myBurbank Talks

The Week That Was and That Will Be - July 29

Craig Sherwood Season 2 Episode 31

Ever wondered how city planning impacts your daily life, or why certain traffic signals seem always to catch you off guard? Join me, Craig Sherwood, as I unveil the latest happenings in Burbank on this week’s edition of My Burbank Talks. Celebrate with us the triumph of our contest winner, Al Epstein, and stay informed about the Olive Overpass elevator rebuild that's set to wrap up by April 2025. We dive into Mayor Nick Schultz's recent "Ask the Mayor" session, where he shared city council updates on the Hamas-Israel ceasefire, no-fault evictions, and the Safer Streets Initiative.

This episode also tackles the erratic scheduling of city meetings and brings you up to speed on the new Glenoaks signal wiring project, which will turn traffic lights into four-way stop signs until August 7th. We'll give you a crash course on proper stop sign etiquette and explain why speeding through timed signals is a lost cause. Plus, get a sneak peek into the upcoming city council meeting focused on relocation assistance and tenant protections, aimed at balancing the needs of both tenants and small landlords.

Lastly, we shed light on the vibrant media industry in Burbank and the various career opportunities it offers beyond the glitz and glamour of acting. Learn about the upcoming Media Industry Expo and Job Fair, and why supporting local studios and businesses is essential for our community. From overgrown weeds near the freeway to the return of the DIG event at the Jocelyn Center, this episode covers it all. And don’t miss our call to political candidates to share their visions on future episodes of myBurbank Talks, Meet the Candidate. Tune in for a thorough update on everything you need to know about our city!

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Speaker 1:

My Burbank Talks presents another edition of the Week that Was and the Week that Will Be a weekly podcast featuring highlights and commentary on local events and issues taking place right here in Burbank. Now let's see what's on today's agenda as we join our program.

Speaker 2:

Hello, burbank, greg Sherwood, here with you tonight and flying solo. You know how it is these summer months things slow down. So tonight we are coming to you from, yes, the my Burbank Command Center and because we're in the Command Center, we have a slew of possible different sound effects tonight to keep you amused, because I'm here by myself. So I hope you're going to enjoy what we have for you and not a whole lot really, because once again, summer months, things are slowing down a little bit with people, and it's just we still want to get a show on tonight for you, because we do have a big city council meeting on Tuesday night.

Speaker 2:

So let's start off with last week's winner, and that was who was that? Oh, it was Al Epstein. There we go, fantastic. Okay, that's enough applause. So, al Epstein, you are the winner of last week's gift certificate, and that's a $25 gift card to Hill Street Cafe on Glen Oaks and you can go in there for great lunches and breakfasts, and I think they have dinners on Thursday, friday and Saturday, so it would be great to stop by there. Of course, the word last week was equestrian and, believe it or not, we will still have another word of the week this week. So stay tuned for a little farther in the show and send that in, and send it to contest at myburbankcom and if we pick you, you will receive a $25 gift card to Hill Street Cafe. So please stay tuned for that.

Speaker 2:

Also, last week the city sent out a release saying that the elevator and stairs on Olive Overpass are officially now closed until the rebuild, which will be completed in April of 2025. So it's about time they got on that project. They had put the $1.2 million towards it a couple months ago but nothing much had gone on. So hopefully now they are going to start working on that. So we will keep you informed down the line as things go on. Turning to, last Tuesday we did a mayor's show. Ask the mayor. Mayor Nick Schultz came by. I thought we had a really good show with some really good questions. One of the things we brought up was about the ceasefire between Hamas and Israel that the council took three hours to deliberate on before coming up with a letter. So take a listen to a little of what he said there.

Speaker 3:

There's. I have no doubt in my mind that this statement it's. If folks are calling it a resolution, it's not. It was a statement of the council. I don't think it's going to lead to world peace. As much as I wish people would read it and listen to it, the reality is that's not what this was about.

