An Army of Normal Folks - The 4 Things Every Family Should Do Before Disaster Hits

Episode Date: September 22, 2026

It's not a matter of if a disaster hits your community. It's when. And when it does, the first person on the scene isn't first responders or government officials. It's your neighbor. Jeff Byard has spent 24 years in disaster response - from the Marine Corps to Alabama Emergency Management to FEMA. Then he left to go work with Team Rubicon - a volunteer lead disaster relief organization. In this episode, Jeff sits down with Bill to talk about what he learned from a career of showing up for people on their worst day - and what every one of us can do right now to be ready when our neighbors need us most. You'll walk away knowing how to prepare your family before disaster strikes, why your next-door neighbor is the most important first responder in any emergency, and how ordinary people are doing some of the most important disaster relief work in the country through Team Rubicon. ARMY ACTIONS Subscribe to the podcast and rate & review us! Signup to join the Army, visit NormalFolks.org Follow us on social media @ArmyofNormalFolks Join or start an ANF local service club at https://normalfolks.org/service-clubs/ Take The 10 Level Challenge, "the hero's journey for service" at 10LevelChallenge.orgSupport the show: https://www.normalfolks.us/#joinSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Jeff is the chief program officer for Team Rubicon. What Team Rubicon is, this is a disaster relief nonprofit. It's started by veterans that now has more than 200,000 volunteers and has launched over 1,300 operations across the world. First, let's just talk about how Team Rubicon started because some veterans crossed a literal Rubicon. What was that? So it was the devastating earthquake in 2010 that hit Haiti.

You know, you had 200,000 fatalities plus. Jake Wood and some others who founded the organization, Jake's a Marine, and he knew that he had opportunities or skills that he could help. You know, so he organized, didn't really know the other eight, but they made their way to the Dominican Republic and then crossed over, and that was crossing the Rubicon and got with a father that was doing a Jesuit priest that was doing good work in Port-au-Prince and just went to work. And that's one of our cultural values came out of that.

A lot of them did, but know your role. And, you know, Jake always tells the story of, you know, he wasn't a medic, but he was mopping blood off the floor and doing whatever he could to help. And then realized, you know, early on that veterans have a unique skill set that really equates to disaster response from some of the austere environments that veterans go in. I'm myself, I'm a veteran, so I can relate to that. And some of the, you know, things that they've witnessed in their time and service, it's a different, different witness, right? It's more of helping than maybe, you know, what a combat Marine does in uniform. So the skill sets easily equate, and then from there,

they realized they had something special. And his sister was actually very intrical, very much a part of the creation of Team Rubicon. She was creating a Facebook page and, you know, let Jake know, hey, you've got a lot of energy here, you know. Before we go on to the, you weren't in Haiti. I was not. No, I was not. But have you been? I've not been to Haiti.

All right. You know what's interesting to me about that particular incident is I don't know if people know geographically, but if you look at the island, Haiti and the DR, Dominican Republic, are an island. And there's a very straight line that divides the two. And the Dominican Republic is a pretty successful republic. And Haiti divided by nothing more than a man's line driven, drawn across an island. And Haiti is a disaster. And it's interesting. It's interesting. to me that that earthquake happened and while the DR had some problems it was nothing like Haiti and it was it was the Haitian infrastructure was horrific and it

it crumbled and it killed people all over place and it didn't it didn't have in its resources its own ability to care for its own people and as it pertains to your story, what can we learn from that in terms of a government's ability to help its own people in a disaster relief versus people's own ability to help people in a disaster relief situation? You know, my takeaway is that disasters don't care. They don't follow political lies. I figured you're going to say that. Go. I love it. care. And the flip side of that or the lesson out of that is put people first. You know, people, people care. People matter. You know, we've got systems, we've got the greatest

response system in the world in the United States, but we still have flaws, right? And always put people first. But when it comes to a disaster, and it reveals what's already a challenge in a community. If you have homelessness in a community before tornado comes through or before a major earthquake like that, it doesn't go away. It just exacerbates the challenges that you already have in a community. So in my opinion, and what Team Rubicon does is, you know, think about it from what can you do daily that can prevent a worse catastrophe. What can you do if you've got homelessness, which we don't address homelessness, right? But we know that's in every community or many, many challenges. But I think the takeaway of that coaches, disasters don't care what country it is.

They don't care if you're a democracy, if you're not, if you're well-resourced, if you're not. Now, obviously, in a country that's more well-resourced, it's better, you know. But a disaster of that magnitude is all hands on deck. What, um, so these eight guys show up in Haiti. Mm-hmm. And your own words, they're veterans. So they've seen things that the average person, typically. doesn't see. So they have this, although it can cause PTSD and everything else, which is a whole

another show, but it's very, very real. But they do have baked into them from their former service a skill set that a lot of people don't have in terms of being able to deal with carnage. And now a few messages from our generous sponsors. But first, thanks for tuning into an army of normal folks, where our mission is to make service easier for all of us and together change the country. So today, I want to share with you an email received from Army member named Sarah March Banks who lives in Manning, South Carolina. Sarah wrote, I recently retired and have time to do volunteer work, but I'm new to a small town and haven't found anything here that inspires me, like listening to the Army of Normal Folks

podcast. I've never heard an episode that did make me feel a nagging to do something. Good. We're nagging now. But I get it. That's why I'm joining the 10-level challenge, which is the hero's journey for service, a journey that Army members can go on to deepen their service over time. Yeah, and we did a shop talk on the hero's journey. end of 10-level challenge. And that's kind of where this comes from. And the idea is if you complete the challenge, you can't leave that challenge without both inspiration

and even an inner calling to get involved and do something to better a community and be part of the Army of normal folks whose ultimate goal is to change this country for the better. So thanks for emailing us, and I really do want to hear about what you do next. because I'm certain that after taking the 10-level challenge, you'll be inspired to. So you too can sign up for the 10-level challenge at 10-level challenge.org.

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And over my career, I've heard account after account of prosecutorial misconduct, story after story of injustice. But I've never heard a story quite like this. The more I kept reading that stuff, I thought, man, there's more red flags that just kept coming up over and over. We'll hypnotize him to strengthen that memory. So he went into a good france. I really didn't believe any of it was real.

And I was like, well, they're going to figure out this is not me. They're going to do their police job. Listen to Examine the Backfire Effect on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. So these eight people show up to a 2010 hate-hate. earthquake, but now it's 200,000 volunteers launching 1,300 operations impacting 14 and 8 million people. How do these eight people grow to that? How does that happen? Because that's a phenomenal story. Well, it's a it is a good story. And I think the key takeaway on the veteran narrative is the one thing that veterans have, whether they've been a combat veteran

or served in support roles is they have a bias for action. And that's the key takeaway from that. They have a bias for action. They're not going to sit on the couch. If there's a need, they're going to move towards that need. Do you think that's training? I think it's a bit of training, but I think it's just a mindset. You know, I think it's, you know, I'm a Marine as well.

And I tell people, and I'm a 1900s Marine, so, you know, they judge me by that. But it doesn't matter. It's funny. Every Marine I've ever met never says I was a Marine. No, you're saying, I'm a Marine. Yes. Yes. And that's the mindset.

That's what they did. Yes. I earned my title, actually, 36 years and two days ago. So graduated Paras Island in October, excuse me, August 31st, 1990. Wow. But so, you know, the growth factor, I think there's a little bit of luck involved in that, too. So that group came home from Haiti and then their next deployment and where the gray shirt came about. was they deployed down to Chile for another earthquake.

They didn't have a uniform. They went to a sports store. There was gray shirts on the sales rack, and that's what they got. So that's where they're gray shirt. No kidding. Yeah, that's the gray shirt kind of origin, if you will, which I will get hit when a gray shirt see it, because I don't have my name on the shirt,

but put your name on your shirt so everybody knows it. You know, you kind of take away some of the, nervousness of meeting somebody for the first time. You just see their name there. So that happened, and then their first... I want one of those. Oh, we can... I really do want one of those.

