Tick Segerblom (Clark County Commisioner) oral history interview conducted by Magdalena Martinez and Taylor Cummnings: transcript

An Interview with Tick Segerblom
Perspectives from the COVID-19 Pandemic: Leadership and Learning in Nevada
Produced by:
The University of Nevada Las Vegas
The Lincy Institute
2024
Principal Researchers:
Magdalena Martinez, Ph.D. and Kelliann Beavers, Ph.D.
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The following interview was a part of the “Perspectives from the COVID-19 Pandemic:
Leadership and Learning in Nevada” research project. The recorded interview and transcript
were made possible through the generosity of The Lincy Institute at the University of
Nevada, Las Vegas. The goal of the project was to understand and document how Nevada
organizations and leaders responded to the myriad challenges that the pandemic
engendered. The interviewees thank The Lincy Institute and their supporters for the
opportunity to reflect on their roles throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. The researchers
also acknowledge the following individuals who contributed to the conceptualization, data
collection, and analysis of the project: Dr. John Hudak, Dr. Makada Henry-Nickie, Elia Del
Carmen Solano-Patricio, Taylor Cummings, Peter Grema, Kristian Thymianos, Saha Salahi,
Madison Frazee, and Katie Lim.
Each interviewee had the opportunity to review their transcript. All measures have been taken
to preserve the style and language of the interviewee. This interview features Tick
Segerblom, Commissioner for Clark County and was conducted on 9/6/22 by Magdalena
Martinez and Taylor Cummings. This interview covers topics including reflections on
leadership, organizational challenges, and opportunities for collaboration.
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Tick Segerblom interview
[00:00:00] Magdalena Martinez
All right. Today is September the 6th 2022. I am here with Commissioner Tick Segerbloom
and Taylor Cummings, my GA. And before we jump into the conversation about the COVID
recovery, I'm going to ask you three questions. One Yes.
[00:00:25] Tick Segerblom
Yes.
[00:00:27] Magdalena Martinez
All right. Thank you. So, you agree to be a participant. You agree to have this recorded, and
you agree for me to attribute any of your quotes to your name.
[00:00:35] Magdalena Martinez
Fantastic. All right, let's just get started. And if you could describe your role throughout the
pandemic and the role of Clark County.
[00:00:44] Tick Segerblom
Well, I was elected to the county commission and started serving. In January of 2019. And
obviously I came in with a lot of ideas and expectations and then was kind of getting my feet
wet and learning what's going on.
And then the first-year kind of just, you know, doing that, found where the bathroom is and
stuff. But then the second year was really on fire, ready to start going. And then I think in
February it started hitting, and then I think March they shut down the strip. And, you know,
our tax revenue is basically based on the strip and, and sales tax.
And, and the staff came to us and said, basically, we don't have any income. And, and so
from that point forward, it just was a one shock after another.
[00:01:43] Magdalena Martinez
Can you tell me a little bit about those shocks? Like what, what is that stands out to you?
[00:01:48] Tick Segerblom
Well, I guess it went in phases. You know, initially it was you know, what do we do income,
strip shut down.
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But it didn't seem so personal as far as being sick. But then as things went forward, then
people started getting sick. We had to do our first budget cycle, was to the end of June of
2020. So we had to either face laying off a bunch of people or I think we went to a four day
work week and we offered a retirement package.
So that basically enabled us to balance the budget, at least on paper to start in July of 2019,
2020. And then we started getting involved in vaccines. We started getting involved with
masks. All that stuff. And then of course, the, the repercussions were that the, the small group
of, I would call a small group of the public was, became very violently opposed.
And so they started showing up at meetings and screaming bloody murder. You're killing us.
You're killing our kids or you're communists or whatever. Then they started to protest outside
my house screaming, shouting, whatever. And that was pretty much, I think, 2021. And
meanwhile, we're trying to get things back opened up.
So when, when can the mask come off? When can the, you know, the hotels really get back
to normal and, and at some point, you know, we were able to, the governor was able to, to
authorize that. And so we started that process and slowly, but surely, you know, resort world,
the new hotel opened up. I mean, stuff happened, but it was still pretty sketchy as far as then
you would go through these waves of when testing was going up.
