Appearing at MomoCon Memorial Day Weekend 2024

Greg Burnham, a Norcross-based comic book and children’s book author who is attending this month’s Momocon over Memorial Day Weekend, spoke with Rico Figliolini this week. They talked about his recent contributions to comic anthologies Milestone Initiative (featuring Icon), Ghouls Just Wanna Have Fun (featuring Superman), and DC Power 2024 – and, his latest children’s book, Swim, Kelly! Swim! They also talked about collaborating with artists, crafting compelling characters, feedback from beta readers, and the evolving landscape of diversity and representation in comics, stressing the importance of authentically empowering marginalized voices to shape narratives.

Related Links:
MomoCon Website: https://www.momocon.com/
Greg Burnham Facebook:   / gregburnhambooks  
Tuskegee Heirs
Children’s Books

Timestamp:
00:00:00 – Greg Burnham: Comic Book and Children’s Book Author
00:02:25 – Collaborative Indie Comics Creation
00:04:51 – Crafting Captivating Visual Narratives
00:06:53 – Learning the Publishing Process
00:07:56 – The Story of Solace: A Collaborative Comic
00:09:41 – Crafting a Spooky Superman Story
00:12:48 – Navigating Creative Collaboration
00:14:53 – Balancing Indie Work and Deadlines
00:16:55 – Coaching Basketball and Crafting Characters
00:18:56 – Crafting Authentic Characters: Balancing Inspiration and Individuality
00:21:05 – Crafting Complex Characters
00:24:35 – Navigating Diversity and Stereotypes in Comics and Media
00:29:57 – Unreal Engine 5 and the Blurred Lines of Reality

Podcast Transcript:

Rico Figliolini 0:00:26

Hi, everyone. This is Rico Figliolini, host of UrbanEbb. And I have a great guest today, Norcross comic book children’s book author Greg Burnham. Thanks for joining me, Greg. Appreciate you being here.

Greg Burnham 0:00:40

Thank you for having me.

Rico Figliolini 0:00:42

Yeah, no, this is great. This is like, you know, I love, I’ve loved comic books since I was ten years old or younger. Mainly Marvel. DC also a little bit, but Marvel was always my best. And then graphic novels as I got older and they got into trends. But we have Greg here. He’s been an author, writer for quite a bit for a couple of decades. Right.

Greg Burnham 0:01:05

I think about it, well, a little bit over a decade. I started with the children’s books. I’ve been writing my whole life. Professionally, like a little over a decade.

Rico Figliolini 0:01:16

Okay. Okay. Well, we’re going to talk a bit about that. What got you into this and stuff? So we’re the. So let me just say that we’re ahead of MomoCon. That’s going to be coming Memorial Day weekend. It’s actually running four days, May 24 through the 27th. Greg is going to be at that. This is why we’re interviewing him also. So looking forward to meeting you in person, possibly when I come out and visit, it’s going to be at the Georgia World Congress center. It’s considered the largest gaming event in the southeast. But, you know, like any of these, there’s artists alleys, there’s all sorts of things going on in cosplay. There’s a lot of things going on at MomoCon. So it’s going to be an interesting four days. So I’m looking forward to it. I’m sure you will be, too. What days would you be there, Greg?

Greg Burnham 0:02:03

Oh, the entire time.

Rico Figliolini 0:02:05

Okay.

Greg Burnham 0:02:06

MomoCon is. It’s one of our, it’s our, one of our home conventions, obviously, but it’s also one of my favorite. So, yeah, we’re there the whole time, actually.

Rico Figliolini 0:02:18

What are you going to be doing? Where can people find you?

Greg Burnham 0:02:21

No, we’re going to be in the artist alley. And I would have to search. I just show up. But I think they told us our tables. I want to say it’s like, 304.

Rico Figliolini 0:02:32

No, that’s fine. But artist Alley, you’re going to be in, so that’s cool.

Greg Burnham 0:02:35

Artist Alley yeah. So I’ll have. We always have books, posters, other light stickers, some different knickknacks. All the books we’ll be talking about today, I’ll have. And then also, I know I’m doing at least two panels, but it could be more.

Rico Figliolini 0:02:55

I’ll see if I can find those. And I’ll put that in the links below. So whoever’s watching on YouTube, I mean, you can find it there or in the show notes if you go, if you’re visiting the website. So Greg has been doing a lot of indie comic hits that he has under his belt, but he’s also doing work with DC and Marvel. So why don’t we get you to tell us? And by the way, I just recently didn’t get a chance to read a check because it just came in this afternoon, just got one of these. So looking forward to going through that. Tell us a little bit about, I guess let’s talk a little bit about how you got into this. I mean, it’s a challenging job, right? You’re writing. It’s not like a novel. This is collaborative work. So what does that work? How do you do that? How do you handle it, man?

Greg Burnham 0:03:46

It’s usually fun. I think the toughest part is fine. Like, when you’re doing it on the indie side, it’s finding people that are reliable and fun to work with, people that are passionate. Like, as a writer, I always want to deal with artists. I want to make sure that they’re having fun, you know, doing it. So I’m always like, what do you like to draw? Like, are there certain things you think you’re better at? So, you know, once you get, you know, the team together, it’s a blast. It’s just like any other team, really.

Rico Figliolini 0:04:19

I would imagine also for you, envisioning what your characters look like, do you give that input to the artist? Do they give you sketch?

Greg Burnham 0:04:29

Yeah, definitely. The cool. So Marcus Williams, who’s my co creator and the artist for Tuskegee years, he and I, we’ve been working together for decades, you know, like, doing stuff artistically and business wise, so I can, it’s easy for me to, you know, convey it to him. Like, what the character look like this. Give him a couple examples, and we’re good. But then when you’re working with other artists, it’s like, you have to be, like, really, really descriptive. Try to, you know, I’m. I’m the guy. Like, I’ll pull up examples, like, stuff on Google. You know, like, this is the hairstyle you know, this is, you know, the body type even. I do that with, like, backgrounds and scenery sometimes. Like, this will be a cool shot, you know. So trying to help them out as much as possible. And it makes the process a lot more efficient too.

Rico Figliolini 0:05:28

Yeah, I would think. No, that’s great. I do that with photographers sometimes. I show the pictures what I think it should look like and then I tell them and then give me what you think you’re thinking it should look like as you’re there. But, but, yeah, no, that’s great that you’re given direction like that because worst thing to do is getting, is drawing stuff, then all of a sudden having to shift from that.

Greg Burnham 0:05:50

Yeah.

Rico Figliolini 0:05:51

So you’ve, you’ve been some of these. So tell us some of the creator owned properties, some of the indie stuff that you’ve been doing. What was your, so what was your first one? Was it Tuskegee airs? Oh, yeah.

Greg Burnham 0:06:03

Comic wise? Well, the way it started, I’m sorry.

Rico Figliolini 0:06:09

Okay.

Greg Burnham 0:06:09

I just got back in town, so please forgive the coughs. Yeah. It started with a book. I always have props at my desk, this book, you know, 20 years ago, over 20 years ago, Marcus and I and another friend, Nicholas, who we created this, but we had no idea what we were doing. People were loving it. People were buying it. We didn’t understand the business side at all. So we had to kind of, we were printing them up at Kinko’s.

Rico Figliolini 0:06:37

Yeah, we did.

Greg Burnham 0:06:41

Yeah, we did everything ourselves. And, like, people were buying it. They were buying it heavy. But we were spending so much money to produce a book that it wasn’t lucrative at all. So we had to kind of step back and kind of learn the business. So I did a couple children’s books. Marcus illustrated those, and then he got in on a comic book called Hero Cats. And he was doing the art for that for a while. But the whole time we’re, like learning publishing, we’re learning comic conventions, you know, who to talk to print wise, all those things. So when we did come up with the idea for Tuskegee airs, we felt confident that we knew how to execute.

Rico Figliolini 0:07:30

At that point and get it printed. I’m assuming you got it printed yourself. It looks great. Great.

Greg Burnham 0:07:35

Yeah. So we used a really good printer out of Canada that prints for, like, the big guys as well.

Rico Figliolini 0:07:42

Okay. Okay.

Greg Burnham 0:07:43

So all that stuff, you know, it’s like learning as you go.

Rico Figliolini 0:07:47

I could tell from the quality. And it’s just I’m, I’m in a nut when it comes to graphics and printing and stuff like that. So I can appreciate the quality that went into this. So you’ve done that. You’ve done the search for SDK Sadika?

Greg Burnham 0:08:03

Yeah.

