It's night Side with Dan Ray on WBZ Boston Radio.
Thanks very much, Madison, as we start a Friday night here on Nightside, WBZ, Boston's news radio ten thirty and your AM dial. We are headed toward midnight. It'll be a little less than four hours, will take you right right to the cusp of Saturday morning. We are now officially in the weekend on Friday night. But you may be in the car somewhere headed north south west. If you're heading east, I don't know, watch out for that ocean. Now. You could be heading east if you're coming into Boston
from Worcester. So wherever you are, wherever your head, and we'll keep your company all the way. And of course when you get home, just flip on the radio at home, you can flip on your computer and let's listen to us on the iHeartRadio app. Just check out WBZ on the iHeart Radio app and you'll be all set. My name's Dan Ray. I'm the host of Nightside here every weeknight with Rob Brooks. He's back in the control room. We'll be get taken for phone calls at nine o'clock.
But during the Nightside news hour, as we do every night, we talked to four newsmakers. They may not be the breaking news type of newsmakers you've heard about, but people who are trying to have a positive impact in the community in many instances, and I think certainly. Steph lewis the president and CEO of The Base, which is a nonprofit that creates new pathways to success for urban youth. Fits that mold a good evening, Steph, How are you tonight?
I'm doing really well, Dan, thank you so much for having me.
You're welcome. I'm a huge believer in sports, particularly for young people. Keep them tired, keep them out of trouble. Your nonprofit is based here in Boston, but it really has a national base, if you will pardon the pun. Here tell us about the National Urban Sports Classic the NUSC, which will be coming up here in Boston the week of July thirty first through August first, which of course
is the the week that starts on Monday. You've got a lot of kids coming in from around the country as I understand it.
Yes, yes, yes, so it's actually the July thirty first through August fourth, But we have young folks coming from seven different states, eight different cities. Chicago Atlanta, New York, New Jersey, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, you know, again in the greater Boston region. And really what we decided is, how do we create an environment and how do we create a sports a sports tournament where we're bringing folks together, right with a sense of connectivity, with a sense of community.
But how do we graten it where it's just more than just the sports itself, but implement career, implement education and professionals that young folks can see themselves to be in the future. And you know, one of the influences that came from it is, you know, Boston is one of the only, you know, one of the few, if not the only, major cities without a highway that runs
through it. So within Boston, right, we have a sense of connectivity amongst ourselves, and so what we wanted to do is highlight that connectivity amongst the different young folks and the different programs coming around the country and really get a sense of feel some of the great things that Boston has to offer, such as our educational institutions and more So.
You started this program, I guess you started it as an idea back in what twenty fifteen, Yeah, so our program.
Actually we started eleven years ago, right and so it's where eleven years strong right now, was actually founded by my father, actually Robert Lewis, who now oversees all the Boys and Girls clubs of Boston and I've been at
the role I've headed for the past two years. But really where it came from was he was always a baseball coach and you know, might see we're traveling around the country, but he's always worked in pelanthropy, and so he figured out a way to take urban youth and be able to allow us to be able to have an amazing experience in sports without ever having to pay
for anything. And so what he ended up doing was taking his passion for sports and coaching and taking his knowledge through his career and nonprofit and marry the two and that's where the base was born. And SAIDs up, how do we get young folks to utilize sports as a way to showcase their greatness? And really, how do we get those young folks to showcase their greatness to really challenge America of how they view urban youth, right, because our young folks are just as talented as anybody else.
And what we all know is talent is evenly distributed, but the access opportunity isn't And so what we want to do is allow our young folks to be able to stand on our shoulders, utilize us, to then continue on with what they desire to do next.
So the sports that we have the Olympics going on, but the sports here in Boston next week with the National Urban Sports Classic involves baseball, softball, and basketball. And obviously baseball tends to be a boys sport, softball tends to be a girls sport, and basketball we have now found out we have great men and women's basketball players at the professional level WNBA, et cetera. So is that those the three sports that base is built upon?
