Bill Meyer Show Podcast - Sponsored by Clouser Drilling www.ClouserDrilling.com - 07-21-25_MONDAY_7AM

Episode Date: July 22, 2025

07-21-25_MONDAY_7AM

The Bill Meyer Show podcast is sponsored by Clauser Drilling. They've been leading the way in southern Oregon well drilling for over 50 years. Find out more about them at ClauserDrilling.com. Here's Bill Meyer. Great to have Congressman Cliff Benz on. Congressman, it is a pleasure. And are you in district or are you in the swamp at the moment? What say you?

I'm in the swamp right up right up to my top of my head. Yeah, we're in the swamp. And I'd be I'd be willing to the few times I've been in DC in July, it must be hotter than blazes. Has to be. Yes, it's amazing. You step out of air conditioning and it's like you stepped into a bathtub. It's hot. Okay, pretty much. Well, around here, you know, warm at times, not nearly as hot as it's been. I wanted to touch on a few things here. Big, beautiful bill, of course, mission accomplished, and that has been passed. And now,

apparently, the fallout is coming here. And I'm looking at lots of stories, concerns about cuts to public broadcasting and public radio and various other things. Of course, that wasn't the big, beautiful bill. That was just a rescission's package that ended up getting passed the other day, right? That was different. Yeah, that is different. And it is a rescission package, and I'm sure we're going to see more of them. And again, it's a fraction. These rescission packages are an extraordinarily small part of how much the government spends. But if you're a Democrat and you're in the minority, you're going to

spend all your time talking about those rescissions because that's all they have to talk about. So it's as though they're much, much, much, much, much greater than in fact they are. But that was a rescission bill. On the big, beautiful bill side of things, beautiful Bill side of things, it's a much, much larger scope of effect. Do you give us maybe just three or four bullet points from the 50,000 foot level of what this means? Because the continuing buzz in conventional media still has to do with Medicaid cuts, Medicaid, Medicaid. And a lot of times I think they try to conflate Medicaid, which is Oregon Health Plan, with Medicare, you know, the senior citizens, you know, medical system here. But what are we looking at, huh? Right, well, first of all, I want to assure your listeners that Medicare is

not in any way involved in this great big beautiful bill. What is involved is Medicaid, but I want to assure people that Medicaid, just like Medicare, is an essential, important program. And the original population covered by Medicaid is not affected by this bill. Unless one wants to point out, as I often do, those folks are going to be more protected by virtue of us tightening up the requirements when it comes to proving that people are qualified to be on Medicaid. And by those people, I'm talking about what's called the expansion population, which is what was added when the Obamacare or the ACA Act was passed years ago.

But I want to assure the listeners that Medicaid is an important essential program and it's going to be protected. But what we've done in that space is to focus on the illegal folks who are here illegally will be removed from the program and that's because the law doesn't allow them to be on it in the first place and folks who... Now pardon me Congressman if you don't mind me interjecting there, does that mean that it's really one of those things where

okay it was always illegal to have these individuals on the program and we're just enforcing the law or did something come into that bill that says that okay we're going to actually attack this now how did that work? No, no, no, no, you had it right the first time. They never should have been on the program they got on the program and then Oregon has a very very lax system of checking who is on and they just let people stay on that aren't supposed to be there. And that's not what the law says is supposed to happen. So no, our bill basically says that Oregon, like other states, will begin to check twice a year to make sure that

you're qualified to be on the program. And that applies to the so-called expansion population that's newer additions to the program, not to the original folk. And folks that are disabled, pregnant, in nursing homes, these kinds of people are covered and will remain covered. And so the scare tactics used by the Democrats in this space are unforgivable because they're trying to scare people who most assuredly are still going to remain covered. I also want to say there we did impose a work requirement on the expansion population, not the original population. And by the way, what is the expansion population when you hear that so people can understand this?

I know it's a little bit into the weeds, but it's important. Right. Well, it's roughly in my numbers. weeds but it's important. Right well it's roughly in my numbers people should double-check them but I believe from memory that the number of people in the expansion population in Oregon is about 40% of the total population and the and and that that group was added when when Obamacare was enacted and what they did is they decided to add those add those folks to the Medicaid program because that was already set up and operating. So they just tacked these additional folks onto the Medicaid program.

