Veteran's Affairs Plus W/ David L. Washington

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Dave Washington 0:49
day Las Vegas. Good day Las Vegas. This is Veterans Affairs, plus on 91.5 jazz and more. I'm Dave Washington, your host, and I will do what I generally do, and that is express condolences to those who have lost loved ones, to include, certainly, Walter Scott Scotty of the whispers, what a great voice he had. And again, condolences to his family. And I got many, many birthdays to express, so I will hold off on that. In the meantime, I'm going to invite a person I consider to be along with her husband, who is now deceased. He's an ancestor, Mike armagon, but this is Doreen armagon. She is the mother of my son in law, Nathan, who has good works, and my daughter, who is his sidekick for at least 20 years now, I believe it is how you doing, Doreen.

Doreen Armogan 1:48
Do count it a privilege of having this service and the spit I'm going to offer

Dave Washington 1:55
absolutely Doreen, let me say, let me say this with the world in the condition that it is. We got so many skirmishes, wars here, there and everywhere, even though we know that the Bible said there will be wars and talk of wars because of all the madness, and seemingly to me, we've lost our humanity, and it's really a sad state of affairs. So yeah,

Doreen Armogan 2:19
just wanting to say this, as I've been saying to those that will be listening in who are under stress and even those who have lost loved loved ones and grieving, they are wars, hatred and enmity, violence and confusion all over this World grant us peace in our time, there are misunderstandings, suspicious and agonism and hatred fills the air. Mm, make open, receptive channels, always ready to be a bearer the beautiful, the good and the pure around me.

Dave Washington 3:03
Thank you, Doreen. And I want you guys to know I know you heard the accent. Doreen is from Cape Town, South Africa. We appreciate you so very much. And we are so pleased that you were able to come to the United States, Las Vegas, Nevada, to visit with family. And we just love to have you around. And we know you got to get back to your children and other grandchildren, back down in Cape Town. So Safe travels, and look forward to seeing you this weekend. Take care once again. This is Veterans Affairs, plus on 91.5 jazz and more. I'm Dave Washington, your host, and I will go now with this list of birthdays. And can you believe it? Las Vegas, it is already July. This is we're taping today. You know, as as they say, this is a podcast, so it'll go live. We're not live. It'll be, it'll be aired on this Saturday. And I can tell you that, wow, before you blink an eye, we are into the month of July. That means that half of the year has already went past us. And wow, what can you say? How time flies and seemingly the older we get, the faster time seems to go by. And I want to thank my grandchildren, Kasara, KJ, Kais and Karen, they came over and helped grandpa with some work around the house. And I really appreciate them, and hopefully I'll get them back over this this weekend coming up, because my energy goes up and down, and I can tell you, when I got some help, it really helps me to get a few things done that ordinarily I wouldn't get done at my stage of health, if you will. With that, I'm going to talk about some birthdays, and there are many. One is our son, Vernon, Washington. We call him Ray Ray. His birthday is this month. Frank Hawkins, local, local businessman, Frank is doing a phenomenal job in terms of particularly and we will. Have on the show. In the next session, we'll have Senator Dean O'Neill, and hopefully she'll give us some enlightenment on what she and Frank had worked on, with regards to the folks over at Windsor Park. So that's that's a project that's coming along quite well. Dennis fountain. He's a cousin of mine, and he's one of them blues singers, and he can blow y'all so don't get it twisted. If you ever get down in in the Jackson, uh Vicksburg Tallulah, Louisiana area, you catch him playing somewhere on the weekends. Generally, that's tennis fountain. Clarissa McPhee, her birthday. Kim Fortson, neighbor birthday, former neighbor. J3 Mason birthday this month. Ruthie McRoy, I mean, there's many, many birthdays this month, the month of July. Brandon Campbell, and he's a world traveler. He's a, he's a, he's a specialized attorney doing, I forget that the area that he works in his specialty, but he is. He's doing a lot of traveling around the world, talking with different people. That's a great thing. And we certainly want to recognize and say happy anniversary to his mom and dad, that's gene and Deborah on their 40th wedding anniversary. So clap, clap for them and drum roll. Barbara Carter birthday this month, my one of my former secretaries. I think I had to do my 33 year career. I think I had about five or six different secretaries, but Carla Berry was a great Secretary when I was running a program out of old fire station seven over in Vegas heights. We ran a program out there, and Carla was very, very instrumental in getting a lot of things done that we were getting done throughout the community. Cleo Coleman, I still call her my aunt. She was married back in the day to my uncle John. So Cleo, we wish you well on your birthday. Long time family friend, Miss Linda Lee. Linda Lee's birthday is this month for sure, and we wish you the best Linda, longtime family friend, and of course, David Washington, the second His birthday is actually on the Fourth of July. And David, he could not stand fireworks. He really did not like them at all, but he's grown into him now. So happy birthday grandson. And Joe Whitlow, her birthday is this month as well. So all those birthday people and we have more for our when we do our next show, we'll express appreciation and happy birthday to those folks. But as of now, once again, this is Veterans Affairs, plus on 91.5 jazz and more upcoming shortly, as I mentioned last show that we would have Senator Dina Neal, and she's going to give us some indication of what's going on, or what did go on in this past session of our legislative session up in Carson City. So with that, we'll talk to you on the other side. Once

