A Talk with Mary Robichaux on Education, Public Safety, Expansion of Healthcare and Peachtree Corners

On this episode of Peachtree Corners Life, Rico interviews Mary Robichaux, current Representative of Georgia House District 48 and candidate for re-election. Listen in as Mary shares her experience as well as her views on topics like healthcare education, TSPLOST, public safety, and much more.

Mary’s Website: https://www.electmaryrobichaux.com/

Timestamp (Where to find it in the podcast):

[00:00:30] – Intro
[00:01:12] – About Mary
[00:03:12] – Why Mary Began Running for Office
[00:07:55] – The Expansion of Healthcare
[00:15:20] – Updating the Education Model
[00:17:57] – High School Vocational Training Programs
[00:23:06] – Changes in TSPLOST
[00:25:14] – Opinions on MARTA Transportation
[00:29:18] – Working with Entrepreneurs and Startups
[00:32:27] – Community and Police Safety and Wellbeing
[00:38:51] – Mary Asks for Your Vote
[00:41:36] – Outro

“When we talk startups, we have to have a workforce educated and ready to go for these different new things. We’ve gotta make sure that they want to stay here… We’ve gotta make sure they stay here and that Georgia is the best place to run your business for various reasons. That you have a viable workforce, that you can get the investment capital you need, that your tax rates are gonna be appropriate. We can get this done.”

MARY RoBICHAUX

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Podcast Transcript

[00:00:30] Rico: Hi everyone, this is Rico Figliolini, host of Peachtree Corners Life. Before I introduce my guest today, I just want to say thank you to our sponsor of these shows, podcasts, and supporter of Peachtree Corners Magazine. And that’s EV Remodeling, Inc. Eli has been a great supporter of ours. He’s a Peachtree Corner resident. A great company, does good work out here. So check out his website, EVRemodelingInc.com. Thank you, Eli, for supporting in the shows that we do. Now, let’s get into it. We have another candidate today. Actually she’s an incumbent. Mary Robinshaw, Robichaux, let’s get that right. Mary Robichaux. Thanks for joining me, Mary. Appreciate that.

[00:01:12] Mary: Thank you, Rico. Thank you for having me. And again, I’m fine with my pronunciation of my name. I know it’s not the most common name here in Georgia. Although we’ve lived here in Georgia now 34 years.

[00:01:23] Rico: Oh, wow.

[00:01:23] Mary: So I’ve been in either Alpharetta or Roswell, so I do not live in Peachtree Corners. But so we’ve been here for those 34 years where my husband and I have been, actually in November we’ll be married 45 years. So met in high school and dated all through college. Married, I have twin sons that we’ve raised here in Georgia. Again, for us, it was over in Fulton County. They’re graduates of the Fulton County School System. So they’re now actually again next month they’ll be 41 years old. And now I have two beautiful granddaughters. It’s much more fun to be the grandmother, sometimes. My background’s healthcare, in my professional career. Again, 40 plus years in healthcare with a lot of different, both clinical and management level experience. Then what I did right before I won election in 2018, it was the first time I ever ran for office in my life. So that was kind of an interesting time for us. I actually was the vice president for the American Heart Association for the Division of Quality for the Southeast. So I did work with about 700 hospitals across the southeast making sure that we had good cardiovascular care delivery systems. And then we designed statewide systems of care that actually are still in place in a lot of states today. So very happy with that kind of concept. So that’s kind of my background, to give you a little bit. My husband, his background is IT with large corporations. But then probably about 20 years ago, he became what I would call a serial entrepreneur. So he likes to start companies and invest in companies. Some he keeps, well, mostly he’ll sell. Some have not been as successful as some of the others, so, but that’s life too, I think so.

[00:03:10] Rico: Sure.

[00:03:11] Mary: That’s kind of who I am.

[00:03:12] Rico: Well, what got you into running? I mean the original first office you landed in?

[00:03:18] Mary: Well, the first office I ran for was this office. I currently do represent what’s called House District 48. Which currently is actually majority Roswell, Georgia. Just over to your west and then I cover a little bit of Alpharetta. Redistricting will be taking place. So while the number stays the same, the district is shifting a little bit to the east. So that’s where now it will cover Roswell, Alpharetta, Johns Creek, and a small portion of Peachtree Corners.