And so we were all panicked and going down and just but the amazing part was the public
started coming and they haven't stopped coming. Really just for better or worse, just risked it
and came here initially you know, the, the quality of the people coming was probably less
because the hotel rooms were basically given away.
And so we had a lot of violence on the strip and things like that. But, you know, we've slowly
improved that the room rates are up. The Raiders football stadium started, but you know, I
guess for 2020 they were open. But they, I mean, they were playing games there, but they
couldn't, there was no public there.
And then 2021, they actually started having people at the games. But it's just been a slow
progression to get back to where we were. And, and we're still not back as far as international
travel. But otherwise, you know, it's just amazing how resilient Las Vegas is, and the hotel
workers, a lot of them were still on that job, especially the maids, because the hotels are not
requiring the rooms to be cleaned every year, every day.
So they basically almost cut the maid service in half at least at the union places. But
otherwise, you know, the constructions continued, the Resort World, as I said, opened up.
The Sarah put a ton of money into their place. The Sphere is, is moving along. The
convention center has been rebuilt. Fountain Blue is, is actually started back up again.
They're another construction, but it's just, and then of course, housing has just gone to the
roof. So it's just now it's the last couple of months with interest rates starting to go up,
housing is starting to slow down. And then of course the water crisis and everything else,
those kinds of normal things, but all in all, it's just been a rollercoaster and facing things we'd
never, never even dreamed of, at least I never dreamed of.
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So I was on the health district. I was on the, the RTC a lot of exposure to different aspects of
the economy. From all aspects. It's just amazing the impact it had, but also the resilience, I
think that Vegas has shown.
[00:06:09] Magdalena Martinez
Do you think this resiliency is unique to. Nevada, Southern Nevada, or is this something that
you think is happening nationwide? Talk to me a little bit more about that.
[00:06:18] Tick Segerblom
I honestly feel that we're probably a bit more resilient, snap back faster than other places.
And, and truthfully, when you look, you talk to the airlines, we're the fastest growing airport.
We're the, we came back faster than any other place in the country. Our hotels have come
back faster than anybody else.
I'm not sure if that's our workforce, it's our mentality, it's a combination of everything, but
apparent, it seems like we did. We dropped farther because without the hotels, we’re dead.
And as you can remember, walking down the strip was like, wow, I never dreamed you could
walk down the strip and not see a car anywhere, anybody just like.
Crazy. And then to go to that bottom, I think we had 30 percent unemployment or more then
to see it come back as fast as it did, it's just, just amazing. So my perception is we were more
resilient as far as the bottom was, was deeper and then we get recovered faster. But so yeah,
that's my perception.
[00:07:21] Magdalena Martinez
And do you think it's partly because of the industries that dominate the economy here?
Tourism?
[00:07:28] Tick Segerblom
I think so, but I think it's also we're small we're, we're able to adapt very quickly. Our
government was able to, if there's a problem, we were able to jump on it right away. And so, I
think, rather than turning an aircraft carrier or maybe like turning a destroyer or something.
So, it was able to turn and move faster than government normally would and like a lot of
resiliency and coming back is government's response.
[00:07:58] Magdalena Martinez
Do you can you give me an example of that because I think that's a good point, you know, the
smallness and the ability to pivot and if you can give me an example.
[00:08:21] Tick Segerblom
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Oh, just when the governor just literally shutting down the hotels. One day he just said, sorry,
it's over. And then slowly coming back you know, then our health district, which had never
done it, seen like this. We were able to get the shots out there. We were able to put these, you
know, we were behind the curb for a while, but then we had these massive stations around the
County where you could drive through and get your shots.
Things like that. Then the hotels, of course they would open up halfway. And then the hotel
workers coming back and things, but, but just, you know, people getting permits when you
shut down a hotel, then you shut it down, all those restaurants. So then to get them back open,
you have to come in and have your health inspectors come in and inspect them and things
like that.