I'll wear... I get a lot of T-shirts. I would wear that all over the first. You've got a sign of a volunteer to get that shirt. Yeah, yeah, that's... I can get you a lot of swag, but the actual... I just want those shirts. That's really is.

We can... We can talk, Coach. You should maybe try one of my shirts. I got too silly. I like it. I tried to look for it. Got too silly. He's in jail.

I like that. Okay, go ahead. I tried to find a Manassas hat, but I couldn't. Yeah, well, that's going to be a tough find. There you go. But the intent was international. That's where the group saw the most need. And then in 2011, Alabama, which I worked for the state at the time, got hit with a really, really bad tornado outbreak, probably the most known.

Is that the one that hit the university? Hit Tuscaloosa. I remember that. four tornadoes that day in the state. So that was just one of many. But definitely devastated 50, lost 50 individuals in Tuscaloosa that day. Lost some students, if I remember right? Yeah, lost some students.

On campus. Yeah. Or just off campus. But still, some kids going to school. But it was. It was bad. And Team Rubicon deployed to that. I didn't know the organization at the time.

So, but that was their first taste on the domestic side. And then really they put all chips on the table. when Hurricane Sandy hit. And when that happened, basically... Were they specifically calling out two veterans? For the most part, yes. It was a veteran-led veteran organization at the time. And they deployed everybody that worked for the organization,

which was very few up to New York. And we got at that time, got on some people's radar, some of the finance people up there's radar, and they put some money behind us. If you think about it, who better to stay organized, calm, and on mission in the midst of chaos than veterans? I agree. I mean, you've trained for it. It's there.

And we continue to train. I think that's the secret sauce of Team Rubicon is we have a professional volunteer force. We do a lot, invest a lot in training. And it's the best way to get people to need. You know, there's a lot of people that want to do goodwill, and we love that. but, you know, untrained, unskilled, unorganized can also create a disaster on top of a disaster. So we have an avenue through training and discipline and structure that can put that goodwill to impact. As part of the 200,000, can you tell Bill about the 3,500?

Yeah, we have about probably a little over 3,000 that are volunteer leaders. And these individuals really are the heart and soul of Team Rubicon. They give upwards and sometimes more than 40 hours a week to the organization. Volunteers. Volunteers that do a lot of our heavy lifting and really our cultural standard bear. So, you know, we listen to that group. We listen to all gray shirts. You know, the only title that matters in Team Rubicon, as we say, is gray shirt.

So, you know, everybody's got that equal voice. But those volunteer leaders that sacrifice that time for the organization is what keeps me motivated because my job is to make sure they have the skills and the resources that they need to do the good work. I really appreciate the forethought that went to the gray shirts showing up at Home Depot and they happen to have eight of them or something. That's hilarious. Good story. As organized as is to just say, well, there's eight gray shirts where the gray shirts now going to Haiti. I mean, that's, but isn't it an interesting that how organic that is and how organic and natural the response to Haiti was.

The point is nobody ever planned to have all these volunteers and everything else. It was a simple act of common folks, seeing an area need and filling it, and organically, it became what it's become. I mean, the shirts, buying the shirts and now being gray shirts is almost a metaphor for the entire organization. No, it is. And it's, especially from the veteran narrative, and I was talking to Alex earlier, you know, it, we're not a veteran service organization. There's a lot of great veteran service organizations out there. But what we believe is that we give an opportunity for a veteran to continue that service, right?

And we do it in a sense of camaraderie. We do it in a sense of uniform. Veterans are used to putting on a uniform, you know. It never leaves you. It doesn't matter if you're 20-year retired or four-year compensation. like I did, you know. So, you know, having a uniform, having a sense of purpose, and then a community that believes in one mission, backgrounds can vary, just as a military does. And the other interesting is the intersect now with our civilians, which we call kick-ass, you know, kick-ass

civilians. That's what our... You call them kick-a-devilian. They're not gracious, but they are kick-a-devilians. Well, they're dressers. You got a veteran gray shirt or a kick-ass civilian. I got it. But Grasher, you know, all the same is it's a unique opportunity for that where civilians can, you know, see the veteran narrative. And veterans can see the civilian narrative. But again, it's grounded in one mission. We're there to help a disaster survivor. We're there to put a community or help put a community back together.

We want to work with a community, not in a community. So it's very important because that's the driver. When you veterans get together, do you guys like, did you see that KAC over there, get, to work, man, that case is the shit. A lot of times outworking us. I love that. But, you know, that's a part that I left the Corps in 94, you know, and went through life and joined Team Rubicon in 2020.

And I did not realize how much I missed. And I did not realize how much the veteran was a part of me. It was just maybe suppressed. And that's a lot of veterans out there that had that same feeling. So it's an opportunity to be around a community that has a like-mind. That's a really good segue to what I wanted to ask you, which is obviously Team RoopCon is a veteran-led disaster relief movement. And I think we've talked about what a veteran brings to the work.

But it may be just as important, especially given so many of our veterans long, long, long, long, long deployments and so much of what a veteran brings home after those deployments, specifically combat deployments, but really any deployment. What do you see this work giving back to them? Purpose. Purpose. Do you think it saves lives? I do.

I do. With the high suicide rate among combat veterans that have been deployed five and four and six times. Just insane numbers of tours in places like Afghanistan and Iraq and many other places. I mean, some of these guys come back and have a real hard time readjusting. And we've done stories on why suicide rates are so high. And you start to really understand it when you hear from their voices and their mouths. And I've sat across from men at this table who have held a gun in their mouth.

and one misfired. It would have been dead. And he said, I'm doing amazing things today. But as I was reading about your organization, I thought this thing not only saves lives and helps people who have been victims of disasters, but the veterans themselves who get to reconnect with other veterans and do positive work and feel good about themselves

and be part of the team and have a mission and all of that, it has to save veterans' lives. I believe it does. And, you know, we have one of our, on all of our operations, probably one of our most sacred rituals, if you will, is called the campfire. And it started in Haiti. And it's where. So what's my next question?

So go. It's where, you know, Jake and the others, the father found some beer, Presidente Beer and was actually called. Yeah. And so. The place may have been destroyed, but they still got beer. We got that for oldies, you know. Yeah, that's right.

So they shared a beer and kind of just reflected on the day. And that... This is their first day in Haiti. First, it's several. Whatever. Sweeping up blood, seeing all kind of cornets, antipedes, all that. So they're just debriefing. Debrising.

They're just chilling. So they build a campfire and get some beer. Build a campfire, get some beer, and they all reflect on what they saw today and kind of what it made them feel. that tradition holds to this day. Every operation we do, every evening, we have a campfire. You know, we have some dry fobs where we may not have a couple beers, but in most situations you get a couple beers, and everybody reflects on the day,

and I've participated in many of the campfires and veterans, you know, will tell their story. Sometimes it has nothing to do with the disaster we're working, but it's to your point, Bill. It's, hey, I was, you know, in a really bad, place or, you know, I was, you know, thinking about taking my own life and, you know, I came across Team Rubicon and somebody reached out and somebody put their arm around me, whether physically or metaphorically, and, you know, I'm here now. And it's good because I think, you know, and I can't

speak for every veteran, but every, I can speak for myself, you know, and I don't realize it. I didn't realize it at the time, but we all go through a dark spot. We all go through where, you know, I was a, you know, team leader. And then I was just Jeff. you know, and that's a, especially a young age, you have, you know, you think about the responsibilities of, you know, 20-year-old Marine that has a rifle squad under him or, you know, running a very important shop and she's got to make sure this works or that rifle squad doesn't get, you know, these are really young people when you get old and you look back. And then you go from that to, you know, you're just Bill or just Jeff. And that's, that's an adjustment that, um, I probably struggle with more than I realized. What's the good thing is, it was a little bit different when I got out in 94. It was not the transition, not the services that our veterans have today.

