We need to sell ourselves. This is the American dream in the Midwest. Doing it as meaningfully as possible is what fires you up. You can do that here.
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drum roll please Brandon Sackbun US Army veteran and the youngest mayor in terote history baby we're talking paradise today.
Well there it is. I was about to say before we get going on Terra Hood, it's actually uh paradise, but uh it's good to be on this show and I love your listener viewership from across the state showcase on the 812 what we have to offer because it is different than the 317 experience, but this collective story called the American dream. You can live it right here in the Hoosier State. Whether you're an indie, Elkcart, Terote, it's great to sell what we offer.
This guy, he's he's spoken in front of cameras before. He knows a thing or two. Uh, I'm super pumped to get into it. We're going to be talking through all things Paradise, past, present, future, what to expect. There's going to be some side quests. Uh, I'm really excited cuz so Samson obviously grew up in Indianapolis, but spent four of the best years of his life out in Paradise, baby.
I'm a I'm an honorary Hosian, man. Like, y'all know me. You know, I'm in Ter, you know, like that's my city.
He's just as loud at Indiana State games as he is at Pacers games. Yeah, quite a couple. Dude, you I've been seeing Samson in every Pacers like in the back of every Pacer shot. He's just going nuts and hopefully he continues to go, right? Make a little run. Uh I'm excited to dive into it. Yeah. Uh obviously you're a uh Brandon, you grew up in Teroot, correct? And then you went to IU Bloomington.
I did.
Spent some time in the military, returned to be the youngest mayor in terote history. That's crazy.
So let's walk through uh two journeys to kick us off. First, you know, my personal journey. Uh I'm the son of immigrants. My mom's the youngest of a lot of kids. Grew up in a coffee bean farm in Jamaica. My father is a Cambodian genocide survivor and and he obviously really remembers when America left Southeast Asia in Vietnam post-war led to genocide by the Pulp Plot regime, the Camir Rouge.
Uh fought hard to come to America, became a doctor. He saw so much death he wanted to bring life into this world. So he became an OBGYn. focuses on uh difficult situations uh for women in childbirth and they chose Teroot Indiana for two reasons property tax and potential right this is a town with not one four institutes of higher learning IVTech St. Mary may of the woods shout out to our engineers at Rose Helman Institute of Technology and of course Indiana State University crossroads of America super close to Indianapolis few hours away from Chicago and St. Louis.
Uh, and then you looked at Teroot 1970s that population was peaking. Manufacturing was rolling in. The downtown was booming. Uh, of course, you know, Teroot used to be sin city. Now we have a casino. So, not not that type of sin.
But what happened? Right. From 1970 to 2025, population of uh 59,000 and a couple hundred. We did have a population increase last year. I helped cause that really effect. The sacment effect is real.
You know, I believe in adding to the population. No. Uh what what I think is interesting is communities like Tero, like Cooko, we're going to use them as an example, too. The United States economy changed. It went from manufacturing based to a service-based economy. A lot of people will say, well, that's all because of NAFTA.
It's a bill from the early 1990s at the federal level. But if you look on a graph over 50 years, the total percentage of manufacturing jobs has been at a decline. When NAFTA, a federal policy was passed, it did not accelerate that decline. It stayed at a decline. Why? Because, you know, companies go to other countries to make things because one, the workforce, the labor, and two, the American economy is simply different.
We don't have as many individuals who want to work in some of these manufacturing style environments. and Terote instead of diversifying what I call job diversification uh updating its economy to meet the modern times kind of stayed flat. They waited for another Sony DADC or another Colombia enameling to come in and open up instead of saying let's modernize. Let's invest in health care. Let's grow our banking industry. Let's support our unions and our skilled labor community.
Uh let's invest in teaching. They kind of got stuck in their ways and you see that in communities where factories shut down. Yes, factories have reopened. Yes, federal policies do help. But the total amount of manufacturing jobs is not the same. Why?
Because of technology. We're more productive on the assembly line than we were 50 years ago. That's what we want to be. You know, tero 1970s to now, more people were buying more cars. A lot of cities have struggled because as Americans got more cars, they spread out instead of up. So they spread out a little bit.
They stretched out their government services. Think police, think fire, think streets.
Yeah. You're talking I mean, we live in where the whole city is the county. I live in Indianapolis. So you're talking about expanding and stretching out post de-industrialization.
We did it here and it's and you feel the effect still. We kind of reinvested back into downtown. But that's kind of like the same thing Terra Ho had going on in the 70s where it is who is downtown? What what would I do downtown?
Now think 2025. What do this is going to shock a lot of listeners, but what do Gen Z and baby boomers actually have in common?
Gen Z,
I know you talked to all of them, man. Me too.
What do they have in common? Uh I don't know. If you ask a lot of them, they would say nothing.
Exactly. They'd be like, "Well, you know, my grandfather's a Fox News guy and I'm a, you know, a Pete Buddha Jay guy." It's like, "No, no, no. I'm not even talking about politics. I'm talking about natural wants." What they want is, and we see this through studies and data and through the current population.
They want to walk around. They want to walk. I walk and talk. They want to walk around. They want
You're literally the first person to answer that question.
They want to have a neighborhood. Listen, they want to have a neighborhood in which everything that they need, they can get cuz that's how they grew up.
And what do they want? What do they want there? Keep let's keep going on this. They want a drink.
Yeah. Yes. Everything that you can eat.
They want some type of shopping. It's usually shopping.
Stuff to do.
Stuff to do.
I want There's no That's like
They want main They want a main street.
They want a main street.
Dude, that's the biggest thing. Check my Instagram comments. There's nothing to do here. It's so boring. There's nothing like
whether you're 60 or six. Okay, 60 or 16. It's a classic a classic classic line. There's nothing to do or it's so boring. That's why I go out and do all these things of like showing like dude you ever been to a show at the mill that'll get you right. We've had jer pain but you know hooers want to live a normal modern lifestyle. So they want what we pass call a designated outdoor refreshment area where if you're 21 yes you can walk from one bar to the other with a drink in a confined area. Right. and our downtown. We've got $70 million being invested in downtown Terote,
predominantly private money. That's not public money. That's private. The private sector is saying, "No, we bet on this community in this city."
That's a town of 60,000 people
with 70 million committed.
Exactly. I do want I do want to talk real quick. You talked about putting all of your your kind of eggs in the big industry basket. Uh manufacturing specifically, right? When you're relying I don't know who were let's say go back to the 70s. Who were the large employers in Teraho? Like what were there like GM or automotive manufacturing? What was that? What was that base
really? You had like the big Sony push that was more 80s 90s, but even before that you had like home products. You even had uh some of our factories on the river post World War II and during World War II started manufacturing ammunition. So how it essentially worked, of course, some agriculture as well. How it worked is a lot of these manufacturers could go with the times and and move the pieces that they need to produce whatever widget was hot on the market. Well, 50 years later,
what's hot on the market, right? Of course, I I don't have an iPhone. I have a Droid. I'm one of those guys. But it's like iPhone screens technology. Sony, DADC, gotta love them, got crushed when Netflix took
I mean I mean look at look at a lot of these similar metro I bet at a time Anderson Marian all those places they relied on the GMs the Fords these big industries that weren't maybe they made a strategic acquis acquisition and had some manufacturing there but what's the first they're not going to cut off their their home state exactly right they shut down the one thing uh Jasper is not nearly as big as terote It's probably a third of the size.