It absolutely is. So those are the three sports that this event is and that the base is built upon. But you know, we do a lot of other work with a lot of the other sports based youth development organizations here in the city and beyond as well. But what we're proud again is to be able to provide
this opportunity for these different programs to come in. You know, as I mentioned before, you know, we were kind of based off of the idea of philanthropy and we understood really had a fundraise to provide an opportunity for our young folks. But a lot of the programs that are coming in are just your regular neighborhood programs of folks that really just care about kids, care about the sport, but don't quite know where their next dollar for their
program is going to come from. And so what we decided to do was we house every single program and a local college so that we staying at Boston University. We feed them breakfast every day, and we have cookouts every night so that therefore programs don't have to worry about food. And then they're playing games all on college fields, so from UMass Boston to Boston College and they're getting just a top of the line sports experience. And let me be clear, though we're doing this for the other
programs free, we haven't diluted our sports. It's very competitive. There's some amazing athletes that are coming out on the basketball side as well on the softball side as well. You're seeing some amazing sports and that's just something we're super proud to be a part to showcase because it's almost as if you sports has almost become intellectual property that you have to pay in order to be able
to gain the knowledge. And what we wanted to do is showcase that no, if you just give kids the opportunity, they could do some great things too.
So let's talk about the colleges that are helping you out here. You Mass Boston, which I'm very close to, Boston College. What are the other schools that are that are really pitching in.
Yeah, so we have you Mass Boston, we have Boston College as you mentioned, and then we have some of our other partnering schools. We have Assumption University as well as American International College. So the Base we've actually created a scholarship program with the UMass system, with American International College and Assumption University where we can look at every single one of our participants and say, truly, through these scholarships that we have, every young person that goes to
the Base can go to college room boards. Wish it for free.
I don't mean the Rushia his Steff. You give me a lot of information. Your funding comes from private groups and all of that. Generally, I assume that this is not a program that you can tap into big federal dollars for. You must raise the money yourself, I assume.
Yeah, so we're just short of a three million dollar budget, and I go out and fundraise and so it's corporate, individual as well as grants.
So how can folks get in touch with you? Or what's the website? One? If they want to support you financially number one or number two? They want to come out and see some of these great competitions in the next week or so. Is there a big Is there a schedule somewhere that people can look at.
Absolutely, just go on tobase dot org wwwthebas dot org and all our information is there from the donate but at the very top to our programming you'll see the National Urban Sports Classic, where we have our schedule post it online.
Perfect perfect Steph, best of luck with us. I played a lot of sports in the city of Boston on a lot of those fields from Reville to East Boston to just about every community northeast, west and south in Boston, and sports were really a great pathway for me for both schools, and what you're doing for these kids is amazing. So thanks very much for what you're doing, Thanks for being with us tonight, and best of luck next week. Everybody.
Everybody should be successful. Next week we lose a draw Thanks.
Steph, Thank you so much.
Dan, You're welcome when we get back. When we talk about a Boston attorney who rescued a puppy from an island in the Caribbean called Saint Lucia. Now he's suing a challenge which has been imposed to being from entering the United States. Going to talk with Attorney Aaron Katz. If there's anything that I feel more passionate about the youth sports, it's dogs. So we got a daily double
here on Nightside. We'll get to Attorney Alan Katz right after the break as we start our way through an interesting Friday night here on Nightside.
Now back to Dan ray Line from the Window World Nightside Studios on WBZ News Radio.
Well, I think all of you know how I feel about pets, particularly dogs canines. With me is Attorney Aaron Katz. He is an attorney based here in Boston, and he happened to rescue a puppy from Saint Lucia according to an article we read in the Boston Globe, and that has started him on a journey which now finds him suing in federal court. Attorney Kats, welcome to Nightside. How are you.
I'm good Dan, how are you great?
So tell us? Obviously you and I both love animals, pets and dogs particularly. I believe I finished my show every night, All dogs, all cats, all pets go to Heaven, and I do believe that. But they're not all born into good sets of circumstances. And you, I guess found that out on a visit to the island of Saint Lucia. Tell us about it.
