Dead Men Walking #129 Paul Pirrone: God, Government, and running for State Representative

Exploring Theology, Doctrine, and all of the fascinating subjects in between. Broadcasting from an undisclosed location,

Dead Men Walking starts now. Hey everyone, welcome back to another episode of Dead Men Walking Podcast.

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Cool, now that we've got the business out of the way, we have Mr. Paul Perrone in studio today. How are you doing,

Paul? Doing good. Don't you just love Jacobs Supply? I do. I love Jacob, he's a great guy.

You know, it's funny, he's the sponsor of the show, and I just saw one of your ads come out with Jacob talking about kind of how you came alongside of him and helped him with that business, that booming business he's got going over there.

Oh, I'll never forget showing up at his house where he had the biggest garage sale on earth.

That's how they did it for years, they just had tarps and there was windows and doors under tarps, and you'd go to this tarp section and have, you know what

I mean, showers. In a residential area. In a residential area, and I got that call, hey, this guy's got semis coming down this road because we were about to stick $450 ,000 into the road.

Right. So we go over there and we're like, hey, you can't have semis going down this road because, I mean, you figure loads of trucks with tile and all, they're heavy loads.

And so, you know, instead of saying, hey, you're shut down, red tape, get out of here, fine, yeah, whatever.

You know what I mean? We said, hey, let's work together, let's team up, let's partner up, let's get you a home here in Bedford and see you thrive, and boy, he has.

Yeah, he's done really well. He's got a great business model of helping people, and he has truly been a blessing to this community and to so many people.

For sure. So many people, so. Yeah, so we're getting a little ahead of ourselves, so Paul Perrone, Supervisor, Bedford Township, largest community in Monroe County, he's a friend of mine for quite a few years, went to church with him for many years as well, too, he's a brother in the

Lord, and now running for state representative, which is quite the,

I don't know, it's fun, right? I mean, it's a lot of work, it's insane, right?

Definitely different than local because, you know, I wasn't prepared for a lot that comes with running for state level, you know, the endorsement surveys, unbelievable how many endorsement surveys come to your, you know, mailbox, and it's like, it's overwhelming because a lot of these things you don't know about or don't really understand, you know, so it's a learning curve as well.

And they're looking for particular answers on like one or two subjects to get an endorsement. That's what people don't realize, you could be very well suited for a certain endorsement, if you give a wrong answer on one thing that they don't maybe particularly align with, or the people who fund those align with, they'll just go, no, we don't want to endorse you.

Yeah, so it's been interesting, but it's been really good, you know, we've been working hard. All the money

I've raised has been local, you know, from a lot of my past supporters and people that love me here in Bedford and support me and my family's working hard, my son's knocked over 3 ,500 doors, you'll see him on his one wheel cruising around, yeah, and my wife and kids, yeah, they're working hard, we've done a lot, you know, so we're prepared.

Yeah, but I would also mention for the listeners too, probably the most important endorsement that I like to see is that you're the only candidate with a pro -life, right to life endorsement.

Yeah, so I am the only candidate endorsement, right to life of Michigan Pac, they're very specific about what they are, so right to life of Michigan Pac, I'm passionate about the unborn,

I think, you know, we're going to be persecuted for it, you know, and I have been for putting my views out there and what

I'm about, but it's okay, you know, I'd rather, like you've said, you know, be yourself, be who you are, and if people want to vote you in for that, great, if they don't, you know what

I mean, it is what it is, but yeah, it's been a lot of fun. So full disclosure, so we've been friends for a few years now, geez, probably going back six, seven years, and we had known some people mutually that we kind of knew way back and didn't know that they knew each other, but one of the things that really attracted me to you when

I first met you was the whole reason I ran for county commissioner when I came down here is

I went to my current county commissioner and had some issues and he just kind of went, it's not my problem, and I went, well, you're not doing your job,

I'll just take your job then and I'll get it fixed, like that's just kind of how my attitude is, right, and when

I met you, and I talked to, look, I worked in Lansing and I ran campaigns and all that stuff, and a lot of elected officials and politicians just try to figure out who they can pass it off to instead of let me help you and I'll figure it out, now sometimes you have to give it to a different department or different municipality or whatever it is, but when

I met you, it was just like, yeah, let's get it done, let's figure it out, like that was always your attitude, and it was so refreshing in local government to find someone who went, oh no,

I'll figure it out for you, I remember when you first got elected too, you had that Rolodex of 200 cards and you just flipped through it, okay, this guy can solve this problem, it was like that, like the

Henry Ford, right, he said, I don't have to be the smartest guy in the room, he just had a big switchboard with a button, who can

I call that can help me with this problem, and I remember in our first year, your first year and my first year as county commissioner, yours as supervisor,

I mean, it was just like, I'd call you up and go, yeah, let's figure out how to get it done, let's go get a half million dollar grant for downtown, let's go figure out how to snowplow the roads, let's figure out how to put in a roundabout or let's go figure out how to fix this road or whatever it is, and it's like, there's very few people in local, state, or federal government that have that kind of energy to want to help their community, a lot of them are there for title, for notoriety, for pay, for the free meals, whatever it is, and you're going, no,

I just want to help my community, and it shows, I think, because you've been doing it, what, 14, I think, years now, between park board and trustee.