Rico Figliolini 0:08:05

Little Rock files and. Little Rock files and the story of solace. Yeah, I guess.

Greg Burnham 0:08:13

Yeah. So, like, the story of solace, that’s was my brother’s idea. He wrote. He’s had this idea for a long time, and so I just kind of, you know, kind of guided and helped him, you know, making it into a comic because he had written it in prose and. But we always thought it would be a comic. So we have one issue of that. We’re working on the second one now.

Rico Figliolini 0:08:40

Just the Kickstarter we were talking about before. Is that different?

Greg Burnham 0:08:43

Yeah. Well, we did a Kickstarter for that last year. We may do one for the next book, but we’re trying, like, we like to try to have the book finished or have it really close to be finished before we do a crouch one.

Rico Figliolini 0:08:58

Yeah, yeah, no, I can’t imagine because otherwise things will take longer then. And that’s. So I can appreciate that. You’ve done three comic book, three comic anthologies last year, 2020.

Greg Burnham 0:09:10

Oh, yeah. Yeah. Within the last twelve months. One of those was in February. I did DC power, which is like their black history anthology. This is one of the covers. I like the prompts and would. Oh, yeah, I keep props. And so I got to write a mister terrific story. I was super happy because I snuck and brought him to Atlanta. Nobody said I couldn’t do it, so I did it.

Rico Figliolini 0:09:39

But Atlanta’s famous. Yes.

Greg Burnham 0:09:41

Yeah, but, so, yeah, that one was really cool. And then in October, for their Halloween anthology.

Rico Figliolini 0:09:51

Right.

Greg Burnham 0:09:52

They changed the names of these every year. I don’t think I have that one over here, but I did. Ghouls just want to have fun. It’s an anthology.

Rico Figliolini 0:10:03

I think I’ve got. Hold on a second. Let me just bring that up. I think it was this. Maybe that’s not quite the COVID Yeah, that’s the.

Greg Burnham 0:10:12

That’s the main cover right there.

Rico Figliolini 0:10:14

Okay.

Greg Burnham 0:10:15

And, yeah, I got to write a clean page Superman story for that one. Like this. It’s like a spooky. It’s not super extra spooky, you know?

Rico Figliolini 0:10:28

Okay, so how does that work? You have an, you have your own ideas of what you want to do, but now you have this icon, Superman and. Yeah, they’re giving you. I know they’re not giving you totally free reign. I’m sure you got a protective brand maybe, but.

Greg Burnham 0:10:44

But, yeah.

Rico Figliolini 0:10:45

How do you handle that? How do you do that when they give you something like that and you go flying.

Greg Burnham 0:10:50

So I think it’s part, I mean, I think for all us nerds, like, if we’ve been reading comics and movie, watching the movies and everything, I feel like you always think about, like, what would I do if I got a chance to tell these characters stories? So I just, I wanted, like, with this one, I wanted to tap in. I mean, I’ve been watching Superman for my entire life in some way. So I wanted to kind of tap into the stuff that I loved about Superman. You know, I loved him and Lois’s interactions and, but I also wanted to tell, like, something. It’s like there every, there’s so many stories. So I was just trying to figure out a way to do something unique. And I think I did that. It wasn’t like it was a ghost, huh? Yes. Well, that even that description they gave is kind of sort of, but not all the way I used, you know, I wanted like a ghost because, you know, you think about who, you know, they say Superman is susceptible to magic. So I figured like a ghost, you know, like, what can he do if he can’t actually make contact with him, you know? Yeah. So, yeah, but it was cool because for these little one off stories, it’s like canon is not, you know, end all, be all. So they’re kind of like, it doesn’t have to, you know, be, you know, perfectly in canons. They made it easier. But there are still, like, there’s a lot of things that you, you know, you have to get, I wouldn’t say approval, but more so, like, certain things they’re not going to really do with Superman versus others.

Rico Figliolini 0:12:38

Okay, well, fun anyway, I would imagine. And I’m sure you got on your stuff.

Greg Burnham 0:12:43

I just, the whole time I’m working on it, I just, you know, have to keep pinching myself. Like, this is Superman.

Rico Figliolini 0:12:53

Okay, so you’ve done that. DC Power 2024. You’re talking a little bit about that milestone initiative. There are other artists that are in there. Do you get a chance to, when you meet other artists, other writers, other creative people, do you guys share notes? Do you like to shop talk?

Greg Burnham 0:13:18

I like to talk more. Not necessarily in general, but we talk about, like, creating one thing I’m always careful of because it’s like we, you know, you soak up so many things subliminally that sometimes something that you heard or you’ve seen could come out accidentally in your own, like, I’ve plenty of times where I come up with an idea and I’m like, oh, this is gonna be great. And I have a rule, like, I’ll come up with the idea. Usually I wait for, like, a couple of weeks, and then I come back and revisit it.

Rico Figliolini 0:13:50

Uh huh.

Greg Burnham 0:13:51

And when I revisit it, I’m like, oh, no, that’s nothing but new skin on this story. Yeah. So I try to, like, you know, keep it more in general, like, about creating stuff like that than sharing notes on what we’re creating.

Rico Figliolini 0:14:10

Gotcha. I’ve heard authors, like, best selling authors and other writers, they don’t accept anyone’s manuscript for that reason.

Greg Burnham 0:14:19

Yeah.

Rico Figliolini 0:14:19

Or unsolicited scripts, for that matter. That could be a problem, too, I guess. You know, when you’re balancing creative work, your, your independence and publishers expectations. Right. There’s two different things. We talked about that a little before, just, just before about how it’s easier to do your own stuff because you’ve set your deadlines. You can pick the quality of work, people to collaborate with, but sometimes that may not be the case on the other side of that, where you have publishers expectations, you have to work with people maybe you’re not familiar with.

Greg Burnham 0:14:56

Yeah.

Rico Figliolini 0:14:57

How does that work? Is that fun or can that be challenging?

Greg Burnham 0:15:02

For me, it’s fine. So a little bit more about me. Like, I coached youth sports in, you know, Norcross, and I’m not doing it currently, but I did for about 15 years. So I think that one of my strengths is being able to bring people together and figure out how to work with people, you know, in a pleasant kind of way where we’re all moving in, you know, the same thing. So I think I utilized some of that, but I’m, when you’re doing indie stuff, it’s like, typically, you know, there’s going to be a little bit extra leeway, you know, whereas, like, if you’re working with one of the major publishers, it’s like, the deadline is this day and that’s all there is to it. If you can’t have it by this day, they’re going to get somebody else to do it, you know?

Rico Figliolini 0:15:55

Yeah.

Greg Burnham 0:15:56

Yeah. So it’s like just trying to figure out balance. Not to be like a tyrant, but also to be like, we still got to make sure we’re getting it done, so, but it’s, it’s fun. I love collaborating, especially with artists. Love it.

Rico Figliolini 0:16:12

Yeah. I got to believe that you see your stuff visually being rendered is as a whole, that got to be a whole different feeling. Right. You’re writing it, you have it in your head, but that artist is rendering what you’re hopefully pulling out of your head you want. But it’s a whole, it’s almost like me seeing AI art sometimes it’s not the same thing, but, you know, you type in some words and AI will generate a picture. Right. It’s never quite as good as everyone says it is. That’s for sure. I’ve experimented and trust me, it’s. But that’s what you see on Instagram, I guess. But the, so I’m sure it’s exciting to see the rendering of what an artist produces for you.

Greg Burnham 0:17:00

Absolutely.

Rico Figliolini 0:17:02

I was curious, what sports did you coach?

Greg Burnham 0:17:05

I coached mostly basketball. I did baseball some, but it was mostly basketball.

Rico Figliolini 0:17:12

I like the way you were phrasing it before about moving in the right. Sort of in the right. In the same direction or something.

Greg Burnham 0:17:17

Yeah.

Rico Figliolini 0:17:18

Getting parents move with you to just competing.

Greg Burnham 0:17:21

Yeah. So, and it’s like if you, if you can do that, you know, coaching twelve, you know, adolescent boys, then, like, you could do a lot of things.

Rico Figliolini 0:17:33

Yeah. Yeah, I would think. And, you know, that’s, that also brings up something else in my mind. When you’re, when you’re writing stories and you have five characters, and then I’m sure some of them are your most favorite characters. Right. More favorite one. How do you know, you have to decide these darlings, how much time they get on that page because you’re not, you know, and do you, it’s just a, that’s an interesting thing, too, to decide that. Well, what is your favorite character or two that you’ve written?

