Paul Szmal: Good morning, it's 8.37, it's FLX Morning Monday, it's Guest-O-Rama edition, our fourth and final guest of the day, Zooming with us is our 130th District Assemblyman, Brian Mangelo, welcome back.
Brian Manktelow: Well, good morning, Ted, and thank you for having me on this morning.
Paul Szmal: So a lot of what you've been up to lately has been going around the district at the end of the session and meeting with constituents, learning about some of their concerns. Talk about your recent discussions with upstate and Wayne County apple farmers.
Brian Manktelow: Yeah, Ted, we met with some farmers back about a month and a half ago, Senator Helming, myself and the Congresswoman, about the hailstorm that had hit up through the Williamson-Sodus area and actually all along the lake, Ted. And we had a lot of apples that couldn't be harvested, they actually just fell on the ground.
And one of the issues is with a lot of the apple concentrate, Ted, coming from overseas from China. Even though we don't get it from China anymore, it's a roundabout, it goes from China to another country and then maybe another country, and then the country of origin really isn't China anymore. And that's really hurting our apple farmers, our producers here in this area and across the state, Ted. And we're trying to come up with a solution, working with some of the producers like Mott's Cadbury, some other producers across the state, to see what we can do to help get more concentrate, more apple juice pressed here. That way we can use those apples that are produced instead of letting them fall on the ground. And that's one of my key priorities once we get through the election, is meeting with those individuals and starting the process.
Paul Szmal: I know that there have been some apple juice recalls recently. Have those had an impact on farmers in the district?
Brian Manktelow: No, not at all. Absolutely not. This is more for a new product coming forward that was from something previously. So no, it did not.
Paul Szmal: It's been now, oh, next April will be 11 years since the big ice storm in 2003, which really hurt some of the stone fruit growers in Wayne County and throughout the 130th. What's the state of that industry now, 10 years later? Have they been able to recover and come back?
Brian Manktelow: Well, they've recovered, Ted. But one of the biggest issues with stone fruit, especially like sovereign cherries, you know, we're competing against Michigan and Michigan does such a huge amount of cherry production up there. We have the market. We still have it here, but we need to help that grow as well and be competitive with Michigan and other areas across the country and even outside of the country.
And you know, here in New York, we talked about some of the things that come through New York State. And, you know, whether it's overtime, whether it's unemployment insurance, whether it's workman's comp, we constantly put our growers at a disadvantage against other states. And again, once we get back to Albany, we'll continue to work on that and making sure that we protect our growers, not just to protect them, but to help them grow for the next generation. So we're here. You know, we have a very safe product here in New York State. We're very fortunate, Ted, to have these products here and know where they come from. We just need to help these growers and make that happen. And that's part of our job as legislators.
Paul Szmal: October, of course, was Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and I talked about this with Senator Helming recently, how blessed we are throughout the Finger Lakes to have great organizations like Thrive to Survive and all of the opportunities to get screening mammograms through our various health systems.
Brian Manktelow: Yeah, Ted. Earlier, or I shouldn't say earlier, last month in October, I met with Sylvia Reindach. She has Reindach Realty up in Ontario, and she did a Breast Cancer Awareness Day at her facility there, and we had the regional mobile mammogram unit on site, and she actually did a Facebook Live with me when I got there, and we talked a little bit about it. And one of the cool things was she asked me if she could paint my hair pink for the day. So I allowed her to paint my hair pink for the whole day, and throughout the rest of the day, no matter where I was, I left it pink. And it really brought up a lot of conversations, Ted, about breast cancer awareness.
Paul Szmal: That's fantastic. One of the things I learned is what we're seeing with younger people is it seems to be more permanent, it's coming sooner with younger people as we can see, and one of our jobs as legislators is to make sure we get those people covered at a younger age, whether you're a female or a male, it's happening, and we need to make sure we can help them. So that's one of our top priorities when we get back to Albany is looking at legislation to allowing them to be scanned earlier at a younger age and also have it covered by insurance because it's really about a presence of peace in your mind if you have a concern about it, especially if it's in your family.
Brian Manktelow: So what are some of the other things you've been hearing from residents and businesses as you've been getting out and about in the district?
Paul Szmal: Well, we talked, Ted, we talked to a lot of different businesses, and we actually have more businesses that are opening up constantly, and that really encourages me, that encourages me to do my job. But probably, again, the number one comment we get is public safety. Not just public safety for them, but public safety for the people that in the areas where we live and work, but also for the safety of our police officers and our first responders. It's a crazy world right now, and we need to make sure we cover that across the board. That is by far the number one thing that I'm hearing out there is the public safety aspect of it.
Of course, we have the economy, the cost of food, the cost of electricity, the normal things that we're hearing every single day. So that's just a couple of things that we're hearing out there.
Brian Manktelow: The other thing that we have going on as we go into the next session is all these various green initiatives. The electric truck mandate is supposed to come in in 2025, and so what are you and the Republican conference going to do to try to kind of slow this down? Because a lot of people, same with the buses, I mean, school districts are saying, fine, I mean, we're okay with electric buses if that's what you want us to do, but I don't know if we can do it in the time frame.