[00:03:47] Rico: Right. I’m putting that map up actually. So that’s the new district that takes into Johns Creek, and then the portion of Peachtree Corners. Mostly west of Peachtree Industrial Boulevard, I think.

[00:03:58] Mary: Correct, toward John’s Creek, up toward the river.

[00:04:01] Rico: So very different from what you’re had before.

[00:04:05] Mary: Yeah, it’s very different. It changed probably about 70%. So I’m over in the Roswell corner on this. I am on the eastern portion of 400. So why I ran because again, in 2018 at the time there was, in my opinion it was the start of a lot of discourse between parties and between people. And I guess with my background in healthcare and what I did, what I was very good at in the healthcare realm was getting different voices to come to the table and to talk and to try to come up with solutions with the patient being our center of where we needed to make change. And that included doctors, nurses, insurance companies, hospitals, CEOs, all the different pieces that go into providing care in different cardiovascular diseases. So I was very good at facilitating those kinds of things to say, let’s all, we need to talk and we need to put our egos at the door. And sometimes that was a little challenging. But I was good at getting people to talk and come up with solutions. So when some of the discourse and what was going on in the district I currently represent, I felt that the representative at the time was not as willing to listen to others and to talk to all people to come up with those kinds of solutions. And I said, well, I’m gonna run. Because I think I do have that kind of capability to have what I call having those conversations with people. Because yelling and screaming at each other gets us nowhere. I’m sorry. It doesn’t, It never has. I grew up as one of seven children and yeah, we could yell and scream, but ultimately that’s not gonna solve a problem for us.

[00:05:46] Rico: The political landscape has changed quite a bit since 2018, or even before that, really.

[00:05:51] Mary: It has unfortunately, in my opinion. Theres still lot of ways to have those conversations.

[00:05:57] Rico: Yeah. I mean, it’s okay to stir the pot a little bit. That’s what I think happened with Donald Trump coming in to office. Not my favorite candidate, but he did stir the pot. He got people thinking about certain things. Certainly in my opinion, not the best president of the United States that we’ve had. But, the idea of looking at problems in a different way and also because people, to some degree, aren’t being heard. Even within the Democratic Party. I think that’s also the case. I think over the years, I think certain segments of the Democratic Party has been taken for granted, that they’ll be there.

[00:06:37] Mary: I think when we, the way I understand the parties, what’s interesting to me, when I first decided to run. When you looked, you go back and you look at people’s voting history, I was actually, my husband and I were classified as independents. Because we voted both ways, at the time. Now since 2016, I’ll be honest, I probably have not voted many for Republicans for various reasons. But, our histories have been, we voted both ways. Sometimes the system even of running for office is set up, you have to choose. It’s very difficult at the state, at this level. When I looked into it, qualifying to run as an independent would’ve required an exorbitant amount of signatures to even get on the ballot. And I said, well that doesn’t make any sense. So, and I lean more towards the Democratic. I’m probably progressive in more social aspects of governance and probably more fiscally conservative because I am one. I don’t think we should spend money we don’t have. I don’t do it in my personal life. But I do think there are valid things we need to be spending money on as a government and therefore we need to figure out how we’re gonna pay for it. People want to be heard. And I grew up in rural Louisiana, so I understand rural. I understand urban. I think we need to make sure everyone is getting the same types of chances, however we accomplish that.

[00:07:55] Rico: Right. So let’s get into some of the issues I think that you support or that you express. But one of them is sponsoring legislation to expand availability of Medicaid in the state of Georgia. That would add half a million people to the uninsured in Georgia.

[00:08:11] Mary: Correct.

[00:08:12] Rico: So if I understand correctly, the federal government would take care of a decent portion of that budget if we allow it to come in. But at some point the state will probably have to take over a decent portion of that budget.

[00:08:26] Mary: Well the Affordable Care Act currently, if we were to start it today, the federal government would cover 100% of the cost. That’s what’s still in place for at least the next two years, how much longer that will stay in effect. You’re correct. The current match, though, is nine to one. Could that change in the future? Yes. But I think when we just say, well, it’s gonna cost this much. But let’s, what we need to talk about though is what is it costing this state right now not to cover those 500,000 people?

[00:08:54] Rico: Okay.