And the original population covered by Medicaid back in 1965 were folks who were disabled, folks who were pregnant, kids, children, and the like. And when the WambaCare bill passed, then that population expanded. So they blew that up. Yeah, they expanded it greatly. The reason I wanted to bring up the Medicaid is that here's an example of an email that I got from a listener over the weekend, and I'm going to leave the name out, but it says, Bill, I have a family member who is wheelchair-bound and on Medicaid. That would be the Oregon Health Plan, once again. And I just heard about this when scheduling some medical transports. And buried in the first paragraph is the reason for the cuts that Oregon experience the funding freeze due to its sanctuary state status that

has caused significant delays in three annual grants used for operations vehicle maintenance and ADA service. And this was from RVTD. RVTD is looking for public input on this because that had nothing to do with Big Beautiful Bill. That was something different. Would that be clear to say, you know, when I write back this person and tell them what's going on? Right. Well, what they ought to do is call our office there in Medford and talk to somebody

there to get the exact specifics of which program is involved in paying for transport. I think that's what they're probably talking about. The transport issues are separate and different, but they need to be understood more clearly. The number they would call is 541-776-4646. That's what my staff is there for, to answer exactly those kinds of questions. Yeah, the reason why they brought it up to me is that they were thinking, gosh, if Oregon was not a sanctuary state, would these funds have been available? Because it seemed like there is a, you know, this is kind of a real tightening of the news on sanctuary state budgets such as Oregon. Is that reasonable to assume that that's what's going on?

Right, so, well, I don't know if that's going on or not, but if it is, then people need to check to see what the actual facts are. Since you raised the issue, I will check, and I'm happy to have one of my staff call back and share with you what exactly I'll call back. But one way or the other, we'll find out if there's a reduction in services resulting from sanctuary state status. I have not heard of it, but that doesn't mean it's not happening. I simply don't know, but we'll check. May I talk about the bill has a lot of stuff in it,

and I want to talk about the just the tax extensions that have been included, because they are hugely important to people who pay taxes. And the one that people haven't been talking about, but they should have been, is the benefits that go to what we call pass-through entities, which are S corporations or limited liability companies or partnerships. And there are a lot of them in Oregon. There's 79,000 S-Corps, there's 236,000 limited liability companies. There's a huge number of partnerships. And each of

them retain a 20% reduction off of their gross adjusted gross income under this bill. And the reason it was put into the law in the first place in 017 is to make sure that LLCs and little businesses, S-Corps, partnerships would be treated the same as corporations. And so if... Were they not before that? They treated differently? They were actually... A corporation paid around 31% tax and that was reduced to about 37%.

It was in the 30s. It was reduced down to 21% in the bill in 2017 for corporations. In order to keep the playing field level, we put in this 20% reduction in adjusted gross income for the smaller businesses. Well, that makes a lot of sense because that's helping out or very helpful for many small businesses and like you said, it's about a quarter of a million of those corporations here in Oregon. Well, those small businesses, it's closer to three, four hundred thousand of those across

Oregon. And so that was just one of many different tax benefits inside. There's no taxes on tips, for example, no taxes on overtime pay. There's no taxes on car loan interest if your car is manufactured from the most bargier in the states. There's an increase in the child tax credit, up to $2,200 a year. There's enhancement to the paid family medical leave tax credit. And so these kinds of things are... The 2000 Trump tax cuts made back in 2017, we extended those

to make permanent, make them permanent, and that avoids a 22% tax hike on thousands, millions of different taxpayers. Yet you don't hear one Democrat talking about that because the Democrats voted against those those tax savings, those extensions. And so they want to resume around and talk about Medicaid and scare people. It's ridiculous, a bill, and it's unsettling and that's why I become... Yeah, well, I appreciate you, you appreciate you delivering a corollary to that. By the way, that letter that I got was not coming from a Democrat harping on it, but just saying, hey, this is something that happened in her family. And so I was going to at least ask you, since you were going to be here.