You mean the caramel of the south?
That's what I call Jasper.
Do you know why? Do you know why Jasper has uh continue to rip and they've funded or or they've really built up their their entrepreneurial ecosystem? Like those companies that have been born and bred down in Jasper, they didn't rely on their manufacturing jobs to come from GM. They relied on it to come from the furniture making or whatever. And they really took those business to the next level. And so when they were doing like, you know, if there's restructuring or there's cuts to make, it's not coming on your home turf where you have to see those people in church like GM comes in or whatever the microchip like, oh yep, cut terrao cut. Like when you don't build up your your current work base or your current entrepreneurial ecosystem, it's easy for whoever that's making the the decisions in the boardroom in New York to be like, "Yep, all right, slice that."
And look at their main street. So Dean Vanderheim, that's their mayor. Great guy. I mean, and yes, he's old enough to be my father. And I just love what he's done to their downtown.
That old theater is great.
Yeah. Okay. So, so as like the evolution of Teroot came, obviously a huge family uh that you have to talk about is the Home Hullman family, right? Maybe you've heard of the Fighting Engineers of Rose Hullman uh Hullman Lynx Golf Course.
Yeah, man. There's like even the Holman's own the motor speedway till about three four years until later. Yeah. Um so what does that family mean to the city of Teroot? You know, I think what that family means is symbolic of what families of that type and caliber mean to the terotes of the Midwest, right? There's plenty of other examples of Homeman type families and what they've done to transform communities. Uh historically, and we were talking about this before the show, you know, you're born and raised in a community. You want to fight for that community and you're not as apt to move from Terote, Anderson, Muny, or Cookamo to Indianapolis, right? So, you are still keeping some of that quote homegrown talent. Yeah,
that homegrown talent leads to solid homegrown investments. Uh obviously Rose Hullman Institute of Technology uh giving land to become public municipal golf courses and those are the types of transformational projects that last for generations. And what it what I think is unfortunate is I was just at Teroot South Matter and was recognized and able to be in their hall of distinction and I'm looking at the wall of validictorians.
Yeah. How many are still terrible?
How many stayed? I was thinking that
zero
for however how many years from 1972 to now?
No way. Not a single one. Handful of saludiatorans, handful of solid alumni. But I think that is symbolic about where we uh where we are today. Right. And we've talked about this. I've heard you guys talk about this on the show of a lot of students come to Indiana for college. Yeah.
From around the United States, from around the world, right? But we're also really bad at keeping those students here. We're equally as bad as creating solid workforce development programs for our friends and peers who don't go to college to enter the workforce, make a livable wage, and climb the corporate ladder. And if you can't synchronize these two things, college and non-ol professional development and growth, you'll lead to this type of story where it's like, okay, after the home and family, after uh individuals like Greg Gibson, uh what happens? Where do you go next? How do you retain uh those individuals who graduate from the Scott College of Business uh who pair that with an engineering type of degree from Rose Hullman and can create incredible companies right there in your community?
That would be an interesting like graph to see or just like a chart of look through look through cities that are let's say 15 to 75,000 across the state of Indiana specifically not in like Indianapolis prop like don't go Fers caramel whatever look at the biggest industries in the Muny tero Columbus Evansville down there too I'm saying yeah and it's like look at how many of those and then take the top five uh like locally grown businesses like you know like What's what's one one business in terote?
First Financial Bank.
First Financial Bank. This they sponsor everything.
They're amazing. They're amazing. A family that stayed that went and got degrees and came back and continues to lead.
That is my favorite example to use.
So that that's like the the shift I was getting to was look at these town Warsaw, Indiana. How many of those people go to Purdue, get an engineering degree, and then come back to work in the they are big on orthopedics, right? come back and work at the Zimmer biomet or start their own companies that end up like you know selling to Zimmer biomat that that where the talent comes back. You have to have pride in your main street. You have to be doing building
belief in the city like they got in the city in the community. I mean this entire chapter of my life I call uh coming home to grow right to grow personally to grow professionally and to grow the community. And we talked about some population stuff earlier and we danced around this. I really want to hit it. 92 counties in the state of Indiana. Do you know only about 10 of them account for the vast majority of our population growth? So what are these counties doing that other counties are not? And the harsh reality is if you look, people want to go where they actually pay higher taxes because they're investing in their schools,
right? You look at communities that pass school referendums and now it's like, you know, Tarot South, we used to be in the Mick. I remember we got second place in the Mick in boy swimming and my best friend got knocked out in the first quarter by a Ben Davis running back and I'm like, whoa, we shouldn't be in this conference. And then you follow, you know, Avon's growth, Planefield's growth, Brownsburg's growth, and you look at Hamilton County, you look at the Caramel schools and how much they are pumping into their facilities. Everyone's like, "Oh, why are they spending so much money on an aquatic center?" I'm like, choose to do that. cuz first day of school there's an Olympian that arrives with a gold medal around her neck and the community is invested people are moved from across like people move from across the country to go to car swim
because of the amenities that they provided for their people in that community right and so like I always tell people people chase quality of life if given the opportunity
let's talk about a guy who when he was I believe uh Scott was 26 or 27 when he became town manager of Fisers because they used to have a town manager not a mayor They weren't big. Yeah. They didn't like
early 2000s.
This is just early. Look, I think it's late 2000.
Fatness. Yeah.
And then Fatness comes in. He grows that town so much. I love his redevelopment.
I was so wrong. I was so wrong. 2015.
Okay. I thought it was 16. Okay. Yeah.
I was saying
they had to damn near make re like make downtown again. Yes. And Westfield's doing that. Caramel had to redo downtown with the Caramel had 10,000 people or really had 1500 people in 1950. Now they have over 100,000. Exactly.
So they need they need to like create density in the community.
Boom. And to do density, you fight a couple of things. Obviously, you fight municipal finance, right? The economics behind it. But then you fight what I think a lot of I hope your listeners uh look into is the concept of yimi or nimi. Yes. In my backyard verse not in my backyard.
Right.
Right. So, how do you approach projects like a trail or like bringing in a business through what's called a developer back bond or growth at large? There's two ways to fight it. You can say, "No, I like that green field. I can walk my dog in that green field."
Zensville that there's only six hotel rooms in Zensville. I believe that's the number. Don't don't totally single-digit hotel rooms in Zensville because they don't want that there. They're like multif family development really hard because they want their brick street downtown like main street feel and that's what they've chosen to do right so I I like it's like and that's your choice and then for other communities to keep growing it's like hey look if we keep fighting off the same playbook waiting for the next manufacturer what's going to happen like we need to choose to say no yes in my backyard like I want development I want large companies advanced manufacturing defense technology innovation medical research to look at Terra and say, "Wait, I've got four universities I can pull from locally. I'm an hour from Indiana University. I'm two hours from that school in the black and gold.
Uh I'm not too far away from Notre Dame and Indianapolis is an hour away. I can recruit talent there." Well, so that's what I sell when I meet these companies is we're investing in quality of life. We're building a brand new YMCA. Shout out to Lily. Thank you, Lily, for the grant.
Uh we're partnering with foundations, public dollars, private dollars to say we actually know the playbook, right? I mean, we're just taking from another Super Bowlinning community looking across the Midwest saying what are they doing? They're investing in the river. They're adding density. They're adding housing projects. And I just get so passionate because I see Terote Indiana and I go success for communities like Terraote is not just chasing target and bies.