Dave Washington 8:20
again, this is Veterans Affairs, plus on 91.5 jazz and more. I'm Dave Washington, your host, and we have Senator Dina Neal, and we're so pleased. We're so pleased that God has given you favor. So how's everything been for you?

Dina Neal 8:36
Everything's been good. Everything's been really good. I'm grateful that I was able to be in the 25 legislative session.

Dave Washington 8:46
Which session was that?

Dina Neal 8:48
2025 2025

Dave Washington 8:51
All right, 2025 the legislative session. So give us an update. Give us some of the kind of the things that were accomplished. And I know there's crunch time. I just happened to see the assembly person leaving from taping her show, and she's just talked about how at those last few weeks, they start crunching things in. You got to be very careful on the possibility of people slipping stuff in, if you will.

Dina Neal 9:16
That is very true. So I there was a lot of good work, but there were also a lot of bills that you know the Governor vetoed. He vetoed 87 bills. His track record last session 23 was 75 bills. He vetoed SD 128, which was my bill that actually was going to deal with the artificial intelligence being used for doctor, for insurance, pre authorization, so to try to make sure that a doctor will have a say, versus an AI tool. Tool. And the reason why I brought that policy is because in 2023 United Health had used an artificial intelligence tool that made medical decisions on what was going to be pre authorized, and two elderly women died, and it was understood that the tool itself was 90% faulty, but it was still used in this. And the two women's estate sued United Health. And so that was in that bill. And then I also had stem cell therapy in the bill, because we've advanced so much with stem cell therapy related to arthritis and osteoarthritis, Mayo Clinic has advanced in that space since 2017 and he vetoed the bill, claiming that Stem Cell was not, I guess, a legitimate policy. Listening to folks from the Medical Association who were claiming it was Kook science. So, yeah, like stem cell, you know, it was a matter of folks not being researched and paying attention. Because I'm like, we've advanced to the point where it's a DNA technique called CRISPR, where you could literally go in and cut the DNA that is causing the disease and then so that it won't keep replicating. And they've they've done that with sickle cell and but before they were even doing it with sickle cell, they were they were doing a DNA cutting of DNA for malaria and mosquitoes in Africa, like 15 years ago, right? So I was just like, I'm gonna need somebody to read and stay up to date on medical science, because this is real, and arthritis is affecting millions of people, absolutely, nationally,

Dave Washington 12:06
yeah. And, you know, I thought that, well, not thought the research has been done and stem cell has been around for a number of years. It ain't like this just came about

Dina Neal 12:16
over, yeah, over 2025, almost 30 years. I mean, it's super advanced with in terms of cancer, right, and the techniques with cancer. So why? You know, it was crazy. It was the last I had made a move from two houses. It was this lobbyist running around, trying to kill it, making up stuff. And I was just like, I can't. She also the Nevada Medical Association also was against my bill, that it was a big omnibus health care bill. I was trying to get testosterone paid for for women who were going through menopause because the insurance companies weren't covering it. And come to find out that there was a law passed in 2021 that stated that they should have been covering it. But in the bill, what they objected to was doing EKG on students before they play sports. And what was so crazy about it was that there was already a contract an MOU with CCSD, with this company to do a EKG, because we had all of those stories of students dying before they go play sports, and we find out that they had a heart condition, and their argument was, oh, well, it's gonna, you know, their health insurance isn't going to cover it. This is going to be expensive for the students. And I'm just like, is it more expensive to bury the child or to get an EKP Right, right? And they were saying that, you know, cause all these problems. And I'm just like, it's already happening, you know, already being done. One

Dave Washington 14:00
thing, Senator, one thing, I continue to say on this show, and I'm not speaking for UNLV, and Jason always covers, you know, the give the disclaimer. You know, we've lost our humanity. Why can't you care about people? I mean, because this, this, this is not something that has not been properly researched, and they should, you know, let's do this to help someone and these students, because there's all kind of, I've hear horror stories every week about some child dying. You know, they were involved in some sports activity and they didn't realize they had this, or that it's, it's crazy.