Greg Burnham 0:18:03

Oh, man, I don’t know, because, like, I mean, I love the Tuskegee heirs. Like, it’s like they’re, all of them are like your kids, all the stories. So I love Sadaka from the search for Sadica. I just don’t want to say one’s my favorite and then the other characters attack me in my dreams. But, like, I’m doing this book now called Little Rock Files. It’s like a eighties noir detectives story takes place in the south. And the main character, Owsley, I love, I also love his little sidekick Tia. She’s good. Good fun. So I don’t know, it just kind of depends on the day, I think.

Rico Figliolini 0:18:50

Do you ever, do you ever base these characters on people, you know?

Greg Burnham 0:18:55

Absolutely. So one of my things is so sometimes. So, like, with Tuskegee heirs, I have two kids, Marcus has two kids. So four of the kids are named after our actual real life kids. Now, we, I don’t necessarily, we didn’t, we modeled their look a little bit after them, but their personalities aren’t necessarily the same. But I. One of my things that I want to do, because it’s like, I love creating characters, but I want them to feel, like, organic. I write a lot of female characters, and so I definitely take inspiration from people I know. You know, it could be somebody I went to elementary school with, but I just take those inspirations because I’m always careful. I don’t want characters to be empty and feel like, you know, like, you ever read a comic where you’re like, okay, this sounds like a dude trying to sound like a woman or trying to, you know, I don’t want to be one of those. So I really try to get in. Like, I’m working on a book right now with four girls, superheroes, and I finished the first, you know, like, my first iteration of the script, and I was like, I need to add more, you know, like, depth and more emotional personality to them.

Rico Figliolini 0:20:23

Yeah. Some background, different language. I mean, you want that voice to be individual, right?

Greg Burnham 0:20:29

Yeah. It’s like, I want, like, all your main characters, I want to make sure they have, like, a voice, like, their own distinct kind of way.

Rico Figliolini 0:20:38

So. So the flames of destiny, the first character that I find slip, and he just doesn’t listen. He just wanted to do his own thing. It seems like she pays someone with the kids.

Greg Burnham 0:20:49

No, actually, he’s our. He’s our lone, you know, completely out of thin air guy.

Rico Figliolini 0:20:56

Oh, okay.

Greg Burnham 0:20:57

So, yeah, but he, you know, like, he provide. Like, he’s. People love him. Like, fans all over the place really, really love him, but he’s, you know, got some. He was kind of created to add, like, the, you know, comedy, but he’s also feisty. And as you go, you know, we’ll get more depth and stuff behind him, and readers will understand why he is, you know, how he is.

Rico Figliolini 0:21:27

So do you work through the writing process when you’re doing this? And you said, like, you did the first. Everything goes through drafts, I guess. And you want to continue to add voice and complexity to a character when you’re doing this, do you ever decide. Do you ever decide that maybe a character is not the right character and you have to change it?

Greg Burnham 0:21:52

Yeah. So, yeah, sometimes it’s like I’m hyper vigilant. I utilize sensitivity readers. I have some really good friends that will say, hey, man, this is some crap. Go back to the drone board. Good. They’re not mean people, but I tell them, I want you to talk to me. You know, like, yeah. So usually by the time they actually, like, we get into the scripting and everything. I’m pretty cool. I’m pretty sure, you know, but up until that point, yes. Like, plenty of people get cut, are changed altogether.

Rico Figliolini 0:22:31

Okay, cool. So beta readers and just other people giving advice, that’s a tough thing to find, people willing to give honest advice.

Greg Burnham 0:22:38

To the ones without ego. Like, one of my friends, she’s a really good writer, and she was telling me recently a story about, she gave to one, you know, had a beta reader, and this lady, like, ripped her apart. It’s like, you know, this book doesn’t need to be made. Like, and really, she already has tons of fans. And when she releases the book, it hit, you know, it’s breaking all these sales records and stuff. And it’s like, you know, so you want people that are going to give you, like, the kind of that raw opinion, but not the one with the ego behind it, like, better than you like, because there’s so many, you know, like, readers like different stuff, you know? So just because it doesn’t sit with you doesn’t mean it’s not going to resonate with its intended audience.

Rico Figliolini 0:23:31

You almost have to have thick skin when you get these things back.

Greg Burnham 0:23:34

Yeah. Like one, I think for me, like, one of the things, like, whatever the criticism is, I’m usually okay with it because whatever I showed you in that book, I, it was 100% intentional. It’s, you know, there’s not a lot of, like, ooh, how did that get there? You know? Okay, so I’ve had people that like the way you did, you know, whatever, but then they read the next issue and they’re like, oh, okay, I get why you do. It makes more sense.

Rico Figliolini 0:24:05

So it’s like, yes, they gotta wait. They gotta live through the. Live through it. Yeah, no, for sure. I mean, sometimes the backstory comes out later. Right. You wanna give it all at once when we talk about. We talked a little bit before we start about diversity and representation, right. In works, it’s changed over the years. Diversity is a little better now. Certainly better now. I mean, even in probably the sixties and seventies, it wasn’t too much of a stereotype. Although, you know, that’s one of the things you got to worry about, or other writers have to worry about. Stereotyping people does. You don’t mean to. And sometimes the stereotype is meant, right. As a comic, it’s a comic turn or something. Maybe we’re being used in a way, but it’s not long lived in a character. Right. How do you handle that. How do you do, you know, with, with especially this industry. I mean, when you think about comic books, when people think, well, not today, but before comics, comic books was very white, you know, I mean, up until about sixties and seventies, and then there was some diversity that came in. Not a lot, but some black panther, Luke Cage or a bunch of them got more. So, as, you know, X Men came in. So that was supposed to be a thing about diversity, of accepting different people. So. But there’s a lot more indie. Well, there were indie authors back then, too, indie comics, I remember, but, but there’s a lot more now than there were before. And some of them get tv shows, too. So it’s becoming a bit more. A bit more profitable or lucrative to be able to do some of this stuff. Do you see yourself trying to get into, breaking into that, you know, multimedia, just the print?

Greg Burnham 0:25:56

Yeah, definitely. As we go, we’ve had some near misses with certain stuff, but it’s definitely a way that we, you know, would want to move to where because, okay, so with the diversity, it’s like they’re starting to realize that. And I’ve heard this from, like, execs at, like, major publishers, they’re starting to realize that diversity isn’t just putting a character, you know, like, you know, different character in, it’s allowing people to tell their, tell these stories like people, you know, so, you know, instead of dropping a black character in a book, it’s like, allow a black person to tell the story, because that’s when it’s like, you start really getting into diversity representation with stereotypes. If you’re not even aware of all the stereotypes, then, you know, yeah, you might hit one here or there. So it’s good. Like, for us, we want to do, you know, we’d love to get into animation. We’re working on a little bit of animation right now, but we would love to work on a lot of bit. But, you know, it’s very expensive. Our thing is we, we would love to be, we want to be able to kind of guide it. We already know if somebody gives you, you know, millions of dollars to make a cartoon, sure, they’re going to have, you know, the power and, you know, but we want to at least be able to keep it on the rails because we’ve seen so many times, like, I think about teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, which I, you know, we loved the iteration that came, you know, to animation and everything, but it’s so much different than what the comic was and what the creators I be, you know, what their, you know, dreams about what it would be. It’s just, it was a lot different.

Rico Figliolini 0:28:01

Yeah.

Greg Burnham 0:28:02

And that was, you know, that was an instance where it still was super successful and lucrative, but you can talk to, like, a lot of creators who, like, man, they took my idea and made it terrible, so it flopped in.

Rico Figliolini 0:28:18

Yeah.

Greg Burnham 0:28:19

You didn’t get to control it.

Rico Figliolini 0:28:20

So I think. I think a lot of times when Netflix or other companies get into that, they’re just making more vanilla to just be able to reach a broader audience rather than niching it down, because, you know, it’s telling it, I think telling the stories of, from a diverse background, like you said, you don’t just drop in an indian or a black woman or Hispanic into a story. It needs to come out of their story. Right. It just needs to be. It’s more authentic that way. It’s more interesting. The storytelling is way more interesting to me when it comes out that way then, than someone. I can’t write a black story. Right. I mean, I can’t. Having diversity in the creative process is important, so. And things are becoming better. Animation is actually becoming cheaper and cheaper to make because of digital, all the digital movement that’s going on right now. So it’s gonna be. Give it another five years, you’ll be able to make your animation. 30 minutes show.

Greg Burnham 0:29:24

Yeah, it’s coming. Like, we. We were, we were awarded a bit of a grant from Epic Games to do, like, unreal engine short.