Paul Szmal: Senator, we've already been working on this already in our conference, but across the state as well. And once we get through election year in a couple days, you know, we'll get right back at it. We're already geared up. I'm very fortunate to sit on the Energy Committee in Albany. So some of these questions that we're getting from our school, our public schools, from our local municipal highway guys, you know, saying we have to have a snowplow truck that's electric. Well, they're not out there. They're not available. So I'll be reaching out to the governor's office and holding, you know, holding her feet to the fire because we need to make some decisions.
We know that it cannot be done. We've met with every single player that's involved with this whole initiative, and it's a great initiative, but it needs to be over 100 years, not over 10 or 15 or 20 years. I think we're all for clean energy, absolutely, but not in this time frame. So that will be one of my priorities, even before we get back to Albany in January, is making sure we can get answers for all these municipalities, all these schools, all these other firms that have to make a plan because it's mandated through the state by law now that we have to switch over. We have to slow the process down, and that's what I'll be focusing on.
Brian Manktelow: We're talking with Assemblyman Brian Magdalo, who represents the 130th Assembly District, Wayne County, and Points North in our listening area. You were telling me you recently got to do some baking.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, one of our local bakeries, it's called Community Coffee and Cafe right here in Lyons, right in the downtown area. They invited me in to help make apple crisp, and I had never done that, so they had started some of the prep work. I got to go in, cut the apples, mix everything up, actually put it into the oven, and we used honey crisp, and I think we used some Fuji apples in that apple crisp, and it was great to do that because I got to see a lot of people, and I want people to see that we're just normal people. We're not up on a pedestal. We're just normal people, and it's great to get involved and get engaged with our local businesses and not just talk the talk, but walk with them, walk the walk, and being involved and getting my hands dirty, and actually the day after, I had a piece of the apple crisp. It was pretty good. Probably not as good as my mom's, but it was really pretty good.
Brian Manktelow: So next Monday, a week from today, is Veterans Day. I know that's very important for you. Do you have any particular plans for observances that day or events you're going to try to attend?
Paul Szmal: Yeah, absolutely. I'll be speaking at several different events on Veterans Day, but even prior to that, I'll be up at the end of this week, I'll be up in the Lamson School District for a Veterans Breakfast. On Thursday, I'll be up in the Webster School District for a dinner for veterans that evening, and as a veteran, I've been invited to come to both. So I'm looking forward to that. I'm looking forward to engaging the students because it's really important that we get that message across to our young people that, you know, what have our veterans done and our veterans' families done to keep us who we are as Americans, and it's just a blessed day. You know, we can talk about veterans that gave their life. We can talk about veterans today. We can talk about veterans in the future and what we need to do for them. And it's an important time for our country and an important thing to make sure people know exactly what Veterans Day is for.
Brian Manktelow: You've talked about some of your priorities going into the next session. It sounds like, kind of in general, what you'd like to do and what the GOP Conference would like to do is lift some of the tax and regulatory burden off of our businesses.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, absolutely. That's one of the key points that we need to do, and let me give you a quick example, Ted. I'm working with multiple individuals that are trying to open up liquor stores. The whole way of getting a liquor license in New York State is so complicated. It takes forever, Ted, to get a simple liquor license, and some of these individuals already have a location. They want a second location. It takes anywhere from eight months to a year to get a liquor license. We have to make that easier because these are businesses that want to grow. That's just one small business that we've talked about that we need to change and operate to make sure we can expedite some of these things.
If it's a new applicant, I completely understand going through a longer screening process, but when they already have a location that they're doing well in, no problems, we should not take eight to 12 months to get a liquor license. That's just one simple one that we really need to work on.
Brian Manktelow: We do have Election Day coming up tomorrow, and you're on the ballot running for re-election. We haven't talked about that yet, so go ahead and tell us a little bit about what you think you've accomplished for the district the last two years and what you'd like to do moving forward.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, for the district, making sure that their voices in Albany are heard. I've been there six years, Ted, and now having the ear of all the Assembly members on both sides of the aisle, having some leadership positions, having great committee assignments, it's really allowed me to accomplish a lot of things in Albany, and I want to continue to do that.
What I tell everyone, Ted, is for me to be successful, I need to make the people that I represent successful, no matter what they're asking for or what they need help for. And I really mean that. It's not about who I am, it's about who you are, it's about who these businesses are, who these mom and dads are, who these parents are, these families. Helping them get through life, getting through some of the struggles here in New York State, that's what it's all about. That's my priority once I get back in Albany, or as I should say, once we get down there to do session, but that's my priority every single day. It's been a great time to go out, doing some door-to-door, talking with constituents. It's really been a great time, a lot of momentum moving forward. I'm really excited about getting back to Albany and making sure I work hard for the people that I serve.
Brian Manktelow: Have you seen Assemblyman Oaks lately? I haven't heard much from him in the recent years.
Paul Szmal: I talked to the former Assemblyman about two weeks ago, Ted, and he was actually down, I believe in Washington, where one of his children live down there, they go down there quite often. He's doing very well, he's on a lot of non-for-profit committees and boards, and seems to be doing very well.
Brian Manktelow: All right. Thanks for asking. Well, Assemblyman Brian Mantello, his successor, joining us this morning, representing 130th District. Good luck tomorrow in the election, and thanks for the time as always, we appreciate it.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, thank you so much for your time, and thank you for allowing me to be on and talking with you.