Speaker 2:

And he also talked about what's on the agenda for tomorrow night, which is about no-fault evictions. So how about a quick little sound bite on that also?

Speaker 3:

But this topic is the important related issue of what you do in a situation where a tenant is being evicted. You know, look, and we're not talking necessarily about the at-fault causes. I mean, if you don't pay your rent or your tax. That's one thing. We were talking about Ross and John through this. Right Now we're talking about no-fault eviction, right? So I need to do a substantial renovation of my building, I have to evict you, or I need to move an elderly or sick relative and I need that room back. So we're talking about those situations. So the way the ordinance is written currently, what is currently on the books in Burbank, is that only, or the category of I had a substantial remodel that I have to do on the property.

Speaker 2:

Only for that reason, for eviction, you are entitled as a tenant to three months worth of relocation assistance he also talked about a number of other things, about making sure you register for the upcoming elections, uh, at city council. And he talked about the update they're going to get tomorrow night on safer street initiative too. So that's something that's been worked on, he says, for about 18 months, and I'm sure that they are. Nothing's gonna be decided tomorrow night, but they'll get an update on it from city staff, which will be good. That was a good show. We'll have a link to it on the end down below. Please go ahead and and give it a watch and listen to what Nick Schultz has to say. It's really nice that he takes time as the mayor to come by and do a show with us every month. I think it's a good way to talk to people and get to see what's on his mind, and he's in a non-Brown effect, so I mean he can kind of say what he wants to say and give his own personal opinions. It's a good show. We are working on next month, getting him on a Burbank bus and doing our mayor's show about transportation in Burbank. We've been working on it but not finalized yet, but we hope we're going to have something on that. So hopefully, hopefully, it's something that we will have next month for you. Let's see here.

Speaker 2:

Wednesday oh, cbis Data Tax. They held their 25th anniversary. Cbis Data Tax has been in Burbank 25 years, of course, and really nice people In fact. They are now stopped by there and check them out. And that was Wednesday, so Thursday last week the school board met and it was the only time in July they met.

Speaker 2:

You know, once again, things are slow in the summertime, I get it. It is a little questionable. What's going on with Steve Ferguson lately, though. I mean he has now missed seven meetings in the past year, did not show up to one meeting in June and according to our reporter, he left the July meeting the only meeting in July after only 23 minutes saying he did not feel well, and if that's the case, then absolutely hope he he does feel better. But that still is not explaining the other seven meetings he's missed, which is a lot of meetings to miss, and the official meeting usually twice a month. So hopefully he'll have a explanation for that.

Speaker 2:

The next meeting coming up this next thursday, we'll find out. Um, there were only three board members present, uh, because board member Kamkar was not there, maybe on vacation, probably a well-deserved vacation. Once again July, this stuff happens. So they decided Not a lot really going on Once again, not a lot on their agenda, but by a 3-0 vote the lead educational sign language supervision position Was approved, and by a 3-0 vote the lead educational sign language supervision position was approved, and by another 3-0 vote they include the acceptance of E-Rate Structure Cabling Project in Burroughs. I have no idea what E-Rate Structure Cabling Project is Told you. I got my sound effects tonight so we'll find out. I'm sure any updates to Burroughs is going to be very helpful because some of that construction they did there was kind of a little bit shabby when they did it. So I know there was a lot of people upset with some of the construction that was there in the past.

Speaker 2:

Let's move on to last weekend. In fact last weekend gosh, not much at all really it was a pretty slow weekend. You know, it's just the heat also. Let's face it, when it's hot out there it's really hard to do things and a lot of people aren't on vacation because once again school starts in like the second week of August. You know, I remember back in the day when you know you always knew that school never started until after Labor Day. So you kind of had, you kind of knew August was off and after Labor Day up the first Monday of Labor Day, here we go, what what.