[00:08:54] Mary: I would phrase it in a lot of different ways. Number one, we have to understand our federal tax dollars, even though we live in Georgia, goes into the pool that covers Medicaid across this country. So our dollars have left this state for that program in Kentucky, in Florida. So those are our dollars that have left this state already. I think we should bring those back. That’s number one. Number two, in my experience in healthcare, when we talk about the concept of what happens to those that are uninsured. Some people think, well, we don’t need to worry about them, it’s up to them how they get care. But we have to understand people who do not have insurance, typically the way they’re going to get help when they need healthcare coverage, it’s going to be at the point at which they’re gonna go to an emergency room. Now, sometimes they’re going there because they are so sick. That their cost is gonna be very, very high to cover them. Other times they’re going to that emergency room maybe because they have a sore throat and they can’t talk you know, I mean, they don’t understand. We have to understand in healthcare economics, covering care in an emergency room is one of the most expensive ways to deliver care versus preventative care models. So if we had a system that people had good preventative care access, it would prevent that. Because when that person goes into that emergency room, you and I are still paying for that. By law hospitals have to treat any patient who comes in their door, and that’s a federal law. We can’t change that. So, and then besides the concept of just covering people, we also know there are studies that show that when people have health insurance, their work productivity goes up. Anywhere from one to two percent overall. That to me would be a great boom for our economy, especially right now when we’re having issues with getting workforce in certain parts of the state. And then of course, we’re talking about the number of new jobs you know, the expansion of medicaid would do for this state. And I appreciate, and I think we should invest in places, companies like Rivian. The state’s putting in close to 1.2 to 1.6 billion dollars, which is fine to bring in an industry that’s gonna give us about 7,000 jobs. Healthcare, Medicaid expansion if done well and correctly in all the other things that need to happen. Which, that’s why I know how I do things. Lower estimates are talking about 60,000 new jobs in this state. It’s an investment. And again, I’m gonna say one last thing, and I know I talked too much.

[00:11:33] Rico: No, no.

[00:11:33] Mary: I was at a meeting with the president of the Georgia Chamber of Commerce the other week. And he stood up there and said, we are at the point now we need to consider healthcare as infrastructure. The government supports and pays roads. We’re doing broadband expansion. We do utilities. In a lot of ways healthcare is infrastructure. How are we going to do that? We need to fix our infrastructure of healthcare, period.

[00:12:00] Rico: I agree. Part of that problem is that I think that people don’t understand really, is that especially in the age of Covid, when people are sick like that. Number one, a lot of people that would use Medicaid are lower income people that don’t have that insurance, that are working hourly jobs, that have to leave that job to be able to go to get medical coverage. And if they have contagious diseases like Covid or like others because they may not have been vaccinated, that’s a worst case scenario for the rest of the population. So that’s the way I look at it also, that it, it’s not good community security to allow half a million people, let’s say, without insurance like that.

[00:12:41] Mary: Right. And I think it’s part of our workforce that I think is untapped. Because if you have a chronic disease that basically you cannot get care for, a lot of times you’re unable to work until you can get care. So it’s this you know, chicken before the egg concept. I’m not against people working, but sometimes if you can’t work because you’re so sick, we’re not going to give you healthcare until you can work?

[00:13:06] Rico: Yeah, and I can, I can understand the budget part though. Where the federal government is paying all that money. But at some point that money may go away and the state has to pick up that budget and where do they fund that from? I think that’s part of that program.

[00:13:20] Mary: Right. Again, we fund education, we fund healthcare now. We just have to decide how we’re going to do it. And I’m not saying Medicaid expansion in and of itself is going to fix our entire healthcare systems. There’s other things we need to do. Let’s all be honest. You know, reimbursement rates need to be adjusted. We need to look at opportunities to expand private pay and, or to force private insurances to live up to what they’re telling the people who have insurance they’re going to cover. So we need to clean up a lot of things.

[00:13:51] Rico: For sure.

[00:13:52] Mary: And to figure out what, I would call out of the box thinking ways to cover people that doesn’t always have to be Medicaid. So like I was talking the other day to some members of the Police Benevolent Society of Georgia. I didn’t know this, because I mean, up here we have great police forces and first responders who their healthcare coverage is done by our municipalities. We have the funds, they can buy in. There are municipalities in Georgia, they are so small, their police officers do not have healthcare coverage. Because the municipalities are so small they can’t afford it. My thought was, and I’ve already, okay, so Georgia State troopers have an insurance form policy. Why can we not as a state, figure out a way at an appropriate prorated model to allow those same police officers who are serving their communities to buy into the state plan? I’m thinking those are the kinds of things we need to identify. Where can we expand that, make it better, but yet still cover all? And the 500,000 that we do need to cover probably with Medicaid. And I would think sometimes that that number of Medicaid recipients as they go back to work, as we make it better for them, their numbers are going to drop off of Medicaid. Once you get that full time job because your health has improved and things look better. You get that job that you can get some private insurance.