Rico Figliolini 0:29:36

Yeah.

Greg Burnham 0:29:36

So.

Rico Figliolini 0:29:37

Really?

Greg Burnham 0:29:37

Yeah. So we’re working on that. And something else that you might be able to see. We have something cool that we’re going to be. Hopefully we’re going to be dropping at Momocon, so.

Rico Figliolini 0:29:48

Yeah. Okay. I’d love to see that. Unreal engine five. That’s the last one that came out. That last version. It’s unbelievable. It looks so real.

Greg Burnham 0:29:58

Yeah.

Rico Figliolini 0:29:58

That you’re stepping into a place that’s just like, my God, you want to be afraid that something’s going to scare the death out of you.

Greg Burnham 0:30:05

Right? I just watched the planet of the apes, the new movie.

Rico Figliolini 0:30:10

I didn’t get a chance.

Greg Burnham 0:30:12

Half the time. I’m like, that’s unreal engine right there. That’s unreal engine. Like, it’s. It’s, like, almost seamless. Like, you can’t.

Rico Figliolini 0:30:21

Yes.

Greg Burnham 0:30:21

Yeah. Like, I can tell because we’re working in it right now, but for, you know, that most people.

Rico Figliolini 0:30:28

Well, I think. No, most people can. I mean, unless you put a person in it, then it becomes these nuances that.

Greg Burnham 0:30:36

Yeah.

Rico Figliolini 0:30:36

That you sort of figure that’s there’s something not quite right there, but I can’t wait for them to do more VR work because unreal engine five can do in real time renderings. I believe, as you. As you move through a story, it’s just so much technology. You can’t even tell what’s real or not anymore. If you’re like the Matrix, almost.

Greg Burnham 0:30:57

Yeah. So. Waiting for this?

Rico Figliolini 0:31:00

Yeah, sure. I’m just tell us the. So you have another book that you’ve done. So we’ve been talking about graphics and comic books. But you did swim, Kelly. Swim truly?

Greg Burnham 0:31:12

Oh, yes.

Rico Figliolini 0:31:13

Very different. So I want to make sure you tell us a bit about that, that, you know, what. What went into that, why you did, why you wrote that one.

Greg Burnham 0:31:22

So, so far, I’ve done three children’s books. Every one of them was based off of, like, an experience from my childhood. And of course they’re based, but I, you know, will make it more fantastic and all that stuff. But this one was a story that actually happened with my brother. And I taught my brother how to swim when he was way too young. So, like, by the time he’s, like, three, he can swim for. So we were at the pool. We’re military kids, and so we were at the pool, and I probably should have been paying more attention to him, but I knew he was good. He was supposed to be in the kiddie pool. And so I look up and there’s a lifeguard blowing. They’re all blowing their whistles, and they’re yelling, get down. And my brother is standing there on the high dive getting ready to jump, and he’s nine years old, and so they’re yelling, telling to get down, he gets down. And at the pool had a rule where in order for you to jump off the diving boards, if they felt like, you know, you were like, it was like you’re in danger, they would make you swim all the way across the pool in the deep end. So it’s like 10ft, you know, you gotta swim across. So I convinced them to let us do it. They let me swim beside him, you know? Cause it’s like my mom will, you know, disown me if something happens to my brother at the pool. Yeah. So, you know, we swam, and it was just fun because, like, the people, like everybody, it’s like people got out of the pool and everybody’s just cheering for him. His name is Kelly. It’s totally real. So. So I told that story, but then I also added, like, little things, you know, about swimming. The goal was to like, demystify swimming. So if, you know, it’s funny because I’ve had adults that are like, man, this is for me, you know, because people, people want to learn how to swim, but, you know, the older you get things like swimming, they seem like, that’s not real. I can’t do that. My body can’t do that. So that was the goal, is to kind of demystify it a little bit to where, you know, kids will understand. If you learn how to do it, you believe in yourself. You could be a great swimmer like Kelly.

Rico Figliolini 0:33:43

So it’s a great cover, too. Yeah.

Greg Burnham 0:33:47

My friend Michaela Moore, she’s an absolute jewel. I met her at a comic convention, and, you know, we, like, this became, you know, like, we would see him all the time. She’s younger, so it’s like we always try to, you know, not necessarily mentor all the time, but just encourage. And one day I was like, hey, have you ever done a children’s book? She’s like, sure, I’ve done one, and we ended up with this one.

Rico Figliolini 0:34:16

That’s cool. It’s good to work with people. We’re at the end of our time together. Greg, it’s been, yeah, it’s been great talking with you about your work, about the business. I love talking shop, finding out how people are creative and doing stuff. So you’re going to be a MomoCon this Memorial Day weekend, all four days from May 24 to May 27 at the Georgia World Conference center. And you’re going to be at artist alley and some panels from what you said before. So we’re going to try to find those links to the panels. Get that there. Otherwise, if you’re looking to go to MomoCon, everyone, momocon.com is where you should go. Buy your tickets. You could get day tickets weekend. I think it’ll four day passes also. It’s going to be a great event. Artists like Greg there and say, hi, especially if you’ve seen this podcast. But thank you, Greg. Appreciate you being with us.

Greg Burnham 0:35:16

No problem. Thank you for having me.

Rico Figliolini 0:35:19 Thank you, eve

This episode features special guest Shaun Adams, Peachtree Corners’ new Community Development Director who continues as Assistant City Attorney. Shaun’s responsibilities include identifying areas that could benefit from redevelopment, planning, administering, and implementing redevelopment projects, and helping to identify and obtain public funding for projects. Part of our discussions include the 6-month moratorium on new residential development in the central business district which reflects a reassessment of the city’s needs. Included in the podcast discussion was a discussion on zoning and development, emerging market trends, navigating development pressures, and community and business roles. Hosted by Rico Figliolini.

Related Links
Redevelopment Authority of Peachtree Corners: https://www.peachtreecornersga.gov/21… Peachtree Corners City Meeting Calendar: https://www.peachtreecornersga.gov/Ca…

Timestamp:
00:00:00 – Shaun Adams: New Community Development Director
00:01:21 – Peachtree Corners Resident Balances Legal and Community Roles
00:03:26 – Community Development: Zoning, Permitting, and Collaboration
00:07:24 – Adapting City Codes to Changing Needs
00:09:54 – Adapting Zoning to Emerging Market Trends
00:12:37 – Navigating Zoning Overlays and Mixed-Use Developments
00:15:07 – Examining Zoning and Development Trends
00:20:01 – The Impact of COVID-19 on Cities and the Growth of Smaller Communities 00:21:30 – Navigating Development Pressures and Public Input
00:25:28 – Leveraging Comprehensive Plans for Strategic Development
00:29:43 – Exploring Proactive City Planning
00:32:23 – Upcoming Agenda and Code Updates
00:33:57 – Upcoming Planning Commission and City Council Meetings

“You have to have a force that people want to join, and that is incumbent upon the leader to create the environment where people love to work. Where they know that their boss has their back. They know that their boss is looking out for their career. They’re invested in training, equipping them, and so on.” Baron Reinhold talks about his run to be the next Gwinnett County Sheriff.

Baron Reinhold, who has a 30-year military background, discusses his varied experiences in the Navy, including leadership roles in nuclear command and reconnaissance. He aims to enhance transparency and accountability within the sheriff’s department through measures like budget audits and public forums. He stresses the importance of restoring public trust by addressing organizational issues promptly and effectively, including staffing shortages and jail safety concerns. Listen in with your host Rico Figliolini.

Timestamp:
00:00:00 – Baron Reinhold’s Extensive Military and Community Service
00:01:53 – From Naval Academy to Military Consulting: A Military Career Spanning Decades
00:04:50 – Running for Gwinnett County Sheriff
00:07:05 – Addressing Gwinnett County’s Challenges
00:10:14 – Lack of Transparency in Sheriff’s Budget
00:12:21 – Implementing Command Climate Surveys for Organizational Improvement
00:14:14 – Navigating Jail Budget and Safety Challenges
00:18:21 – Understaffed Jail Struggles with Inmate Safety
00:21:56 – Importance of Effective Leadership in Law Enforcement
00:24:13 – Addressing Staffing Challenges in Law Enforcement
00:28:12 – The Sheriff’s Role in Upholding Constitutional Rights
00:31:20 – Balancing Constitutional Rights and Public Health
00:34:40 – Abuse of Public Funds for Personal Branding
00:36:28 – Exploring Alternatives to Traditional Law Enforcement
00:38:54 – Experienced and Qualified Candidate for Gwinnett County Sheriff

PODCAST TRANSCRIPT:

Rico Figliolini 0:00:29

Hi, everyone. This is Rico Figliollini, host of Peachtree Corners Life here in the city of Peachtree Corners in Gwinnett county. And lately we’ve had election candidates on the show. Today we have a special candidate who’s running for Gwinnett county sheriff. His name is Baron Reinhold. Hey, Baron, thanks for joining us.