Dina Neal 14:36
Yeah, it was pretty crazy. And then I had a bill on HOAs, the Governor vetoed that. SB, 121, and so what, what brought me to bring that bill was if you had a small business, or if you have been working in a company truck or car, and they give you that car. Hmm, certain HOAs will say that you can't park it on the street in front of your house unless you cover it up with a magnet. Now your ccnrs will state that, but I was with the law right overriding the covenant that is in the HOA. So because I'm just like, not only is this protecting folks that have to go to work, I mean, it's a blessing that the company even gives you a car. Number one, two, if you have a small business, you have some form of advertising on your car, right? So it's your house. So why shouldn't you be able to park the car in front of your house without being forced to cover it. I also had a piece in there. So when you first buy your house, you normally the standard is, within 180 days six months, you have to landscape the backyard, because the front yard is usually landscape right. And so most people after moving in, right, you're tapped out. You just bought your, you know, blinds, refrigerator, all of your appliances, your furniture, and you don't have any additional money to then go spend 30k right to landscape your backyard. So I was, I was buying 18 months for them to be able to landscape their yards. So number one, a family could save money not be hit with all these notices from the HOA that you need to landscape your backyard. Go into debt because you can't afford to do it, and he vetoed it. So

Dave Washington 16:34
the HoH right now is you got one year, and you were trying to extend it to 18 months. You

Dina Neal 16:41
have six months, 680 days. I

Dave Washington 16:45
missed that over 180 days, and you were trying to get it up to, yeah,

Dina Neal 16:49
18 months. So you would have in the bill. It was 18 months. You could lay a thin layer of rock, and then within 24 months, fully landscape the backyard. And he vetoed that bill.

Dave Washington 17:01
That seems a reasonable thing to me, because I certainly appreciate your point that when you move into a new home, more times than not, you're going to be tapped for your dollars. So giving somebody a reasonable amount of time to to get that together, it just makes sense to me. So what else you got? Go ahead,

Dina Neal 17:22
I'm my God. And then the, I know, he vetoed like six of my bills. He thinks that. I mean, I'm slightly mad, but at the end of the day, I'm like, I'm coming back. So we'll deal with that later. So and and the the bill to limit corporations from buying up property. It was just one part of the housing solution. He vetoed it when 23 I brought the bill back, and this time, he told the caucus, the Republican caucus, that they needed to vote against it so he wouldn't have to veto it. And so there was a whole floor speech from Senator Hanson, who's a Republican, lives in the north, and he basically outed the governor on forcing the caucus to vote against the policy. And then when I tried to do they were like, Okay, well, if you bring it back, because I had two Republicans and wanted to vote for it, and so I was given an amendment from the chief of staff, and then all of a sudden that they acted like the Chief of Staff acted like, I don't understand where this language is coming from. And I was just like, I had to have my legislative assistant run the language down to the floor have Senator Hanson verify, hey, this is, this is language he gave to us. I had to highlight and circle the page, give it to the majority leader and say this is the exact language that he gave. And he's out here acting brand new like he never thought before, because the senator Hanson wanted he was going to vote for it. He was going to flip his vote and vote for it so it could pass. I mean, the level of just, I don't know this every session is special for one reason or another, right? But this one was special because folks were not keeping their word.

Dave Washington 19:20
That is a sad state of affairs. And mention the bill again, because I think that's something that is critical that the public needs to be aware of.

Dina Neal 19:29
SB 391 would have limited the ability for corporations, hedge funds, to come in and siphon up properties, which they were doing in poor and low income communities. Yes, and they're also buying and building entire neighborhoods in the Southwest for rent.

Dave Washington 19:49
You know, those folks and then what they turn around. And I've been watching this to some extent, and I want to say so everybody will know, because I mentioned this often. I am not a. Journalist. I'm a talk show host, so, you know, I don't, I don't bring people on here to try to beat them up or anything like that. I just want to get word out on things that are, that are very important to our community, and we're mostly operating particularly, that's why I call it Veterans Affairs plus, because on the plus side, we talk about other things that are important. I think this is important because there are some big, big companies coming in and they buying up all this property, and then they turn around, they won't even sell it to you. They rent it to you, and as you're paying that rent, the equity is going up on that property that's owned by somebody else, these big boys. It's ridiculous. We Well, I hope you take it back, Senator, because I think it's something that's important. In fact, we need to have a groundswell of support for you in that regard. And I know my wife gonna say, you always into something you don't have no but it's just important that we get this word out to people, because we've got to let folks know what is going on around us. Because otherwise, you look up and say, man who owns this community, well, this company that coming out, and I know some company names, but, you know, I don't have no attorney to protect me again. I'm not a I'm not a journalist, but I can tell you this, there's some big companies out there that's going in, to include banks going in, sweeping up and buying all this property, man, and then the people wind up owning nothing. That's crazy, but exactly so I'll do what I can to get the word out for sure, because I think it makes so much sense that we put a stop to all this madness that's going on. How big do you have to be? How big do you want to be? And the other guy, I won't even call his name, running out, running out, and spending all these millions of dollars for a wedding. Are you kidding me? What are you doing? Why there's people anyway. Let me get off my tangent. Go ahead, Senator, what else you got? Because we got, we got, we got, right about a 20 minutes total.