Just, there's just a massive amount of paperwork. They're involved in all these kinds of
things. And we're able to either do them or overlook them or, or just adapt it. And, you know,
the hotels call up and say, we need this, we need that. And, and of course that's our economy.
So, we don't want to risk anybody's health, but absent that we're going to do everything we
can to work with them.
[00:09:19] Magdalena Martinez
Now thinking about the pandemic, how did you work with groups who were the hardest hit
by the pandemic and who were those groups?
[00:09:27] Tick Segerblom
The groups hardest hit. You know, I guess I would have to say that, you know, the culinary
workers were the hardest hit just because, you know, they, they literally just stopped working
that whole sector. So, working with them to make sure that they had resources. You know,
their health fund almost shut down cause they…it's paid for by a certain amount of money
per hour.
So, we worked with Congress to get money to, to keep that going. The flip side is the
hospitals you know, they were going 94 miles an hour and their workers were just
overwhelmed. So, we had to try to subsidize them and then keep them going, pep them up,
you know, bring in people out of state, try to bring in more nursing staff, more everybody.
So just different levels where we're either working harder than ever before. Or are working
less than they were working before, and trying to balance that out and make sure that people
[would] survive as far as people being evicted. We were able to subsidize people as far as
their rent goes. If there were evictions, we were able to work with the justice court to prevent
evictions.
You know, food, we had food pantries all over the place where people could come through
and get all the food they wanted or have food delivered. So, I mean, there's been a lot of
suffering, but I think we, we minimized that as well, on a mass level. I'm sure individually,
there's just a ton of people that have just been devastated, but as far as the society, we kept
everybody floating.
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The one aspect that just was a nightmare and still is, I think, is the schools. There just didn't
seem to be any way to really figure out what to do with them. And so, they just, since we
don't really control them, even if we did control them, but I think that they were just really
devastated.
And I don't know what you can do about that. I don't know. The teachers, you want to save
the teacher's lives. You want to save the custodial staff's lives and the student's lives. But then
the parents are stuck with, you know, what do you do with our kids? If I'm going to work or I
can't go to work or just, just a mess.
[00:11:45] Magdalena Martinez
As you know, our school governance structure is very different than most of the country. In
most places it's more localized and there's more local government say. How could, how
would you see it differently if local governments had more of a say in education policy?
[00:12:09] Tick Segerblom
Yeah, I'm not sure that that's true as far as local government being more involved.
It's just our school district is so large, but you know, most places have a separately elected
school board that, and they're autonomous, so they get their own tax returns. Money. And so
places like Chicago, where the, so the mayor and the city council actually run the school
district in New York, but most of these like Los Angeles and places, they have a separate
school board and they run differently.
So, you know, just in general, the school board structure, I think currently doesn't work well,
just because you have people that are making $5,000 a year, trying to supervise somebody
that's making $300,000 a year. And 300 and some thousand kids. That's just, it's more than a
full time job and you're electing people who really don't have the ability to spend full time
and then you have a school superintendent or a process where basically the school board
doesn't get involved.
They won't give them the authority to really do much, but it's just the structure itself. That is
the aircraft carrier trying to turn. It just the school, this just is so big and unwieldy. It just
does not move very nimbly. And again, when you're dealing with kids’ lives and teachers’
lives, I think, you know, the caution is the name of the game. And just when you're dealing
with a pandemic, caution says, you don't want people in these rooms and we're, because all
our classrooms are all isolated as far as there's no outside air coming in there, you know, put
30 kids in this and teach you in a room with, without, with no air no outside air. It's just a
disaster waiting to happen. So, I don't think our buildings were ever built for this kind of a
disease.
[00:14:00] Magdalena Martinez
Right, right. You know, thinking about the different government interventions. Is there
anything you wish the government at any level, whether it's federal, state, county, local
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would have done differently or could do differently in response to the pandemic and the
economic downturn?
[00:14:25] Tick Segerblom
I'm not thinking of an example right this second, but I'm sure in hindsight there's a ton of
things we could have done differently, probably just timing wise as far as not shutting down
things or opening them back up. But, you know, the other thing is I didn't mention is that
historically in Clark County, probably most of our government operated in silos.
So, the county is a separate thing. The city is a separate thing. It's called two separate, the
library district, something in the health district. And we didn't talk to each other. We didn't
work with each other. We have learned probably the hard way just that we're all part of the
same government.
And so we now work much more closely with each other, which I think is going to be very
positive coming out of this. So those are the kind of things that, I mean, there is some benefit
to what we've been through. It's made us realize that you can't just. You live in your own little
world, but you have to view the bigger picture.
And, and there's no reason why, you know, we can't going forward, we can't have county
parks at school district at schools or at the health district in county buildings or at the library
talk to us or the bus system or whatever. Just it's all, we're all part of the same package. And
to the extent we can work collaboratively, it's much better.
[00:15:50] Magdalena Martinez
When I spoke to Commissioner Kirkpatrick, she talked about the MAC Committee. And I'm
wondering you're echoing some of the same perhaps, you know, pivot and strengths of what
came out of it. And I'm wondering, what's it going to take to sustain those type of
collaborative relationships outside of a pandemic?
[00:16:18] Tick Segerblom
I think trying to, you know, hopefully the people that have been through this realize that they
don't just have to focus on the strip or on zoning or whatever, that we can focus on other
things and we can also work collaboratively.
Now we know each other. We know what their strengths are, what their weaknesses are. But
it's just, the government has a much major and positive role then then we're used to. When I
got here, we just didn't view ourselves as this is kind of running the whole place. The reality
is we're the one entity that has the whole county and can at least, and maybe water will be a
good example of that as far as how to, how we deal with the water issue going forward.
But the fact is, we need to look at this holistically and not just, you know, individually what's
best for the county or what's best for the city or what's best for any different entity.
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[00:17:35] Magdalena Martinez
Is that, do you think that is that people/leadership contingent or is it resource based or is there
legislating that needs to go around that?
[00:17:38] Tick Segerblom
I think it's probably all, but I think it's primarily people. It's just realizing that, you know, I
can get more done by working with somebody and just cause there's a line here. That's a hair
and says that you're the city of the county doesn't mean I can't talk to the city council person
or the city county.
My staff can't talk to the city staff. I mean, it’s there's just been a lot of artificial lines drawn
over the years, and there was no need to really do those things. Whereas now we're starting to
realize how much more we can accomplish. If we work together again, the one distinction I
make is the schools.
I think we haven't really penetrated them enough, but I think going forward, at least for my
personal goal is to really get the county much more involved in the schools and look at them
holistically. And then how can we work together to take care of families that are in need or
kids that need anything.
In general, you know, that's the one missing element in Clark County is our school system,
public school system. We have great schools, but we just have schools that are just a disaster,
and we cannot have this image around the country that, you know, our school system is
failing because that's what really prevents us from attracting major businesses.
[00:18:50] Magdalena Martinez
And as you know, your time in the legislature, there've been many bills introduced to
restructure governance. And this idea of a hybrid board of having, I think, one of the
proposals was having like county commissioners weigh in on, you know, recommendations
for an appointed board. Do you think that might help steer the ship a little bit?
It could, but, you know, my goal or or my idea is to at least have the school district
boundaries mirror the Clark County Commission district boundaries. So, then you have two
systems that fit together and you have reason why a school board member would wanna run
is because they could see themselves as a future County Commission member.
So it's like, and then we could get more involved directly in what's going on and have more
say in our schools. And there's lots of different ways to cut it. But at the end of day, we just
have, the school district has to allow us to get more involved in their day to day decisions,
and we can provide services, we can provide healthcare, things like that, that historically we
haven't done so it's doable But the other thing is just the school district has got to get out of
this idea that the elected officials or even the point officials don't really have a say.
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I think it's so important to have people who respond to the public who actually can come in
and make a decision or if somebody, a parent calls me, I can call somebody and take care of
that problem. It's not like the head of the school district is God. Which seems to be the
current structure.
[00:20:27] Magdalena Martinez
So that would increase the board of trustees then from seven to Well,
[00:18:53] Tick Segerblom
No, it would, they would still be seven. They would just be the same size as ours, but, but you
could have an appointed one along with the elected one, or I don't think there's a big deal as
far as elected or appointed so much as they need to have more of a say so in what's going on
as opposed to basically they have their meetings, but they can't really make a decision. And
the open meeting law, the way it's interpreted ties their hands to the point where they can't
really get involved.
And then they have this policy governance idea, which they, all they can do is talk about
policy. They can't really talk about day-to-day things. Which means that who wants to be on
the school board if you can't actually do something. But, but that's one thing I would say,
relative to what you're asking, but the open meeting law is killing local governments just
absolutely kills us because there's the bureaucracies, can do anything they want to do because
they're not subject to it. But anything we try to do anything, “Oh, you can't do that, you can't
do this because you have to publicly post it and you can't have him talk to anybody else.”
So it's just, it's become a real hurdle and basically empowers the bureaucracy as opposed to
giving elected officials who theoretically would be the ones to respond, allowing us to make
decisions.
[00:21:57] Magdalena Martinez
And the open meeting laws apply to everyone but the legislature. Is that right?
[00:22:05] Tick Segerblom
Correct.
[00:22:07] Magdalena Martinez
Okay. That seems like a reasonably…
[00:22:08] Tick Segerblom
And the courts.
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[00:22:11] Magdalena Martinez
And the courts. Okay. Yeah. I haven't followed that issue to see if there's been bills
introduced to try to. Move away from that.
[00:22:18] Tick Segerblom
There's not, I'm gonna have some people prepare, present some stuff this next session. To try
to at least allow us to have subcommittees with, if we have, like, if we have seven members,
four as a quorum, but if we have subcommittees of three, they shouldn't have to worry about
the meeting.
They should be able to meet and discuss stuff without having to go through this great
rigamarole of posting and having 10 days’ notice. And just, it's just a, you can't do it. And
which means that if you look at our agendas, 90 percent of it is stuff that the staff has
proposed, and we vote on it without even having seen it, but if I try to do the same thing, then
it's a violation of the meaning of the law.
[00:22:56] Magdalena Martinez
And this is something that not all states have, right?
[00:23:10] Tick Segerblom
I think most have some level, but I think ours has been interpreted more strictly than ours, I
don’t know who can be more strict than we are. It's just crazy. And as you said, the funny
part is the legislature, which imposes these rules, doesn't use it themselves.
[00:22:22] Magdalena Martinez
Right. Now, as you've talked about the role of county and the role of local government, you
somewhat alluded to this, but we haven't talked about it. And that is the distrust of
government. You've been in in civic life and civically engaged and elected positions. Do you
see this point in history?
Just an extension of the lack of trust of government, or are we really at a heightened level?
And I'm wondering what, what we can do about that, you know, as a society, as elected
officials and as a community.
[00:23:59] Tick Segerblom
I think there's definitely a need to regain trust. But I think also that doing something
hopefully will regain trust.
I mean, this my generation is probably too late to do much about it, but hopefully there's this
newer generation coming up can see that we faced a pandemic. We actually dealt with it. We
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conquered it and going forward it didn't just happen by accident. I mean, government stepped
in and paid to have the vaccines created and paid to have the vaccines delivered.
All the things that happened were government and even with Trump and his people are all
talking about, and this goes way back to Nixon trying to attack government, but at the end of
the day, we need government. It has a very valuable service. And if you look around the
world, other governments work well, it's just, we have created this thing where government is
somehow evil, but in fact, it's necessary.
And, you know, education, I mean, all this stuff, this is where we go. That's how we've
progressed. And the thought that science would be looked down upon is just, I never would
have considered that in my life. So, it's like, how do you even deal with it when people are
talking about that or are questioning election results? I mean, this is just bizarre.
[00:25:26] Magdalena Martinez
And let me ask you, Tick, and this is kind of going off my script here. Some people are
saying the sky is falling in terms of our democracy. What are your thoughts on that? Is it, isn't
it? I mean, how do we go back to these, ideals that we've created.
[00:25:43] Tick Segerblom
Well, I think we, that we have to, you know, hang together and hopefully come out of this.
Because when government has been very dysfunctional and all you hear about on TV is the
dysfunction. And then you have TV channels that are actually promoting dysfunction. But at
end of the day, if you look at that, you know, this bill that just passed and we start to turn our
economy away from, you know, fossil fuels and electricity and somehow other people can
see that this global you know, climate problems is a real. And we have to do something or all
the, there's lots of issues out there that we just can't sit back and say, “Oh, they're going to
take care of themselves.”
They're not. I mean, I think that right now is the perfect opportunity for government to
actually step forward and do something. And it looks to me like we are, it's just, it's barely
moving forward, but I think we are making some progress. And I think people are starting to
hopefully, I hope people are starting to realize that we, if we don't make progress, we're all
dead.
[00:26:47] Magdalena Martinez
That's right. Now you've mentioned the water issue. In thinking about the pandemic, are there
any lessons learned from that crisis that can help us for the future crisis, i.e. the water
scarcity?
[00:25:02] Tick Segerblom
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Well, I would say the biggest one, and this is probably the first I've been talking about for 30
years, is the pandemic literally came out of the blue.
I mean, if you talk to healthcare professionals, they knew this was coming. You know, I've
been in politics all my life. No one ever told me there was a pandemic coming or if they did, I
never paid attention to it, but I mean, these things don't, I mean, if you ever, every hundred
years, there's the pandemic. The fact that we weren't prepared for this, didn't realize it was
coming, didn't know how to deal with it.
It's pretty amazing. The same with water. I mean, you're in the desert. I mean, there's the
Colorado river is only so big. How hard can it be to plan that this was going to run out,
whether it's going to run out tomorrow or run out in 10 years or a hundred years, where we
can't keep using water, can't keep growing.
That's just that's the reality. And so to face reality and to have people talking about that and
instead of just sitting there, I waiting for it to happen, why not planned on how to deal with
it? Just like the pandemic. Now, if we had plans in place and face masks and gloves and all
that stuff, you know, we were able to reproduce the vaccine relatively quickly, relatively
speaking, but then we have, how do we get the syringes and how to get them distributed and
just all those mechanics that we've honestly had no preparation for.
Just amazing given the fact that I think I didn't realize it, but with people, smart people knew
it was coming. It was just a question of when. So, the same thing with water, water is very
easily manageable. But, but right now, I mean, not to criticize the governor because I love the
guy, but the truth is he just announced that, “oh, we have a water problem, but we don't have
to worry about it, and we can keep growing.”
No, we can't keep growing. We have to deal with it. And let's say we know how much water
we have. Let's start to plan it and figure out what we're going to do with it, as opposed to just
grow mad. And then all of a sudden one day say, “oh my God, we're out of water,” which it
seems to be the current philosophy.
[00:29:10] Magdalena Martinez
Yeah, yeah take I'm going to turn it over to Taylor to ask the last two questions or so if that's
all right.
[00:29:17] Tick Segerblom
Was that all one question?
[00:29:20] Magdalena Martinez
She's going to ask you about two questions.
[00:29:21] Tick Segerblom
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I know, but I was saying, it's like, like you asked the first question, she asked the second two
and three.
[00:29:26] Taylor Cummings
Yes. Hello. It's been wonderful being a part of this conversation. But I know you mentioned,
you know, holistic approach and the importance of just restructuring and having new ideas.
So what do you think might be some of the most innovative ways that you've seen
organizations or citizens, you know, address and deal with the pandemic? And that can be
collaboration programs or really anything that is coming.
[00:29:49] Tick Segerblom.
I think really just trying to assess the problem. Deal with the problem. If it doesn't work, try
something different. Don't give up. You know, it's not every problem is solvable
instantaneously. So having the ability to just hang in there and keep trying and wait, figure
out the solution. But I personally feel that we, as a community have grown and this
government have grown tremendously and learned so much more what we can do. Today we
just did 120 million, I think, it was for housing. The good news is this is like the federal
government gave us.