It is chasing a transformational approach to housing, to sidewalks, to road funding, to colleges and workforce development and investing in schools. Well, some of the smartest people in the state of Indiana spend at least four years in terote. Yeah. Like Rose Holman is like obviously you know every Notre Dame is prestigious, very well known. Obviously IU talking about Purdue um but like like some of the smartest engineers in the world are developed right there in terote and thinking of how you can you know recruit retain and like keep them they spend the four best years of their life in tero it's like spend the next 40 best years it's kind of like baseball like you're not going to bat a thousand like there's no way you keep and if you look at their starting salary the employment you're like I'm not going to hit all of them but how can you recruit uh young people who want to do two things one work.
And then the second, get a family and get a mortgage because then it kind of walks them into that community, right? You've got to build solid housing. You've got to have quality school so they want to put their kids through school there on top of just the employment. You go talk to the senior class. Let's say they bring you in to give the 2025 uh
I just talked to the commence commencement speech. Yeah. What do you say to them? What's your what's your sales pitch to Rose Holman and Indiana State seniors to stay in Teraho? So I break it down two ways. I've got a high school themed conversation that I do and then I have a a college theme that I do for lectures at those universities as well as Indiana University.
So I'll start with my kind of high school approach. I really talk about uh three things to number one uh friendship and mentorship. Right? You are the average of the five people that you spend the most time with. You should constantly be evaluating those that are around you, saying, "Are they challenging me to be the best version of myself, to be humble, to have confidence but not cockiness, and to help those around me and be a good teammate?" That's my my high school pitch.
Then I talked to them about faith. Do you have the personal faith to know that you will go through struggles? You will fail. I failed the Army's Ranger School before I was an Army Ranger. and I had to go back and I I went back with my bags, waited outside of a fence hoping they called my name and would give me another chance to walk on and they did. Um, my religious faith, I'm a man of religion, right?
That that's why I'm a member of the Democratic party, right? I know everyone launches on some of these social issues, but you know, I read Leviticus and and welcoming those who come from war torn nations, and I read the New and Old Testament saying, "Okay, someone doesn't look like me. Someone might not love like me, right? and they're different. But that does not mean I'm going to hate or punish them. I'm going to welcome them and if they choose to come to my faith, great.
But I am taught to love uh one another, to love each other. And that conversation around faith and public policy is something that I do do. And then the third I always talk about is like family, like you know, do you have that family to support you? I've got an older brother who's a national champion boxer. I've got a younger sister who's an Olympian. I've got another sister who's a D1 swimmer.
I was wondering think the limits was going on. He posted my sisters up right now for Cambodia. Yeah, for Cambodia. I'm like,
what the
like that's the American dream, I think. Right. You know, two immigrants, two different nations, getting citizenship, four kids,
and it's how you love this. You're talking about loving other people and like what you read from scripture. It's like, well, then how okay, you read these words, you know these things. How does that apply? You know, and I think that's kind of what you're talking to.
I I do want to We have to go through the Army Ranger story. What happened?
Oh, yes. Before we get that though, I forgot about my college lecture shoot. I forgot the actual question. Um, but the the college phrase tell the kids why you're going to stay and why you should stay uh in the Hoosier State. Um, one is opportunity. Opportunity I break it down to employment, right? What are your work uh opportunities? Two, quality of life and how do you pay for that quality of life?
Right?
We are cheaper than Chicago. We're cheaper than New York. We're cheaper than Austin, Texas for now. They're doing some really cool housing policies that I love. Um, but what we have to start marketing is the Hoosier experience is you get that Midwest feel. You can still get in a car and drive to do something just as quickly as you can walk to do something.
And it's modern and there's family opportunities here. And how do you sell that? Because yes, you need employment to go with it, right? We have a lot of good companies in the Hoosier State. Uh, I think Governor Hulcom spent just so many years doing an excellent job at recruiting uh, very well-known companies to come here and start here. So, of course, I got to give him a shout out for that.
Uh, but I just I look at what we offer and I look at what other states offer and I I just think, man, we need to sell this. We need to drop this, oh, you know, who's your hospitality? No, no, we need to sell ourselves to the world and say, this is the American dream in the Midwest. We're too humble and then we get offended when somebody say something about us, you know, like we don't and I tell people that about their hometowns. If you don't come out of Teroot saying you love Terote, this is what I like about it.
Then don't be mad when somebody says something about it cuz you're not saying I feel something about ISU like I rep I rep ISU to the death cuz I feel like IU Purdue Notre Dame Michigan fans they wear their I wear their stuff all the time. My father named you know but like
you know they wear their stuff all the time with pride. Like I'm a sycamore. I'm proud. So, I'm going to rip it. And more people do. They like seeing it.
Yeah. Uh, two things. One, when you talk about, you know, you can get in the car, drive, the number one thing we're going to hear is, "What do you mean I have to get in the car and drive?" And blah, blah, blah, and it's like that's not it. Like, if if what you're looking for is like a walk through Central Park, like you're looking for mountains, looking for beaches. If that's what fires you up, then this isn't the right place for you.
But if opportunity and impact, the number one thing I think for young people in Indiana, they have to be driven by impact. How old are you, Brandon?
29.
You're 29 years old and you're the mayor of a 60 plus thousand person city.
Mhm.
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org. That leads straight into the Ranger story because I I do look back at a period of my life when I was deploying a lot and I was living the dream and I had that decision of do you stay in or do you get out chase your other dream and I mean I'm still in the National Guard uh as well. So and when I was very young when I was in third grade is when I decided I wanted to do two things. One be mayor and two join the Army Rangers. Two things happened. One, I was horrible in school.
Horrible. And my teacher called my parents like, "How do I get him to settle down?" And they're like, "You just need to make him read because if he's not active, he's going to yap." And I remember reading this book about government and there's like two paragraphs or two sentences about local government. And they're like, "Oh, there's a mayor." And I asked my teacher, I'm like, "Oh, do we have a mayor?"
And she's like, "Yeah, we do." And I was like, "Okay, I'm going to do that one day." And I think she was she kind of kidding. Maybe she wasn't kidding. She was like, "Yeah, you could do it one day. Um, now stop talking uh to the girl next to you."
And I was like, "All right, I'm I'm gonna be mayor. What does that do? How do you impact a community?" And as I got older, I just looked into it more and more and I was like, "No, I wanna
I want to fight for these people. I want to fight for this town that accepted a Asian and Jamaican immigrant and said, "No, you're one of us. You're a Hosian, right?" That to me just means the world.
Gave me chills, bro. Because like that's what everybody like wants when people come here. They want to be Hoosiers. They want to be a part of Indiana. And sometimes the rhetoric that gets spewed or what they hear makes it seem like we don't want them here. But when you're in these communities like the love is so there that if we could kind of communicate that at the same time that we're show like you know what I'm saying.
It is the classic um it's unfortunate but it's like one tough experience taints the whole image for
and we need it. Every city could use a thousand immigrants.
And look I've had a ton of tough experiences like when it comes to handling uh race, right? Like I I always joke a lot of people who are racist do believe in equal opportunity uh because I look a little bit racially ambiguous. So they call me all kinds of slurs instead of just one slur. Right? You got to you got to take everyone can get it.