[00:15:20] Rico: That makes sense. So let’s move on to education. We’ll wanna be able to cover a couple of issues as well. Education, obviously in the city of Peachtree Corners, we have a couple of private schools. We have a great public school system here. Simpson Elementary, Pinckneyville Middle, Norcross High School. And there are a lot of involved parents in these schools also. Peachtree Elementary. I mean, there’s a score of schools around here. Wesleyan is a private school. But speaking about the public model, I think one of the things that you spoke about is updating the 30 year model for state funding of public schools.

[00:15:56] Mary: Right.

[00:15:57] Rico: Tell me a little bit about what that would mean and then let’s get quickly after that into high school vocational training programs, which I’m big for. That makes sense to do that.

[00:16:07] Mary: So specifically the QBE formula, actually the Gwinnett County Public School Systems is one of the ones that is being the most disadvantaged right now with the old model. It’s based off of your total population of students in the system, but it also comes into what your tax base is there within your county and some other formularies. But what’s built in there too is if you are a much smaller county, the percentage of the state dollars that you get is much higher than the percentage that say a Gwinnett or a Fulton County gets. So in effect, and I’m not saying that we shouldn’t do it up to a point. But I think we need to review that to say, so why should Gwinnett, and Gwinnett is actually the highest one. I think you’re getting only about 82 cents on the quote-unquote QBE dollar, which helps subsidize some parts of rural Georgia and other parts of Georgia that are receiving 130 plus percent per student cost. Now I just think we need to re-look at that. We need to balance it based on local tax base, but I think we need to understand why are we doing it based on something that’s 30 years old? Let’s review it. Let’s understand that there are opportunities that maybe Gwinnett needs to come up to 90 plus percent of that. There’s just some opportunities there.

[00:17:38] Rico: Right.

[00:17:39] Mary: Especially in the areas where of our state, as you probably know, we’ve had a reduction in population. Versus in this area we’ve had such an increase in population. So some of this is based on, oh, population, new population. So there’s a lot of things we need to look at and readjust in my opinion.

[00:17:57] Rico: Okay. What about the high school vocational training programs that you advocate for? That public partnership or public-private partnership?

[00:18:05] Mary: I think that is a great opportunity. You know, I’ve had conversations with business owners. A lot of them car dealerships, places that they can’t find people to work as, mechanics, although now I would call them computer technician mechanics. Because I mean, let’s face it, our cars nowadays. And other opportunities, and again, in this area we have Gwinnett Tech, we have those kinds of things. But we also have, one of the things since I’ve been serving, I was able to visit down in South Georgia, there’s actually a true apprenticeship program. Which is different than an internship. The apprenticeship program, you have a private manufacturing company pays a portion along with the state in that students are recruited in the 10th grade. And it becomes part of their high school curriculum. They go and they work X number of hours in this manufacturing plant learning computer skills. They’re not allowed to operate big chainsaws and dangerous equipment per se, because of age requirements. But they start in 10th grade, they then learn some more skills such as computer designing. Some of these 3D printing manufacturing companies are doing it. In 11th grade they start to get a salary, and I think it’s around $9 an hour. But they’re still going to school full time. I mean, it’s a part half. 12th grade, I think it goes up to $11 an hour. But what happens, and it’s done through a program model actually, through a European model. So when they graduate from high school, they get a high school diploma. They get a two year associate degree diploma from the university system of Georgia, and they get a guaranteed job starting at approximately $60,000 a year. And they get an international certification in their specialty. I think we need to be doing that all over the place in different areas, not just manufacturing. You know, and here in Roswell, our schools, we started in elementary school, a program through my Rotary Club. We do Home Builders of America. We have groups that we go in, in high school, and it’s an elective kind of an after school program. At first in elementary school, we go in and we teach them how to build a frame structure. In Middle School, we go and we build the structures a little bit bigger and they learn how to put electricity in it. And then in high school they’re learning something else. So they come away with some skills, whether or not they’re going to be electricians, plumbers, whatever. My plumber makes a lot of money and my electrician. Think about finishing high school with a skill set that you could be certified in. And then if you choose to become an electrical engineer and go to college, you could still work. 60,000 plus a year to start right out of high school. I think that’s a pretty good job personally.

