crimes.