Baron Reinhold 0:00:48

Thanks. It’s great to be on your show.

Rico Figliolini 0:00:49

Yeah, no, I appreciate you being here with us. Barron has a long resume of participation in all sorts of things, certainly in the military. Right. And different posts, different positions that you’ve been in, from everything from a professor of naval science to director of military community management, you’ve been part of nuclear command and control operations, team three. I was looking at that. I was like, wow. Squadron commanding officer, United States Air Force. You on the admiral staff in Bahrain, I guess, during deployment in 2003 to 2004, is that correct?

Baron Reinhold 0:01:32

Well, there’s about three different things in there. I was at US strategic command, and I was also on, that was a combatant command in Omaha, Nebraska, but I was also on an admiral staff out in Bahrain for two years and another admiral staff in Norfolk for two years.

Rico Figliolini 0:01:48

Okay. Yeah. And the list goes on. It’s just. It’s an expansive list of accomplishments. And you’ve been involved in a lot of volunteer work in organizations quite involved in Europe. Some of the past groups included Boy scouts, Kiwanis club. But what I’d like you to do is tell us a little bit about yourself, beyond the resume, if you will, and you know what you’re currently doing, and give us a brief, a little bit about that.

Baron Reinhold 0:02:18

Sure. Well, thanks again, Rico.

Rico Figliolini 0:02:19

Yeah.

Baron Reinhold 0:02:19

My background, I joined the Navy right out of high school. I enlisted for a year and then went to the Naval Academy prep school that year, and then on to the naval academy when I graduated from there. I ended up going to flight school, finishing up flight school, and spent 30, 30 years as an officer all over the world. Just kind of look at the last half of my career, which is most of my senior leadership positions. Right after 911, I was the officer in charge of a number of combat detachments. Our squadron got surged for the next 20 years, doing the most important missions in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Somalia. And after that, I was on that admiral staff, brought the family out to Bahrain, right there in the Gulf region. It was a couple years there, then was in charge of global strike planning at US strategic command for two years. Then the third year there, I was the deputy commander’s executive assistant, went on to command the nation’s, one of the nation’s two highest reconnaissance squadrons, and again spent most of that time in Afghanistan. And then was the officer in charge or the senior officer on the nuclear command and control 747. So, literally, if we had nuclear war, we would be at a different base every night, were constantly on the move. And if nuclear war happened, our ground nodes would be gone, and I would personally be briefing with the president on his nuclear options and executing his war orders from the 747. So that was totally different than my reconnaissance days over land in the combat zones. And anyway, then from there, I went on to command a unit that was in charge of the entire Navy’s 388,000 community management. So we made sure that the entire Navy, over a moving 30 year period, was properly manned in every subspecialty, which was a pretty wild job. And then I finished up, like you said, I was the commanding officer of NROTC Atlanta region. So I had a battalion at Morehouse that had Spelman and Clark Atlanta attached to that, and then a battalion at Georgia Tech that Georgia state and Kennesaw state attached. And we trained all the naval officers and, you know, future Marine Corps officers at those six schools. So that’s kind of a quick 35 year round the horn.

Rico Figliolini 0:04:41

Yeah. Where did you originally come from, Baron? Where did you.

Baron Reinhold 0:04:46

I was born in Rochester, New York, but we moved around a lot when I was a kid, and we settled in Miami when I was in first grade. So I considered Miami until Hurricane Andrew wiped out the house, and my family moved up to Melbourne, Florida. By then, though, I was out of the house and in the navy, blasting around the world. So Miami was the home that I grew up in.

Rico Figliolini 0:05:06

Gotcha. And when did you move back, actually, to. When did you move to Atlanta? Let’s put it.

Baron Reinhold 0:05:12

Well, we did 16 moves since I’ve been married, which is, you know, that’s kind of wild to think about. My oldest daughter did 15 of those. So we moved here in 2015, built a house here in Gwinnett in Suwanee, and, you know, made the commute down 95 or 85, rather, every day. So I got up really, really early, got down there before the traffic got insane. And we usually either try to beat the traffic home or stay until the traffic that dissipated.

Rico Figliolini 0:05:42

Yeah, God knows the traffic has continued to build. Doesn’t disappear.

Baron Reinhold 0:05:48

Yep. But when I heard January 1 of 2020 and then since then, I started a consulting business. So I still do a lot of work down in Pensacola, which is the cradle of naval aviation, which has been a lot of fun because all the senior officers down there, you know, buddies of mine and the admirals and whatnot, and then the students, a lot of them were my former students at my Georgia Tech and Morehouse battalion. So I always get together with them. So I’ve got both ends of the spectrum. The senior most, the junior most people every time I go down there.

Rico Figliolini 0:06:21

That must be fascinating. My youngest wants to go into military history. He’s actually attending Kennesaw. Not quite the place for that, but that’s where he’s starting at, right? Yeah, he’s all into. Especially prior to World War two. World War two and prior, actually, that part. So it’s fascinating to be able to see and talk to people that are involved. So your consulting work is still with the military, I’m assuming? Correct. Okay. And so I guess the biggest question. The first question would be, why? Why run for Gwinnett county sheriff then? Why run for that post? Why do you see that you need to do that?

Baron Reinhold 0:07:05

Well, I mean, really, there are a lot of reasons. First, we did exhaustive study. We could have lived anywhere we wanted to when we moved here, and we did a lot of study, a lot of research, and Gwinnett county was the place to move to, you know, in 2015. And, you know, it’s been great. And, you know, we’ve seen a lot of changes, and almost all of those have been in the wrong direction in the last three to four years, whether it’s, you know, school board problems or taxation rates, you know, we have high. I think, well, I don’t think. I know. We had the highest number of people, you know, having a problem with their property taxes and appealing those. So those are going the wrong direction. And then certainly crime and just everything that the sheriff’s office is supposed to be doing, they’re failing in a major way. And so seeing what Butch Conway did for a quarter century and then seeing what’s happened since Sheriff Taylor took over, it’s night and day, and any county can only really be as good as the sheriff and the law enforcement. And since the sheriff is the senior law enforcement officer in the county, that’s a direct reflection on who’s doing that job. So, bottom line is, I think Sheriff Taylor’s doing a horrible job, and I think I can do. I think I could turn the county around completely.

Rico Figliolini 0:08:27

Now, the sheriff, so then people understand the difference, right? Gwinnett county police and the sheriff department. Two separate entities. Right. Gwinnett county police has the police officers that arrive on the scene of a crime that patrol the streets and stuff. Right. Gwinnett county sheriff has other responsibilities, including the jail system, serving subpoenas and such. Right? Correct. So two different. Just want people to know that two different areas. One of the things that, quite frankly, to my audience, we’re not fact checking any of this, but Baron is one of two candidates running. We have the incumbent, Sheriff Kebo, and we have Baron running. One of the things you want to do, based on what you’re saying, is that you want to be able to do full audit. How will you ensure that the audit’s done correctly and that it’s. That it’s open, impartial, transparent. How would you plan to do that?

Baron Reinhold 0:09:30

Well, just one thing before we go on. There’s actually five people running against the incumbent right now.

Rico Figliolini 0:09:37

I’m sorry, you’re right.

Baron Reinhold 0:09:39

So there’s three.

Rico Figliolini 0:09:40

Yeah.