So I'm really, really happy about that. What's it like to go sit with men who you understand uniquely because you've served and watch them work their app for no money? to help some people who were victims of disaster release and watch their camaraderie, their mission focused, their bravery, their willingness, and then sit around a campfire and hear a man like that say, I was ready to take my life. What's that like?

Well, it's inspiring. and it's also very humbling, I would say, too. And Bill, I would say it's men and women, right? We have women that outwork us on a regular basis. I am such a jerk because, right, I shouldn't just say men. But it's a... And women suffer the same issues. Women suffer the same issues.

And, you know, so when I hear really a community, yeah, it's inspiring, as I said, because, you know, I'm part of an organization. that I know has made a life better. And actually it's two lives. It's the veteran's life that's telling the story, and it's the disaster survivor that we just left. So, you know, it's, I was, you know, more on the government side. One of the things that I know, because I feel it when I go out on an operation,

when you give back to others, you feel really, it's almost, I feel bad sometimes, how good I feel. I feel selfish because I'm like, damn, feel really good, because I just did really good. But when you feel that, it's, it's, it's, you know, it's addictive. At least it is for me. And at least it is for the gray shirts that, you know, because they do it time and time again.

I think it's universal. I can't tell you how many people cut out across from me and say, honest to goodness, and they don't mean it with some false sense of humility. They all say they get more out of their service than what they put in it. And I think there's a sense of euphoria. There's a truth to that. And it's really, you know, when we talk about veterans, we talk about civilians, you know, the, the, the, where the magic is for team Rubicon.

We'll bring 30 gray shirts from every background. And we do fly gray shirts in. We try to use local gray shirts. So you've got 30 individuals that may or may not even know each other. Common mission, though, to help. And then they go out and they'll work in 100 degree heat on a homeowner or disaster survivor that none, nobody knows. that's inspiring. That's where I'm like, all right, we still got a shot in this thing.

And then by the end of the day, they sit around a campfire with a beer and share their most intimate thoughts. Yep. You know. It's a pretty incredible transformation over 24 hours. It is. It is. And then they leave that. We generally will have, you know, we'll do, depending on the length of the operation, you'll do a week, you know, week on the Fob, then we switch them out.

Fob. A forward operating base. So that's where we camp. I knew what it was. I want to make sure everybody else did. Ford operating base. It's funny, military terms. That's it.

That's it. That's it. And it's open sleeping, you know, your own cots. And, you know, luckily I don't snore, but we'll have the gray shirts that snore. And everybody's like, man, we're going to put this jack outside. You know, you can't sleep. But it's your camaraderie. It's the seriousness of the stories.

But what I really love and probably the part I missed most that I didn't realize, you know, when I left the service. was when I left the Corps was, I mean, just the joking, you know, it is, the banter is unreal. I mean, there's more laughter than there is anything when we get out to an operation, which is all. A locker room. Yeah, yeah, it's just awesome. You know, you never know what's going to happen. So again, the organic of it is when I was reading the story, I was like, this is so good for communities that need help, but it is so good for the community of veterans that also themselves may need help. And I think that's important.

Is there a disaster relief story that you've been part of or maybe not part of that's almost legendary with Team Rubicon? That you guys always talk about that one? You know, we have a couple. I mean, obviously, the Haiti, you know, that's the origin story. Hurricane Harvey is really where we blew up. Which one was Hurricane Harvey? Hurricane Harvey was in 2017 and it hit Houston. Houston aired.

I'd forgotten about that. Yeah. So that year we had Harvey, Irma, and Maria, you know, all that we'd be. storms. That was really big. So that one set a lot of records, if you will, for Team Rubicon. It really exploded the volunteer ranks and exploded some of our financial giving, which was good. So it really let the organization expand. How many people do you think you had on the ground on Harvey? I would have to go back, Bill. I don't want to. We had a lot. I mean, it was our record, you know,

record number of deployments, record deployers on the ground. You know, it was a big, big storm. We worked at it for a long time. But in the disaster world, records are meant to be broken, as in everything else. And then comes Helene. Helene, I had a big part of Helene. I helped lead a team into Asheville. We were into Asheville. Funny story there.

We tried to find somewhere to sleep. And really good friend, good guys at the Asheville Fire Department. We met with them. They didn't really have room, so I asked the chief, you know, can we sleep in a parking lot? I don't think he thought we was really going to do that. And, yeah, we popped tents in a parking lot and kind of showed our medal. And it went from there. But Helene was our benchmark now.

And that's, you know, we had 300 gray shirts on the ground over 300. 300. Over 10 different operations that stretched from Florida to North Carolina. Some of those, the operations in Georgia lasted 200 plus days. so, you know, really big storm. 200 days that you guys stayed on the ground? Yeah, that was probably. So we broke all the records from Harvey and Helene.

You know, we've had COVID was a really, really big one, you know. One that actually stands out that's not really caused by a natural disaster. We did, we stepped into the breach, if you will, when the, when we let us. left Afghanistan and, you know, helped integrate 70,000 refugees, partners of the military from Afghanistan that came over. So we did a lot of logistical efforts on five different installations, you know, just doing our part. But that's one where, you know, we try to get to yes. I tell people our scope of work is, how do we get to yes? And no is not something we like to say, so to speak. So that one, that one, you know, is a unique one. because it wasn't caused by a natural disaster.

It was still a disaster. It was still a disaster. We'll be right back. The music you love. I heart. Radio stations. Everywhere you go. The podcasts everyone's talking about.

All in one place. And it's free. I heart radio. Whatever you want to hear. Listen anytime. Anywhere. Music. Radio.

Podcasts. Unlimited audio. It's on the free I-Hurt Radio app. One app. No. My name is Josie Duffy Rice. I'm a journalist who covers the criminal legal system. And over my career, I've heard account after account of prosecutorial misconduct, story after story of injustice. But I've never heard a story quite like this.

The more I kept reading that stuff, I thought, man, there's more red flags that just kept coming up over and over. will hypnotize him to strengthen that memory. So he went into a good france. I really didn't believe any of it was real. And I was like, well, they're going to figure out this is not me. They're going to do their police job. Listen to Examine the Backfire Effect on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I think most know that our exit from Afghanistan was probably second worse than you.

United States history to Vietnam. It was a bad exit. And I don't want to get into the politics of it. But when you leave and people are hanging on planes falling off of them and you've got U.S. service personnel being killed as the planes are taking off and then you have the enemy being left an entire airport and base and munitions and stuff, it's a bad accident by anybody's measure. So I think people kind of know that story. We can argue about how we need to get out when we need the politics of it, but I don't even want to talk about that. What I do think some people miss is that U.S. military personnel could not go into these outstretched areas outside of Kabul and everywhere else and had any success, had they not been able to communicate. with local tribal leaders and other Afghan people to build relationships,

to find out where the enemy was, to understand that many of these tribal leaders didn't like the enemy. And you can't do that without Afghani personnel on the ground translating, embedded with the military, going on missions with U.S. personnel, saving U.S. personnel's lives, brave men and women from Afghanistan, who fought and operated as bravely and as gallantly as any U.S. veteran of that war. But they didn't have planes out. And the Taliban was going to find them and execute them.

and it left this massive community of people who were our friends and allies who worked alongside us and saved our lives that had nowhere to go. And if someone didn't step in and find a way to get them to safety and integrated and reward them for their bravery and camaraderie with the United States, they and their families would be literally hung in the town square. So under the backdrop of that, tell us what Team Robicon did to try to help fill the void for those people. And is that a fair description? And I don't think the vast majority of people understand the importance of those folks. I agree with that. I definitely, you know, and I don't disagree with anything you said.

I agree with the vast majority of people don't understand or don't realize the importance. of what the interpreters, those that were embedded with our troops, you know, the importance that they really had, wasn't over there, you know, at that time. So I don't want to speak about the situations on the ground. What we did know was 70,000 of our allies were coming to the states in a relatively short period of time with a system not set up to intake. Right. Yeah.