Speaker 2:

But back then I know when I was at you know my days at Stevenson and Jordan and all that we didn't have air conditioning. Yeah, that's back in the oldest days, people, way, way long ago, and so there was no air conditioning. So a lot of those days would be 110 outside. We would probably usually just go ahead and have a half day. So we enjoyed the half day. But I'll tell you what, between 11 and 1 o'clock or 1230, when they let you out, it was damn hot in that classroom. We'd just sit there and just be melting, but we did get out early. I think the rule is, as long as you attend so many hours a day, it counts as an instruction day for the schools. So that's how they usually work that. But now of course the schools have air conditioning so that's a lot better situation for everybody.

Speaker 2:

So, moving down, moving along here, in fact, you know what? I think that's it for last week, for the week that was. So let's take a quick commercial break and we'll be back in a second.

Speaker 1:

Enjoying the show right now, think you may want to do your own podcast. Well, my Burbank Talks is renting out our podcast studio on an hourly rate. You and your guests can record audio podcasts, or both audio and video. We'll help you get set up on podcast platforms and even your own YouTube channel. We can also edit your productions to make you look and sound your very best. If interested, please drop us an email at studiorentalsatmyburbankcom. That's studiorentalsatmyburbankcom. That's studiorentalsatmyburbankcom. Now back to our show.

Speaker 2:

Okay, we are back here. We are in the MyBurbank Command Center, which is always a great place to spend my days. That's right. Okay, enough of that. Back in the Command Center again. So you know, one of the things that we do here is this is where we monitor our radios, and we monitor a lot of things going on, update the website and all that. So it's kind of a place I spend most of my days anyway. So when I just turn the camera on here tonight, we do our show.

Speaker 2:

Also, we are now what's called monetized on YouTube, which is a great thing. So down below you'll see a super thanks button. If you'd love to click that and give us a little something on the video, we would really appreciate it. We're now going to start offering channel memberships also, so you can also subscribe to our channel and we will have some extras down the line. Really don't have a whole list of them yet. Yeah, we put some things on there, but we'll come up with some more things down the line. But if you want to support my Burbank, this is a great way to do it and we would appreciate it. So think about it and we move on.

Speaker 2:

Okay, today, of course, being Monday there were no meetings. For some reason I in our great, the great way we do things in Burbank, here we'll have four meetings in a day, and then other days we have no meetings at all. I, I still can't figure out why we can't just cast, spread them out a little more, so no more than, at the very most, two meetings in a day ever, just in case you want to see a couple things or go to a couple different meetings, because most of them, of course, are not televised and some are already recorded, so it's hard to know what's going on really. So we kind of hope that down the line they would start spreading those meetings out a little more. But starting today, the city did start working on a new signal wiring program on Glen Oaks and it's going to go on between now and August 7th, so about 10 days, and they're going to be working on different signals on their sections on Glen Oaks, between Reese and Harvard, and so every I'm sure every day they're gonna pick it a different intersection and when they do they're going to shut those signals down and put stop signs out on Glen Oaks. So it's gonna be a four-way stop now, stop Now.

Speaker 2:

Let's remember our etiquette here and our California Vehicle Code. Of course, when two cars come to a stop sign at once one comes from the left and one comes straight ahead the car to the right always has the priority. So if you're not sure which one and you see a car to your right, that's the car that has actually the priority to go first. Of course, you know, most times we all sit there and we kind of wave the other person through. I look at it as you know what. I don't need to get there that quick. Anyway, if you're in a hurry, get going. You know these people who go speeding and they tailgate and anyway, if you're in a hurry, get going. These people go speeding and they tailgate and everything else. I'm sitting there.

Speaker 2:

The funny part of that is, more times than not that's time going down a part of the way or something. I'm going 35. The car goes behind me about 45. I'm going whatever. He goes behind me about 45. I'm going, you know, whatever. First he's behind me kind of tailgating. He gets around. He goes speeding down there and let's say we're at Magnolia and Holloway, going towards Burbank Boulevard.