That's all I'm having, and I'm happy to answer. I'm not talking about our conversation here, I'm just talking in general, because as you can imagine, as the only Republican in the federal delegation, I'm not talking about this, our conversation here, I'm just talking in general because as you can imagine as the only Republican in the federal delegation, I'm the... Yeah, you're kind of lonely in the state of Oregon for that respect. Okay, I know. Hey, I wanted to touch on something and this is kind of an interesting deal. I've been wondering how long it was going to take, but you're on a committee that was involved in the name and image and likeness. And this was that push to get college athletes some compensation in some form or

another. And could you update us on it? Because there has been some movement on this recently. I want to hear more about that. Please. Well, thank you for asking. I am on the Energy and Commerce Committee and one of the subcommittees is the Commerce Manufacturing Technology Subcommittee and that subcommittee has jurisdiction over the name, image and likeness space. And I don't think there's any dispute any longer because of court cases that a student athlete is entitled to be paid for their name and for their image and for their likeness. And of course, the big question is going

to be how does the money get divvied up, right? How do you determine that, right? Exactly. How much of that money and it's by the way, Bill, it's in the billions, it's in the billions of dollars that are paid to colleges by the media, all the big television networks and online and everything else, it is in the billions. And the question is, how much of those billions should the athletes receive? The reason it's so complicated is because certain schools draw a lot more media attention than others, right? And so, for example, the U of O draws more media attention than Oregon State. And so, how much should one school receive? And more importantly, this is where it gets

really, really difficult. How much money should a school be allowed to offer one of these really, really good student-athletes? Bill, right now there are high school kids getting hundreds of thousands of dollars a year. High school kids. No kidding. No kidding. And so the question is, how in the world do we properly manage this situation?

Because it's hugely confusing. You see kids jumping all over the place, going here, going there, and you have these bidding wars over these kids. But what's really challenging is that as the situation changes and you saw everybody blocking out of the PAC-12 to all over the place, leaving it the PAC-2, that's because all the schools that had big media markets flocked together, leaving the schools that didn't out there and adrift. And so how in the world do we take the extra money that's been used for many, many years

instead of spending it on the kids who are actually helping them generate the money, it was going into other programs, funding Title IX, for example. And so now how in the world do we step into this space, keeping it fair for everybody that's involved? It's an extraordinarily interesting conversation. I've met with Nick Saban. I've met with the coach for Alabama, a former coach. And I've met with the four big power conferences, the SEC and the ACC, and these big, huge conferences

that have billions of dollars. And you can imagine that they want to design the system so that they're protected, but not so much the Oregon states of the world. And so I've been working with both Oregon and Oregon state and many other schools, Boise State, Wazoo, across the United States. And lots of, lots of, lots of discussion. Very, very interesting.

I'm kind of curious, is there any conversation about that? I'm not advocating this, but I remember how in professional sports, a lot of times there would be a revenue share between the wealthier teams and the poorer franchises. Is that kind of model being discussed, where everybody throws it into a pool and you know and then you're a you know a ballplayer for a particular sport in some college and you get a get a certain stipend connected with that how is this how is this going to work anyone anyone a great question and probably one of the most important questions we're facing the revenue sharing arrangement has been worked out in a lawsuit called of all things the house lawsuit and it's been, and it's a couple of billion, two and a half, $2.9 billion,

that the schools are going to be paying two athletes looking back to around 2015-16 and there when the statute of limitations runs. And that House settlement includes in it a means of sharing revenue. The general outline and whether we will adopt it or not, your Congress remains to be seen, but the general outline is to take about 20 or 22% of the total revenue generated in the media space by these colleges and use that to go to the students. And then the rest of it would stay with the college for paying all the stuff that the colleges do. And so whether we will adopt that or not is unclear.

But as currently discussed, except for some of us, like me, the pool arrangement that you're talking about when it comes to sharing that big pile of money in excess of that which goes to the students, has not, it's not been discussed, but that it would be shared. It should be for a whole bunch of reasons. And the reasons are linked to what the big conferences, in fact, every school is asking for. They're asking for a complete carve out bill, a complete carve out of exposure to antitrust regulation. And they're asking for a complete carve out of exposure to antitrust regulation and they're asking for a complete carve out of exposure to any state laws. They want an exemption from all 50 states and they

want an exemption from antitrust. And if we're going to give away those public benefits, those laws, the benefits to the public. Yeah, then you can see the price for that would most likely be, hey, you're going to pool this revenue, right? That would certainly be one way of approaching it. That's on the table. All right. Congressman, I appreciate a quick update. I know that may not be on top of a lot of people's radar, but I thought it was interesting, you know, hearing about that. So what is next here? I know that talk is President Trump doesn't want the Senate to go away and not go into recess, into the traditional August recess, because he wanted to get some more people