You got to take it with a joke a little bit. You have to
there are right that those issues are prevalent in society and if you don't believe it, you should see some of the messages I've received before and and frankly some of the threats. Uh and in third grade when I'm, you know, growing up, I look different. I want to be mayor. I also did something which I'm not telling any third grader to do and that's watch Blackhawk Down.
Okay.
I was like I want to do that. Right. The company in that movie is Bravo Company Third Ranger Battalion.
I uh at college I did the ROTC program. I decided not to work and do the guard, but instead just to only serve and be in the military and I joined Bravo Company, Third Ranger Battalion in real life.
Was this just you or you have any homies with you who was like, "Let's do do this together or you just locked in?" It was just me.
That's what I'm going to do. Y'all do what y'all want. But
and I met a ton of great friends in the military. I still talk to a lot of them. Had the opportunity to serve overseas, not once but twice. Uh to fight our nation's wars, to show that the the concept of democracy uh is not just voting in the United States of America, but it's going across the nation saying, "Hey, look, if we don't keep our our mouth to keep some of these problems away from our shores, they will come back." Right.
Right. And history has proven that. Uh and I loved it. And I remember sitting down my boss's boss, he's like, "Hey, you know, you're okay at this. Like, do you want to stay in?" And it was hard, right? Because I did want to come back. I wanted to get involved, not politically, but in public service. That's why I'm a mayor, right? That's why I, you know, I've got a lot of friends from both sides of the aisle that are in the state legislature. And I don't want to do that, right? like I don't I mean they sit there and you know they argue they talk about theoretical policy and it's like no I want to be able to go help someone's life right and so I decided not to be a consultant in Chicago that was a big offer that I had and instead to put all my chips on the table and run for office
what do you do when you run for office well uh you get your message out there which requires a lot of fundraising unfortunately in today's modern political world uh and if you can't you know if you don't have the dollars you got to go doortodoor a And I went door to door a ton. People were like, "Ken, are you selling me blinds? Are you selling me health insurance?" He's like, "Wow, this way. I'm running for mayor."
And I just did that. And I talked to people on their porch steps. Uh I met people where they were at, not where I wanted them to be, right? Like I see uh the Democratic party, the Republican party, and I see a lot of individuals on cable TV telling America what they should think, what they should believe. That's not me, man. I want to meet you where you're at.
Why are you thinking what you're thinking about your country or community and and I I vehematly disagree with most people that I work with, but we can all fundamentally agree that we need to grow the who's your state and we need to grow ter right? So, it's like how do you localize these issues? How do you talk about how you can help a community instead of fight on social media that way too many elected officials do? And I'm I'm at fault for doing that at times as well. And I mean, I've been in a yoga studio meeting with a small business owner talking about, you know, VO County's poor community public health rankings and how we can improve it. I've been on construction sites.
I've been at a park. I've gone hunting with two individuals to talk about ISU NIT pregame watch like
Yeah.
outdoor drinking thing. It was hosted by the city, by the mayor, by the university. They never really turned up. Yeah. Hosted. Mayor put the dardies on and I was there and I'm like and that's and you're on the I came there homecoming. You're on the radio in you're sitting there doing a radio broadcast in the mix of everything. Everybody's drinking having a great time. It's 7 a.m. in terote it's homecoming.
He's with the people, you know, just like talking.
Yeah. Wait, what is the big the big bar?
The walk. The walk. He he he on the walk doing the
I do I I do I stop at a couple of bars. I always say hello to folks. Uh I do the homecoming parade this year. Uh couple fraternity guys were outside the verb. They're like, "Hey, will you will you take this jello shot?" And I'm like, "Absolutely, man."
Like you guys are celebrating your university. You chose to come to Terraote. I'm not going to act like I'm better than you because I'm mayor. Like shoot when I was in college, I was doing 10 times worse. So it's like you want to be there with because homecoming is great because you've got alumni, you've got students, and it's like let's just celebrate Indiana State for a day. And you have to you have to double click into that because people like will see that the headline or whatever.
Local mayor takes jello shot. They're like, "Oh my god." But then it's like what it actually does is brings together your alumni base back, gets them connected with the community. They're going to spend more dollars if they're having fun. If your homecoming is terrible, you're not going to get alumni back and they're not going to be a part of that. I do have to give credit to this third grade teacher.
Okay.
Same. Um because so easy so easily people can make big impacts
positive or negative had the third grade teachers of you'll never be mayor like blah blah blah like all these like that could have stuck with you. I have a similar story okay when I was in second grade we did like what do you want to be when you grow up and I actually haven't told this story in the podcast yet and I love the drop.
I was in second grade what do you want to be when you grow up
and uh I said I want to be president of the United States. I was like, "That is the job for me." And the second grade teacher said, "Oh, Nate, sweetie."
So, I was adopted. I was born in the country of Georgia and adopted from Russia. Okay. And she said, "You weren't born in the United States. Like, you can never be president."
And it was second grade. Me was like, "What do you mean?" Cuz we had just done showand tell and I had like but I was like in an orphanage in Russia. Like I was adopted when I was nine months old. Don't remember. Yeah. This is I haven't dropped this one. And from that day, I vowed I was the class president all the way through. And I like did everything that I could to be like, I'm going to prove her wrong. I'm like, I still can't be the president of the United States. But like I had the fire to like go try to like disprove this thing.
Yeah.
And you had the fire to like go make this happen because you got that positive reinforcement. But so many little kids like they might hear
what could be a throwaway talk from someone having a bad day and they don't believe that they can go do this thing. They don't believe they can go serve in the black the company from Blackhawk down, right? and achieve their dreams or go become mayor.
Yeah, that's why I spend so much time with our elementary schools, uh our police chief, our fire chief, um and a lot of young men who work for the city uh and young women, but we we go to these elementary schools. Yes, we do the reading, we do the lessons, but we also like play basketball. Like I'll play basketball in a full suit uh with elementary school, not high school because they could totally beat me. Um and it's a short goal and I can dunk. But we just connect with these young kids. And when we do that though, we also bring in the nonprofit camps that have summer programs.
So that way, I mean, these are kids that are struggling to eat during the summer. And when they lose that structure of school and positive reinforcement, that's if you look at the exact data, you can see when they choose to self- select out of the path to success. So it's like, well, let's take this energy, this fun, let's get them into summer programs. Let's get them in our parks. I'm so passionate about parks. I'm so passionate.
You know, kids used to be outside two hours a day. Now it's 15 minutes, right? And I always say, I want to beat Tik Tok. I want to beat the mayor. I want to be the mayor who invested in basketball courts and playgrounds and youth programming that got kids back outside.
When was the last time you saw a kid climbing a tree?
I was just talking about climbing a tree just the other day.
Actually, not not too long ago. There was also a cat in that tree and there's a there was a 911 incident, but you know, go into details. What doesn't he do?
But it's important for kids to see, you know, all of us really for you go to a school and to know that like that kid that's yapping, like I was voted most likely to host a talk show. I was just cuz I was just talking in in middle school, but they see us like, okay, he's kind of doing what he wants and he looks he he looks like me. He's from his community. People from Bourbon see you like, okay, like, all right, he's really doing that. I can do it, too. People see you in Terote and it's not like you just came out of nowhere. No, I grew up right here. I grew up in Indiana. So don't think that you can't do nothing because I'm doing it.
And that goes back like to the the original point where if what really gets you jazzed up is climbing a mountain. Well, if it's climbing a mountain or swimming at the beach,
that's what you got to go do. If making an impact and like doing it as quickly and as meaningfully as possible is what fires you up, you can do that here. And that's what you have to be driven by. And that's what a lot of the most successful Hoosiers are driven by. Impact. I do. We have to get the story. So, you fail Army Ranger School?
Yeah. So, I was the uh after college, I went straight to Fort Benning, Georgia. You have what's called Ibolic Infantry Basic Officer Leader Cors. I was the number one graduate and I'm like, man, I'm set. Uh but to do well in the military in the infantry, you've got to have a Ranger tab. Uh going to Ranger school is different than the Ranger Regiment. I go to Ranger school. I got knocked out like the second day.
Whoa. Okay. Wait, wait. So, how do you knock out? Give us Yeah. give us the you got to do like a PT test. So you got to do, you know, push-ups, sit-ups, and run. I made it through that. I did all the physical stuff. And then you have to do like tasks like you got to assemble a weapon under a set amount of time. But it's all in an order. And it's about paying attention to detail. And I was just a go go go guy and I didn't pay attention to detail and I messed up these tasks. Yeah. And so I go back to uh another portion of the base and they're like, "Look, you can go do your army job or you can wait a couple weeks and try again." And this entire time I have a bald head. And I'm so happy that I did not meet my wife then cuz I look horrible.
Hey, what's what's wrong with bald, dude?
I dropped a bald head pic in the YouTube clip. Yes.
If I have it on, if you look it up, look up outside magazine Brandon Sackman Ranger School. I go back and I walked on. They're like a few people didn't show up. So, like we have room for a few more. And I made it through in 62 days. Uh, which is the shortest amount of time you could do it. It was a very huge learning experience. You get starved. Uh, you have to stay up late. It's all about teamwork and how do you close with and destroy the enemy in the worst possible conditions. And during this experience, there's this guy with like facial hair and you couldn't really have facial hair. You always had to shave. Uh, and he I'm like, "Who are you? You keep asking me questions, right?"
He's a reporter for The Outside magazine and he's writing about students in Ranger School. And I'm like, "Oh." So, like that entire journey is documented in that magazine. The people I did it with. And I get done and I'm like, "Great. I want to, you know, join the 82nd Airborne and deploy instantly." And I got passed up.
I had all the credentials, but someone passed uh someone got that spot instead of me. That is a picture. Sound like Isa. You sound like Isaiah Thomas talking about the dream team. I met the criteria.
I met the criteria. They picked someone else cuz that guy's dad knew the general and I didn't.
Hey, that's how it be, man.
And they shipped me to Fort in California where I didn't deploy for 16 months. I just worked with units coming in to train them for deployment.
Damn. So you're So you you want to be deployed and you're just there watching people show up, get deployed,
train with them, and then they go. So, while I'm over there, I get an email from the Ranger Battalion saying, "Hey, look, we really think you should try out to be an Army Ranger." So, you can go through Ranger school, but that doesn't mean you're a Ranger, right? You're not in the Ranger Regiment. This is the special operations, and this is a qualification that you need to be in it. So, I go back to Fort Benning, Georgia. I try out to be in the Rangers. Was fortunate enough to be selected. Had the best three-year experience in the United States military. take us through what that process cuz I know it's tough
you know like like the army rangers and ranger school going through that is is
the I think a lot more people maybe not a lot more like know buds and know Navy Seals and like the special forces like this is the army's equivalent of Navy Seals right you know the it's a direct action right you're a lethal fighting force you work a lot with a group called Delta as well as you know you're working with the SEALs um there are some NDAs about the the training experience
is this the one and you can if you can't So you can't say is this one where they like stick you out in the woods and you have to like track this whole thing down with like
there is some wood sticking and some finding the points like you know
no further questions David Gins reveals like the whole thing in his book.
I can't stand David Gins. I'm like you you just wrote the book about this. There was the mystique. Yeah. You know, honestly though, I will say this, like when you're going through all this training, the selection timeline, and uh working out to get into these programs, there were times when I'm like sitting there like it's 3 in the morning, I'm just carrying heavy stuff on my back. Like, why? Right.
Yeah.
United States of America, baby. That's why. Like, if you don't have a good ride,
what an answer. What an answer. Like if you're not waking up every day just jazzed like this is it. This is what I want to do in the world, you ain't going to make it. Yeah.
And I I meet a lot of young people. They're like, "I want to be in office." Okay. Why do you want to be in office?
Well, I want to I want to change what's going on and and I don't like Trump or I don't like Kla and I want this. I'm like, nah, man. That's not it. If you're not waking up every day saying, "I want to change my country for the better. I want to change my community for the better. I want to fight for these people." It's not going to work out. I'm the type of public servant and politician. I'm fighting for Hoosiers, right? I'm not fighting against one group or another group. I try to be pragmatic with policym. Uh and to do that, to have that love, have that passion leads to strong public policy. In terote right now, you can get on a city bus for free.
Yeah. That's tough. That's tough. In terote right now, we are investing in quote the rich neighborhoods and the rich parks just as much as we're investing in the poor parks and the neighborhoods that haven't seen transformational investments in years. If you look at our home building, we're building in strong white collar neighborhoods and then we're building in the hood.
Some people like in those neighborhoods that have lacked so much love for so long, they kind of get skeptical when they see the investment. feel left behind,
you know, and they're like, "Is this to push me out? Is this what?" It's like, "No, we're actually we're going to try to make this area better and it's going to improve. There's issues with home ownership that sometime if you're a homeowner in the area, you're going to be a direct beneficiary, but if you're renter, it may be tougher, but like no, we want this neighborhood to be nice for you really for the city
because you deserve that same quality experience as individuals in a gated community." Exactly. Right. And I think that when you're growing one of these smaller Midwestern towns, you do sometimes have to get more creative and you have to figure out solutions. Like it's just as I look through small towns in Indiana, like all the different creative stuff. Like if you just start hosting First Fridays, like yes, that does something and it's a it's a small piece of it, but it's not going to like, you know, you're not going to get a hundred new college graduates because you're hosting First Friday. Respectfully. Respectfully. Yeah. So, what are what are some creative ideas or things that you're you're trying to bring to life in terote?
So, one thing actually you brought up home ownership. We work with a program called Club 720 that helps firsttime home buyers feed directly into the housing market with down payment assistance. Um, on top of that, we synchronize home buying home buying with HR departments and how they recruit people for jobs. And on top of that, we synchronize new people coming in for jobs with a program where new employees from different companies get to meet up and get to experience fun things to do in tero
community sticky. Exactly. That's people there.
We've got all these buckets here. And then the last bucket that I really really uh want to get figured out and the mayor is not in charge of the school corporation, right? That's a superintendent. The city council is not in charge. That's the school board. But I love working with county government, which is different than city government, state government, and the school board, and trying to find a way to fund schools to build quality facilities in Teroot, Indiana, because they need it. The kids deserve it. Like I look at Indiana sometimes, and it just rs me up. I'm like, every dollar that is spent in for jails, in building jails, I think $1 and a half dollars should be forced to go into schools.
Well, in terote the public schools, that's it for high school, right? I mean that's it. The community's got to be there's there was like a talking history there was like the Schult schools
Schulty Garfield
before consil before consolidation they were all spread out and but it's been public schools has been
that's terote
three three schools
west baby don't leave north and south
people forget about the west north just made it uh to the semi-state in basketball and that team could shoot the three Todd Wolfley I mean that offense is phenomenal great team. Um, South, they're the Patriots. Patriots. Braves. Vikings. Yeah. The Braves. Just got a great football.
I know that's I know you value that.
The Vikings, their baseball lineage is absolutely wild for such a small school. And you know, you see that, you see that culture and it's like, okay, we got to provide that experience for future generations. And sometimes it might not mean wearing a Terode South letter jacket. Sometimes it might be having hard conversations about the data and about total kids at the school corporation and doing something transformational like building a new school which provides new amenities. Um, and sometimes it's investing in the facilities you have. And I'm not saying it's one or the other.
What I'm saying is the experience that kids have in Teroot needs to be better. And I I want to fight for that. I want to fight for that statewide. Like it doesn't matter if you live in Teroot or not. Like ask yourself, man, you know, are my kids able to uh walk to a park? Are my kids able to uh go on a date in an area that's safe in town if they're in high school?
Are they able to enjoy high school and athletics and academics? And like we should want more for our kids than we had. I do want to touch on uh the idea of a program where you're bringing adults in that are maybe uh taking a job at whatever the corporation might be and getting them connected because making friends as an adult is hard. It's hard in Indianapolis where there's a ton of adults. Yes. And I I talked to my friends that live up in northern Indiana up in the South Bend area.
And it's like if someone moves in and takes a job in South Bend, making those first couple friends can be very challenging. And if you don't get them wi with like a sticky community, it's so much it's so easy after your year-long lease or whatever is up to be like, "Yeah, you know, I'm going back to where I know people." So, getting them plugged in your community. How How are you getting people plugged in?
It's great. It's like a four-month program where you do everything from a ropes course at the children's museum to uh a happy hour and some appetizers with elected officials to you go to our museums, you go to our musical opportunities. Um you walk downtown and you even do like team building challenges. Uh we do a similar program for our interns like for the the interns at uh Thompson Thrift, at Great Dane, at Saturn Peckare, at GE Aviation, at Union Health, the interns for Indiana State University, interns for the city do it. I mean, we open it up to all of our large uh and small companies. We're partnered with the Chamber of Commerce on it.
To be honest, they do it most 99% of the staff work on this. And I love our local chamber of commerce because they are embracing this idea of well community and quality of life helps recruit talent. You need talent to successfully run some of these businesses, right? And it's so interesting because you see people at that first meeting and they're kind of like, oh my gosh, like am I in school again? Like fun facts about you, right?
Yeah.
And by the end of it, it's like oh no, like you know, they're they're actually hanging out with that person. Like, yeah, you see like you see John in the grocery store like, "Oh, what's up, man?"
Or like after I remember ISU when I like a friend who was on the football team, just a dude. We was vibing in class like I was demon like I got to get your number, dude. Like we got to hang like I I don't know like if we're on that level yet, bro, but I'm trying to I'm trying to hang out. Let's grab a drink, dude. Let's like I feel like you're cool people.
Well, one I love I love all the things we've talked about. We've covered some some amazing ground as we starting to think about wrapping the show up. Even though I feel like we could talk for like three hours about this. Uh Samson. Yeah.
From Indie. You show up day one. Obviously, you go out to play football.
Yeah.
But you show up day one in Teraho. What was your perception going in and what was your perception coming out?
I remember when I first went on my visit, I felt like it was a city that was like back in time a little bit just like how it was set up. But also when I got there, I realized it was a city that I could walk through. And cuz Indianapolis wasn't a city really where I could walk. You know what I'm saying? like from where I grew up and where I what I knew. And so, uh, out in tero, it was great just walking around the campus. I was out there in the summers. We did football workouts and that's it. We did not we didn't have to take classes. So, I work out at 7:00 a.m. and have the whole rest of the day. Walk down to the W bash river. I was going to ask you about that. See, like Native American influence, walk by, just get a sense or feel for the city. And I feel like it's a city that like
that's just cuz you're Samson and you're you're different. You're different. Like the average,
let me show you. Yeah.
Let me show. Look, I'll show sack probably already seen these, but I got the tero. I got the I got the 40 and 41. That's Mount Vernon right there. That's my mom hometown.
That's the crossroads, bro.
Yeah. Yeah. This is why we say it's a crossroads of America,
bro. You see you see the 40. You see the 41? That's that's W Bash and that's Seventh Street. But that was the old like crossroads of America. So like I would stand there,
go to the Max statue. He's this great poet from Terote. Had all these little life guides written on there. He wrote this poem called like this poem called like
this the desert data by Max but he also has a quote that says terra hope is the world in miniature.
It is bro and there's a documentary that came out from Baylor about terote and I just like I fell in love with the city and like even just going to the wall bash just sitting there and being like
dang this mattered.
Uh so Max the poetrad
shout out Tigers. I knew that I knew that I knew his name. I was like where have I heard that? Yeah, but he's tough, bro. Like, like I mean,
but you're just so you're so unique that you wanted to get like immersed in the culture of Terra Health.
I got to know where I'm at. You know what I'm saying?
Okay. So, so you're going there, right? And and you went and did all this stuff, but like first opinion, you said it a little bit slower, like kind of like going back in time a little bit. And then four years later as you leave, what were your feelings towards?
You can do anything there. Like I felt like I I just felt like the man in Teroot, but also because I loved it there and they love me back when I'd walk in and like to different places that I frequent like Cackleberries. They'll still recognize me. Like like George, I'll call in like I'll be flying down before they close if I had to get to Terote for reason. I'm like hold a burrito for me. I'm going to be there like five minutes after y'all close, but hold me to the the same burrito y'all used to make the football team. Hold that for me. And so like there's community there from the people who grew up in Terote to the people that are coming in. And I think like it's a city that allows you to to be yourself and explore your interest and it's not overwhelming but it's also it's a city you know
Brandon you obviously left went to college at IU then end up you know joining the military and then you make the decision to come back. What really influenced that decision to come back to Terote? You know, I think what really drove me back is I remember reading an article by one of our local reporters and it was it was really eye openening. You b it b they basically rated all the small towns in the United States of America and we just were not doing well on any of these rankings and to to a lot of Samson's points like there's a lot of good in terote right but if you don't continue to reinvest in yourself
good eventually becomes stale. Yeah.
Right. Buildings eventually become dilapidated. And I was like, "Wait a second.
If we don't go back and invest in the YMCA, which is on the river, if we don't redevelop the parcels in and around the river, we won't be Fort Wayne or Southbend or Owensboro, Kentucky. We will just be a Terote was cool. It was fun." And you know, then the the casino legislation had passed and a new casino was going to be built in Teroot. And I'm like, okay, there is a chance here. If we really focus on redevelopment, on blight elimination and housing, and we synchronize public and private partnerships, I think we can get this place to explode. And I started just doing a ton of research, right? Like I I'm a huge nerd. I don't have a ton of hobbies because every hobby I do in
But when did you feel like you could win? Like I can I can run for I can run for mayor and I can win. So, I had about two months left in the military and I was like, "Okay, I need to make this decision." And I got on LinkedIn
and I looked at the uh the the previous administration people who worked at their LinkedIn and I was like, "I can produce better policy, but also I can communicate this better." Yeah.
Right. I I sized up my opponent. I I did some uh enemy research, right? You know, what's what's the battlefield look like?
He was digging. He was He was sleeping on the internet. I did the full army. intelligence that he was creeping.