So we early on volunteers kind of stepped into that arena. They had really good leadership at Homeland Security, some individuals that I worked with back when I was with FEMA have known for a while. So I knew there was very competent, you know, kind of leadership at that area. But again, you know, you have to develop a plan on the fly, kind of overcome, adapt, and improvised. So what we're really good at in that situation is legit. You know, we can take in goods. We can organize.

You know, we can, we, our volunteer base, our gray shirt nation, it was very sentimental to a lot of our volunteers because they lived it over there. They understood it. They, we actually had some of our folks connect with their interpreters that, that serve together over there. No kidding. Yeah, it's really literally a world apart. Yeah, literally a world apart.

So, you know, a lot of very, very. very passionate, passionate about that operation. So recognizing that, we knew, hey, we're going to do something. And so we, again, we did a lot of the logistics piece while our allies were on some of the military bases and then getting integrated back into communities. Then we also helped, you know, we also have strong backs. So, you know, as they were integrating into communities, we did a lot of the apartment setups, a lot of the... Did you really? Yeah, a lot of that.

Oh, that's fantastic. You actually said welcome home. Yeah, welcome home. Your new home. Your new home. Your new home. Your new, foreign, weird, new home that you don't understand. Exactly.

We're going to welcome you. And, you know, you saw despair. I was able to go to Camp Atterbury in Indiana, who, you know, I forget how many thousands that we had there. And I remember telling my wife, you know, you saw a lot of despair, but I could, if you saw the mother's face, they saw, you saw a lot of hope, too. They were like, hey, this is, you know, I think a mother to me is the best thing in the world. But, you know, you see a mother that knows their children is going to have a better opportunity, albeit thousands of miles away. So, you know, it was a.

And let's be honest, only a week, two, three weeks earlier than a month earlier, they were wondering if they were going to be hunted down and killed. Well, yeah. I mean, it was a different, different world, you know. And it's one that, again, I've never been there, was not in that theater. But I think it's, we can get low old in our country to think, well, everywhere is like America.

It is not like America. Only America is like America. It makes me proud that you guys did that work as an American. I don't see how we maintain our standing in this world. If we go to people and say, we're here and we're going to fight, fight alongside us, and we'll have your back, and then we leave and don't have their back. If we do that, we lose our standing.

And the work that you did, in my opinion, completes a commitment on our country's path. Just imagine yourself being displaced, 2,000 miles away, worried about your lives, and showing up in somewhere you know very little about the language, you know nothing about the culture, you don't know what you're going to do, and then some people show up and set up your apartment. That's phenomenal work, in my opinion. It's neighbors helping neighbors. Just a long, long distance. Long distance.

What are the four things that I, Lisa and I, right now, should be doing? Do you know where, you know, do you know Memphis at all? I don't. It's the first time here. And I had some really good ribs last night. Oh, good. Where? At rendezvous.

Oh, there's as good as they come. All right. So, Alex will get the date right by the time I finish this. I guarantee it. 19-something, like 12, 21, 30-something, 15, I don't know. There was an earthquake in Memphis, and everybody knows about the San Andreas fault in California. New Madrid.

The worst fault in the continent of the United States runs right under Memphis. It's the New Madrid fault. Exactly. You said it so you know it. Yeah. Well, in 19-something, the last time the New Madrid really had an opening. It was a massive earthquake.

And north of here, about an hour is a lake called Real Foot Lake. It's a big OXBO Lake. Well, it didn't exist prior to the earthquake. It opened up such a big crevice in the ground that the Mississippi River flowed backwards for 24 hours backfilling it. That's how big, the Mississippi, the largest river, it flew, it flowed north. backfilling that massive crater created by this earthquake. The New Madrid fault is no joke.

1812. When? 1812. 1812. I was off 100 years, but it was close. My first case was 1912. You weren't alive either way. So it doesn't matter.

Yeah, but the point is that's where we live. And we live on a bluff. It's clay ice, right? We're not around a lot of rot here because we're in the Delta. and this thing's going to happen again one day. And everybody lives. Other people live in Tornado Alley. Other people live in, you know,

everybody lives in a place that does have natural disaster risk. What are the four things Lisa and I should be doing right now to prepare for that? What are the things, maybe not four? What are the things we should be doing so that in the event something like this happens, we can hang on until the Grasurer show up. Well, I think, yeah, New Madrid is one of the catastrophic planning scenarios, if you will. And I believe it actually rang the Liberty Bell in Philadelphia when it went off. I think that's one of the stories I heard about that.

Wow. So you think about the scope of that, and it can impact, I believe, you know, five or six states, you know, can be impacted. And Memphis sits on the fall, dude. I mean, yeah, if you're going to be in it, be in the middle of it, right? Yeah, that's right. I think the first thing that I would say is, and you nailed it, you realize that you, what the risk is, right? How many Memphis, how many folks here know about that? How many schools, you know, maybe exercise, hey, if we see here shaking, we need to get, you know, what's our shape drill, you know, do we get in the doorway, do we get under the desk? What do we do? How many times have you exercised that? So I think first and foremost is know the hazards, know the risk of where you live, you know. Second of that is, and it sounds simple, right, but, you know, if you had to, if you had to leave right now, do you have what you need?

Are you on medication? Do you have a backpack? Do you have a plan? A go bag. A go bag, right. My kids are probably similar years. You know, our youngest is a junior in high school. They're throughout, right?

I've got one in college in Mobile. You know, how do I communicate with them? Do they know where to go, you know? That is interesting. That ones I've never thought of. Yeah. If communications down, where do we meet up? Where do we meet up?

You know, kind of think, think in terms of, you know, everything's, you know, I've got everything as you do. You know, I can pull out my little mini computer and it does anything I want, you know, from banking to calling to, you know, what are you going to do if that's not? there, you know. So, simple things. You know, hey, we're all going to meet if we can. I want everybody to meet in Knoxville. I'm just using that. I'm Alabama fan, so I wouldn't meet in Knoxville. Maybe Chattanooga, you know what I mean? So I'm sure. You can meet Knoxville, Mississippi. It's probably, you know, so, you know, I mean, it's things, you know, have a plan. It goes back to your neighborhood. You know, who lives around you, Bill? Is there an elderly person that may not have anybody and, you know, she's the nicest person in the neighborhood,

but we kind of start thinking about ourselves and how we're going to get out. Who's checking on her? You know, who's saying, hey, you know, Ms. So-and-so-Mitch Johnson, I need you to jump in a car with us. We've got to get out of here, you know. So know your risk. Have a basic plan. Understand that no plan is successful. Every plan has to be changed, you know, no plan survives first contact with the enemy.

That's the military term. No plan survives first contact. when you imagine. But without a plan, you're already lost. So, you know, have a plan that you can riff off of. Is it smart to have water and, like, dry goods for a week, or is that, like, too much stuff? You know, that's kind of the standard playbook. What I always say is if you need that, right, I'd rather you have $500 that you could evacuate the area where there is water, where there is food, where there is electricity, you know, and then come back in when it's safe. But, you know, The old adage of, you know, have tons of water and tons of food,

Bill, the challenge with that is, is, you know, I don't want to make assumptions, but probably all of us in this room could afford to have that. But those that really are vulnerable, are you going to pay rent? Are you going to buy two weeks of water and keep it in your closet? You're going to pay rent. So you're not going to have that. So I'd rather you have a little bit of an emergency fund that you can get you and your family to a safe area while. That's interesting.

An emergency fund. A go pack and a great upon place, everybody that you love knows to meet if you've got to get the L out of Dodge. Exactly. And know who's around you who might need extra help. Yep. Well, that's all really, really smart advice. Yeah. And I have none of them.

So I'm going to fix all that. I don't have a go bag. You got the cash. I do have cash. I do not. I've never discussed with my family where we'd meet up at something where it had. Gifton's Donuts. And that's smart.