[00:20:55] Rico: Yeah, I totally agree. I would hope the state could take some leadership in that to be able to help bring that across. Because I agree with the apprenticeship, done in Europe and other parts of this country, like Michigan, is really important, right?

[00:21:09] Mary: So yes, I’m talking to some of the, again, up here in my area we have a Honda Innovation plant, so they’re bringing in interns. But I’m already talking with them. How can we convert that to an apprenticeship? That it’s a private public partnership that makes this happen for our students.

[00:21:23] Rico: I mean, essentially what’s happening is that these kids, some of them are not gonna go on to college. That’s not what they want maybe.

[00:21:31] Mary: Right.

[00:21:32] Rico: They want to get out into the workforce. And there are companies out there that are dying. They can’t find the workers out there. And imagine having that pipeline to be able to fill those jobs.

[00:21:44] Mary: That’s my idea. You know, when my kids were in high school, in Milton they took a semester of shop. Which is fine. But I think again, if students really wanted to learn more nowadays, it’s not just learning how to change a belt, it’s the whole computers and you have to be very highly educated to do these things.

[00:22:02] Rico: Yeah. I think the schools that bring in that, if you’re gonna learn how to do an HVAC system, that should let these kids work on an HVAC system, touch, take it apart, see how it’s working. Those kids are the ones that are gonna be able to take advantage of this type of process.

[00:22:18] Mary: And we you know, this state does have, we have that program, where there are sixteen specific career program paths in the technical college system that students can go to. And it’s a two year program, but basically the state pays 100% of the cost. So with things like EMT, there’s some other different things that we’ve put in place. So I think we need to expand that in a lot of ways. But also look for other opportunities that businesses, you know, to me when a business can identify someone very young, and then to teach them what they really need to know to succeed in their business. That’s the mentorship concept.

[00:22:59] Rico: That’s right. It works well in Europe. I think it would work right here.

[00:23:02] Mary: Right. You know, modifying it how it would work for us. But I think it would be a great thing.

[00:23:06] Rico: Correct. SPLOST. Now The City of Peachtree Corners gets probably the biggest share of SPLOST in this county. Because of the size of the city and stuff. One of the things that you’re, that you have been talking about or on your website is the continued oversight of TSPLOST and programs. Do you see a problem there? Do you see anything that needs to change?

[00:23:29] Mary: I think we’ve made some changes and again, not that the state legislature needs to do the audits, but that the audits need to be done in the contracting process. Sometimes when designs are done and I would like to make sure. And again, I’m in Roswell so we all have that same issue. That the cities or the municipalities that these TSPLOST, as you know, some of it is determined how much is state pay, federal pay versus local municipalities have to be responsible for. And depending on that percentage is who gets control of design of the project. Sometimes it’ll also be two heads butting against each other. So I would like to make sure that the municipalities who are gonna be affected by these changes have as much, if not more, say into those design aspects where appropriate. Sometimes it just is what it is, a bridge has to be done a certain way. And I understand that. But I think there are lots of other opportunities to have more input from local areas into some of these designs and how that money is spent. Since it’s all of our tax money.

[00:24:40] Rico: So more local control?

[00:24:41] Mary: Well, local control slash local input. I think sometimes a lot of municipalities that I’ve had the pleasure of working with don’t feel they’ve had as much input as they should. And that someone’s really listening to them. And I’m not a traffic engineer, I don’t know. But I think most of us are relatively intelligent people that you explain this in a way, you know, you gotta explain it to us in a way that really does make sense. Don’t just tell me it is, it is because the traffic guys say this. I’ll probably want to question that a little bit more.

[00:25:14] Rico: That makes sense. Sticking to transportation to some degree. The big thing here in Gwinnett County has been quite a few times, there’s been votes on MARTA coming in. And it’s been turned down quite a few times. There’s so many times that this keeps coming up. Inevitably I believe that MARTA will be approved eventually down the line. Maybe within the decade. This county has changed demographic wise. Getting people employed here and moving around in the right way needs to change a little bit. So how do you feel about MARTA coming into Gwinnett? I mean, how would you want see that done?