Oh yeah. I was like, "Okay, what are the voting population? What are the numbers? Um, how do I get myself out there?" And I called a friend um said, "Hey, can I get your dad's number?" His dad had been bigger in politics.
He's like, "Yeah, yeah, he'll talk with you." And I was like, "Hey, I think I can do this." And he's like, "Well, the numbers are there, but you're going to have to work really hard." And I'm like, "Well, if I treat this remotely the same that I treated being an Army Ranger, nobody will outworn me." And I say that all the time. Like if you're running for office, like you should when you go to sleep at night be like, "Okay, what did I do to get elected today?
What did I do to show this community that it is worth it taking 15 minutes uh to give me a shot because I'm fighting for them?" And I just relentlessly attacked it. But what I also would do is when I'm meeting with citizens, some who could vote, some who couldn't vote, I would just be in chat with everyone. I'd be like, "Okay, where are we sitting?" Right? We're sitting downtown.
uh we don't have a 100% occupancy of our first floor stores. We've not invested in the infrastructure here and we need to tear down these next five dilapidated buildings or reinvest in them. We have two options here. And they'd be like, whoa. I'm like, yeah. I mean, I would really research uh the budgets, what other cities were doing, and just say, hey, here are three things we can do in terote to get better.
And I always talked about terote. Why teroot? Terote Terote? Because it is true that it is very divisive in America right now with politics. Oh my goodness.
It is super divisive and it's turning people away.
I saw one study 42% of Americans are independents and they say these two political parties are not doing enough to convince me that I need to be a Democrat or a Republican. And so, you know, I I really want to close with a political message to those who are involved in politics or who want to be or those who are on the fence. And it's like meet people where they're at, not where you want them to be. Don't spend so much time branding the other side as uh baby killers or as oh they're way too conservative and just start saying okay hey look you know I I love everyone right like I I want you to feed to have the freedom to grow up to raise your family you you know have a job in this community and it means we're going to agree to disagree it means we're going to say hey look uh fundamentally we're not going to see eye to eye on gun control right like I I carry all the time, right? I I own several guns.
I love firearms, but it also took you like a minute, 60 seconds to reload a musket in the 1700s, right? Like,
how many rounds can you fire from an AR-15 uh now in present day society? And I'm not saying ban AR-15s.
And I think these are things that we kind of fundamentally like agree on from a from a things
we should have a conversation, but it's so uh what's the word? Uh like ones and zeros, whatever. Binary. so binary. It's like you have to be 100% this or 100% that. And that's tough. It's like I'm 100% United States of America.
Makes sense. Yeah.
There it is.
Well, I don't know if I was going to just ask you just real quick about Terote cuz you're there. You see development. You talking about meeting people where they're at. Like where do you feel like to hoot is at? Like are they
people ready for to jump into the next 25 years or do you feel like there's still some there's still people trying to hold on to what terote was or just they they can only see what it is now?
Yeah. You know, I think we're getting closer. Like a lot of our housing projects have just exploded and they see physical construction and they see streets being improved and they see parks being invested in. They're like, "Okay, I I do believe in this. I bought into this." But being in politics, you got to win the Super Bowl four years in a row to get elected.
You can't just win it once and then slack off for three years. Like, you need to continually provide for your uh constituency. And I think what's going to get us there, and I touched on this earlier, is now a school plan and say, "Hey, here's how we're going to invest in our kids." Um, and if you don't consistently look for feedback, you will not lead through listening. And that's a very important uh conversation that I have with leaders is like you need to take bottom-up feedback. Like I believe in government efficiency.
We have changed our staffing and what equipment we use for a number of departments. the government employees have changed
because we took feedback from guys and gals who'd worked there for 30 or 35 years, right? We didn't just cut things. No, we developed a plan and said, "Here's how we're saving taxpayer dollars to produce uh more opportunity for hers in the 812." Right.
Right. And I think we're getting closer as a community. Uh, of course there's doubt. There's always going to be doubters. There's always going to be, you know, people who comment on the city's Facebook calling me suck bun. But like, so what? Like, I'm not gonna worry about you. And, you know, you care.
You got to worry about the thousands of people who, you know, believe that best days are in front of us. Yeah.
And I I love how you're talking about no one's going to outwork you. I think I looked at the number the number is 10,000 doors. You knocked on 10,000 doors during your campaign.
That's work. I went through two shoes
just footing it around the town. That real Walker earned it. My girl Hunley Hunley did that. Like Andrea talked, they told her, "You got a long shot." Senate District 46, Indiana. I think that's House District 46. But they told her same thing. There's, you know, it's going to be an uphill battle for you. She said, "I walk up hills. It's nothing.
I got I got those on clouds, baby.
On clouds. I walk up hills."
Well, as we wrap up, I have a a couple fun segment questions to ask for you. First guys, as an honorary Hosian and a lifelong Hosian,
what's the Mount Rushmore of Teroot?
Oh,
men, women, people. Yes. People from Terraote. Like, who are the big four that everyone needs to know? Like, hey, these people are from our
Indiana, man. I don't
You got to put Larry Bird on.
Yeah, Larry's on there.
Oh, okay. Yeah,
we got we got to claim him. Like, we have we got to claim Larry Bird, man. I'm trying to think.
Scatman KS. Scatman. That's a great That's a great call. That's a great call.
That's two good polls.
I got to go Eugene Debs because Eugene Debs ran like
Eugene Debs ran for president and the things that Eugene Debs, people know Debs all across the world. We don't talk about him enough in in Indiana at all. people in terote don't even some people don't know that the house is there like and the things that he was fighting for just like regular work hours child labor just like
things that are so much common sense now he was jailed for but he was passionate and like talking about people commenting in suck fun like he was not in jail for the right thing multiple times for saying and doing the right thing
if you follow the Eugene Ve house on Twitter they're hilarious they just have hilarious content u but yeah yep he's on No. Yeah. So that's No, Debs is Debs. I'll put Debs on there.
Then Tom, I think you put Tommy John. I mean, he is great guy. I met him a year ago. I gave him the keys to the city.
So funny. I mean, I was like, I want to spend days with this man.
The Bionic Man, Tommy John, proud. Those are four those are four really, really good hoses. You got to give an honorary shout out to our boy Richard Goodall, right? Like,
oh,
dude. Viral heart of gold.
Viral thing. If you ever get a chance, just
right back at school next year, man. Right back to work.
It's like like it gives me chills thinking about everything he's gone through in life and how he chased and followed his dream. I don't stop believing, of course. And I I just being on that show, I was like that represents the Hosian spirit.
No, it does, man.
Dude, it's like this janitor from Terra Ho. This is so terri so tero. Like of course he's from Teraho.
He opens his mouth and I just remember like my jaw dropped.
Just a small town girl, man.
Yeah. What a guy. Okay, as we continue to wrap up the show, Brandon, uh this question is brought to you by our friends at Or Fellowship. They're a great organization here in Indiana helping develop young business leaders across the state. What advice would you give to your 22-year-old self?