Dina Neal 21:52
There's, there's so much, right? I mean, the the session was the dramatic to say the least. I I'm still, you know, pushing Windsor port, Windsor Park forward, which was the sinking neighborhood in North Las Vegas that I've been actively pushing since 2019 and we finally, in 23 we got money to move them. And then in 25 I went back for part two to clean up some legislation and ask for additional money, and it died on the Senate floor. It passed both houses and died. But nonetheless, right? I'm not a person that gives up. We're headed to the city council, actually, this week, so that the city of North Las Vegas can vote on moving the project forward so we can start building and so we,

Dave Washington 22:55
yes, I was just gonna say, you got your daddy's jeans. You ain't gonna You ain't gonna quit fighting. You're gonna fight to the end, which we admire, because I think you gotta, if it's something that's good for the people, the people who's quote, unquote, supposed to represent the people that's what you're supposed to be doing. So I admire and appreciate you and and keep you in prayer in that regard, because I think it's important for someone to stand up to things that are that are going on again, just allowing these people to come in and buy all this property makes no sense.

Dina Neal 23:26
Well, yeah, I just think you know, one thing that my dad taught me, you know now deceased Senator Joe Neal, or former senator Joe Neal, was that if you serve your people and in your district, it will always be the best thing that you ever do. He was like, you always go back into the community. You're not above the community, and you only elected to do one thing, fight for the policy that is going to change and affect their lives, and to stand up for them, not stand by.

Dave Washington 24:03
That's right. You gotta go out there and do the work. So we got about three more minutes, I think, or so. So what else is going on? Or any closing remarks you'd like to make to our general? You

Dina Neal 24:15
know, my closing remarks are, you know, this, 26 election is going to be pretty serious. We have a lot of people that are running. We have ag Ford that is running for governor. It matters. We need to make sure we have Nicole cannazaro that's running for AG. And so this is the time for people to start paying attention, right? It's not 26 it's now, right? And really getting involved with how do I become more active? How do I support good candidates that actually want to fight for Nevadans? We're not playing anymore, right? They're sitting on the sideline being a selfish leader. You actually. Need to fight for Nevadans and stand up, because in this environment, presidentially, we are, we are getting ready to suffer in serious ways. And so if we don't have a leader that says Nevadans first, then we're going to fall by the wayside.

Dave Washington 25:15
Well, I'll tell you, senator for sure. I can I keep telling people and last show I mentioned that project 2025, is about 40% I don't know where they are percentage wise. Now, of getting some of these ridiculous items that they are pushing forward, and I can tell you that people don't really understand. You know, you know, I debate to some extent. I say debate, but we talk about what is happening with the immigrants, and I can tell you that if they come for one group today, they'll come for another one tomorrow. And a case in point is the Haitians. Now they're they're being deported. It's you got to stop it at some point, because otherwise it's just going to be total disruption of our country. And I think that America can do better. And I certainly support you and believe in your point that we must be involved. We can't wait and say, you know somebody else is going to do it. In fact, I'm trying to round up Dr Ruby Duncan, Mr. Virginia Brewster, because these folks have done some things that I know were purposeful for people and all people. I mean, they focus on African Americans to some extent, but they also cared about people in general. And I still say, and I'll continue to as long as I can breathe, say that we have lost our humanity, Senator, we really appreciate you, and anything that we can do to, again, help you to push forward some of those ideas and and bills that you're pushing. We will do that because I think it's important. So you always got a seat or on the telephone, you always got a line on the phone, or you can come in and take a seat in the studio. Which doctor, yeah, really he, thank you. Thank you. Wes. He's doing a fine job. You should see the studio now, Senator, it's really cool. So we thank you so much, and look forward to talking to you again and Godspeed with your help.

Dina Neal 27:09
Thank you. Thank you for having me

Dave Washington 27:12
for sure, once again, Las Vegas. This is Veterans Affairs, plus on 91.5 jazz and more, we had Miss Doreen armor gun to give us a prayer to try to help save this crazy world. And then we had, oh boy, Senator Dino to give us an update, legislative Update. So thank you. We'll talk to you soon.

Music 27:42
You we learn all the smoke in the air till they hate when they stare, all the pain that we bear, all you bet.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai