The following is a presentation of FCB Faith. This is Keeping America First with Bishop John T. Coats and Reverend Jeff jimmisad on FCB Faith. Welcome to Keeping America First, and we're happy to have today with us our dynamite co host, Bishop John T. Coats. John, how are you today, man? I'm doing great. Is always good to be in good company. Yes, yes, And we're here in this great state of Ohio and we have a dynamite guest with us today, none other than Lorraine County Commissioner David Moore. David, glad to have you here today. You're gonna tell us about all the great things that are happening on the on the north coast. Well, thank you. I appreciate you having me so so, David. Commissioner Moore, could you tell us a little bit about yourself and tell what's happening there in the great County of Lorraine, OHI. Oh Loraene County is like is almost through a renaissance right now with a lot of changes going on. Like the rest of the country, what we. Got going on right now is well, first of all, I'm not a politician, even though I'm an elected official, Loraen County has something very unique going on right now. After eighty years of one party rule, we have three Republicans that are in office, but really we're not even political party types. What we really have are three businessmen that are not career politicians. And so we've taken a new look at how to market our county. And marketing is extremely key when you're trying to let people, the media, the newspapers, like the you know the old saying, if it bleeds, it leads marthing is all talking about the positives of our county. You know, Loraene County is a great place to live, work and play. And so you know, by reaching out to organizations like yours, that we can help promote our county, tell you what's going on in our county and all the great things that are happening here, especially with jobs and housing and affordable living. I think. It's just a very unique thing happening out here in the ninth largest county in the state of Ohio. So it's kind of a kind of an exciting time. So I don't know how you want me to segue, but we got so much going on here. We're really you know, right, how much you want me to talk about. But Bishop Coats has always been excited about enhancing the lives of Ohio citizens. What are some of the things that we can. Take advantage of that citizens all over Ohio can take advantage of. Oh, well, before I go into all the great things that are happening for maybe for weekend or day trips and getaways, one of the unique things that we've done in Lorraine County that's kind of put us on the national spotlight is I was I did something foolish and Ranford Commissioner twenty four years ago and one okay, I do it one term I thought, I'm not doing that again. Well, you know, my children were grown. I decided to run again. And the same issues that they had twenty five years ago we're still having, which is transportation helping our communities that have issues that can't even afford a car. You know, you know you can maybe get you might have a car, Can you afford the insurance, can you afford the gas? And so our transportation system here has been antiquated. The fixed route was set up where it take you two hours to get picked up. So you go to buy groceries, it takes you two hours to get back home. It was a failed system that they did every year, year and year out. So with technology, because I tried to fix this twenty five years ago. Now with technology today, we now have a system called Via and that system is almost like a public transportation like lift an uber, but it's not where they go all over. They basically have routes set up, usually within a block or two of your home, and you can call them up look on your app and you can see that vehicle. Oh wow, they're ten minutes from my home. And what we're doing is we found out instead of to our weights, people are having ten minute weights and now we've increased ridership from almost to like thirty thousand a month. We I mean, we were in our. Market like you let's say you have New York, Chicago, Atlanta, Detroit where they have or even Cleveland where they have these transportation systems for the big urban areas, but in the mid size communities like ours. You know, we have a Laria Lorraine and those are the two communities we experimented with and it's a pilot program. We we just couldn't get the support of the county to get the funding to have a very successful fixed route system. So right now, what you're looking at is when the mayor of Lorraine went to Washington, c and they did a transportation discussion, he raised his hand and he said, we're doing it in Loraine County. And what's beautif. About having Like I'll go back to the politics, is you know we have three business guys that are running the county commissioner's office. You know in each county you have three commissioners and their job is more of the budget authority. Well, the two largest cities here are Democrat mayors. But guess what, we all have the same goal what's best for our community. And that's why we all get along. Because once you're in office, you put you you are a public servant to all. And so I think when everybody's on the same page about providing I would say services. And we're all three business owners, which is our goal is customer service. That's how we approach government. Our goal is to provide a fiscal budget, make sure everybody, all the elected officials, because we're in charge of their money, make sure they're spending up properly. But then how do we provide a better service to those in need? That really need it, and I'm really proud of VIA and that's something I think that you're going to hear a lot more on a national basis that we kind of piloted here in Lorraine County. So I'm very proud of that. And by doing so, by connecting our two largest cities, the other communities are looking to participate, and we're asking them to participate financially. If you really believe that this is something that's good for your community, how much can you participate? Because I'm all about partnerships, And by doing that, it gets buying from everybody financially, because it's like anything else. We got everybody addicted to the service. Now we have to pay for it. And with the grant that we got from NOWAKA, which is federal dollars for the pilot program, I see a success that we can continually use our grant funds from ODOP and from other federal agencies as the poster child of how you can make a mid size communities like ours successful with public transportation, which segues into all this other stuff we have going on in our county. We have brought in the. Cabella's National team championship for Walleye Fishing Us downtown Lorraine. That was last year and that was a huge, huge success. So we're now working to see can we get you here on an annual basis. They were so happy with the services that we had to provide here. Our community came together and started to actually volunteered to feed over seven hundred fishermen. Now it was providing food, providing just so much that we just rolled out the red carpet and so by. Doing that, other things are happening. We have other organizations like the we have an air show that's coming. We've had air shows in the past, but we can't compete with the money that Cleveland has, but we're gonna have a mid size one in which we can have. We had I think last year close to I think maybe seven or eight thousand people show up because we co mingled a car show and an air show with