Veteran's Affairs Plus W/ David L. Washington

Wesley Knight 0:00
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Music 0:42
what's going on good day

Dave Washington 0:48
Las Vegas. This is Veterans Affairs, plus on 91.5 jazz and more. I'm Dave Washington, your host. I have in studio our first born, April Washington, on the line. We have Trina Robinson, Trina Giles, so ladies, hold tight. We're going to make a few announcements, and then we're going to bring you in, and Trina Giles will go first, because I know she has a staff meeting that she's working with right now, but I hope that you can stay on mute Trina Giles, because I have a couple different questions, and I'm trying to do it in a way that will be important for our listening audience to hear. So with that, I know I've always tried to give some some birthday well wishes. And one April's husband's birthday is this month, Carlton, happy birthday, young man. And you know you're supposed to do what you're supposed to do now, handle your business. Don't have your your father in law getting on your case. We have a number of things to include. There's some things that we have going on in our community that are important last month or last week. I should say we had Jeff Jones. He is the commander of American Legion Post 10 over in West Las Vegas. And in that vein, April said she had a number of things that she was aware of that will be coming up that important to veterans in American legislators, would you do that for me? Would you tell us just a couple of the things that are occurring soon? Yes,

April Washington 2:07
sir. First of all, I'd like to say hello to my two sister friends, Trina and Trina, hello. So the first Hello, hey. So the first veterans of the first veterans heroes activities. Conference is on Friday, March 28, 2025 at doula Community Center. And the second announcement is a new store that's opening, and they're looking for heroes. It says they're hiring heroes. So that's admission barbecue. That's 375, North Stephanie Street, Suite 111, Henderson, Nevada, 89014,

Dave Washington 2:46
all right. Thank you, April for that. Now. Trina Giles, could you tell us where were you born and raised? And we all know in the community that you were fire service professional with what department and how long, because I know you got work to do. So please go

Trina Giles 3:02
absolutely Hello everyone, and thank you, chief Washington for having me. My name is Trina Giles. I was born. I am born and raised from Las Vegas, Nevada. In 1996 I became a firefighter, the first black female for the Clark County Fire Department. I served the fire department for 21 years and retired and 2017 Wow. So it was quite a journey. It was. It molded me into the woman I am today.

Dave Washington 3:35
Hey, I understand and appreciate that you know what. I'm going to go ahead and because I know you're busy. So tell us. I know you are a business woman after leaving the fire service, or even before you started, you started your own business. Tell us a little bit about the business that a lot of people in the community know. But this is a worldwide audience that we have on 91.5 jazz and more, you know, UNLV. It can be heard anywhere in the world. So tell them a little bit about your business, if you would.

Trina Giles 4:04
Yes, I am the owner of grits cafe. We're located in the historical west side of Las Vegas. I took a leap of faith and 2008 during the economic depression and open this restaurant because there was a need for soul food, breakfast restaurant in our community. And so I was working at the fire department at the time, working five days on, six days off. So I had the time, but not necessarily the experience. However, we are still here in standing and at 1911 Stella lake, it will be it's 17 years now, wow. And we're grateful for just the community support throughout COVID. It's the community's cafe. It's not even my cafe. It's the community's

Dave Washington 4:57
17 years now. Wow. I didn't I. How time flies. Wow. So how many employees do you have?

Trina Giles 5:07
I have a staff of 23 employees, seven part timers and 15 full time employees. We're open every day from seven to three and so we're growing slowly, but it's definitely a journey. Sure,

Dave Washington 5:26
what was your what was one of your greatest challenges that you can share?

Trina Giles 5:32
Oh, my goodness, I think I'm I'm living one right now. So when you have longevity in the community, you reach a point where you understand you have to create a growth strategy to grow further than what I have. We started at 907 D, square feet. We're at 1700 we expanded during COVID, and we're still really, really busy, and so I'm facing staffing issues from burnout. We have staff that's been here a long time, but of course, we know that the restaurant industry is very high paced. So one of my biggest challenges for me is just understanding how to grow grits in the proper way. This is ground zero, and making sure I have the right team to be able to do that

Dave Washington 6:28
excellent. And you know, in terms, and I would imagine you learn some stuff from your your years of service with the fire department, strategic planning is important as anything in any business or any organization, because, like you say, the proper growth. I can tell you that I've seen people try to grow and then they fall on their face because they really didn't have a plan, and they try to stretch out too big, too fast, and it just flopped.

Trina Giles 6:55
That is absolutely the case. And so what not for us flopping, but you can't grow too fast. So it has to be a progressive it has to be incremental growth strategy. And so you can't do it without staffing, but you can't do it without the right team. And when you say the fire department taught me that I learned so much about business just from Fire Department culture. So now we finally have a chain of command. I was so hands on in my business that I wanted people to be able to come to me. And now I realize I need a chain of command in an organizational chart so I won't get burnt out too.

Dave Washington 7:37
That's right, you know Trina. And then we're going to go to April, then Trina Robinson, we're going to come to you as fire chief. I was allowing people to call me to set up appointments, and my secretary, you can't do that. You have got to come, let them come through me, because you going to forget somebody, and you ain't going to have it down, and then you going to look terrible. Don't do that. No more chief. You may be the cheap, but you need a gatekeeper. So I'm glad you recognize I'm glad you recognize that it and we're going to continue to pray for continued success. For you, April, give us a little background on you to our listening artists, even though you have been on the show before. And the other thing, ladies, I want y'all to understand that this is Women's History Month, and I wanted to raise up and show some of the young black women in our community that's, that's, that's trailblazing, doing good things. So go ahead, April.

April Washington 8:28
Okay, thank you. Yes, I'm the oldest. Your your oldest, and I'm born and raised here. I can tell everybody I'm a native Nevadan. Worked 20 years with Clark County. I'm the founder of the look back cause I designed products to remind parents to stop leaving their children in the car. Remind employers everyone to stop leaving their children in the car. I'm the author of fire safety in the Washington home, which was a book dedicated to you and my mother, who's also also worked and retired from the fire service, and I also own Annette Southern Tea Cakes, which, when he talks about people falling on their faces, I have to admit, I've fallen a lot because I'm one of the type people. I try to stretch myself to do 20,000 things at one time, which, now that I'm getting a little older, I'm realizing I got to slow down somewhere,

Dave Washington 9:27
absolutely 300% Trina Robinson, hello. Are you tell us, give our listening audience a little bit on your background. Born, raised, etc, etc, and I know we were caught. We were colleagues at the City of Las Vegas for a number of years. Yes.

Trina Robinson 9:46
So I was born in Pine love, Arkansas, but raised here in Southern Nevada, specifically North Las Vegas. And Las Vegas has been my home since pre. Elementary elementary school. I've been in business now for close to 20 years as a provider here in Southern Nevada, but my background is really varied. I was an administrator for the state of Nevada Department of Health and Human Services, and then started working at the city as an analyst, and finished my career at the fire department as an administrative officer. I worked for the mayor in Las Vegas City Council. I created a number of programs that have won the city national recognition, their homeless services programs, their youth initiatives, and now I am in private practice, the owner and Clinical Director at clearwaters family guidance and limitless centers in the Northwest Las Vegas, part of town, and have been in that specific location well over 15 years now. And we provide mental health to individuals, couples, families. We do group therapy assist a lot of veterans. Pro bono arm for individuals who are uninsured or underinsured.

Dave Washington 11:09
Oh, God bless you. Excellent. So Trina Giles, if you, if you can come back on, I'd like to know what inspired you to open up your business.