I would stick to that line I talked about earlier. You are the average of the five people that you spend the most time around. So continually evaluate uh your friendships, your relationships, your mentors and say, "Okay, who is pushing me to be the best version of myself?" Uh and are you doing the same vice versa? Like are you close enough with an individual, a co-orker, uh a friend to say, "Hey, like that's no, that's not who you are. Like don't do that." And I think that's very important especially in a higher leadership position where you are under the microscope. Like, you know, there's some conservative media hosts who always look for an opportunity to just bash me on on radio talk shows and I'm like, man, like
why am I getting held to such a higher standard than other individuals? Don't shy away from that. If you are, own it and live to a higher standard and just prove that, okay, it's it's okay. You know, we're going to keep growing and being better.
My uh my friends and I uh my best friend specifically have a saying where it's be a friend a friend would like to have. And it just goes like it's like the way I show up is like I I try to be the friend that I would want my friends to be for me. So like when you're calling them out or you're supporting them or doing whatever it is, be a friend a friend would like to have. Uh as we keep going on, we're going to talk specifically around Terote. Uh we'll go back and forth now because Samson already got that question on his. So uh uh we'll go Samson. What is a hidden gem in Terote?
A little spot that I like is Marco Mill. You know that spot up there?
Yes.
That's a cool little spot. It's
Have you been recently?
Yeah. No, I haven't been recently. Have y'all done?
It's wonderful. Okay.
They've done a ton of improvements,
but it's cool. It's like this this dude, he fought in a war and the government gave him some land and he built a mill there and like you can still see the remnants of it kind of little waterfall. It's kind of ducked off like in the city. I like the water out in tero and so I like being by the wall bash. I like being by there. But the children museum is great. The new Larry Bird Museum is really cool. I went in there and it's like just pop in, learn about Larry Bird, pop out. It's something that's
that's needed for the downtown. But those are a few little things I like to do there.
Uh Brandon, what's a hidden gem in terote? My big one is Wise Pies Pizza.
Solid.
So over um right around I think it's fifth in Waw Bash. It's a couple blocks from the spot that Samson was talking about earlier, seventh in Waw Bash. Really nice pizza joint. But if you sit outside one when you go inside, you see the old building. You see what the building used to be, how there was a ton of uh department stores, boutique shops. And then if you're sitting outside, you can see First Financial Bank, uh, Fortune 500 company in Terome.
You can see some of the newer apartment complexes that have been put up, the new mixedtouse spots, and you can also see construction in our downtown. And, you know, we're building hotels with outdoor pools and bars and bodeas. We're fixing the main street. And I think it just really like that like sitting there eating that great pizza. I mean, it's phenomenal. It's so good.
My wife and I love it. You just see everything around you and it's like we're blending 1950s, 1960s architecture with modernday urban planning and sidewalks are getting
IPA baby. Let's go.
Oh yeah.
Yeah, man. W Bash AB is it like I feel like that's a spot like
Yeah.
I don't know. Not enough people with the interstate. They don't they don't hit it enough.
I can't say just one. Sorry.
Of course not.
After Burner Brewing Company.
Oh, a couple of Air Force vets. They put it together.
It's just kind of tucked away. It's it's a just a few blocks downtown. They actually have a huge uh festival, Hops and Vines. It's a huge showcase for breweries across the Midwest to come to outdoor music. Uh great beer. If that's not your thing, well, it's just a nice community event, and you can walk around and see a ton of people, see what Teroot has to offer, and it's all in this like gravel parking lot with a bunch of tens. It's so much fun.
Okay, Brandon, who is a who's your hero that you look up to? actually uh Dick Luger and Evan B and that those two types of just like statesman pragmatic public servants where you know yes they were partisan and then they were focused on progress at times and they always blended this concept of what type of policies help the hoosier state. I I definitely think those two speak out a ton to me. And then the other one,
Kaitlyn Clark WNBA is Indianapolis.
That matters, man. That matters.
What she hasn't been able to do to grow the game. I mean, I see little girls
and little boy just as out there like, "Wow, the fever." Like, basketball's still going. Like I just saw Tyrese Hallebert, knock on wood, win an NBA championship and now I'm going to watch Caitlyn Clark do it because you know there's that awkward time in sports where baseball has not yet hit the playoffs and you're like well preseason's going to start. You know what do I do for football or basketball? The WNBA has just totally
rocked that portion.
Dude, she's here. Caitlyn Clark is here in the town.
Samson, who's your hero that you look up to
right now? like Madam CJ Walker and you know we talk about her a lot of course but you know she invested in Indianapolis and that like she left a legacy here and she was only here for six years. I tell people this all the time, like if you hate Indiana, you don't want to be here, whatever. You're here. Be here. And then if you're going to go somewhere else, go somewhere else. But be here. Like be here. And Madam CJ, like when I played football, there was a saying, be where your feet are that our coach used to always say, right? And so like be where your feet are in Indianapolis, Indiana. She's invested. She's using um how centrally located we are to build her business, catering to her community. She wasn't worried about getting business from, you know, people that didn't look like her. She really was just like, "Okay, there's a need in my community. I can fulfill it."
Yeah. It's like start like start now.
Start.
Like even if you want to go, you know, make movies in Hollywood, make a movie here.
She has a quote. It says, "I gave myself a start
um by giving myself a start." That's like
bang,
you know. So, like we just started.
Uh final question of the day, gentlemen. Usually we ask this about Indiana, but we're going to get specific on Terote. What is one thing the world needs to know about Teraho, Indiana?
I'll just say one thing people may not know. It's French. It means high ground. It was an advantageous position during like 1810, 11, 12. Fort Harrison was there and and the river played a big factor. But Terrajo is French just like Vincen is French over there on the Waw Bash. You see how the French spell the Waw Bash with the O. Wash. Look at that. Type Wash with a O.
You still have an elementary.
Yeah. Type W bash with a O first. It's French out there. So that's what terraote is. That word is wobbash. Look at his face. Cameron, look at his face. That word is wobbash.
Terra ho means high ground. It's French. And so that's just a little OG history.
So I used to say, "Oh, you know, the CocaCola bottle." Yeah. Now
you got to say that. You got to say that. Tell everyone. Tell everyone that real quick.
Yeah. I mean, it's the birthplace of the Coca-Cola bottle and you know, manufacturing. But now have really pivoted the last six months. Do you know the Wobbash River has like the straightest amount of just like straight waterway, which is perfect for crew, perfect for rowing. Uh, back in the day, there's a very, very, really good for shipping lanes. And I'm like, as a society, you know, watching towns grow around cities, watching towns get back to that.
I think that Wabash River and Fairbanks Park and what's going on there, the YMCA and some redevelopment opportunities in the mill, the concert venue, I think it just shows and highlights opportunity in the Hoosier State. And I think that's it's a really good metaphor of of what's to come for the community. Um, and other communities have invested in their river, but I just think it's it's a really like it's a physical thing you can see to to highlight our community.
Gentlemen, I appreciate you coming on. This is your reminder if you're listening and you love this episode because I love this episode. Make sure you leave five stars. That would make a lot of uh that would make a lot of people happy. And if there are, as we talked about Terote and dived in, dove in to everything in terote. If there's another town across the state of Indiana and you want us to bring on an expert there, hit us up. Let us know. Uh gentlemen, I really appreciate you coming on and sharing everything there is to know about Terodise. Uh from, you know, the the birthplace of the Coca-Cola bottle to the Wobbash River to the Sycamores and the Fighting Engineers. Hey, Braden Sack.
Sack and and I think that when they when they replay this podcast in I don't know 100 years maybe the Mount Rushmore will have changed.
Maybe I appreciate you guys. Thanks for stopping by.
Appreciate you.
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