Speaker 2:

Well, by the time we get to Burbank Boulevard, here's that guy sitting at the signal and I get right up next to him usually and then off we go again and he's off to victory now and by the time I get to victory and the light's red or something I caught up to. So you know what. He's not getting anywhere any faster. You know that's something when you're speeding, I get it, you're in a hurry, but the signals still work as the signals work and you're not going to get there any faster. But of course you want to run signals. That's a whole different uh can of worms and we hope, we hope here that nobody ever wants to run signals, right, yeah, absolutely have to get a little boo on that. Um, but the whole idea, you know, is if you stay in the speed limit you're probably going to hit signals, usually right around the timing At least they try to time them, I think for 35 on the major streets.

Speaker 2:

I do know that going down southbound on all the way from the airport, you know, if you're basically at 35 miles an hour, the airport, you know if you, if you're basically at 35 miles an hour, you can probably get from the airport, or at least Pacific, all the way down to at least Magnolia, maybe even Verdugo, without stopping once if you were going at 35 miles an hour. So what does that do? You know? One thing it's gonna do is help you save a little gas. He's not starting and stopping and all that. So if you're don't like paying 450 gallon or 550 gallon or, pretty soon, $250 a gallon, that's a good way to not to spend a lot of money is by driving at the speed limit.

Speaker 2:

What else here? So that's it. They're going to work out the signals and by August 7th they'll be done. And I say stop signs will be used. So respect the stop signs and respect the people working. Let's not be beating around that area, because if you do, then you're putting people at risk.

Speaker 2:

So tomorrow, tuesday, the city council will be meeting at 6 pm. Now one of the things they're going to be working on is they're going to adopt an ordinance increasing relocation assistance for certain no-fault evictions and adding anti-retaliation tenant protections. But one of the things they're also looking at is exemptions, because once again we've talked about this and the mayor talks about it on his show also is that, especially with the small landlords, if you have four or less units, it might be a lot. Pretty hard to come up with three months. You know, rent for somebody, and the idea is not to force people to sell their buildings. Who are we going to sell them to? Probably corporations, and now we're really in a situation. So it's something that the landlords and the tenants it's really too bad is. They just can't work it out.

Speaker 2:

You know, I wish they'd have also put a provision saying that if somebody is forced out for to have a building worked on or their unit worked on, that they have the first right to come back and rent that same apartment again. You know, instead of costing a landlord three months of rent to pay somebody to go somewhere else Well, wouldn't that be nice if he only had to pay maybe two months of rent for somebody to go live in a hotel or something for two months and come back to his own apartment. Then I think it's something that you know, everybody makes that in the long run, the person gets an updated apartment, the landlord doesn't have to go find a new tenant. Um, I think there's a lot of things that you know to say for that um, it's a, it's a consideration, it's an idea, um, but it's something that, uh, you know, once again, no winners, no losers in that whole thing, it's just tenants and landlords. You know, once again, no winners, no losers in that whole thing, it's just tenants and landlords. You know it's. They need each other and in all honesty, I know landlords that sometimes it's hard to find renters.

Speaker 2:

And then you find a renter and they they last for four or five, six months, maybe a year, and they kind of tear the place up a little and obviously you're paying a lot of money to to know new carpet or new this or new that and um, you got somebody else in there and how long do they stay? And you know it used to be the thing used to be getting office buildings was the way to go as a landlord, because you get a building and you rent it out to a especially a corporation that's going to be there 10 years, 20 years. You know I mean it's. That's a very stable corporation. You know you're gonna get that check every month and not really have to worry about. Oh yeah, you know my the pipes backed up, the refrigerator's not working, the air conditioning. You know it all depends on the kind of lease you do. But I know a lot of people like corporate.