Trina Giles 11:22
Yes, so I come from a family of entrepreneurs, and my mother has always followed her dream in whatever she wanted to do. So she owned a childcare center, flower shop, dress resell boutique and help my sister open expertise, cosmetology, and so I kind of saw it emulated quite a bit. But the real inspiration was just wanting something that represented the food that I grew up eating. And I woke up one day and wanted a good breakfast, and I thought, Where can I go and get like, grits that, like my mom made, and that was really my inspiration, but I think also I was inspired by her tenacity as well. Excellent,

Dave Washington 12:11
excellent. It's something how the mothers men are integral part of our lives. Even after they become ancestors, you still think about the things that they encourage you to do that is great now, April, as a part time business, one, because you still work for the county, what is some of the biggest challenges that you feel you've had, and also, why are you not in a large store with your T case?

April Washington 12:39
Well, I've, I've tried, I tried going into large stores, but the red tape, I remember when I took your your enchilada recipe and I tried to put the enchiladas into WalMart, they had me go out and make all order all these different boxes with and I spent all of this money. And then when I brought the stuff in, they said, We're not interested. And that just broke my heart. This time, when I talked to them about the tea cakes, they wanted me to put preservatives in them. Well, I don't want to put preservatives in them. So I have been talking to some of the the, you know, the whole food stores, the the health food stores, about possibly putting them into into their stores. You know, I have my UPC codes now that I can do that, because they, you know, they wanted all those, you know, all of that. So I, I did, did get that taken care of my biggest challenge is because my mother does not want anyone to have the recipe, I would have to mass produce, which you and I have talked about, but she's, she's just adamant. She doesn't want me to share the recipe. So, you know, I'm, like, my guy, if I'm not gonna do this, she told me, you need to get some rest well with the way I'm going, just with private orders now and just in the little places they are now, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm up to my really seriously, up to my, my nose with with business now, so in order to go large, I would have to really have to convince her to let us mass produce them

Dave Washington 14:15
interesting. So, Trina Robinson, what has been your biggest challenge? And I can imagine you've had a number you say you've been in your current business about 1920 years?

Trina Robinson 14:27
Yes, I think the overarching, or the biggest problem I have is having call up visuals to provide the level of care that you know people need. It's meeting the need of our community, and it's so great, and we have some great clinicians out there, and we've trained quite a few, launch quite a few, and still, some are still at my practice, but it's meeting the community need that that's the biggest issue, and learning when to say no and when. And, you know, winning the you know, kind of slow down a bit, but that's the biggest challenge that I've seen so far. The needs in our valley are so great and so vast, sure that just keeping up with it is a challenge. I would imagine

Dave Washington 15:13
that having it, and I'm assuming you mentioned clinical, I would imagine that people who work in your industry, have to be certified with some level of training for certification,

Trina Robinson 15:26
absolutely, education and training. We have our licensed mental health professionals who go through a rigorous education process and then a testing and training process to be able to serve individuals in our valley. And I think I know that our mental health professionals are some of the most unsung heroes in the valley, because we oftentimes go unseen, undervalued and under appreciated. But you know, we make a great impact overall,

Dave Washington 15:58
absolutely. Well, I'm just honored to have all three of you guys on the show, because I think it's important for people to understand and appreciate that women, and in this case, I'm talking particularly about black women are doing great things. And Trina and Robinson, I remember you from back in the day, and I had no idea you Dave way more programming suggestions and implementation for the city of Las Vegas, and I'm just getting that under my belt that you did all these wonderful things to make our city a better place, and it's important to do what we can to build a better society. So God bless you for all that you are doing and have done and will continue to do. And we're going to, I don't know where we are time wise, but I can only imagine, because I'm starting to get the right field as a talk show host on on time wise. So I'll take that up with you. April, words of inspiration, thought that you would share with any young people working for a particular industry, government, private business, ownership, etc. Well, I

April Washington 16:59
say at the time, when I started all my businesses, I was a single mother, and my kids followed in this footsteps, in the footsteps of me, as far as being as far as entrepreneurship, go for what you know, follow your heart, keep Have faith in God, and just believe that whatever you want to do. You can do whatever you want to do. You can do it's everything is possible.