I'd never even consider it that. Well, well, look. Lisa's going to think I'm a weirdo when I come home tonight and start talking about all this. Because you and most of us don't have that. That's the challenge, right? Most people don't have that simple plan, you know. And it is simple. And I do think about because when Katrina happened, man,

people got Houston got a lot of Katrina folks Jackson, Mississippi got a lot of Katrina folks, but we got a lot of Katrina folks in Memphis. And in fact, there are still a lot of people living in Memphis today that were former New Orleans residents that came here and

either didn't have someone to go back to or just settled here and didn't go back. In fact, one of two chefs in town that have some of the greatest restaurants New Orleans transplants from that. But I do remember so many of these folks in Memphis and shelters had no clue where sisters and brothers and cousins were and spent months trying to reconnect. And they were healthy and happy and fine in places like Houston and Birmingham and Jackson, but nobody knew. So I think that's really is a really poignant piece of advice.

Again, Lisa is going to be. Mistakes. Lisa's kind of like, do you know something? I don't know. Something about to happen? No, honey. It's just outs of prevention. Well, I tell you this.

You know, I get asked, especially when we get into May and June, you know, hey, as Team Rubikana used to do it when I was on the government, are we ready for hurricane season? You're ready for hurricane season? And I always say, hey, every day's earthquake season. We better to be ready for hurricane season. We can see those coming, but every day's earthquake season, you don't know. That's true. Earlier, you said the first two responders, your next-door neighbors.

I've never thought about that. But it's absolutely true. I mean, the first person they can get to you is the guy next door to you, not the police, the fire, or, you know, with the right cost, and certainly not you guys. I mean, you guys are going to do your work, but it's going to take you a few days anyway to mobilize, right? What do we need to take from that in terms of the way we approach one another in our homes?

You know, we are Jeff Byard opinion, right? I don't, probably not science behind it. Maybe some science behind it, but we are in our own little cocoons all the time, right? It's so true. You know, we don't know what's going on around us. I think we're in our own bubbles too much. We've got to get out of our bubble, you know. We've lost the art of connection through conversation.

We've gotten to a me mentality and not a we mentality, and I think that's a challenge. Trying to walk my Christian faith and the journey that's, that's wrong. hockey sometimes. But I told my daughters the other day, I got four daughters, so they don't forget anything, right? They can be a grudge 20 years ago. And they, you know, I'm like, what are you? Anyways, I said, you know, if you would just focus on meeting somebody else's needs, everybody's needs would always be met. And that's such a good point. You know, and I feel at that, right? I don't want to come across like I'm perfect at that. But I think that that goes, lesson that can be applied to any aspect of life and we'll all be better.

Your neighbors, your first and best first responder. And I really think we can't go down this path because it'd be a four-hour conversation, but I really think just to to leave that part of this conversation with this is, and that doesn't have anything to do with a disaster, actually. No. That has to do with everything. You can forget, race who you love how you vote who you worship or whatever that neighbor's still your first best first responder yep for anything you need anything you need if you could just break through all the noise break through the noise and take that step you know um it's good advice yeah um all right so you've mentioned it but you served in the ring corn um you were 15 years with the Alabama

emergency management six years at FEMA managing a 185 presidential disaster declarations, which I can't even imagine that. And now, Team Rubicon. You know, when I was a kid, I'm pretty sure I wanted to be either a fireman or a policeman. I've never met a kid that grew up and said, I want to manage disasters. Why did you choose this career? and how did this career become you? That's, you know, some of the numbers are a little bit.

I was about 14 with the state, and then I did three last with FEMA. I did a year with FEMA after Katrina. Okay, well, the numbers are off because Alex doesn't know how to put together. They're close, though. Not my fault. But they're close.

They're close. They all equal the same. But these jobs, the time, mind. That's the point. And the point is, how does this happen for you? I mean, it's, it's an incredible story that you started as a Marine, and then all of this, and you end up being a disaster guy. You know, I think, first let me say, you know, I got out of the Corps and then went to college, so I kind of did it backwards. I spent six years at Troy, great university, did not get a master's. That was, you know, it took me a little bit to get my undergraduate.

It first two years, I tell people, it was social reacclamation from the Marine Corps. When I realized. How long were you in means? Four years. Four years. Where were you stationed? Stationed at Cam Lejeune for about three years, two and a half, three years, did two deployments for Second Battalion, Fourth Marines.

Where? I did the First Gulf War, and then I did Med Cruz all over Europe on a ship. And then got stationed from there down to Paris Island where I was a basic weapons instructor working with recruits and doing that. Got out, went to college, graduated 2000 business degree, and worked in the hospitality industry. If you ever worked in a kitchen, it teaches you management. I mean, really, really quick. It's a really, really crazy environment. But then 9-11 hit. And I think that that's a point in our country that as we get closer to the anniversary, which is right around the corner, but also further from when that happened.

I think a lot of people forget. All my kids were born post 9-11. I've had the opportunity to take them to some of the memorials, so they understand that. And it wasn't this life-changing, I guess it was a life-changing thing, Bill, and I look back on it. It wasn't an instant life-changing thing, but I knew that I wanted to get back into some type of service.

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Everywhere you go Always free Download the free My name is Josie Duffy Rice I'm a journalist who covers the criminal legal system. And over my career, I've heard account after account of prosecutorial misconduct,

story after story of injustice. But I've never heard a story quite like this. The more I kept reading this stuff, I thought, man, there's more red flags that just kept coming up over and over. We'll hypnotize him to strengthen that memory. So he went into a good friend. I really didn't believe any of it was real.

And I was like, well, they're going to figure out this is not me. They're going to do their police job. Listen to Examine the backfire effect on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. That led me to the state emergency management agency, which, you know, there wasn't, now there's degrees in it. It's four years, six year doctorates in it. You know, this was, you got into it and you kind of on the job training. more trade than profession and got into it in 2002. And first disaster, it just clicked on me.

I really enjoyed it and had a great, great team around me. So you think about it from an aspect of team, and I'm really big on team. I don't like talking, I don't like talk, you know, because all my successes and failures have been team-related. But if you look at disaster response, recovery, mitigation, all the phases. It's similar to being, you know, the best team I've been on, you know, as a Marine Corps. I mean, you've got to know your job, got to know what you're doing.

So being able to work with individuals that had the same deal, I got addicted to it. I got addicted to the disaster, you know, and it just hasn't left. And, you know, I tell young folks that want to get into business, first of all, you know, it's crazy. you think about your job, like you're rated on a couple of things, what the weather's going to do, which you can't control, and then what people do because of the weather, which you danger can't control. So, you know, you don't really control a lot of the variables that could be a success metric, if you will. But it's like teaching, which I'm not a teacher. You know, you have been, right?

You've been around the education pay. You've got to like that. I mean, you're not going to get paid a lot, right? You're not going to get. You got to love it. You got to love it or you're not going to do it well. Disasters are similar. Emergency management is very similar.

You're either going to like it or you're not going to last long in it. And, you know, the world always needs, you know, more accountants and more of the things. So, you know, I'm open to that. But it's something that's provided, you know, a good life for me personally. But that's where it started. Started in 2002 and it's gone from there. The reality of the work that Rubicon does, that you've done, that your volunteers do, that your former veterans are, is that when you go into these places, you go to do work and hard work. Oftentimes without electricity and running water.

And, I mean, obviously, the place is destroyed where you're working. But all of that is infrastructure and can be built and hard work. You can overcome it with a little rest rehab and sleep. But the other reality of this thing is you do see death. You do experience horrific sadness of survivors looking for lost loved ones. And, you know, in 20-plus years of this work, is there any of these that have been hard to shake for you? It's hard to pick out necessarily one. The Alabama storms in 2011 were, and I still get, you know, when I hear a tornado

siren go off, I get nervous. Do you? I do, you know, because, you know, that was all told, you know, 250 that day that we lost. And it was, even within our own emergency operations center, you know, just about everybody knew somebody or were one removed. That feeling came back in 2025 when I deployed with others earlier on down to Kerrville, Texas, when the flooding hit July 4th. The girls' camp.