Speaker 2:

Now the problem is is, with so many people now working from home that you don't. The buildings are starting to go empty and I heard the other day that a lot of office buildings are being now foreclosed on because they can't find tenants, because now everybody's working from home and they're not using offices anymore. I think people have found especially smaller businesses and you only have maybe between 10 and 20 people that it's probably cheaper, instead of of paying rent, to have people work from home remotely and they still. There was a study done saying they still actually probably do a little more work even than when they come to the office and people don't have to drive in traffic. It's kind of a win-win. And you wonder, after this pandemic pandemic, as bad as it was is this one of the things that now have come out of it is the fact that we're finding you don't need to be all crammed into an office building every day to do your job if you still get your job done as it is. And I can see showing up to an office or location once a week or once a month as all the employees and seeing each other face-to-face and talking to each other and going over things. There's a number of places around that rent out their office you know by the hour and you could just use one of those places. I know the Chamber of Commerce has a meeting location there you can actually rent out. So I think there's alternatives there and maybe commercial real estate's not as good as it used to be.

Speaker 2:

But what do you do? What do you do? Okay, let's see what else we have on the agenda. They're going to be authorizing acceptance of the Department of California Highway Patrol Cannabis Tax Fund Grant. That's interesting. We're going to be getting a Cannabis Tax Fund Grant for $147,922. We have ordinances that you cannot have a cannabis store in Burbank yet we are going to benefit from that fact of cannabis sales in California by getting $147,000 for impaired driving crashes. Increase public awareness of the dangers for impaired driving crashes. Increase public awareness of the dangers of impaired driving and enhance the safety of California's roadways. Of course California's roadways go right through Burbank.

Speaker 2:

Well, that's interesting. The of that money $107,000 is going to the purchase of two DUI traffic enforcement vehicles. We're going to have purchase of two DUI traffic enforcement vehicles. We're going to have two new vehicles in the department just for traffic enforcement or DUI driving under the influence. $32,000 will be allocated towards outfitting those vehicles, like putting on the emergency lights, the sirens, the radios and the transport partitions the lights, the sirens, the radios and the transport partitions Because you've got to have that as transport partitions because they're going to be taking a lot of people to jail for DUIs and about $8,000 to pay for personnel costs during specialized enforcement saturation details.

Speaker 2:

So occasionally they I know we got another grant from somebody else and so this is why I should we'll supplement that probably where they'll put out you know 10 extra motor units on a night to patrol an area just looking for DUI people. That's usually better than they feel. That's better sometimes than having a checkpoint, but it's still something that you know a way of. They look at the stats and they look at where the dui crashes have been and where the arrests have been. They kind of use that information to kind of form a plan to put there to have those as the saturation areas. So, uh, it's something that is, once again, if they're looking at they don't want to do it after the fact they're looking being proactive and not reactive, which is always a good thing. Let's see here what else we got review of the cost and benefit analysis of potentially implementing construction workforce programs. So basically we're talking about when we have housing developments, about trying to get local hires, prevailing wage, skilled and trained workers and maybe also apprenticeships. I think we always talk about trying to get union workers too, to make sure that we're not paying below what we should be paying and these developers are taking shortcuts because that's not what should be happening, especially when it's a project here in Burbank. And of course, as the mayor talked about on his show a little bit, they're having a discussion and update on the development of the Safer Streets Burbank Plan. So that has a lot to do with the bicycle riding and pedestrians and all that type of thing. So they'll have an update on that you can watch.

Speaker 2:

Here's another thing that's very interesting and I'm a little bit. How do you want to say it? I really like the idea, but I'm still worried about, down the line, what happens. They're going to have approval of funding for incentivizing the transition of legal, non-conforming firearm retail businesses. Basically, they've reached out to four firearm retailers and two of you know a couple are expected to open this to the possibility of exiting the firearm retail business by either transitioning their businesses or closing permanently with an incentive the council asked the staff to explore, to incentivize discussions with interested parties and determine a reasonable cost for such a proposal. So basically, they've said that there are four existing firearm retailers who expressed interest in, you know, receiving money from the city to stop their business. Um, after april 23rd says 2024, um, but since that time two of the four did not renew, did not renew their local license, despite being warnings and offers of assistance, and are no longer eligible to even sell firearms. So we've lost two firearm resellers. That brings our retailers down in the city from 14 to 12. And staff would like to now negotiate with the remaining two interested firearm retailers to relinquish their legal non-conforming status at a cost to the city of up to, but no greater than, $150,000 for each business. So we could dole out $300,000 for two more firearm retailers to leave.