appointed and confirmed. Does this affect the House, or is the House going to go on vacation in the next few days anyway? Yeah, using the word vacation with some qualifiers. Well, I'm... Okay, scary air-quote vacation, okay? The August recess, okay? How about that? So, yeah. So, I would say that the House is going to be going into recess and during that recess doing an awful lot of in-district work

that has been shoved to the side over the past five, six months as we worked on the great big bill. And whether that will involve tours to each county, which may indeed be what I do, and visiting with I don't know how many people that I haven't been able to talk with for six months, and it will. But I don't think the House is going to be delayed in leaving. The big issue, of course, right now for the House is appropriation. And so we hope to get a bunch of appropriations worked on this week, but we shall see. Because, of course, as you might guess,

we are coming up on the end of the extension of our budget. And it's time to get these appropriation bills passed. Is there any chance of truly getting long-term spending nipped in? Because hey, you're talking about, and I know everyone's talking about, I'm thrilled with tax cuts, etc., etc. But as we're seeing, we're not seeing any national debt, public debt going down. We know that. It's a big deal.

Yeah. So it's a huge, huge, huge deal. And one of the reasons I don't do earmarks is because the concept has been, let's not spend as much money. But the challenge right now, if you're going to reduce your debt, you better figure out how to make sure your economy keeps clicking along. Because if you fail to maintain your economy, you're in big trouble. Because the foundation for any debt reductions is an economy that works. And so that's why these tax reductions and adjustments are so

important because the idea is let's keep this economy doing well. In fact, let's make it do better. And so people tend to just assume that if you let taxes go through the roof, that somehow the economy is going to keep right on producing in the end and it doesn't. So yeah, first step. Well, I think that's what the Oregon state legislature thinks, you know, with the Democratic majority. It doesn't matter how much we raise the taxes, it'll be fine. Don't worry about it. It'll come out. They can't leave. They can't leave as Dutch Bros takes off, you know, that kind of thing. Or a number of others. I would say that I saw a hint of concern finally starting to dawn on the Democrat folks. I saw Governor Kotec reach out to Jessica Vega-Peterson up in Multnomah County, County Commissioner, and she, the governor, told Jessica, the chairwoman of the commission

in Multnomah County, that they needed to maybe lay off on the 1% tax on people that make over $100,000 or something like that, because all those people are picking up and leaving, leaving the state bill. What a surprise that they would move when I think Portland has the highest taxes of any city in the nation. What a surprise. Yeah. Well, so, and you have to do this and you have to keep this in mind as you're getting

ready to do another budget. It's just that so much of the federal spending, as you yourself have even talked about, is on autopilot. There is just so much of it, which is, well, as an example, the entitlements, Medicare, Social Security, things like that, you know, you can't touch these things. Military spending to a certain extent is also on automatic pilot too. So where do you go in the future here? You get everybody on board.

Well, I would say there's some good thinking going on in this space. And I would recommend people look at Senator Cassidy's idea, which is, I think, still early in the discussion stage, nothing formal whatsoever. But there's a bunch of ideas out there that protect people as they must be protected on these programs. Medicaid aside, Medicare and Social Security are entitlements because people have worked for them, and they deserve them. And so the challenge is how do you go into these spaces and make sure you keep your promises because we've got to keep our

promises to the folks that relied upon on government. But there are some really, really good ideas out there that allow us to keep those promises and yet at the same time salvage these programs. Congressman Cliff Benz, we always appreciate the input here. Why don't you, when you're in town, when you're in district, stop in and we'll have a talk here again, all right? Happy to do so, Bill. Thank you so much. All right, thank you, Congressman. 734 at KMED, 993 KBXG with the Bill Meyer Show. Hey, you're a beautiful crowd, but let me tell you, no, I worry. When I was a kid, my parents moved a lot and I worry.

KMED. It's 20 before eight and joining me in studio. Glad to have him back. That's Chad McComas. Chad McComas, of course, with Set Free Services. And he's been big for a number of years into getting people who need housing into housing. And I wanted to do just a follow upup because we we spoke to him a few weeks ago when the joy community ended up officially opening and I just haven't touched in since that time. I haven't had a chance to drop by

Thank you. We're so far away from you. Yeah, I know I just drive past you all the time But I'm driving past you at either 430 in the morning or at 430 in the afternoon. It was just like, I love Chad, but I got to get home. I agree. Yeah, get all that stuff. And I just want to find out how this was going, your latest homelessness, advocacy kind of deal that you have going on, Joy Community on Biddle Road. Where the old slaughterhouse used to be, crater meatpacking plant, you know, over in that particular area.