Just be a few minutes [he signals to his assistant]. So we were able to spend it, but, we
actually are now focusing things like housing and we're going to be working on homeless.
And so there's lots of things we can, government can do and if we just set our mind to it. And
of course you need the money. So hopefully Congress is going to start to realize that you
can't just sit back and expect things, solutions without, without you know, funding them.
[00:30:59] Taylor Cummings
Yeah. Were there any specific policies at the state or the federal government implemented
that you noticed impacted people maybe directly or indirectly?
[00:31:03] Tick Segerblom
Well, frankly, the first shot of money, you know, where they just pumped up money like
crazy and everybody got $1,000, whoever it was, that was a huge thing.
I mean, that really enabled us to survive as a society and then having money for rent so that
people don't get evicted, and food and all this money just really saved our butt.
[00:31:38] Taylor Cummings
Did you see any maybe negative impacts of any policies that were implemented at any other
levels?
[00:31:43] Tick Segerblom
15
Not personally. I mean, some people would say, “Oh my God, you're subsidizing people and
people don't want to go back to work.” But I think frankly, a lot of people said, “Shit, why am
I working this? Why am I killing myself? You know, life is too short to just go work at the
McDonald's for eight bucks an hour.”
You know, and go home and so anyway, I think a lot of people rethought their lives and
hopefully are resetting. At the end of day everybody's got to work at some level, but you don't
have to either kill yourself to become a billionaire or just to survive. So try to have some
meaning to your life and slow down and smell the roses.
[00:32:24] Taylor Cummings
Yeah, this is perfect for our last question, because I really do think this pandemic caused a lot
of people to just think reflectively and critically about where they are in life and their
purpose. So are you hopeful? And if so, you know, what might you be hopeful for?
[00:32:35] Tick Segerblom
Totally. I'm an optimist. I've been doing this forever.
So I'll never give up. But I do think that, you know, the pendulum has swung. I think we've
held it. I think Trump was the epitome of all the evil in the world and the fact that we were
able to stop him, which is pretty scary when you think how close he came was for being as
bad as he is, but we stopped him and now we're pushing back.
There's going to be a lot of, you know, ups and downs in the process, but going forward you
know, I'm a Bernie Sanders Democrat, so I believe in big government. I believe in spending
money. I believe in taxing the rich. And I think there's a lot of rich out there that could be
taxed. So I think it was just have the will.
In Nevada, particularly, I think if we can get through this election, we got 10 years of we're
going to be a great place to for business and money is going to want to come and be invested,
but we also have control over the government enough that we'll be able to implement some
really good policies and hopefully start with schools.
So, we can really properly fund them get some good teachers. And really take care of that,
that last aspect of our of our city. But, but it's, I mean, we've learned, I think we can do
anything. So hopefully we just, we take that to say, let's do things as opposed to, “oh we
solved our problems, let's go back to where we were.” I think we can never put the genie
back in the bottle.
[00:34:06] Magdalena Martinez
Tick, I really appreciate you taking the time. I know you're a busy man.
[00:34:12] Tick Segerblom
16
This more fun for a politician than just being able to tell people what they think so much.
[00:34:17] Magdalena Martinez
Well, I appreciate it. And I'll see you in a couple of weeks for Bea and Adrian's baby shower.
[00:34:28] Tick Segerblom
Oh, you're coming to our party. Great. We just, I just looked at the temperature is supposed to
be 98 and it's, it's outside, so dress casually.
[00:34:34] Magdalena Martinez
Okay, all right. Well, my best to Sharon. I look forward to seeing her.
[00:34:36] Tick Segerblom
Great. Thank you so much.
[00:34:38] Magdalena Martinez
Okay. Take care.
[00:34:39] Tick Segerblom
Nice to meet you.
[00:34:40] Taylor Cummings
Nice meeting you.
Audio end: 34:41