[00:25:47] Mary: Right.

[00:25:48] Rico: With the way that I think a billion dollars a mile doesn’t make sense to me, but.

[00:25:53] Mary: No. And I think, again, so I live off 400. But I’m about six miles from the last MARTA train station. Then we have bus service up in my area on the major arteries. It’s not into the neighborhoods. Again, that’s where to me, the locals do have to have input. I personally do think MARTA is going to be a benefit if it’s designed correctly to meet the needs of the citizens of Gwinnett. To bring people in that could work. People that are maybe living in one part of your county that want to work in another part, but you know, affordable housing issues that they need transportation over. If you don’t have those kinds of transportations, you’re stuck. By my areas up the North Point Mall, so now we do have a bus line that comes up to North Point Mall so that it brings a lot of employees that can come up and work in that area. So I think that’s good. I’m not a big fan of Heavy Rail. I mean, I just don’t think Georgia is gonna really go that route in the next 20, 30 years. I mean, maybe very, very high future. The train itself, you know, I’m being honest. So I head down 400 when I go downtown to go to a Atlanta United game or to a game in downtown, we catch MARTA. And it’s a great ride versus driving my car down, paying twenty to forty dollars to park to attend a sporting event. On those times, especially the people on the trains, everybody’s got their jersey you know, it’s kind of like you’re tailgating in the train. So I’ve had positive experiences. When I used to work for the American Heart Association, I traveled every week on planes. So I would also take MARTA, again from the North Fulton Station all the way to the airport. It was a 45 minute ride, it was great.

[00:27:43] Rico: Right. I can see what you’re saying. I mean, I, coming from New York, I mean, I used to take the subway and stuff then I took the coach bus because it was easier. A little bit more money, but it was easier. And I felt safer actually, because at the time was during the late eighties and in the seventies. It was a little different on the subways. And maybe, one of my kids too, MARTA as a commuter to GSU to attend college campus. He wasn’t always feeling safe on MARTA. So different people had different experiences, not just on the system, but even at the stops.

[00:28:16] Mary: Right.

[00:28:16] Rico: Unfortunately. But that’s the nature of those types of mass transit. So I understand you’re not into the heavy rail. Neither am I. I don’t think the expense makes sense. Light rail makes more sense maybe, or certainly bus rapid transit like that.

[00:28:30] Mary: One of the things too that Marta is now testing, and again, not in our area yet. But literally, especially for those people that more toward the disability that you can actually call, a MARTA smaller transport bus will show up at your door.

[00:28:46] Rico: I’ve seen that.

[00:28:47] Mary: So again, I think those are the kinds of things we need to explore lots of different options in regards to safety. I think you know, and again, I’ve never had a problem or feeling unsafe on MARTA. And I understand people, I think we need to solve that problem and make it safer in all of its different variances. We can make it safe and we need to do that. But I would say sometimes too, think about driving down Peachtree Industrial Boulevard you know, sometimes is that, that can be dangerous too.

[00:29:18] Rico: In a different way. Yes, certainly. So Peachtree Corners is a city that likes to talk about itself as a smart city. We have Atlanta Tech Park, which is an accelerator. Curiosity Lab at Peachtree Corners, which handles a lot of startups in there. Because of the street system, the autonomous vehicle presence that we keep promoting, lots of companies are moving here from even foreign countries. And companies are relocating into Peachtree Corners.

[00:29:48] Mary: Right.

[00:29:49] Rico: I know you’re a big advocate for working with start-ups, providing certain benefits for entrepreneurs. So tell me you know, in short, where you stand some of those issues, what you think could benefit Peachtree Corners and what you’d like to work on.