live bands and so the more and this all and that money is being is being used from a bed tax that taxes used to promote Lorraine County, and so we're using that money to market ourselves. I know, I irritate a lot of people in Cleveland because we did this whole thing with the eclipse last year. Well, you got to stir the pot in marketing and get recognized. So we had this billboard out says, you know, this is where you're going to see one hundred percent of that total eclipse. Well, actually, you know, we got tons of press on TV in Cleveland because they were all talking about Lorraine County being the center of totality. Well, that's what we're promoting, the center of totality. But somehow calls us sir, and that's about That's what marketing is all about, is getting people to talk about issues, to talk about the positives and the negatives. But you get people in conversations and it really puts us on the front page to say here's where we're at. That's a great place to live, eat and play. Well, the weather's getting warmer, Commissioner more, the weather's getting warmer, and you know, I'm looking forward to a trip to the North coast this summer. With your your interesting perspective, having been able to see the then and the now and through a business lens, what would you say have been the most significant economic growth and development highlights of Lorraine County within the last time ten years. Well, I would be kind of hard to say ten years now, the city of Lorraine, they spend a lot of money on their downtown, promoting the waterfront. In the meantime, they came up with this outdoor concert series and that has probably been the most successful activity. That's bringing in probably averaging six to ten thousand people on a Friday or Saturday night. So it's a great outdoor event and we bring in people from within about an hour an hour and a half around us, if you know, just for a day in a restaurants. We know, and we have the technology today to know based on cell phones and I forget the name of it, where they gather your data when you're in the area. It's big Brother watching, right, and they know where you're eating, know where's restaurants are busy. We actually had downtown Lorraine. The restaurants there ran out of food, so they started calling saying, hey, let us know what these concerts are going on. So what we're doing now is we've partnered with. Them as a county help them extend that out instead of summer, to extend out even longer, to promote other activities like boat shows and things. Such as that. Now economically, though, what we see happening because we have a lot of land. We have Lake Erie, we have the water, and we have sewers that go all the way down to our airport. We are now we now have one of the largest megasites in the Midwest. We have about twelve hundred acres under our control. In order to bring in companies like chip companies and all that stuff that we started working on that three years ago. Well, now with what's going on on a national. Basis, whatever the words you want to call it, with the terrif fights and everything else going on, the bottom line is we've already laid that foundation to say we're here, we're business friendly, we want jobs, we have affordable housing, and we want you to come here. So that's kind of the biggest thing you see is the downtown entertainment that's coming. We have a race we have actually like a midd Ohio racetrack coming along the waterfront. We have one for golf carts. And these are not just how we grew up golf carts. These are golf carts that go sixty to seventy miles an hour. This is where people, the twelve to fourteen year old kids start to train for professional racing. I didn't realize this even existed, and so we have that coming we, like I said, with the economic development coming that kind of the synergies with our Lorraine County Community College. Twenty five years ago. I partnered with the college when I was here on a new concept. It was called Glide, an incubator for new businesses, and this new thing come out. This is I know this is two thousand and one, but it was called the Internet, okay, and that was starting to develop. Well, we developed at a community college almost like an education system for tomorrow's economy. Well, tomorrow's economy is here today. Because of that, the big ten U of m Michigan, I mean University Michigan comes here. All the big ten colleges come to Lorraine County Community College for the training because we have the technology that the today's workforce wants. And you can get in fact, in high school. If you go to high school in Orange County, you have the ability to get educated in high school graduate with some of the partnerships with our college, and you can actually walk out of high school with a fifty five thousand dollars year job. Which is cool because when I was in high school in the seventies, it was all you could go to high school in Flint, Michigan, graduate and get a great paying job at General Motors. Those when I graduated in nineteen eighty, those days were gone. So it's great to see that resurgence in a different kind of economy, a different kind of manufacturing, and you can get the same education here in Lorraine County in high school to get you those good paying jobs. So I'm really excited about we have so many plates spending. I call it going on that. I think Lorraine County is going to be on the cutting edge and more of a I would say a beacon of hope to tell people this is how you can do it if you all put your politics aside and do what's right for your community. If you can do that, I think you can. Get a lot more done than everybody being worried about politics. Be worried. You should be worried about customer service. What can we provide for those that need it? And how do we open the doors for others to come in here? Because the more jobs you get, the more people are working, and the more houses will be built. I mean, it's just a dominal effect of positive energy that's here right now. Did I answer the question because sometimes. Sir, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you. Well, this was very informative, and Commissioner More, we just want you to come back and you shared some great information with our audience. And I'll tell you one thing. It really lifts up, sheds a light on the Lorraine County and just the neighboring all of the cities and so forthunate that are in Lorraine County. And I'll tell you it's a it's it really makes people want to look at Lorraine County as a place to live and business, visit. Come out and visit. You know, we got a lot going on this summer, a lot of fun, a lot of activities, and I'm really excited it's going to be an interesting two years. Again, thank you, Commissioner More. For being thank you both. Thank you both. Correct, but you are the president of the county, Commissioner. No, no, it's it's it's uh. You have a president, vice president, a member. It's just three of us. It's all have equal votes. It doesn't. Yeah, So keep up the good work that you're doing. Again, thank you, and Bishop Coach again, thank you. Thank you Bishop, thank you Thank you. I have Walleye on my mind. While eye Campitalill, come on up. All right, we're gonna do some fishing there this summer. That's okay, I'm good. All right again, thank you to our audience. And let's remember to keep fighting a good fight. And let's do all that we can to make our communities better and keep our state better our communities, and of course keep America first.