Yeah. And, you know, when you're around that type of disaster, and I've seen big ones, right, Katrina is still my benchmark. I mean, that's devastation debt, everything that you could imagine. But when you're in communities like that and you're talking to disaster survivors bill, and it's either really personal, they know somebody or they are, you know, literally one removed from somebody that has lost their life in that disaster. It brings it back. It brings a lot of that stuff back. And our business, there's nothing I can do for somebody that's dead.

We're there for the disaster survivors. I can't help the dead. You know, the system, that's. Sounds callous, but unfortunately. It sounds callous is probably the right way. But it's really how you have to approach it. You have to. Otherwise, you're going to have more people die.

You're going to that or you're just going to stop. You know, and when you stop. Oh, it's going to cripple you. It's going to, you're just going to stop, right? You're going to focus on that aspect of it. You're not going to focus on, well, we can provide help for those that are surviving. So it's all about the survivors. My heart goes out to anybody, right?

It's not, I don't want that to come across callous, But that's the reality of our business is we're in the disaster survivor business. Our systems cannot do anything for those that have lost their lives. That Carville thing must have been rough because those are children. We all can relate to children. That's the tough part, you know. Fatalities can happen, but, you know, I sell folks. The machine really gets moving when children and the elderly are impacted because everybody can relate.

That's what people get super motivated. Well, yeah, everybody can relate to a parent and everybody can relate to a child. That makes complete sense. Do you guys need the people on Team Rubicon after they've done their thing? And yes, the camaraderie, the fires, the campfires, the beer and everything else. Do your people need just a little decompression time afterwards, typically? They do. And we have one of our cultural values is change your socks.

And what that means is you got to change your thoughts. I love it. Yeah. You got to know when you've had enough and kind of taking the knee is not a sign of weakness. It's a sign of strength. And then we also on certain things like Curville, we would have, you know, certain things available for like crisis decompression, that type stuff. Not on every operation, right? The majority of our operations is heavy home damage, you know, little to no fatalities, which is really, really good.

But some of those, you know, when you, Asheville comes to mind, Asheville was, you know, a really, really, Haleen hit a lot of places, but Asheville just took the. Do you find that specifically veterans still deal with it differently or have a different approach to it? You know, I don't know if it's different, Bill. I think that there's a sense of mission first that kind of kicks in, But, you know, I've seen that with our kick-up to billions, too.

I think that, you know, the mission-first aspect. And, you know, I think veterans do compartmentalize. They have a, you know, a way of doing that. I had to learn that, I guess. Even more than a really great KAC. It relates to your other principle you haven't mentioned. You told me earlier. Our favorite one that I have got shit done.

Yeah, get shit on. Get shit on. I love that. So, you know, and that one's one that everybody loves, because they're, you know, we're all like kids like, oh, we can say shit, you know. And I try to say, yeah, but, you know, let's maybe put smartly behind it or safely behind it, you know. But the cultural value that, you know, I really hang my hat on and I talk about all the time is mission first, Grayshirts always, which is directly.

Mission first, gracious always. You know, and that's from the military, you know, at each branch. But, and I look at it in this, you know, if we're folks. focusing on the mission, getting that done, and then focusing on those, delivering the mission, everything else will fall into place. Is there, and I am certain, you're extremely proud, as you should be, although you're humble and you talk about the team. So I'm not saying you personally proud. Was there any that you personally been associated with that you, that things happen that you're just like, I am so freaking proud of this organization and be part of it, that you can kind of, point two i you know this is going to sound kind of like oh okay standard answer but it's you know

i have a uh a saying that that i do on a lot of interviews bill and it's a great day to be a gray shirt you know and um it's what i like there's there's a million things i like about team rubicon and the ones the big ones we see that but we also focus on what we call low attention disasters and those are the disasters where there's no cameras A lot of times FEMA's not there, didn't meet whatever threshold. And, you know, I tell the team, and I've told my teams, you know, everywhere I've worked. One, we don't compare disasters on the disaster. What I mean by that is, if Bill, if your house is destroyed, that's your Katrina.

It doesn't matter, you know. It's your Katrina. We need to treat it as such. So I always get proud when we're in, you know, really the low attention disasters. And our mission. No cameras. No cameras. But you're still working just as hard.

And because it matters, right? Again, I go back to, I think, something that I said, if I didn't, it's on me that, you know, we're in this, this whole business, the disaster response business, it's all, it's just people business. It's the people. We're in the people business. Doesn't matter process and radio systems and trucks. All that's great. It helps us. But if we don't have the people first mentality, it's not going to work.

So, and then it's the, you know, what I think draws a lot of our gray shirts to, to what we do is we want to do the hard. We want to sleep in the hard. We want to have the stories of, oh, man, you remember when we didn't have this or we didn't have that? And, you know, we're working on getting a team right now up to Alaska for two weeks. And Alaska is a whole different ballgame. You know, there's things up there that, you know, there's animals that will kill you in Alaska. So, you know, it's a different safety. And I always got safety now.

I'm like, oh, man, the main thing I want to do is if we send 10, I want 10 to come back. You know, let's make sure we do that. But I think the low attention disaster is I get really happy about that. And where I realized that I'm in the right place when I left FEMA, which was a great experience, I didn't go into, you know, consulting or contracting. And that's great. There's a lot of people that I know that do that.

They do really good work. But when Hurricane Laura hit southeast Louisiana, which is somewhat a forgotten part of Louisiana, you know, if you get, excuse me, southwest of Louisiana, if you get, you know, west of Baton Rouge, it's a different part of Louisiana. And Hurricane Laura really swamps and a lot. Cages him. Yeah. Rice paddy. I didn't realize. Rice paddy.

And I didn't realize that they grow, that's where they get the crawfish from when the rice is a seasonal thing. Didn't know that. So you always learn when you go. out. But I was on a roof in Hurricane Lorne. It was, you know, typical Louisiana weather, 150 degrees. High a cell. 150% humidity. And Ms. Parker, we were tarp in her roof. And I got emotional because I had done a lot in this business, right? When I was with the state of Alabama, there's no telling how many blue tarps I ordered from FEMA over the many disasters and hurricanes and tornadoes. When I was at FEMA in 2017,

They're, you know, it's no telling how many millions of blue tarts I purchased because of the three big hurricanes. But I never put one on a roof. I never, myself. I had never been that last mile, that last touchpoint to a disaster survivor. And it dawned. I mean, Jeff, you're where God wants you to be. Isn't it interesting that through all of it, that that is what sticks with you? Sticks with me all the time.

It's kind of my, you know, people. say what's your TR story, what's your team Rubicon story? I always say it's that. It's that. And you remember the lady's name who's Ruth? I can picture Ms. Parker right. I hope she's doing really, really well. You know, tough as nails. That's really, really, really cool. Kind of as an aside, as I was listening to you, have you responded to a disaster as gray shirts for a gray shirt? Have you had gray shirts who were in

impacted by a disaster? You know, I'm sure we have. Found to happen. I'm sure we have. We've had, you know, one of our full-time gray shirts. You know, our headquarters is based out of Los Angeles. And when the fire came through, what, years ago, we had one of our gray shirts that a good friend of mine and great colleague, but he had to evacuate.

He lived in Altadena and had to evacuate. So, you know, we did a quick kind of, hey, let's me. make sure that our folks are, we can get comms to our folks. But, you know, I'm sure in the number of disasters that we've had, you know, probably have. And, you know, we're distributed, kind of, you know, our motto is delegate to the, to the point as painful. So, you know, a lot of decisions are made at the local level with volunteers that we trust. You know, there's an instant trust there when you're letting, you know, letting a lot of folks make decisions for the organization.

And, you know, 9.9 times out of 10 would get it right. So, you know. Nothing's ever perfect. No. I got to ask this question the right way. Every job you do revolves around showing up for people on, if not, their worst day. Certainly one of their worst days. how has that shaped how you see our society and our country?