Speaker 2:

Now I'm all for this. If we can reduce the number of firearm retailers in Burbank, that's great. The problem with our ordinance is what's going to stop other retailers from coming back into the city and move that number back up to 14 again? Yes, we do have areas now they can only go into certain areas and they're very small areas, but yet we still are allowing more firearm retailers to come back into burbank. So if we're paying people not to do it, what's this type of business from saying, yeah, we'll come in and you know, we're going to open a gun shop here in this legal area?

Speaker 2:

And I just don't understand. We should have had a cap of gun stores. I always thought that should be the way to go, but we didn't do it. But at least if we get non-conforming shops to leave now, non-conforming means they're in locations they probably shouldn't be in. They're no longer in locations that you can open a gun store in. It doesn't mean that they're illegal and the area's illegal, but another gun store. If they were to close their gun shop, then their gun shop cannot move in there because it's now a non-conforming area. So hopefully we can get a couple of those gun shops to leave, but let's just stop more from coming in. I don't know. I think it's the old slippery slope, but I'm all for doing whatever we can to reduce the number of gun stores.

Speaker 2:

Get a few email notifications in. We can probably down the line, might even do a live show out of here and get your comments during the show. This might be an idea. So we'll be looking at new things. Let's move on here to Thursday. The city of Burbank I know this is going through the library they are going to have a media industry expo and job fair. Now it's going to be Thursday, august 1st, from 12 to 4 pm over at Woodbury Technically down in Burbank, but I guess they're going to give them the space for free, probably, so we'll take it Basically. It says the city of Burbank proudly presents the first media industry expo and job fair, a groundbreaking event designed to give you the knowledge and tools needed for a career in the media industry.

Speaker 2:

Now, I don't know, back in my days of coaching, I used to actually teach video production in my days as a teacher or as a Crespi, and I told, would tell the kids it's the media industry, the whole entire industry is a great industry to get into. Now I always ask the kids well, you got a job in the industry and of course you're not going to be an actor. What do you want to do? Well, I want to be a director. Well, okay, you can be a director, there's no doubt about it. But of course you need to get a lot of schooling for that and know the right people and get the right breaks. But there are a lot of jobs out there in the media industry.

Speaker 2:

I know a kid who graduated from Burroughs and struggled a little bit with his grades but he did. He did graduate and because he had his father working in the industry, he was a carpenter. He got his son in and the year after he left high school he's making six figures a year. And he has been every year and he's working 12-hour days working on shows at Universal and all over the place, and that's great money. That's great money. I always told the kids okay, fine, I know you want to direct, but you've got editing, you've got special effects, you've got there's construction, there's a ton of jobs. I always told the kids okay, when the movie is over or the show is over, watch the credits, and those credits will have hundreds and hundreds of names on them lighting guys, set decorators, you name it and all these people are making over six figures a year and that's the nature of that business. And then they're all in unions and they all have pensions and it's a good, well-paying job.

Speaker 2:

Now I worked a few years, of course, in the studios too, as a production coordinator, of course, in the studios too, as a production coordinator, and I loved it. But my problem was I wanted to coach and I had to pick. I loved watching a movie, how a show was made you know how the sausage is made, type thing. I used to love all that. But those shows go sometimes 12, 14, even 16 hours a day. If you want time for yourself, it's not going to happen. But the money's good. The money makes up for it. So you've got to kind of make that decision. Do you want to be in a job that you have long days, or do you want to be in a job that you have long days, or do you want to be in a job that you know is a nine to five or something and maybe not pay as much, maybe in a service industry? But I think the media jobs are tremendous we're in the media capital of the world are tremendous, of course we're in the media capital of the world. So there's a lot of jobs here that are excellent, well-paying and clean industry jobs.