Dave Washington 17:27
Okay, excellent, all right, I see Trina. Giles is ready, Trina, go ahead. Give us some words of encouragement or inspiration that you would share with any of our young men and women in our listening audience.

Trina Giles 17:44
So it's so interesting, Chief, because I'm sitting here in front of my team, and we're doing a effective communication team building. Oh, that is excellent. We heard you when you were looking We overheard you when you said, Trina, some words of inspiration. So what I would like to say is that I love what April said, Follow your dream. Just because you haven't seen anyone else do it, that doesn't mean that you can't do it yourself. And then also, you have to dig deep during those times of adversity and pull out the grid in you be determined and make sure that you put that first, because I don't think grits would be where it is right now if it wasn't for God. Amen. Well,

Dave Washington 18:26
said, you know, as fire chief, I used to tell people for me, and I encourage all to do the same. Put God first your family then your job. Because I said, Let me tell y'all something when, when, when it's all said and done, the ones that's going to be in your corner is going to be family. Well, God, first, of course, and then it's going to be family. I said, when you leave this dog on job, they going to forget your name. They don't, you know. And I've never felt bad or or discouraged when I left the department. I've always felt good about myself. I thank God that I never got upset. Oh my goodness, I'm going to be late for work. Never happened. Do I miss it? Absolutely not. Did I try to do the best that I could in terms of turning around the culture of our organizations? I did. I just barely turned the ship. There are still things that are occurring on that is so ugly in the fire service and 49 pulling out all the stops with de and I, it's insane, but if people really understand and look at the true picture of our world and our loss of humanity, and you will see that when you when you check back on affirmative action, same thing will apply to de. And I other folks, and I'm talking about as far as DNI, 78% of the leadership are Caucasian. 53% are women, though they are leading those programs. So he cut these people's throats thinking he's getting to us. Most of most of us came up through the ranks on on merit, and they keep talking about merit. Nobody gave me anything when, when my when my opposition? You. For a fire chief. Were asleep. I was up praying, meditating and doing what my wife told me, God told me to do. And she said, but you need to get some rest. I said, I rest when it's over, when, when, when, when they've selected the fire chief. And I'm praying that it be me. But no, you cannot rest. You have to. And I admire what you're doing, Trina, because a lot of times we will go into business and think that that's it for you to be doing some some leadership training with your staff is absolutely essential to continued growth. And see I can see it. I trust you see it. Someday, you're gonna have multiple locations, like some of the other big businesses do, but you're doing it at a pace that's best for you. So I encourage you to keep working it. April, that was, that was Trina Giles, right? Trina Robinson, you're up. April told me I'd done her. She said, I'm a scatterbrain. I get to talking. Trina Robinson, you're up, darling. So

Trina Robinson 21:01
my words of encouragement or parting words would be this, for every young individual, male or female, African American and the like, don't stop your education at an undergraduate or a graduate to keep get your doctoral degree if you're going to open up business, create a plan B and diversify your lines of business. I agree with everybody here that God should be first. However, in the in the business sense, diversification for expansion is going to be the key. What different lines of business do you have within your business, if you're working in local government, what skills are going to be transferable to get you a Plan B post retirement, because you can't just focus and live on a pension alone. What legacy Do you want to leave your children and your grandchildren? What generational wealth are you going to create just having a plan A? So that would be my recommendation. Go to the highest depths of education that you can regardless of what time it's going to take, you're going to be two to five years older within two to five years of getting a master's or a doctoral degree, you're going to also have a plan A and a plan B that will feed you your family and future generations to come. So don't just stop at what you see. Start looking for further vision and keep it pushing.