Baron Reinhold 0:09:41

Unfortunately, it’s a partisan race, which I don’t think it should be, but I guess people aren’t interested in what I think on that. So there’s two Republicans and three other Democrats that are running against the incumbent on the Democrat side. But so, obviously, nobody is happy with how he’s doing, otherwise we wouldn’t have so many people running for that position. But, yeah, so the issue is when Butch Conway, who was the sheriff for 24 years here in Gwinnett county, who incidentally, endorsed me over all the other candidates, even though a couple of them worked for him or with him, one of them worked directly for him for about twelve years. Butch, when he left, he had a budget of $105 million. Right now, Sheriff Taylor has a budget of about $170 million, and he’s got almost about half of the deputies and jailers have left. So he’s got a force that’s half the size, and he’s got a budget that’s $65 million ish more. And so there’s money being spent in crazy places. Obviously. We know that from day one when he repainted all the sheriff’s cars with his name on the back of them. Again, a waste of taxpayers money. But there’s a lot. Where is the money? That’s the whole issue. You can’t trust government, you can’t trust law enforcement when money’s being squandered on frivolous things. And you can’t. I mean, I’ve put in all kinds of requests for, you know, freedom of information act stuff, but I didn’t know that you have to pay for all that. So I figure, okay, I’m a taxpayer. I want to know where this money’s being spent, or I want to know how many. How many deputies we’ve lost every year for the last four years. And, you know, if you want to know that, which is right on a spreadsheet, you got to pay $150, or you got to pay this, or they slow you the information, even if you do pay. So those kinds of things are frustrating. You know, you talked about transparency. I mean, I want to do an audit. You’d have a professional, reputable agency come in and do that, or organization and find out where all this money’s been spent. I mean, if you ground zero of building trust with the citizens of the county, it’s based on knowing facts. And I can’t find facts. And I’m in this race without paying a lot of money. So I think we need to do this audit. We need to flip the table, make it public facing, even if it’s pretty damning, whatever the results are of that, the public needs to know. And you need to snap a chalk line and say, okay, this is what happened before. This is when I took over. And this is what happens from here on out. And it’s not just a budgetary chalk line. I’m talking about in the Navy, every time a commanding officer takes over, they do something called a command climate survey. And again, that’s snapping another chalk line, but that’s more typically with personnel and programs. So what that does is the entire unit gets to give an anonymous. Takes an anonymous survey that’s very in depth. And then they get a free flow. They can type whatever they want at the end of that. And so as a new CEO coming in, new commanding officer coming in, you get the results of all that, and you get to see, okay, if it’s just one or two things, you know, maybe it’s a. You know, maybe it’s not all that important, but it’s good to know. But if there’s huge blocks of ink on, okay, this is a major problem, then it gives you, the new person, the information you need to, a, know that there’s a problem, b, address that, bring all your people in and say, this is obviously a huge issue here in this command. Here is my plan. You bring in people so you can all talk about what that issue is, what the background, why there’s that problem, and then come up with a solution. And then you brief personally, as the CEO, you brief all your different levels of rank, and then you give them an opportunity to give you feedback face to face. And so those kinds of things are critically important for a new boss coming in. And we will do something like that, not only with the people who are currently at the sheriff’s office, the deputies and jailers, but I’ll have surveys sent out to those that left because obviously they left for a reason, and I know why a lot, a lot of them left because I’ve talked to scores of them. So that’s important information.

Rico Figliolini 0:14:04

Sure. I would imagine also that a place like the county jail system, the sheriff system department, I mean, if they’re, if they’re expending money, there’s probably usually bids for certain things, contractual bids. There’s discretionary funds that can be spent on certain things because you don’t want to hamstring a department. There’s usually a budget level where you can spend money up to before it needs to go out on a bid system or some other thing. It could be in $170 million. Budget could be complicated doing that. It could take some months doing that. In the meantime, whatever you find, like you said, you will be able to address at that point. In the meantime, while that’s happening, because that could take several months, you’re going to be hitting the ground. You would hit the ground running. I know there was some other things that you were talking about, like measures that would implement, that you might implement to improve safety and reduce high rates of inmate injuries or deaths in the jail. Has that been an issue? Now, I haven’t myself looked at those issues. So tell us a little bit about that, about what you’re looking at and what you would implement day one for that week. Right.

Baron Reinhold 0:15:23

So right off the bat, well, literally on day one, during his press conference, Sheriff Taylor implemented. He did away with something called the rapid response team. So the rapid response team are trained personnel where if there is an issue going sideways and deputy is in danger or a jailer is in danger, then the rapid response team is rapid. They’re in there within seconds and making sure that you, you know, the deputies are okay and that the inmates are okay, too, because, you know, obviously, if things get out of control, people are getting hurt. So you take away the most important tool of, on day one of how to keep your own personnel safe, and you give them no tools to replace that. It turned into an immediate catastrophe. I mean, one of the people that’s been helping me on my campaign was the 2019 deputy of the year, and she was in the, in our jail, which is one of the biggest in the country as a jailer for, you know, I think, 18 years. And so she was training other deputies and other jailers how to do their job, not only ours, but, you know, other sheriffs would send theirs in, too. And they begged her to stay on and continue training. She was going to leave when Sheriff Conway left. She stayed on for six. Well, she stay. Asked her to stay for six months. She agreed to, and within two weeks, she left. Now, she left because she saw what was going on and how she saw the writing on the wall immediately that, okay, we’ve got no way to maintain control because, you know, if we’re, if people are getting hurt, we can’t protect ourselves, let alone the inmates.

Rico Figliolini 0:17:02

And let me ask you a question, though. Obviously, I would imagine when Sheriff Akibo came in, there was a reason why he stopped it because there might have been, there was all these things going on right there.

Baron Reinhold 0:17:15

Well, yeah. He said if you go back and read the news clips in 2019, 2020, his justification for that was that there were some charges leveled against the rapid response team of using excessive force. And if that’s true or if that’s not true is a new leader. You come in and you, you, you deal with the problem. What he did was he came in and got rid of the tool. He even said, hey, it’s a good tool, but it’s being misused. So, you know, you don’t get rid of the tool. You, if people were being abusive, then you discipline them or you fire them and you keep the tool and you train more with those data points to make sure that, you know, abuse isn’t taking place.

Rico Figliolini 0:18:00

Okay, fair enough.

Baron Reinhold 0:18:01

But obviously, you don’t come in and you undercut your, your entire, all of your deputies and all of your jailers and don’t give them any tools to maintain control of the jail. So as they started leaving, things just have continued to spiral out of control. A jail that is supposed to have about 50 people per shift currently has about 20 people per shift. They used to have, the inmates used to have 8 hours a day out of the cell. Now they’ve got 1 hour a day. They’re locked up 23 hours a day. It’s crazy what’s going on in the jail right now.

Rico Figliolini 0:18:34

It seems like there’s not enough people. I know I’ve spoken to people in the Gwinnett police and such. There’s budget money there to hire, but there’s not enough applicants should say qualified applicants.

Baron Reinhold 0:18:47

Well, that’s only part of the issue. I mean, yes, law enforcement has had its challenges since 2020, but the reality is if you are an. An agency or a sheriff’s office that is, you know, is led by a good leader, then guess what? People don’t leave.

Rico Figliolini 0:19:07

People come there.

Baron Reinhold 0:19:08

So what we have seen in Gwinnett county is we’ve seen sheriff deputies and jailers flee this leadership because it’s untenable. As a matter of fact, I did, a couple years ago, I did this Suwannee Citizens Academy police academy, and it just so happened I got teamed up with a officer who worked for six months under Butch Conway, made the transition, and after a year, he took a significant pay cut to leave the sheriff’s office to go work for the city of Suwanee. And talking to him that night, it’s what every deputy I’ve talked to has said, whether I solicit the question or not, they’re like, yeah, it’s ridiculous. It became untenable, and they left inmate safety.

Rico Figliolini 0:19:53

I mean, it’s always been a problem, I think, in any jail, right, there’s only a certain amount of leeway you can do. Sometimes it can’t be helped, you know, with. You hear about these things all the time on, like, not in Gwinnett sheriff jails, but in federal jails or state jails, where there’s drugs in the jail, sometimes there’s other things going on, and that actually increases the inmate safety issue because other people causing problems among the population, if you will. What tools would you use to improve that or to reduce that? I mean, so it’s not just happening because. I don’t think it’s just happening because officers are being abusive, and some of them have been. It’s also being the other side of that. So what tools can a sheriff have to do? Do you plan on restructuring that whole command of how things are done?

Baron Reinhold 0:20:53

Yeah, I mean, immediately. I’ll reinstate and train a rapid response team. What we need is we need the proper numbers of deputies back in the jail cell. It’s a horribly dangerous job when you are critically undermanned. So the issue now is instead of being in charge of one cell block, they’ve got deputies, at times in charge of two, three, and up to four cell blocks. You know, that is. That is sheer insanity. And when you’ve got that type of. I mean, the inmates know that you can’t maintain control of them, and so things get. You know, things get crazy, and you can’t stop it. So what’s the answer to that? The answer is to keep people locked behind, you know, in their room 23 or in their cells 23 hours a day because you can’t control them. What’s that? Due to the mental health that makes people, you know, more angry. And when they do get out, there’s more problems. So all of these things are precipitated by the fact that, you know, the deputies in the law enforcement is a very tight knit community. So I just went through that, you know, quote unquote police academy. I’m post certified now. I went back in September through December. And, you know, all the guys, you know, a bunch of them were prior, you know, jail or were jailers before they were coming back to get their, you know, their full post certifications. And, you know, those guys, you know, talked in depth about all the different sheriff’s offices around the various counties and about all the different police. But, I mean, they know. And the word. It doesn’t matter. I shouldn’t say it doesn’t matter.