And you told me a few weeks ago, maybe it was a couple, two, three months ago, was that it was going to be a 10 tiny house development. And then as more funds became available, you're gonna continue to grow. And if you could tell us, first off, what makes this particular community different from the standard, let's say, government homelessness shelter kind of model that we've had here in southern Oregon up to this point?

Well, you know, Bill, we've been talking for a couple years actually about senior homelessness and how it's growing across the nation. They're predicting that senior homelessness will triple by 2030. That's not very far away. No. And these are people that they're not homeless because of addictions particularly or because of criminal behavior or just making bad choices. It's just economics.

You know, they worked hard all their life, maybe at low-income jobs. Now they're trying to live on Social Security. And if you're at a low-income job, you didn't put away money in 401Ks. You know, you didn't have it. Yeah, you were pretty much hand-to-mouth most of your life. And then, okay, you get a Social Security monthly payment of, you know, 900, 1000. Correct. It's not unusual. 900, 1000, 1100. I know people better on something like that. Hey, I'm not much above that because I worked a volunteer jobs a lot during my life. And so these people are now trying to survive on that.

How do you do that? You know, what's the average rent here in just Medford? Gosh, what is the average rent? Do you know? Well, I just know that they've been opening up some new apartments over Northgate and their studios are 1,400 a month. So you know, who just know that they've been opening up some new apartments over Northgate and their studios are $1,400 a month. So, you know, who can afford that? Yeah.

How much would you have to make an hour to afford that? I'm pretty fortunate and respect that, you know, we were able to buy a home a number of years ago. Not a lot of years ago, it's about maybe, you know, 10, 12 years ago. But, you know, you refinance it at 3%. It's like my monthly mortgage is like about $1 15 1600 total right for everything and that's actually pretty good at this point Yeah, and Linda and I were saying oh my gosh You know if we if we didn't have this and we were in the rental market We'd probably be paying a thousand a month more just to get the equivalent out there

And and this is what's happening then with senior citizens that are on that lower end then? Absolutely. You know, you think you're a person who's worked hard all their life to get their social security check and now they're supposed to find an apartment for four or five hundred a month. Where are they going to find that? We used to have them. Used to have them. The Alameda fire didn't help us any. Sure. You know, and so there's a shortage if you were to call housing authority and say, you know, how far behind are you in affordable housing? They'd probably say about three or four thousand units, you know.

So how fast can they build those? How cheap can they build those? Who can afford those? And you look at where many senior citizens lived before Alameda, where a lot of them were in mobile home developments and they may have had very modest older mobile homes that they had purchased quite inexpensively at that time. Well, they ended up getting wiped out and they're replaced with fees that are much, much higher if they were going to have a new home.

And if they were going to put a home on, then they have to put a new home. And so everything has just exploded in cost here. Hasn't it? Absolutely. And we're just microcosm of what's happening all across the nation. I mean, it's happening everywhere. And so seniors are being put in a position where they have no place to be. So they end up in homeless shelters, which were never really designed for a senior. They were designed for transitional. Get them in, case manage them, get them to stabilized and then get them back out into society. Jobs and school or whatever they

need to do. Seniors are past that. So they're filling up, even here in Medford, they're filling up the homeless beds, which then, you know, kind of stagnates the system. Do they even fill up over at the Kelly shelter and various other places here? Well, the seven that we took into joy just at the beginning of this month all came out of homeless shelters here in this area. No kidding. And some had been there as long as three or four years. In our local homelessness shelters? Yes. Man, just in that system. And they were never, those shelters were never intended to be long term. But then, you know, the poor shelter leaders and the managers, they're saying, do we throw these seniors back out on the streets?

No, you don't want to do that. No. So then they're keeping them in the beds, which they shouldn't be doing, but they are. Okay. Chad McCombs is here once again, Set Free Ministries, and we're talking about the Joy Community. So you had this idea in which we're going to go to the community and to to various foundations And you ended up getting grants and if I if I recall what you told me is that there's no government money really going in this

No, we're not taking government money. I learned a lesson. I learned a good lesson Don't take government money. Yeah, in other words, you got to bend the knee to Caesar, right? Yes, there's Caesar Caesar's agenda Don't take government money. In other words, you got to bend the knee to Caesar, right? Yes. Which means that Caesar's agenda will just kind of leave the rest of it unsaid. Absolutely. You know, we have the freedom to do whatever we feel like we need to do for the people that are living there and we don't have to worry about, you know, somebody being upset somewhere down the pipeline and come back and get you.