Speaker 2:

Now, of course, the problem sometimes with the industry is that if you go, you're not working. In other words, you don't go work for Warner Brothers, you don't go work for Universal, you don't go work for Disney, you work for production companies. The production companies will make a show. Now those shows only go, you know, for a season, let's say, and when the season's over the production company stops, and if it's picked up for another season, you come back in three months and go back to work again, and a lot of people that's great, they can get three months off that way. And some people say you know, I'll go work a small job in between, but if the show's not picked up, then all of a sudden You've got to go find another production company To get another show. I'm sure some production companies Who've done a good job Will keep you in mind for their next show, but they may not put a show together For another year or two.

Speaker 2:

So that is a problem with the industry Is the fact you cannot get Employment that you know Will always be there on a weekly basis. So if you do get one of those jobs, save your money. Put some money away every month, you know, because you'll need it to get through, and there's a lot of times though, but you will keep working. You know the people. I know my friend and his son. They're kind of on a crew, and the crew does go from show to show to show to show Now. His last show ended two weeks ago but they're starting to start a new show next week that will probably go for another, you know, 8 to 12 months maybe. So you know they're fortunate and a lot of people are in that thing.

Speaker 2:

But you will not. You will not be working consistently at the same location year in and year out. You may get one one show at Universal the next week you are. Next next show might be in the Santa Crita, next to might be in Culver City. It could be all over the place and that's just the way it is. That's how the nature of that beast is. But if you get on the right shows and with the right crews and you get the right people, you're going to be taken care of.

Speaker 2:

So is it a tough industry to kind of get into? Absolutely. But if you get in and you get yourself in the union especially, you're going to be set, so you know, between medical benefits and pay. It's a great career and I'm sure you look at in Burbank there's a lot of people in a lot of different jobs that have to do with the media industry, because all those shows need a lot of things. Nothing gets made just by showing up.

Speaker 2:

And once again, if you look at the Warner Brothers Ranch that's now become the Ranch Studios, they raised all their sound stages because they're 70 years old and they're putting up 16 new sound stages. Why? Because there's so much production going on in the area and there's such a shortage sound stages. Why? Because there's so much production going on in the area and there's such a shortage of stages. I hear there's going to be more stages over on the old NBC lot that's now called the Burbank Studios. So there's a lot of work in the area. There's a lot of work out there and right now we lose a lot of work in the area. There's a lot of work out there and right now we lose a lot of production to Atlanta and Toronto because we don't have enough facilities here and of course the cost of doing business is tough too.

Speaker 2:

But Burbank needs to do everything they can to keep the studios here locally and keep them happy, because not only do people work in the studios but the side businesses. They need caterers, they need editing companies, they need prop houses. There's a lot of businesses that support the studios. They need a forest and I know we have a forest in Burbank who do a lot with the studios. I know those Halloween stores that are on Magnolia that don't ever seem to. Yeah, I wonder why there's two Halloween stores there. But they do so much work with the studios and supplying them with things. It makes it profitable. So there are a lot of business owners who cater to the studios. I know back in the day when I used to work, candy Market used to have an entire catering menu and would drive breakfast and lunches right out to the sets. So these are all important jobs, besides just the fact of being a producer, being a director. There's a lot of really, really good jobs out there. So if you're interested in those jobs, I really advise you go by Woodbury Thursday between 12 and 4 o'clock and see what it's all about.

Speaker 2:

Okay, this weekend, guess what returns? Yes, that's right, it's the return of Dig. Oh, lovely sound effects. Dig is back. And what does the word dig stand for? This week? It's, of course, our word of the week, which is, of course, dig. So if you're still listening to the show, watching the show at this time, email the word dig to contest at myburbankcom and we will put you in the running for this week's Hill Street gift card $25 gift card and let me tell you what people love those gift cards when I get them, and they love the food at Hill Street.