Rico Figliolini 0:22:21

The money.

Baron Reinhold 0:22:22

I mean, money is always attractive. But you know what? You have to have a force that people want to join, and that is incumbent upon the leader to create the environment where people love to work, where they know that their boss has their back. They know that their boss is, you know, is looking out for their career. They’re invested in, you know, in training and equipping them and so forth and so on. And that’s. I mean, the history of, you know, my background for 35 years is training and equipping and leading high, you know, high, highly performing organizations that are the number one of their type in the entire Navy. And you get, you know, there’s a. There’s a specific award called the Battle Efficiency Award. Now, they call it battle effectiveness Award. Same award, just. They changed the name, but you get that when it’s the number one unit of its type in the Navy. We won. We were awarded that back to. Back to back three years in a row when I was the commanding officer. So I know how to build organizations that people love to work in and love to do their job. And that’s what we need here. We need that type of leadership to bring people back. And I know that they’ll be back. I mean, people want to come back. I’ve talked to deputies all the time. They want to work here and Gwinnett, but they won’t work for this sheriff.

Rico Figliolini 0:23:37

Do you. Do you think that salaries or benefits have to change also?

Baron Reinhold 0:23:42

I mean, there needs to be. I mean, right now, if you listen on the radio, you can hear. You know, you can hear the. The Gwinnett county sheriff’s office, you know, spots on there all the time, and they’re, you know, attractive numbers and this, that and the other. But they’re not hiring anybody. I mean, they’re. Their numbers are single digits. You know, people are not coming to their hiring conferences, and they’re not responding to those ads, even though, you know, on the surface it sounds good because they know. They know that, you know, it’s better to work someplace for less money than it is for a boss that doesn’t support you. To answer your question, all of that stuff needs to be looked at, and we need to be the most competitive, pay in the area, and have the best leadership. And because the thing is, after you’ve trained people and you’ve equipped them and built the organization that they don’t want to leave, you don’t want to lose that talent. And those are the two key factors, to have the leadership and to have the money to support maintaining them there so they don’t train, move on.

Rico Figliolini 0:24:45

Yeah. And that’s been, I guess, the problem with law enforcement in the metro area. Right. They get trained in one place, like Gwinnett county has had that, where they train police officers, they work for two years, and then all of a sudden, they get hired away to a different county. Right. Maybe it’s closer to their home. You know, it’s a lot of different reasons. Right. I mean, our peach recorders. Sheriff Restrepo, chief. Sheriff Restrepo is a former Gwinnett county police officer, decided this would be a good place for him to be. Right. So people do leave. So, yeah, I mean, it’s hard enough to find people, even in the private sector, to do things, and it’s difficult all around. So unemployment is low, they say. I guess it’s low, but, yeah, paying bonuses do make a difference, and that’s something a sheriff has control over. Right. That’s not something that has to be decided at the city council level, at the county level, I don’t think.

Baron Reinhold 0:25:46

Well, I mean, certainly the budgets and the money come from the commissioners.

Rico Figliolini 0:25:51

Right. Total budgets. Right. But if you have, like, positions for 40 positions to be filled, but you can’t fill it, you still have that budget money in that line, I guess.

Baron Reinhold 0:26:02

And the other. Your point when you talk about personnel and money is, you know, this. The current sheriff, Sheriff Taylor, you know, has a command staff that’s completely bloated. He’s got all these really high level, high paying positions that he created, and, you know, and it’s like a three for one. The guy who’s actually doing the heavy lifting in the jails or serving warrants. Their pay compared to all of these created positions is way out of whack compared to what’s normative. And that’ll be something that we’ll go back through and rescale that to the right number and have the positions that are needed. But we’re not going to have fat in there, just collecting a paycheck and, you know, having duplicative jobs or whatever else. It’s not happening.

Rico Figliolini 0:26:52

So you’re not just auditing budgets and stuff. You’re going to be auditing the structure of the command. Who’s there? Okay. One of the things that you point out, too is constitutional training, mandating constitutional education, how to enhance the daily responsibilities of the deputies and jailers. So tell us a little bit about that. What you mean by that?

Baron Reinhold 0:27:16

Well, it’s interesting because, you know, 35 years in the navy and every time you have a promotion, you reaffirm your oath to protect the constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic. And, you know, it might seem a little more intuitive, possibly for military personnel because we’re typically overseas and worrying about the people attacking the country and protecting our constitution in that capacity. But in order to do your job in law enforcement, you need to understand how the constitution applies to you. And that has to factor in to, I mean, you have to know because you’re swearing an oath to it, too. So what does it mean? You know, there’s, there are laws on the books and we’ve seen throughout history that there are times when, you know, mandates can come down that are not constitutional. So then the question becomes, is the senior law enforcement officer in the county, what are you going to do about that? And if people don’t understand the constitution, then they can’t work through that. And that’s important. I mean, I think it’s a big problem in America that the Constitution is more and more being ignored. And when you have a mandate that is a potential massive violation of the constitutional rights of the citizens, then the sheriff is the one that needs to engage them and let people know this will or this will not happen. And so, you know the sheriff to know it, then everybody also needs to know it because they need to understand why their command is taking a certain stand.

Rico Figliolini 0:28:50

Okay. That almost begs the question, though. Okay. That if you’re, if you’re, if the sheriff is supposed to enforce mandates that come down, these are, these are laws just like anything else that needs to be implemented. Sheriff can’t, I mean, it’s been done. Obviously, we see it at the federal level where certain laws are being ignored right now, is that right to do, can you slow walk that law, if you will, and not do it? You know, I get it that there’s priorities and that sometimes you might say, well, the priority is not that law. We’re not going to, we’re going to, we’re not going to step through and enforce that right. We’re going to be enforcing these other laws that really are important.

Baron Reinhold 0:29:38

But I wouldn’t put it that way because, yeah, I wouldn’t say, I mean, the laws are the laws and they need to be enforced as long as they’re not violated. For example, you know, you saw, I mean, I guess probably the best current example might be that in some counties during COVID you saw sheriffs arresting pastors for having church on Sunday. And in other counties, you saw sheriffs standing literally in the doors of churches, preventing, you know, state police from coming in and disrupting the services. So the question then becomes, you know, if the constitution is the authoritative law of the land and our Georgia constitution is also, you know, the authoritative law in Georgia, then unless there is something that says, okay, there’s no more religious freedom, then your job is to understand what is and what is not a legal declaration. And so you have to, because at the end of the day, the individual citizen, the last person between their constitutional rights being violated or not, is the sheriff of that county. So I’m not saying it’s normative that that happens, but I’m saying you have to recognize if something comes down that is not constitutional, it’s your oath. It’s your obligation, if you actually are going to fulfill your oath, to make sure that your citizens rights aren’t violated.

Rico Figliolini 0:31:03

Okay, I don’t disagree with you. I just. And we could leave it at that. But it’s just, someone has to, it’s like everything else. Someone has to decide then whether that’s unconstitutional. Now do we leave it up to the courts to decide that or the individual sheriff, lead sheriff, chief sheriff in a county to decide that? You know, and every county needs to be different.

Baron Reinhold 0:31:26

Yeah, if there are subtle things. That’s right. But yeah, something as egregious is, okay, you are not allowed to go to church. I mean, that is a gross violation of your religious freedoms, period.

Rico Figliolini 0:31:37

It is.

Baron Reinhold 0:31:38

I mean, you can, people might want to argue that, but it’s a gross violation.

Rico Figliolini 0:31:44

Okay. I could see that, you know, of course, the CDC and we don’t have to get into the politics of this, but, you know, if they feel it’s a health issue.

Baron Reinhold 0:31:52

You know, they’re, their feelings don’t. Don’t get to supersede the constitution, that’s for sure.

Rico Figliolini 0:32:00

Yeah, no, I get it.

Baron Reinhold 0:32:02

And whenever it does, that puts our entire society at risk. I mean, I’ve seen societies collapse, and I spent most of my life in those areas because of, you know, things getting out of control.