How much does it cost to get your typical senior citizen then off the street and into Joy Community? Well, we're starting small. We're starting with a phase one with 10 units. We have seven of them filled. We're gonna fill the last three really quickly. But it's more expensive to have small than it is larger. Really?

Sure, because you have your overhead for the small that would be the same if it's medium or larger. Because you have a full-time staff for 10 people versus 30 or 40 people. So it definitely is more expensive to begin with. Oh, OK. You're not talking about the expense of the houses more for small.

No. It's about the overhead. OK. Yeah. Well, that would make sense. Yeah. How many of these homes could you put there eventually as this grows? You know, people keep asking that and my answer is always

one more. Well, what I meant though is how much space do you have? We have quite a bit of space and I hate to even think about, you know, where it's going to go. I'd love to see a hundred there, but we'll see, you know, how many we can cram in there. But you know, how fast we're going to grow as the funds come in, we'll add one more and then we'll add one more and then we'll add one more. How are you being funded right now? By private individuals, businesses, foundations, you know, that type of thing. And it's amazing. Probably a large majority of our funders so far are seniors themselves, a large majority of our funders so far are seniors themselves, because they recognize that could be them. Just, you know, a change of circumstances. They maybe didn't have somebody who donated a house to them or, you know, inherited a house or whatever. And what we

find is widows especially are vulnerable. And that's kind of our target to begin with is widows and widowers. You know, that makes a lot of sense because you lose the partner and you know maybe you had two social security checks that you were doubling up on let's say right as senior citizens and maybe with some you know some maybe some 401k or some various other investments you were able to be frugal and eke it out and then you lose one partner and boom you're down to the thousand dollars a month and then you're kind of in a tough place. And if they have no family, which is another key, no kids, nobody that's going to help them if they get in trouble.

Where do they go? You know, they end up in homeless shelters and that's the sad part. These people are good people. They've done a great job in their life being part of society and now they're kind of cast out on the trash heap and that's not where they should be. So the seven that we took in they're just you know that I always say happiest clams but I'm not sure why clams are happy but anyway they're just happy. Until they're eaten.

Yeah until they're eaten. All right so how do you end up choosing which senior citizens end up going into Joy Community Chad? Well we started a couple years ago building an application list, you know, of who would come in. We just decided last week to stop taking applications because it breaks my heart. We have over 130 people that want in. And these units are not going to be emptied very quickly because the people can stay the rest of their life if they want to, if they need that. So there's no turnover. You know, going back then to what I was saying, that, you know, how many, you know, could

you build there? You said you could see a hundred there. You would fill those people or fill those units pretty darn quickly. Oh, absolutely. We'd have them full now. And I just hate to take any more applications because why put somebody's hope up their number 130 or five or 140 and we only have eight, nine, 10 units right now.

It breaks my heart. How much does each unit cost though, as you get them added? It depends on who builds it and where it comes from. We've been averaging about 15,000 for what we call a micro home, which is a living space that has no plumbing, has electricity, heating and air and that type of thing, lights, you know, everything, but

doesn't have plumbing. So they have to use a restroom outside. Like a communal restroom and shower and you could, well you could probably bring water, things like that in or... Yeah, you can have a little refrigerator, you can have a couple burner stove or something. But how large is the unit? Most of our around 8 by 16 when they're that size. We do have one guy that's in one that's 20 some feet long and he's just so happy. It's compact but it's livable. We have a volunteer team, amazing team led by a lady named Annette and she's from Westminster,

Presbyterian and she's pulled together all these people and they're decorating them for the people. It's amazing when they walk in they start crying because it's just so beautiful and it's like this is mine. And it sure beats living in your car too. Oh my goodness. Yes, they're so happy. You know I keep apologizing to the seven out there because it's not all finished the land we need the landscape we need to do a lot more things out there but I didn't want to

wait any longer these people have been waiting. So we said, we're going to move them in on the first. And but they say, stop apologizing. We're so happy. We can sleep at night. You know, one lady said she was in a shelter and she couldn't sleep at night with 50 other people in the room and people snoring and people causing problems and throwing up and all kinds of issues. And she says, I got in here and I am so at rest. She can rest. Yeah.

This is my space. My space. Yeah. And I'm not scared to be here. We all need that space. Yeah. As far as the monthly operating, by the way, I'm speaking with Chad McComas from a Joy Community set free services.org and you can find out more about Joy Community.

JoyCommunityOregon.org is that website. You're going to have an open house next Monday. So finally, even though I have not been able to stop in there, I have my golden ticket. I can pop in and take a look. So you want people to see how this...and I think this is great because I think the more people see this, the more they might you know buy into the concept So about 15 maybe 20 grand then to build the typical little tiny home, you know and so what about the monthly expenses then for

You know for management and making sure and how much do the actual residents pay? Is there some kind of a sliding scale because yeah, I'm sure they would have to contribute something to this. They do and that's a good thing for them. You know, this isn't a handout, it's a hand up. You know, you build people's dignity when they have some time and funds invested and they feel good about that. You know, we even have a little laundry building that isn't quite open yet, but it will have coin-operated machines. Well, isn't that mean? No. I mean, in society, people have to pay to do their laundry. Yeah.

But here it's going to be much cheaper than anywhere else. But it's that dignity piece that I'm paying my way. And some people are paying from $350 to about $500 a month, which is not very much. OK. And that's enough to help us. It's about a quarter of what it costs to run the place. And then do they have their own individual power meter?

No, no, it's all included. Oh, okay. Yeah. All right. So no extra expenses. They just have to pay for their own food, which is fine. They can go do that. Yeah, and they cook their own.

Well, Sharks is just down the street. Absolutely. No, really. And you know, they like to cook together and they've already got a barbecue. A couple of them got together and they're making whatever they're making on the barbecue and they're having fun. And we have a kitchen there that can all use together. They can even make donuts. They have a deep fryer in that kitchen. So a community kitchen, a communal kitchen.

Yeah. So they can do a little bit in their houses, but they can do a lot more in that kitchen. that they can do a lot more in that kitchen. I'm kind of curious when it comes to the regulatory state, did you have to jump through hoops for that? Because I start wondering about things like, did you have to build it to a commercial kitchen standard, et cetera, et cetera. How did that work out, Chad? Well, I have to give kudos to the city of Medf for helping us

make this happen. So we sat down with them early on and said, okay, this is what we want to do. And they told us exactly how to do it in a way that we could pass all those Regulations and standards and they've been really helping us and I appreciate it and the kitchen we have is actually theirs They had a mobile kitchen that they weren't using and they're allowing us to use it out. Oh crater It was it they had bought it for the Kelly shelter years ago. Oh Oh, Crater? They had bought it for the Kelly Shelter years ago.

Oh, it was a city. I thought you're talking about Crater Meatpacking or something. No, no, no. The city of Medford owned this. Got it. And they're allowing us to use it, which is amazing. So they're kind of invested. Okay. Well, that's great. I'm glad to hear that it's now starting to grow. And this was, like I said, a very, I guess, soft start would be a way to put this. And do you take grants for the operating expenses or is that part of the rent too, that covers it? You know, we take grants for however a foundation wants to help us.

You know, sometimes they like to help with capital, sometimes they'll help with operational. It just depends on the foundation and what we can go after. All right. And do you have some growth plans expected over the next year? Because like I said, seven to 10 is what you're looking for right now. What are you hoping for? I can hardly wait to add more and more and more. I mean, that's just kind of where we are.

And I know that sounds... When you're a nonprofit, it's hard to have a budget because you can't go down to the bank and borrow money to do this. You don't get in debt. So we don't have any debt at this point. We're opening with no debt. And it's all been by donations, about 650,000 so far, that people have given us over time. And we're using it wisely.

And we're opening it up. And we'll just keep adding. And every month, people send us money to help with operating. We're asking people to join a club where they paid like $25 a month to help us with operating. And it's just grandmas and grandmas out there and churches and different places saying, okay, we're going to send you a little bit. Here's some more. Yeah, we can't save every starfish on the beach, but we can save these. Absolutely. And we got these seven, they're powerfully packed. The number eight,

it's just can't hardly wait to move in. I think number eight is in a motel somewhere, just waiting for us to get them in because they were in a shelter, but they've gone to a motel and they're hoping that they don't run out of money before we can get them in there. Yeah, we hope that either. How can we help out? Well, you know, Bill, you're helping by letting me just talk about it. But I think as people come to the open house, what we find is when they see it, they go, okay, now I get what you're telling me. You know, the concept of a little community with little tiny houses may not look very appealing or sexy, you know, until you get to see it. And then you go, oh, my goodness, I can live here.

Yeah, these people are being mistreated. They're not little pallets like we've had in homeless shelters. They're actually little houses. I have to ask, what about pets? Because many people as seniors, you know, the pet is a big deal. Do you have restrictions on something like that? They can each have a pet. One lady has a cat that hides under her bed. Another lady has a dog that she's had, I don't know, 15 years or something. Mr. Black is her dog. And then there's, you know, I don't think there's any others at this point, but they

can have a pet. And that's a good thing for them to have. Okay, yeah, I would think so too. But there would have to be, you have to make sure that you have a pet that's not going to cause trouble with the other residents. You know, it's like anything else, Bill, you know, how do you work with community? Everybody has to get along and work together. And if there's somebody that doesn't want to work in a community and work together, they're probably not going to stay very long.

Do they have a lease on the home or is it everything kind of a month to month agreement? This is a program. So it's not a rental. We're not a landlord. They're not tenants. They're a part of a program and they pay a fee to be in this program. That's interesting. And so they agree to the program rules and there's very few of those but it's just good common sense you know getting along with each other you know cleaning up after yourself. So you're not so you're not really subject then to the landlord tenant laws that the state of Oregon would otherwise be on your neck I would imagine. Right. You're exactly right. So if somebody misbehaves or causes trouble, then is this something...

Let's say grandma wants to have a meth lab in her little house, which she's not going to do. Well, we hope not, but... No, yeah. But if she did, we can say goodbye. Okay. All right. So everybody has to behave themselves. Absolutely. You treat the property well, you're part of the program. Get along. Right?

Yeah. And you're no longer having to sleep on the street. Absolutely. Or treat the property well, you're part of the program. Get along. Rent? Yeah. And you're no longer having to sleep on the street. Absolutely. Or in the car. And you know that you can stay here as long as you want to stay here and you can take a breath and say, okay, I know I have a future. Okay.

How is this different? I don't know if you've had much time to pay attention to this, but what is, because there's been talk about doing a similar or senior citizen housing in Grants Pass. Grants Pass has had a great problem too. Yes, every city has a great problem. And I appreciate what they're trying to do up there. I think the mission is putting that together and good people. But they're building apartments and that's going to take a while. How do you raise that kind of money to build apartments? And then how do you keep it affordable? You know, unless you get tremendous grants from the government or something, you're going

to be in trouble. And so, you know, we just really wanted to get out from that. That's why you're using this particular model of that. That's exactly right. So now we're open. You know, we're open quickly, really, if you think about it. Hey, 15 grand per resident. That's a pretty low capital cost in the grand scheme of things these days.

Absolutely. If you were to talk to the Housing Authority or other people that build apartments for low-income folks, they're going to tell you they're going to pay 250,000, 350,000 a door. You know, there was a homeless program in Los Angeles that paid 600,000 a door to get people off the street. You know, and then how do you make that affordable without tremendous subsidies from the government? And you can't. So we want to make it so that we can get this paid off, no debt, and we can keep it running and keep adding and just keep growing. There's a place in Austin, Texas that in 2017 started with one RV. Today they have 400 tiny homes. They're building 600 more and it's no government funds. That's sustainable. It's truly a sustainable operation when you keep it of modest means.

Absolutely. And that place is amazing and we're going to end up being amazing. And what I expect already Bill, I can talk all day, I've already had people from other communities say, how do we do this here? And I expect we're going to have a lot of opportunities to help other communities start one. Chad McCombs once again from Joy Community. Joy Community is having an open house next Monday 5 30 till 7. It's 2813 Biddle Road. I do promise I will be there this time. I wasn't able to be there for the initial opening because I was just in fact I think I was working out of the field the day that you were having that will be honored to have over and anybody else anybody Listening they're welcome to come all right

It's an open house, and you'll see what we're talking about and I guarantee you'll fall in love with it joy community Oregon dot org and you can find out more chat always a pleasure. Thank you very much This is KMED and KMED HT one Eagle Point Medford, KBXG Grants Pass.