[00:30:03] Mary: Well, I think there’s a couple of things, and again our statistics are showing that Georgia is a great place for a startup company. But what we’re also seeing that after that first year, unfortunately, a lot of our companies are having some issues. That if they can make it to five years, much less grow from, say make it to over 50 employees. So there’s those opportunities. So I would like to look at concepts. How do we, again, connect these startups? And I think that’s what we do in Innovation Labs across the state. Connect them with mentors, successful businesses, support, but not just for the startup. I think it’s, once you’ve hit that certain phase, you’re gonna still need money to grow your business. Now, one of the things is to me, when we talk about angel investors. What happens unfortunately in Georgia, if you’re an angel investor, you will take your money because most startups or most businesses, even if you’re at that six months to one year process, that they’re still eligible or startup angel investors are interested investing in. You sign on that you’re not gonna get any return on your money for at least five years. Well, Georgia tax code makes it difficult that as an angel investor, you’re not going to get the tax breaks for that kind of investment if you invest here in Georgia. Versus if you invest as an angel investor in North Carolina, you actually do. So my husband and I, we do a little bit of angel investing. So, and I’m not saying just for us, but I think we need to make it not just individuals, but also some of these other companies who want to invest maybe in some startup companies that would help their businesses grow and expand and produce some things. How do we make that viable for investment? I think we also, when we talk startups, again, we do talk about we have to have a workforce educated and ready to go for these different new things. So we’ve gotta work on that. We’ve gotta make sure that they want to stay here. We have amazing educational systems, especially in our higher ed educational systems that are doing some amazing research and startup concepts. But we’ve gotta make sure they stay here and that Georgia is the best place to run your business for various reasons. That you have a viable workforce, that you can get the investment capital you need, that your tax rates are gonna be appropriate. We can get this done.

[00:32:27] Rico: Cool. Okay. Last subject, Mary. I appreciate the time you’ve given me on this. So, we’ll talk about community safety. That’s a big thing I think in any community. I think people want to feel safe where they live. They want to understand that crime hopefully doesn’t touch them. But crime is everywhere, right? I think the more that we look at social media, it’s amazing what’s out there. If you watch TikTok long enough, you’d be like, is this happening all over the place? So it’s crazy stuff. The City of Peachtree Corners is using fūsus, a company that does crime center in the cloud. Real time being able to interdit before crimes happen almost. Or while it’s happening actually. And that’s how they were able to find, to some degree, the three perpetrators that did the shooting at the QT on Peachtree Parkway. Killed a young man that, just for his car, they ended up finding all three of them. And I’m sure they’re going to be vigorously prosecuting them. How do you think the state can help in furthering along public safety or community safety in some of these ways?

[00:33:33] Mary: So you know, there’s lots of ways. Some of the things we have approved and some people didn’t like. The road cameras to detect not just speeding, but they do detect a lot of other things. I’m a big proponent as much as possible for local control for certain things. The state needs to support it, but the state also needs to get out of the way. If a local municipality wants to do cameras such as Peachtree Corners is doing to make sure they, you know, and their police department works with that, I think that’s okay. There are some who would like to say nowhere in this state can you do that. It may not be appropriate in certain cities and they don’t want it. That’s okay. My neighborhood, my husband is on the HOA and he was in charge of public safety here in the neighborhood. And we just, in my neighborhood, we put in the cameras so that any car that comes in or out of our neighborhood, we’re recording the license plate. Now nothing happens except if a homeowner reports a crime, the police have the right to request those camera views. So they can at least see if it’s something they can track through that. I think again, the state should never put a restriction that they, even that can happen. Some people say, well, we’re invading your privacy. And I think it’s a balancing act. You know, I don’t want the camera in my phone. But taking a picture of my license plate, I’m okay personally. Some people aren’t. But I think too the state needs to fund more. We know that there are municipalities unfortunately, that we are in a shortage for various reasons. You know, it’s a tough time. Currently there are a lot of things we need to fix. One of the things we did with the Mental Health Parity Act actually was increase funding for training for our officers across the state to get more training in deescalation techniques in mental health crisis situations. That’s one set of issues that I believe our police officers deal with that they need that additional support too. And crime. I think with GBI, one of the things I was talking with also with the Police Benevolent Society, and again, I want to be honest, my son and daughter-in-laws are both attorneys both were Assistant DAs. My daughter-in-law now is a Assistant US Attorney in the Southern District and my son is in criminal defense now. But one of the things that the Benevolent Society was telling me about was that there is a law, it’s called the Giglio rule, that so a DA in an area can say, I don’t like you as a police officer. So I’m gonna say that you are lying. And it’s a little bit more complicated than that, obviously there. If it’s a federal prosecutor who does that, there’s some investigation and that person then goes under what’s called the Giglio rule, which means you’re basically labeled a liar whenever you go to testify in court by law. But the state, while that’s federal and that would be different, but the state actually has its own kind of rules that that can happen here in the state. Police officers right now have no recourse to fight that. And I think they should. So I think we need to look for those things that, not just the violence and the threat of life that they are put under. But what other things, as we also are looking for ways in which to reduce our crime rates, that we can do to make it better for them to be a police officer.