Dave Washington 22:25
That is great advice. I can tell you that one of the people that I admire most, because I'm around him a lot now, is Frank Hawkins. Frank got multiple businesses, and they and they, it's almost like an octopus, but he knows what every every area is doing. He's built these areas. And one thing I found from him is that if you build something, you know, the ups, the downs, the ins and outs, so if somebody's trying to steal from you, more than likely you're caught. Because he knows what's there, because he built it. And I admire the work that he's doing. And I can tell you, you ladies, what you all are doing is so important. And trust me, you are an inspiration to someone out there, male, female, black, white. Somebody is looking at what you're doing and the success that you're having, and a lot of times, people don't realize the grit that you had to put up to get where you are, and the multiple streams that you talked about, Trina Robinson, I think is so important. And I know Trina Giles, you've looked at it as well, because I know when you first started, you correct me if I'm wrong. You did not have a catering business. You just had the restaurant. Am I right or am I wrong? I know you're in, you're in, you're in your meeting. I'm sorry, but I just, I just had to put that out there, because I think Trina Robinson, what you said is so important, because there are so many things that can come off your main business, but you have to do it in a calculated, even cure process. They'll just run out and do it because you see what somebody else is doing. You don't know what kind of time they put in, but ladies, once again, I am so proud of each of you for the work that you've done, because I think it's so important that we have women who are doing things in our community that others see and they can learn from. So I am proud of each one of you, and know that only time is going to tell how many have followed your lead, and I trust that there will be many any other words that you always would like to share.

Trina Robinson 24:28
Well, chief, this is Trina Robinson. I just want to say thank you for having me as well as April and Trina Giles on the show, you have been an inspiration, a standard bearer, if you will, being the first black fire chief, you gave not only us, but even our children, of you that we had never seen before, nor was it ever seen in this valley that you could attain something that high. So thank you and. Thank you for what you continue to do with with all of your philanthropy efforts in our valley, my hope is, though, that our young people go out and build generational wealth and not get comfortable and not get comfortable with the status quo and not be discouraged by the current political environment. No one controls our narrative, but us,

Dave Washington 25:21
well said, well said. And I can tell you that I've had a number of different businesses, and they didn't succeed because I did more. Philip, free work that and earnest, my brother in law, you said, Man, Dave, you need to get in some for profit stuff, all this non profit stuff. It ain't get, you know, extra money, but you know, I just feel good in the service that I do and and maybe at some point I get at 74 now, who knows that I get more focus into business aspect of things. But well said, Trina Robinson, well said, Trina Giles, if you're listening with any any further remarks from you, because we got about three minutes left, I just got the sign from from Wes, if not, April,

April Washington 26:06
I want to say I'm just so glad that you back in full effect and you're doing well. And I'm sitting there looking at you, Daddy, you look so good. You do? You look so good. And these two women were praying and asking about you all the time,

Dave Washington 26:22
and I appreciate that

Trina Robinson 26:25
absolutely. We love you Chief Well, I appreciate that.

Dave Washington 26:28
So ladies again, I want to acknowledge the fact and I honor you as we go toward the end of Women's History Month, and this show will air, not this Saturday, but the following one. And I trust that people will get a lot, not only enjoyment, but get a lot of great information that you have shared with those out there in our listening audience. So once again, this is Veterans Affairs, plus on 91.5 jazz and more. Had our eldest daughter, April, who is not only a great employee with the county, but she's also a business woman. Trina Giles, former and first black female to join Clark County Fire and also became a fire investigator. And that's and I'm talking about fire investigators. They get to pack a pistol. And then I'm going to talk about my sister, friend. She always called me pops and Uncle No, pops more. She called me more. Pops. Trina Robinson, you are such an outstanding individual, and I had no idea until today. I knew you did a lot of programs for the city, but some of those awards I just you know, maybe my head was in the same but I am so proud of you that you will continue to carry on. And I know the loss of your daughter hurt you so bad, and no one can, no one can, can carry that load, but the person who bear that child so God bless you for your strength, and we hope that he will continue to strengthen you as you continue to journey through life and you keep doing the great work that you're doing. I love you all and wish you continued success. This is Veterans Affairs, for sure, this is Veterans Affairs plus on 91.5 jazz and talk to you soon. Hey.

Music 28:37
Oh, all the smoke in the air still they hate when they stare all the pain that we bear.