It's hopeful. It's hopeful and scary. You know, disasters bill, they do two things. They bring out the best in people, which you see that. And they also bring out the worst in people. When you see contractors that are scamming, you know, folks and not showing back up and just hunting that dollar, you know, I think that there's a special place for those individuals. Yeah, I do.

This happened to me, Bill, with the Winterstorm Fern. You know, what? This happened to me in Oxford when the ice storm hit. Yeah. And these guys showed up. I just said, like, a couple of tree issues, like, landed on my porch. And they show up saying, like, it'll be, like, $4,000. I'm like, guys, I think this is, like, 15 minutes at work.

I'm like, I'll pay you, like, 300. And they're like, fine, we'll do it for her for $300. Right. You see, you know, people that are, and we, you know, we focus on those that are really vulnerable. So you've got a vulnerable population before something hits. There's vulnerable anyway. Yeah, they're vulnerable and they're going to be more. And then you have individuals that are that are praying on that vulnerability.

I just don't have, you know, that's where I've got to work again on my faith. You know, I've got to love everybody. I struggle with that one. I'll be honest with you. But the flip side of that is you see. the hope, you see the good. You see 30 individuals or more gray shirts and not just team Rubicon, right? We, you know, we may have 10 things just in the general terms that a disaster survivor needs, or they may need 100 things. Team Rubicon may bring 10 of those. So, you know, we want a partner.

Hey, if you can help come with us, you know, let's hitch our wagons together and we'll do more good. But you see organizations, then you see the organic organizations that form at the local level. and that's where that hope comes in. And, you know, because the challenge, the response is a response. People are going to see that. But the recovery takes years. It's a marathon. And the cameras are going to leave.

They're still doing an Altadena right now. Still doing it in Katrina. Yeah. I mean. It's funny. You talk about organic local level heroes and all that. I can't help but think about the few stories I've seen it. I'm certain there's a lot more than I've seen.

of the guy that's on a fire truck putting out fires in Altadino when his house is two blocks over Burning Down or the police officer who's out helping tornado victims when he can't even get in touch to this family and he's not sure if his house is still standing but they're still out there serving and that kind of stuff is what gives me enormous hope. And it happens a lot.

One of the things that, and it's not in everyone, And it's, you know, it depends on the disaster. But I know we did it and go back to Hurricane Lorre and Lake Charles got hit really bad, you know, just a really, it's category four storm, major storm, a lot of wind, a lot of water. Their emergency operations center was going at it. Their first responders had been going at us. We actually got a list from them and we would go out and just check on police and fire. Hey, your house is good. Or, hey, man, you might need to, you know, kind of go check on it.

You got some damage or this, that, or the other. And because they don't, that's cool, they don't come off the line. Supporting them while they're supporting their community. They don't come off the line. And, you know, and you see that. That's, that's that. That's where you say, okay, you know, it looks really bad and society. And, you know, we hear all this, it's just crazy noise out there.

But when you see that, you're like, all right. Humanity is still intact. We're still good. We're still good. You say you don't manage volunteers when you decided to stop managing and start. inspiring as when the magic happened. It's interesting. Yeah.

You know, I get asked that. So it's a question. How do you know, what's it like? And it's more like an informal, you know, coming from FEMA, coming from the government, and in more of a structured way like that. You know, what's it like managing volunteers? And I learned really early, you know, our gray shirts are, they're not short of opinions, you know.

I told our CEO the other day who's doing great, Jim Brooks, our CEO. I said, you know, I kind of explain your job, Jim, is you got a board of directors. You know, you got to do that. And you got your senior staff, which I'm part of, and you do that. But you got 200,000 advisors that all want Team Rubicon. Sometimes, I mean, if you look at, you know, if you look at every gray shirt and their voice is always important. But, you know, I learned early on as I made this transition that it's not about management. It's inspiring.

People volunteer because they're inspired, not because they have to. You don't. Nobody makes you do that. We'll be right back. The music you love. Your favorite radio stations. Everywhere you go. The podcasts everyone's talking about.

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I'm a journalist who covers the criminal legal system. And over my career, I've heard account after account of prosecutorial misconduct, story after story of injustice. But I've never heard a story quite like this. The more I kept reading that stuff, I thought, man, there's more red flags that just kept coming up over and over. will hypnotize him to strengthen that memory. So he went into a good france.

I really didn't believe any of it was real. And I was like, well, they're going to figure out this is not me. They're going to do their police job. Listen to Examine the Backfire Effect on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. So the inspiration isn't necessarily like Jeff Byron up there like Pat, right? It's the mission that we do. It's the work that we provide. It's the challenge that we provide.

You're going to, it's not, you know, Team Rubicon is open to everybody, but it's not for everyone. It's a tough volunteer environment. It's very rewarding, but we're going to look for the heart of the hard. I love that. I am in the lumber business,

and I know this all too well. And it, golly, it feels like, like it gets worse every year. And God forbid, you need a plumber or an electrician. I mean, the shortage of skilled trade labor in the United States is exacerbated year after year after year. Honestly, this is kind of a side note. There's this new study that came out.

I read about a month ago that said colleges are starting to get really worried because their enrollment's going down because people are deciding, you know, graduating in four years with $90,000. student Dutt and a $40,000 your social work job is probably not a good plan. And people are starting to, I hope that means people are starting to go back to some trades. But for now, there is this massive, every year we retire thousands of people that are skilled in trades. And every year we do not replace them or have not been.

I got to believe that that even makes disaster relief that much more difficult, especially the rebuild part, like you said. They're still rebuilding from Katrina. What is team Rubicon doing? And what are you building to combat that shortage? Because I think this is really cool. I have to admit, it is really cool. And as I, you know, we're known for our disaster response.

And that's what we're going to be known for. That's kind of what I say. That's what our 200,000 sign up to do. That's a camp firing the beer. and what you started on. That's it. And we'll do that. But, you know, we're also more than that.

We have a workforce development program that's, I'd say in its infancy, but it's growing. And we have a- Is it for possibly young veterans or for- It's actually open. You know, we didn't. But do you have some young veterans from a minute? Because that really makes a sh-send of sense to me. It does.

It does. And they're definitely open to that. And we thought about, you know, as we grow that program, there could be, opportunities where we partner more with some of the... Feels like that could be a natural regression one day. You know, some of the existing kind of transitional services out there. But, again, it goes back to, you know, how can we better an individual's life? And we have a brick and mortar academy down in New Orleans.

That's where our first academy is. How ironic. Yeah. It's in Kenner. And we partnered with the Home Builders Institute, which has been doing this. So, but it's, we've taken that, that facility over. And right now we're focused on fortified roofing. And the thought behind that is a fortified roof.

Fortified roofing, not just roofing, but how do we get fortified roofs on house? If you can get a, most times the challenge of your house and Bill, you know this better than me, you know, roofs are kind of on a house due to gravity, not, not much else, you know. That's true. Once a little bit. uplift is a bit on a roof. And it's done, you know. So if you can keep the roof on a house, chances are you'll keep the house in most situations.

Now, you're getting into F4, F5, tornadoes, there's not much, you know, unless it's a concrete bunker and there's not much you're going to be able to do. But then if you can keep the roof on the house, you keep the house intact, you keep the disaster survivor in the house. There would be some repairs, but they're not going to be major repairs. So how do we increase that gap? And I've been involved in that. We've got a great vice president team that really knows that side of it.

But I go down. I'll meet with the students. I'll go to the graduations. And the difference is where you may be helping a lot in a big disaster, you know, these are really individualized impacts, and that matters. But you're literally changing the trajectory. Or giving them, you know, I tell folks, we don't change anything. We give opportunities.

People still got to step in. into the arena, right? You can get the certificate, but then if you don't do anything, I can't force you to do that, you know. But we do give opportunities for people to fundamentally change their lives. And I'm excited about that. I think that there's an opportunity there, not just in you alone, but as we continue to expand that program more and more, we're actually going to start a second course of study starting this month in resilient power, focused around generators and power repair, how do we continue to build resiliency? If you can keep the power on, it's really not a disaster. If you can keep the power on, it's really not a disaster.