Rico Figliolini 0:32:15

And so, and I agree, it’s. It’s a fragile.

Baron Reinhold 0:32:18

We can’t allow that to happen here in the United States.

Rico Figliolini 0:32:21

It’s a fragile system. And we’re constantly fighting to keep democracy or our republic alive, if you will, because it doesn’t take much for, like you said, it really doesn’t take much, especially when we had the riots during the COVID time. Remember what CNN was almost broken into during the riots then? I just, like.

Baron Reinhold 0:32:44

You forgot the mostly peaceful riots.

Rico Figliolini 0:32:46

The mostly. Yes. Yeah, we could talk about that at some point, right.

Baron Reinhold 0:32:52

But, yeah, if you’re a cigar guy, come over the house and we can.

Rico Figliolini 0:32:56

Cigar and bourbon. There you go. Jail dogs program. So, I mean, that. That’s one of the things you mentioned, I think, in your. In your program about jail dogs, about branding. Right.

Baron Reinhold 0:33:12

This is another example of. That’s insane that that program went away. Okay, so here’s a program that literally cost the taxpayers zero, not $0.01. It’s a phenomenal program for the mental health of the inmates. And, I mean, it’s a huge incentive for them to be on good conduct so that they can actually get an animal, so that they can train that animal. The mental health aspects of that are off the chart. And the jailers loved it because people would behave so that they could be in line to get a jail dog assigned. They would train the thing, have all this feeling of accomplishments, this, that and the other. The dog obviously is good for the dogs because they got saved, they got adopted out. And it was just, like I said, it didn’t cost a penny.

Rico Figliolini 0:34:03

So why was that? Is, is just.

Baron Reinhold 0:34:04

That’s just another example of failed leadership.

Rico Figliolini 0:34:09

Other things. You’ve mentioned vehicle branding. Right? So we’ll hit some of these other things quick. So vehicle branding was one. What’s with that?

Baron Reinhold 0:34:19

Yeah, exactly. What is with that? So right when we were right, when sheriff Taylor took over, he took all the county cars that belonged to the sheriff’s office and he. Yeah. Had his name painted on the back of him. I was like, okay, okay, seriously, you paid 100. Who God only knows how much money, you know, however much it is, if it’s over one cent, the Navy would call that fraud, waste and abuse. But the bottom line is, you know, he’s got his name spray painted all over these vehicles and county expense. The irony now is he, he can’t drive a sheriff’s deputy’s vehicle up to a polling place because that’s, that’s, you know, campaigning. So if there’s a problem at a polling station, he can’t respond.

Rico Figliolini 0:35:01

Think about that.

Baron Reinhold 0:35:01

Yeah, so anyway, but it’s, it’s just ridiculous. That is, that is the pinnacle of arrogance and egotism in my mind. And, you know, to spend that money that frivolously on something like that.

Rico Figliolini 0:35:14

All right, beyond that, let’s talk about reassigning personnel. Part of it was bodyguards and drivers to other roles that benefit the short.

Baron Reinhold 0:35:23

So when, when you’re critically short of personnel to begin with, he’s got a bodyguard that goes around with them. He’s also got a driver. Actually, I think he’s got two drivers or has had two drivers. So, I mean, that’s manpower that’s critically needed in our jails or serving warrants because right now we have about 50,000 unserved warrants because more warrants come in than can get served every day because we’re critically short and people won’t work for this sheriff. So every day the warrants stack up. They can only serve so many. So every day he’s in office, you know, we’re just going to keep getting more and more warrants. I mean, I should say that aren’t, that haven’t been served.

Rico Figliolini 0:36:04

Okay. I don’t have anything against bodyguards. I mean, things can happen, right. It’s not, it’s not a study. It’s a violent society sometimes. So I don’t see why not have a bodyguard. But serving warrants, though, it’s a different story. Can’t that be done by private services contracted for, to be able to stem through that? I mean, a reasonable thing?

Baron Reinhold 0:36:27

Yeah, I think it’s reasonable. Especially when you don’t have the manpower or they won’t work for you, then, yeah, you better figure out a solution. And, but, you know, the last official number that I got, it was, you know, am I allowed to say leaked to me it wasn’t gotten through FOIA because I don’t have that much money to keep asking these questions to try to get official numbers. But this was an official number. It was 48,632 as of about a month ago. And every month it’s been going up.

Rico Figliolini 0:36:57

So, and to be fair, I mean, a lot of that may have been before his.

Baron Reinhold 0:37:02

Oh, yeah, like you said. But the fact that the numbers skyrocket because it’s warrant division is, you know, is been decimated. And by people leaving, we’re not getting. Every day that those individuals are walking around without having been brought in is a potential death or a potential violent act or a potential robbery or whatever else. So these are important things to get our arms around.

Rico Figliolini 0:37:31

It’s good to have that discussion. I mean, definitely, especially. It’s one thing to, to be one of, to voting for one of over 330 house reps. You know, they do make laws that affect people and stuff, but the sheriff system really has to be taken more seriously. Have we, towards the end of our time together, Baron, is there anything that we haven’t discussed that you want to share?

Baron Reinhold 0:37:58

Well, I would just again ask people to go on my website, it’s Baron Forgwinnett, and look up my background and look up all my proposals. At least my initial day one proposals are on there. Like I said, there’s a reason why Sheriff Conway, who was the sheriff for a quarter century here in Gwinnett county, endorsed me. And he sat down and he said, Baron, you’re the only person with the background and the senior level experience in command and the senior knowledge of budgets and how to make things happen and how to apply for money and how to engage the commissioners and on and on and on and with the personnel experience with running the entire Navy’s 388,000 personnel and keeping that manned. And part of that responsibility was the bonus structure for the entire navy and administering that. I mean, hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars in bonuses across the Navy. So, yeah, it’s obvious from his perspective that I’m the only person qualified that’s running to do that in a manner of sustained, superior performance, which is my track record. So I’ve always loved people. I’ve loved serving people my entire career. That’s the biggest thing I miss about the Navy is the fact that as I got more responsibility and more seniority, I could affect more and more people’s lives and their families lives and advocate for them more powerfully in their career. So I’m, you know, I’m looking forward to, you know, doing that leadership aspect, but also bringing our county and making our county safe and our jails safe and, you know, basically making it safe for, you know, the taxpayer or the tailor for the deputies and for our inmates. That’s, that’s the bottom line.

Rico Figliolini 0:39:49

Okay, so, okay, cool. People know where to find out more information. You’ve been out. There’s early voting going on, but we’ve recorded this. This was recorded on the 8th, on Wednesday. And so there’s early voting going on. I think that, I’m not sure when that ends.

Baron Reinhold 0:40:07

Early voting ends the 17th.

Rico Figliolini 0:40:09

17Th. Okay. The Friday before election day, which is May 21. And you’re running on the democratic?

Baron Reinhold 0:40:19

I’m running on the republican ticket.

Rico Figliolini 0:40:21

Republican ticket.

Baron Reinhold 0:40:22

And the primary. You know, it’s Mike Baker and I that are running against each other on the republican side. And then Kebo Taylor, who’s the incumbent, and Curtis Clemens, Joe Mark and Brian Whiteside are running on the Democrat against.

Rico Figliolini 0:40:38

So as opposed to people listening to this, as opposed to school board races, which are decided on this election May 21, since it’s a nonpartisan or deemed nonpartisan this race, once the ballots are decided. So if you’re looking to want to support Barron, obviously you need to pull the republican ballot to be able to do that. Or the democratic ballot if you want to vote on that side, too. Either way. And then the election actually runs through until November where decisions are made. Right.

Baron Reinhold 0:41:11

So November, if I’m the candidate, then it’ll be running against. Well, there was probably going to be a runoff, my guess, on the Democrat side, since there’s not. But whoever wins that is going to be hopefully who I’m running against.

Rico Figliolini 0:41:26

Yeah, that seems like it. Well, Baron Reinhold, I appreciate you taking your time speaking to me about the issues of where you feel passionate about and how you feel you would handle the Gwinnett County Sheriff Department. People know where to reach you now, or at least where to find your information. And if they want to reach you via email or phone, the information is on your website, I’m assuming.

Baron Reinhold 0:41:50

Absolutely right.

Rico Figliolini 0:41:52

So hang in there with me for a minute. Everyone else, I appreciate you joining us listening to this. We’ll be doing some other candidate podcasts over the next week or so a few days. There’s a few more that I’ll be interviewing different races, so check it out and, you know, share this with your friends. Appreciate your time. Thank you everyone.