Yeah, So we planned a family trip down to Saint Lucia in April of twenty twenty three, and my wife was doing a little bit of research on one of the hotels that we were looking at and was on their Facebook page and actually saw a post from a rescue organization called the Bruno Project talking about the need to you know, find adoptive families for some rescues that
they had on the island. And you know, I'm a sucker for dogs and my wife is as well, and we agreed to take two puppies actually on our trip back to Logan to give them to their adoptive families in New Hampshire. And when we met the puppies at the Saint Lucia airport, we were told that one of the puppies his family had fallen through, and they asked if we wanted to adopt him, and we looked at him.
He was he was adorable. He was very nervous, but you know, I put him in my arms and we just immediately fell in love with him and agreed to adopt them. And you know, the rest is the rest is history.
So then you found out that apparently the uh, the adoption of puppies from some parts of the world have been complicated and in this and you ended up in Central District Court. Tell us about it.
Yeah, So I continued to you know, sort of do volunteer work with the Bruno Project. Once I found out, you know, what the organization was all about, I felt compelled to help the organization. So I would donate money and you know, do other things, help with supplies, things like that. And my wife also sort of just followed,
you know, sort of dog rescue organizations. And she actually saw that the CDC had announced a new regulation that was going to go into place on August first, twenty twenty four, and she was very concerned because it seemed like it was, you know, basically going to prevent dogs like my little Adobe from coming to the United States before six months of age. And so I reached out to the Bruno Project to see if they knew about this.
They did. They told me all the complications that it was going to cause in their rescue efforts, and it's it's really dramatically disruptive to the organization and very detrimental to their rescue efforts. And so I said, you know, I think we should sue the CDC in federal court. Under the Administrative Procedure Act, you can pursue sort of legislative avenues as well, but I think we need to pursue a legal path as well.
Yes, this is supposed to go to effecting next week on August first.
Yeah, So we whipped up a complaint sort of as quickly as we could. I sort of did a crash course on the CDC's rulemaking on canine rabies, you know, really all the issues involved in this. Wrote up a federal complaint pretty quickly. We got I think about six other organizations on board. We shopped the complaints around to see what other organizations in the Caribbean wanted to sign on.
Once we had all the organizations that wanted to sign on, you know, I filed in Boston Federal Court, and I recently moved to stay basically a preliminary injunction to try to put a halt to the regulation. We filed that a couple of weeks ago, and the government about an hour and a half ago put in their put in their response brief. So we'll put in a reply this weekend and hopefully the judge will hear us next week.
So you know it scheduled, yeah for a hearing, but let's hope you get it before August first, so the judge has time to act in advance of August first. Now, this all started as nistand with a dog that came from a different part of the world, had rabies that had been adopted by a family in Pennsylvania. So is
this the genesis of the uh? You know, this new ruling that has gone into one Dog, One Dog has prompted this, this this rule that now is going to affect thousands, if not taken thousands of potential adoptees.
Yeah, the CDC. You know, when when an agency comes out with a new regulation, they issue a rule making statement to try to explain why they're enacting or announcing this new regulation. And they said that there were four cases of poppies or dogs coming into the United States with canine rabies. I think three were from Egypt, one was from ozer by John. None of them were from
the Caribbean. None of them were from canine rabies free countries like Saint Lucian all the other Caribbean islands are designated by the CDC, So it was really I mean, it's almost like if someone goes in shop lists you just arrest the entire town, right they disarrest everyone in town and throw them all in jail. That's what it feels like.
To me, overly broad administrative action that would seem to me.
Sure.
By the way, my daughter and we have where I am right now, a beautiful Corgie. It's about probably three years old. My daughter adopted him from a shelter two years ago, and the amount of joy and happiness that Mustard has brought into our family is beyond description, to be honest with you. So obviously you're doing I think the right thing here for a lot of people. With all the dogs that we have in this country, we have kill shelters, and you know, we have a lot
of dogs in this country. How many people end up adopting dogs in America from offshore. Do you have any idea as your research discovered that issue, as to how many people are potentially affected here?
Yeah, I think the Bruno Project at last count, since they sort of formally formed about six or seven years ago, you know, they're up to several thousand dogs. I think they may be you know, pushing eight or nine thousand dogs that they have gotten adopted, largely in the United States, some in Canada. I think a very small percentage might be adopted by families in Europe and these other organizations I think have very similar numbers. So we are talking about,
you know, thousands of dogs per year. And I certainly understand, you know, some people's views that there are already enough dogs in US shelters, why aren't we adopting them. I'm a champion of all dogs, so I'm supporting those shelters, those strays in the United States, but also the dogs coming from these islands that really deserve a chance.
And what can individuals who are listening to the show tonight, who who like you, love dogs, other than following the case and certainly try to follow the case next week and see what happens. Hopefully you get you get a hearing and it's just not done on paper, and you actually get in front of the district court judge and you get a ruling that is a ruling we want.
But what what can people do to support you? I mean, I I assume that this is the case that's costing you a lot of money to to to go forward, and you probably don't have a class per se, you don't have someone with big bucks. What what what's going on? I mean, what what can we do to help you?
Yeah?
Well no, I so I'm doing this pro bono and you know, for a for a lawyer, time is money. But I'm willing to donate my time. If I have to go into pocket for experts or whatever, you know, that's that's fine. You know, we'll make that happen. I think what people can do. You know, first, if you feel strongly about these organizations, donate, you know, Google search them, find out what they need. Sometimes they just need supplies to help foster the dogs on the island themselves, you know,
money for dog food, money for veterinarian care. That's one thing people can do. The other thing is that legislative change always is the most durable. And so if you feel strongly, call your congress person, call your senator. You know, I'm planning on calling our senators here in Massachusetts, my representative, you know, here in Middlesex County and letting them know that you know, this is an issue that I think cuts across the aisle and that you know, frankly, I
think Congress should look at because the CDC. I think this is an example of an agency just run a monk.
Yeah, I mean, it's an agency almost in search of a cause. It sounds to me like if there are two or three dogs that came into the country with rabies, I would assume there would be a way to isolate those dogs, get them healthy, make sure that no one is injured. There's a way to do it other than just banning all dogs from coming into the country, you know, all.
Adult Absolutely absolutely. I mean I call this sort of an irrational solution to a non existent problem. And you know that's what happens.
It's a solution in search of a problem.
Absolutely. And look, sometimes that's just how agencies act. And that's why I think, you know, sometimes courts just need to step in.
Well. Attorney Aaron Katz. Best of luck, will follow it and get get a hopefully you get a good ruling, and if you if you have to get some sort of an injunction to stop the ruling from going into effect. That that's the first step. And best of luck in court or whenever you get into court. But best of the best, best of luck as you pursue what for you is more than an important legal issue, obviously, it's kind of personal. And best of luck. I hope you.
Probably so much.
Thanks.
I appreciate it, Dan, thank youlome Attorney Aaron Katz.
When we get back, we're going to talk about something which I'd never heard of. There's a lot of the topics here on a night side, particularly the first hour, that I that I do not know a lot about. It's called the disciplined listening method. How a certified forensic interviewer unlocks hidden value in every conversation. Well, I should learn about this because that's what I do for a living.
We engage in conversations. I'll be back with Michael Reddington right after this break news at the bottom of the arrow. My name's Dan Ray. Rob Brooks is back in the control room. Don't call yet. We'll open up the phone lines after nine o'clock. We'll tell you what topics we're going to talk about tonight, and I'll also remind you we will have a snap presidential poll, as we do every final eleven o'clock twentieth hour Friday night. We've done this March, April, May, June, and this will be our
fifth in July. We have a different Democratic nominee this time. Obviously, we'll see if that changes things. But in the meantime, sit back, listen to the news, and we'll be back on the other side, and we'll both learn about this disciplined listening method. Probably all of us can benefit from that.
It's nice with Dan Ray Boston's news Radio.
All right, this is something very well occasionally there's something that I learned about here on night side. Actually I learned a lot, but I have never heard about the disciplined and listening method. And with us is Michael Reddington. He's a certified forensic interviewer. Michael Reddington. That sounds pretty fancy. What let's start with the basics. What is a certified forensic interviewer?
Well appreciate having me on, Dan, Thank you very much. A certified forensic interviewer as a professional investigator who has achieved the designated, the designation of expertise. That really means that they should be able to conduct a morally, legally and ethically successful interview across a wide variety of context and investigations.
So, do you work on criminal investigations as well as, you know, private investigations. Yeah.
Previously in my career, yes, although I'm still on the board for the International Association of Interviewers, I spent my time largely working as an executive resource currently, but in my time as an investigator, I worked a lot in the private sector, so white collar crime, fraud, investment, theft, harassment, discrimination, so forth, but also on the criminal side as well. Unfortunately, your assault cases, your crimes against people cases, sexual violence and such.
Okay, So explain to us then, the concept of forensic interview. Most of us we think of forensics. We think of looking at you know, blood samples and entire tracks, things that are all scientific. It sounds to me like this is scientific way to listen to interviews.
You nailed it. It really is a scientific backed approach where you're conductingat investigative interviews in a way to gather the evidence necessary for successful judication of whatever the incident is, and that could be through an hr eer process on the private sector side, or through the court process that more people are familiar with on the public sectoricide.
Okay, so you wrote a book called The Disciplined Listening Method. Explain it on a practical basis. What can people learn from the book that will have application in their in their personal life, assuming most of them are not professional investigators.
So to use the parliaments we were just speaking in. Really it's how to obtain the everyday confession. So if we think about it, really, all the confession is is somebody choosing to share sensitive information under vulnerable circumstances in the face of consequences. And if we think about it as parents, as bosses, as friends, as sales professionals, leaders, negotiators, teachers, list goes on. How many times a day do we ask people to a sensitive information under vulnerable circumstances in
the face of perceived consequences is constant. So what we've done with the discipline Listening Method is we've taken research and best practices from both the world of investigative interviewing and business communication to provide people with strategy tactics frameworks to continue to evolve their strategic observation and ethical persuasion techniques.
It really comes down to, if you want somebody to share information that they feel at all is sensitive, how do we help them save faith and how do we create the communication experience that they need in order for them to feel comfortable sharing the information.
Okay, I want you to get a little specific with me on this, Okay, because I'm certain I'm an attorney, and in my practice, I've been involved in depositions and as a reporter for many many years, I was involved in investing gative journalism, and I did stories in television here for WBZ and Boston that put a well known
insane presidential candidate in jail. And I also was able to procure the release or help procure the release of four men who had been had been indicted intentionally and wrongfully by corrupt FBI agents for murder they had never had anything whatsoever to do with And so it takes a lot, but give us give us kind of a more everyday example of how you would apply your theories here and what people could learn from the book that would help them in their own personal.
Lives certainly, so we started a family level. So one of our principles is focus on the issue, not the person, focus on the resolution, not the consequences. So quite often we ask questions that come across as accusatory when we don't mean them to be. So anytime you start a question with did you or why didn't you, people feel immediately accused or why you know, why did you or
why didn't you? People feel immediately accused. So instead of making the question about the person, make the question about the outcome or the issue that you're trying to resolve. And perhaps the simplest one ever, which actually resolved a quite comedic disagreement between my wife and I, is instead of saying every morning, did you feed the dog? That has the dog been said yet? Because if you say did you feed the dog? Really, what that feels like is you're accusing me of not feeding the dog.
Yelp. Whoever the you is, it's your responsibility, and what you're saying is that's really a shared responsibility in a family unless one of you has assumed that responsibility to the exclusion of the other person. I get that. Okay, that's that's a pretty goodntion. So what you're saying is that that that the language, the approach of the language often can adduce a better response.
Yes, the word choices that we make are going to elicit an emotional response from our counterparts. Unfortunately, all too often they create an unintentional or listen, an unintentional emotional response from our counterparts that cause us somebody to react in a way that we didn't anticipate, which then begins to fuel a little bit of confrontation because now that surprised us. That's not what we wanted, that's not what
our intentions, and we respond in kind. Even if you flip into a teenager that was supposed to be home at midnight and they come strolling in at twelve thirty, sure we can go ahead and confront them, but we know that's just going to be met with immediate resistance. So instead of hitting them with a while, were you late? You know what your curfew was, you don't listen, you don't care, give me the keys, you know, how much
did you drink tonight? Those kind of questions. Instead, if we hit them with, well, you know, it's easy to get carried away. And we've got friends who maybe need a ride home and aren't ready to go yet. I'm just curious, how early in the evening did you start to realize that you likely weren't going to make it home by midnight.
Yeah, you know, it's funny. I have one. I tend to be the person in my house who goes to the grocery store. I happen to enjoy a guy, but I like going to the grocery store because I like making sure that the food in the house is fresh and that I check out, you know, used by labels and stuff like that. That's just something. And I also like to watch my dollars. I used to say my pennies,
that's red gone, not my dollars. And some folks in my family am not going to identify who although they know who I'm talking about, they will always say to me, are you going to the store today? And I I kind of after a while, I would say, well, you know, why don't you just ask me would you mind going to the store? And you get a better response because if it's are you going to the store today, it's sort of like I'm going to ask you to do
something if you say yes, but you're going anyway? It's almost like that track.
You know.
So that's an example of language that I think is important. Someoneld say it's pretty picky, owned I would where you would sit on that one.
I don't think it's picky. I think it's strategic. And to think about applying a strategic thought process to our personal conversations might turn some people's stomachs or raise an eyebrow, but really what we're doing is we're cultivating the best relationships we can. And we're not perfect, and we all have our moments. But the word choice is going to convey respect, It's going to convey care or empathy or
concern or whatever it is in the situation. So to your point, absolutely, are you're gonna go to the store today?
Is that what.
Feels like a trap question? Because if I say no, You're going to ask me to which is what you really want to do. But if I say yes, now, really what I'm doing is stepping up to volunteer to do whatever it is you want me to do. So instead, if the question was I'll use the term dad, I don't mean to potentially throw any of your children under the bus. If that's what they.
Trust me on that before both of us get into big trouble there you go. Hi, all right, So give us the name of the book again and how they can find that The Disciplined Listening Method available.
Where Amazon, Barns and Nobles, and they can sample it at discipline Listening dot com.
Sounds great, sounds great. Enjoy the conversation. I really did, Michael, you I learned a lot. Thank you very much.
Appreciate have a great evening you too when we get back.
When we talk about normally we talk about bad weather here. We've had some bad weather weekends here in New England for those of you around the country, Yes, all of us have had bad weather weekends. But we have a perfect weather weekend. We had a just a Chamber of Commerce day today, we have another Chamber of Commerce day tomorrow and Sunday. It's going to be almost perfect, almost perfect, and then we're going to get back into some of
the muggy heat next week. But we're going to talk when we get back about with one of our ACU weather meteorologist, John Ferrick, about why we're going to be so lucky this weekend. It's a great weather forecast. Let's luxuriate it. We'll be back with John Ferrick right after the break here on Nightside.
Now back to Dan Ray live from the Window World Nightside Studios on WBZ News Radio.
Well, if you're listening to me in New England tonight, you know that we had a beautiful weather day this Friday, and we have another beautiful weather day coming up tomorrow and pretty much a carbon copy I think, coming up on Sunday with us as ACCU Weather meteorologist John Ferrick. John, normally we're talking to you about a rainy weekend or you know, all sorts of problems in the wintertime. We're talking about a snowstorm coming. And is there a better
weather weekend that we will ever enjoy? In your this weekend?
I don't think so, Dan, I think, uh, you know, at least as far as late July goes with the low humidity, Yeah, I think this is about as good as you could ask for.
So why are we so lucky here? Everything? I know we've gone through some really hot, humid weather in July, but it's July. You expect that What what forces have combined to give us everything we wanted? Here? Uh? This weekend? Everything everything is lined up correctly. What why are we so lucky.
Well, just the timing of a cold front came through yesterday, you know, and and behind that front and humidity has dropped significantly, and then we've got cool Canadian high pressure that's in control, you know, cool as far as July standards anyway, And that's pretty much going to be in control right through the weekend. It starts to give way a little bit early next week, but you know, through Sunday, things are looking really nice.
You know, last summer, if I'm correct, we had a lot of rainy weekends, and then we started out this summer too, having a couple of decent weekends but a lot of kind of off rainy weekends that I assume that's just the luck of the draw, right realistically, or is that the most part.
Yeah, that's yeah, exactly, that's just the luck of the draw for the most part.
Yeah. And you probably haven't done this, but I'm just wondering if you've taken a look back again. This is the last weekend of July. One would argue, this is the middle of the summer. June is behind us, July is almost over, Labor Days five or six weeks away, and then the thing's cool up this is the middle of This is the middle weekend, one of the middle
weekends of summer. Can you look back in your memory bank or even on them and find find one that is as crystal clear as today without the humidity, but a nice blue, bright blue sunny sky. I mean, I I'm assuming that really we had a good one. Go ahead.
I'm sorry, no, sorry, no, last weekend wasn't too bad, but it was you know, it wasn't probably as nice as this one. And and you know, you go back the weekend after the fourth of July, I really wasn't a whole lot of rain to speak of with that, but yeah, it's it's been hard to come by in general. You go back into June and certainly there was a lot more in terms of at least one day kind of having having some problems.
You know, the other the other thing too, John, And I don't want to make this sound like a Chamber of a New England Chamber of Congress, but you look around the country and you look at the tornadoes that have hit all across well generally the plains in the Midwest and now Upper New York State. You'll look at some of the flooding down in Houston earlier this month. Some of the rainstorms that that have just been unbelievably
horrific for people. And you realize that we get our problems up here, but our weather in New England I think, for the most part, is the best weather in the country. My right or wrong? Am I imagining things? I mean, I ah, if you could live anywhere, I mean down south, it's great in the winter time, but it's hot in the summertime, Texas hot. You know, they're talking about hundreds of in California, temperatures in the hundreds. Fires in the upper Northwest. The worst thing we get is a is
a snowstorm or a blizzard. Yeah, usually usually, usually that's the case.
And if you don't mind the snow, I would probably say the Northeast is the best place to be. You don't have to worry about well most of the time once in a while, but you don't have to worry about earthquakes for the most part or anything like that too.
So and then the last question I have, at least for now, and I know this is probably looking into the future. I remember in early July rather early June, we were told, well, the hurricane season has officially started and other than Burle, which gave us that gave us some problems, it's been relatively quiet. What's it look like in the tropics, and were looking at an active month in August or is that too far too far to look.
It definitely looks like it's going to get more active in August.
You know, when you get a.
Storm early like Burle, people kind of expected to continue to keep cranking. And usually July itself is actually not that active.
You know.
The peak is really from August through October. So things are going to ramp up here certainly over the next couple of weeks. And I'm sure we're gonna come out of this spell here of not a whole lot going on in the tropics.
So what you're saying is enjoy this weekend that not everyone's not going to be like that. John Ferick, thank you so much. I appreciate it. As they say, normally we have a lot of negative stuff to talk about. It's fun to talk with you on a positive note. Thanks for joining us tonight. Okay, thank you all right,
So that that takes care of this hour. We will be back after the nine o'clock news and we're going to talk about a story both in the Globe and the Herald today, and we're going to be talking with a state representative here in Massachusetts, or Paul Frost, about real problems with the shelter system that we've talked about so much. And it just seems to me that there is now a realization amongst everyone up on Beacon Hill that this is a situation that we probably have bitten
off more than we can choose. So we'll talk with Paul Frost and talk with you if you're one of those communities that is dealing with the situation of shelter in terms of what it's doing to your school system, et cetera. Yeah, what's done is done. Decisions were made, but it looks to me as if the governor now has decided that, hey, we cannot house the entire world population. It's pretty obvious. It didn't take a brain surgeon to
come up with that conclusion. And we'll talk about how we got here and maybe how we get out of this situation or is there a way out of it, And we'll explain it all right after the nine o'clock news, and then i'll remind you later on tonight at eleven o'clock, we'll have a snap poll on who is your pick for president right now? If the election we're held today. We've done this the last Friday of Nightside in March, April, May,
and June. This will be our fifth one. We'll do one in August, one in September, and one in October. And of course the one that will really count will be the one that's held on November fifth. But well, we'll talk about it all coming back right after the ninth