I mean, you think about it. If we can keep the power on, keep a, it's band, double that with keeping a roof on the house. It's a challenge, but it's not a disaster. You see, you know, disasters are a lot of time measured by how long the power was out. I mean, you talk about Fern, and, you know, the power out. So power is key, you know, the disaster that wasn't teen Rubicon related, but I always tell people it's the hardest disaster I ever worked that we didn't lose power was 2010,

the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, you know. But we had power. Still a disaster being power. You know, it's interesting. I mean, you've gone from response to now response and prevention. Mm-hmm. And one way you're working yourself out of a job, hopefully. That would be awesome.

You know, not just in the workforce. We're also expanding our wildfire mitigation, you know. Now there's an interesting topic that nobody really wants to talk about. Well, you know, if you look at the current fire map, I mean, there's fires everywhere. And, you know, we on this side of the Mississippi, if you will, in this part of the country, you know, think that's a western. problem. It's really not. You know, wildfires can hit anywhere. And I think

I forget the year, but I remember when Gatlinburg, you know, it went up, what, five or six years ago? There's a little more than that, but it was bad. But here's the thing that most people don't understand is that there's seven times more likely strike, lightning strikes east of the Mississippi than there are west.

Seven times. There's also, I think it's 200% more standing timber east of the river than there is west. Wow. Yeah. You're talking to a lumber guy. You know that.

But so here's the thing. Why then does the West burn so much more than the East? Well, it's because the East has continued to log. The East has continued to harvest timber. The East has continued to manage its forest through harvesting. But here's the other problem. The salmone industry has lost 60% of its production last 10 years, and that's all east of the river.

So when the salmone production goes down, and the trees are no longer harvested, and there's no longer logging roads that create firebreaks, you're going to get the same setup that's been out west for the last 30 years, but with 250, 300% more timber standing, and with seven times the lightning strikes, just get ready for what that's going to look like 15, 20 years from now. That's a real thing.

That is. Yeah. Oh, your wills are spinning. Oh, yeah. Well, you see them. I'm like, well, we can, you know, the best response to a disaster is no response because you've mitigated it. Because you've prepped it. Yeah.

It's not there. So, but we know fire, again, that's another one. It doesn't, you know, now. You're bringing back memories, and I was in Paradise, California, a couple of days after it went through when I was with FEMA. And, you know, I learned then, this is real, you know, it's tough. It's a real deal. And you talk about something that doesn't discriminate. And God forbid, the wind changes.

Well, it's just, it's moving. You know, it's a living organism. It creates its own hurricane effect. Yeah. And winds. It's incredible. Most people think of a firefighter of that they don't really understand. understand how incredibly devastate those things can be, and almost impossible to stop.

Yeah. I mean, we say, it's here, there. It's, you know, I still haven't figured out what the containment, you know, how they come off with that. Actually, and we'll move on from here, but what we need to do is understand that before we showed up over here, there were First Nations people. and there was a reason that they burned a lot of their land periodically. And it was because if you don't have tender, fire stop. And they would create their own fire breaks through burning land. You ran 185 presidential disaster declarations during your time at FEMA.

And I assume those numbers are right. If the prep is right, if not, maybe it's close. But then you quit that. and go to work for an all-volunteer organization. I'm interesting in why you chose to make that transition. So, you know, when you see it was the position I was in at FEMA, you know, manages the disaster relief fund not to get in all that. So that's how many declared disasters were there when I was in that position.

Again, have to go back to each one of those are ran by regional administrators and federal coordinating officers. So it's really a team effort as we do that. But, you know, I, it's important to me to stay on mission. And the government was good. The government is good from that standpoint. But I knew that I still wanted to do the craft. I didn't want to, you know, necessarily going to the consulting and the contracting world. And happened chance.

I had a dinner with a really good friend. friend of mine who was in this position. He was a VP at the time, but ended up being in this position. And we hit it off. He's a good friend now. I didn't know him at the time. And we hit it off. And when you're an appointee, which was an honor to be an appointee, you know, that's the only time I've been appointed and probably the only time I will be appointed. But you do know that you don't set your end date on that. And, you know, I had moved my family to D.C. had a responsibility and wouldn't have left for probably anything else. But when I had the dinner, got to know Team Rubicon, got to know the veterans, and got to know that,

hey, I'm going to be able to continue to really do hands-on mission. It was a good fit. Talk to my wife, and, you know, she's been supportive of all these, this craziness that I've done over the years and decided to make that move. And, you know, it's, It's part of trust in the plan that God puts before you. And it did. And, you know, again, sometimes I question it, you know, but at the end of the day, it's been the best move that I've made and I enjoy it. Got to believe there's some vets out there listening to us or family,

certainly family of vets out there listening to us. How can an army of normal folks get involved with Team Rubicon? Oh. Or kick-ass civilians too. What? Also kick-ass civilians can become a great. Well, certainly kick-ass billions, but how can any of us get involved with you? It's, you know, go to our website, team Rubicon, USA.org is an easy way to do that.

It's, it can, you know, and we ask people to get involved in many ways. One, you know, your time is your most valuable asset. And I was telling Alex, you know, volunteerism, volunteering is a privilege. And, you know, not everybody can do that. You can't just leave work and do that. but you can still be on the team. There'll be a time when that will open up. There'll be a time when you'll have the opportunity.

The other way to support us is we do a lot of amazing things, but everything we do takes a dollar. You know, there is a business side of this. There is a financial side of this. So, you know, if you can't give us your time, give us some of your other treasure, and I guarantee we'll put that to impact. We'll make your dollar work.

I got one funny thing before you close. go. What are you about to put out on your dormant? Well, Alex, as I look at him, he's got this symbol on his shirt. So I'm a big Alabama fan. For those listening, it's an Auburn shirt. Yeah, I'm going to get lit up on comments on this one, but I do from time to time put an Auburn shirt on my doormat so that, you know, you have to kind of wipe your feet on it.

But I love my Auburn shirt. Auburn family out there. I've got nephews that go to Auburn and in. You put an Auburn shirt on your floor bath, so you have to wipe your feet on it when you come in. More when we get around Iron Bowl time. Yeah, I get it. That makes a lot of sense.

My brother would love that comment. Yeah, the only problem with that is you have to actually purchase and touch an Auburn shirt in order to do it. So I will not do it for Mississippi State around the Egg Bowl because I don't even want to touch the thing. Well, I love college football. Me too, brother. Jeff fired everybody, chief programs officer for team Rubicon.

Are you still living in the Montgomery area? Hey, still in proxville. Down there. What an incredible story. Thanks for coming up and sharing it. I'm glad you got a slab of ribs for your time. Oh, it was nice. Thank you.

And really, really appreciate you being here. Thank you for having us. Really. Thank you so much. It was great. And thank you for joining us this week. If Jeff Byrd has inspired you in general or better yet to take action by becoming a gray shirt with team Rubicon, donating to them, getting prepared before disaster strikes in the first place, or something else entirely.

Let me know about it. I really do want to hear about it. You can write me anytime at bill at normalfokes.org, and I will respond. If you enjoyed this episode, share it, share our friends, share it on social, tell folks about us, subscribe to the podcast wherever you're watching or listening to it, rate it and review it. Join the army at normalfokes.org, join or start one of our local service clubs, take the 10-level challenge or buy our merch. Any and all of these things will help us grow.

An Army of Normal Folks. I'm Bill Courtney. Next time, do what you can. In 1986, a man named Scott Macklam was killed in broad daylight. Police quickly found their suspect. Prosecutors convicted him. But now, almost 40 years later, I'm reexamining this case. I really didn't believe any of it was real.

And I was like, well, they're going to figure out this is not me. They're going to do their police job. Has the wrong man been in prison this whole time? Listen to examined. the backfire effect on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.