[00:36:51] Rico: Sure.

[00:36:52] Mary: I think we need to have those opportunities when there is an unfortunate police involved shooting. We need to understand that that police officer is also under stress and we need to talk to them and understand that, but make sure that his rights are also preserved. And not just make an assumption.

[00:37:11] Rico: Right.

[00:37:11] Mary: I think there are ways we can go through that. I think we need to re-look at ways in which, how do we, unfortunately open up some of our, let’s call them jail beds, because once you’re in prison, I think that’s different versus you’re incarcerated if you can’t pay a bail. So you’re not even have gone to trial, and yet our system becomes so overloaded with people who cannot make bail for sometimes relatively minor things. I’m not saying everyone should get out, and I’m not saying it should be easy, but we’ve gotta figure out a way. We’ve gotta have more beds to get more people off the streets so they’re not being released when they shouldn’t be. But they’re also not being held when they shouldn’t be. And I’m not the expert on that, but I think we need to look at that.

[00:37:53] Rico: And that gets a little, that gets a little complicated too sometimes. Because I’ve seen, and we’ve seen it on social media, where some things are considered misdemeanors. When you actually look the video of what happened, it’s like, why aren’t they being held on bail?

[00:38:08] Mary: Right. So I think some of that we need to revisit. Many people do need to be held, but there are some, that maybe there’s ways we could do this a little different. To make it easier for our police officers. I think we need to understand from the police officer’s perspective. I cannot imagine living that when I pull over someone just for a traffic stop, that I am walking up to the possibility of someone just pulling a gun on me. And I think that is very dangerous. So I think we need to understand that that’s what they live with. So how do we change that? I don’t know that we can change it one day, but I think there are ways we can work together to make it a little bit better.

[00:38:51] Rico: Cool. We’ve come to pretty much the end of our time together, Mary. So what I’d normally like to do is ask the individual interviewed to be able to ask for the vote. Tell people where they can find more information about Mary Robichaux. And just, ask for that vote.

[00:39:09] Mary: So again I’ve been honored to serve as the incumbent for the last four years for House District 48. And I know to those of you in Peachtree Corners, I’m new there. But I have served there for four years. I think when we talk about, I’m one of those that we need to work with each other to get things done. I work behind the scenes. I’ve never been one that seeks the limelight. As my husband would say, I hide from the limelight sometimes just because it’s not in my nature. When I was in healthcare, I always did things with the patient as the center of my focus of improving whatever project I was working on. When I went to the legislature, I switched that to the constituent is the center of my focus. I’ve taken votes that some would say, why are you voting this way or that way? And that comes from both sides of the aisle, trust me. But I feel that I look at the vote to understand how’s it going to affect my constituents? And then also, how’s it going to affect all of Georgia? Because again, while I represent the constituents of House District 48, I also understand that my vote that could affect all of Georgians will ultimately have an effect on my constituents here. So I try to balance that, I try to think long term. I want solutions. I don’t want to just be stuck in a mire of pointing fingers at each other. If you didn’t do this, so you didn’t do this. We need to move past that. We are a great country. I would like to say I am the daughter of a son who was a World War II veteran. He unfortunately passed last year at the age of 95. My dad was the youngest of eight children. My dad grew up in a two room sharecropper shack in the middle of a sugar king field in Louisiana. And I feel this country allows someone like me to get to where I am now. I live in Country Club of Roswell, have a great life. My family has, we’ve had some great opportunities that we’ve taken advantage of. And I think all Georgians want those same opportunities. And I just want to fight to make sure that we all have that. That we’re all held accountable. That we do it in a way that continues to push us forward. So if you want to find out more about me, again my name is Mary Robichaux and I do serve as the representative currently. My website is www.ElectMaryRobichaux.com. It’s all one word, so if you want more information. And you can contact me through that website also.

[00:41:36] Rico: Great. Mary, I appreciate your time this morning. Thank you and good luck on your campaign.

[00:41:42] Mary: Thank you, that was great.