Speaker 2:

I believe Hill Street is one of those places that people just don't realize it's really there because it's kind of off the beaten path. But once they go there they say, wow, really good quality food. So, once again, the word of the week is dig. Word of the week is dig. Oh, there we go. And, all right, we'll give you a. Yeah, we'll stay with the. There we go. So send that word in to us and we'll put you into the running for the contest.

Speaker 2:

So, but DIG, of course, is at the Jocelyn Center this week, this coming week, from 8 to 10 am. Like we always say, you know, bring your hose with you and tools and anything else you might need. 8 to 10 am like we always say, you know, bring your hose with you and tools and anything else you might need. It's a great event where they you know, citizens come in and volunteer and spruce up the area, and who doesn't need a good sprucing? Okay, that kind of brings us to the end of the week, so we don't have a Ross's rant because we didn't record anything for you Probably should have, but we didn't, so I guess that would be my fault, you know. So I'm very sorry about that, but I'm going to give you Craig's comment. How's that? Not exciting like Ross's rant, but it's.

Speaker 2:

It's something you go by then let's start with. I would just want to say I know a couple weeks ago I talked about driving down Hollywood at Clark and seeing six-foot weeds growing in the parkway and thinking, wow, this is Burbank and this is happening in Burbank. I mean it looks like a somewherebank. I mean it looks like somewhere in Sun Valley, you know. Or it looks like in North Hollywood, and you know it was just. It was sad to see that. Well, I drove by there the next week and those weeds had been cut. They were cut right down to the ground. So I don't know if somebody heard this on the podcast or it just happened to be that time when they finally got around to it, but it got done. There's a couple other spots in the city that have weeds also and hopefully they're checking those out. I know one of the eyesores, I guess you'd call it, is on the freeway, the side of the freeway in San Fernando, near the Empire Center. I think that's Caltrans property.

Speaker 2:

Caltrans kind of really screwed us in a way by telling us after they got everything done and they did a great job and all that, but we're out of money now. We don't have money for landscaping, we don't have money to put little trees and shrubs and bushes and make it look good. So you get what you get and it's like, really, that's your tax dollars at work. And why wouldn't they have planned for that when they first started the project, saying, you know, we need to have this? It shouldn't have been a oh, we should have done this. No, it should have been planned for in advance and money should have been a oh, we should have done this. No, it should have been planned for in advance and money should have been allocated in advance too. So it does not look good Anyhow. That's kind of it for my comment. Not much of a comment, but it's something to pass the night, okay. Well, I guess that's it for the week that will be.

Speaker 2:

We thank you for listening. We're going to have some more exciting stuff coming up pretty soon. We may do some more live stuff here and there and watch for our shows. Watch our upcoming podcast Also, if you are a candidate. Starting August 1st we are going to have candidates who want to do a podcast with us meet. The candidate are more than welcome to to line up a time with us, come on in and spend an hour with us on on the podcast and then talk about their, why they're running, talk about their background, what they want to do. Hopefully they can do. It's a good way to get to know candidates and know the person, not just what you read about them, not just what they claim, but know their background, know why they're motivated to run. So I think it's kind of a good series we do.

Speaker 2:

We don't write an invitation to every candidate. We just, once again, if you're watching our show then you'll learn you can. All you have to do is email in to us news at myburbankcom, say you're a candidate and you'd like to do a podcast and you're on. We don't say no to any candidate, to any party, to anything. If you appear on a ballot that goes to Burbank voters, you will be eligible to be on a podcast, simple as that. And we'll do those any time in August and September. We want to do before early voting starts. Once voting starts and you know people kind of. More and more people now are mailing their ballots in, so we want to get that done as soon as possible. So that's it for another week. We thank you for listening and we will talk to you again next week.

Speaker 1:

Thank you for listening and we will talk to you again next week.