Yeah, 14 years, park board, four years, trustee, four years, second term supervisor in my second four -year term, so it's very rewarding, you know, when

I first got in, there was a drain issue off one of the dirt roads, and they laughed at me when

I told them I could get that done for them, or at least try hard, and 30 days later, we had their whole drain issue fixed, that was flooding like five houses, and it had been 20 years.

Wow. Well, that's what I'm talking about, right? Three or four supervisors that they tried to get it done through, it's all about working with other municipalities, other people in local government to be able to work together to get a job done.

I remember being a trustee, and I'd sit at our meetings, and one of our full -time elected officials would constantly bash the road commission, and I just thought, they probably hate us.

Right. So my whole mindset was, when I got in, is partner with everyone, everyone, let's partner, and we've done that, you know, even with plowing subdivisions, they ain't me doing it, you know, although you and I did go plow some neighborhoods one night.

Right, that was fun. It's the community, you know, people laughed when I said I could budget 10 ,000 and get our roads plowed, 127 neighborhoods.

But I've got people every single year for 15 bucks an hour that have jobs, that make 100 grand a year, that go plow roads.

Because they love the community. Because they love the community, and they want to see a good thing happen, and they're excited because they're like the guy that's like getting the calls, looking at Facebook for the roads that wasn't done, they're like, you know.

So it's just about making people feel wanted, feel like they're part of the team, because I mean, everything that happens in the community doesn't happen from Paul Perrone.

Yeah. It just, it happens from, you know, leaders that want to put the effort together and get good volunteers.

It's just like the library. We put 750 feet of six foot wide sidewalk from the junior high to the library for 600 bucks.

That's unheard of. You can't do that. Yeah. That was because I partnered with the community, I partnered with local labor unions for their apprenticeships and we were able to get it done, you know, and that all came from Hunter Gandy that was going down Jackman Road in his wheelchair to get to the libraries, you know.

Yeah. I'm like, wow. You know, I got a call and so we made it happen in a few months. Yeah. That kind of attitude,

I think, might serve you well up in Lansing where you'll be working with 110 other representatives from both sides of the aisle.

You'll have bills come before you that'll be dealing with community issues across the state. Well, that's what I tell people.

I'm going to take everything I've done in Bedford because I'm the only one with a proven track record that, you know, has been in government and has a proven track record of getting things done.

Getting things done, yeah. Because you take a gamble when you elected a politician. Sure. You take a gamble. Yeah, you really do.

And with me, I have that proven track record of getting things done. So you take less of a gamble with me, but I'm going to take that same thought mentality to Lansing.

Treat local government like it's your own home, the buildings, everything we have with it. It's easy to spend your tax dollars.

Yeah. But it's difficult to be creative and really, you know, work with other people and organizations to get a job done for 600 bucks.

That's difficult. Well, that's funny you say that because you mentioned the snow plowing thing and I went, is people really going to snow plow for $15 an hour?

I called a buddy who's in Toledo and said, you want to do this? He goes, dude, I don't step in my truck for under 75 bucks an hour.

That's minimum 75. Well, he said that was low. That's friend price. That's a good price. And I'm going,

Paul's got guys over here and they're all, you know, and they're all professional and they do it. And it's like, but you have, when you make those relationships and, and, and you spin it as like,

Hey, you're part of the community. We need your help. People will usually step up and help. They will. And there's all kinds of people that are looking for things to do and get involved.

And let me, you know, they're not perfect. They take out people's grass sometimes and sprinkler heads and mailbox. I mean, they've done all that, you know, we clean it up, we fix it, but you know, you know, we're getting something done.

We're doing 127 neighborhoods in seven hours. That's that's pretty insane going from four, three, four days than what we'd be waiting on the road commission because no fault of theirs, you know, they got the primary local road system to take care of.

Yeah. And, but they don't have the highways anymore, which is, which is great. So, so this is your second time on the podcast.

I think you came on, geez, it had to be over a year ago, maybe a year and a half ago. So for everyone listening and all the new listeners, tell them a little bit about yourself.

Give us a little two minute bio. What's your bout? You're married. You're married. I know you got kids, but I won't spoil it.

Go ahead and give us the lowdown. So before, um, politics, I was an iron worker for 20 years.

I'm okay. You know, I was the guy up on the building connecting the steel and the guy on the bridge decks laying the steel, the 20 % sociopath, right?

As they say for iron workers. Yeah. So, um, so I was a construction worker and very involved in my, my union and I was apprenticeship coordinator.

Um, but it was interesting being a Republican working, working directly for the union, you know?

Uh, but it worked out, you know, I was able to work with other, with other people, you know, on the different side of the aisle and still be able to get things done.

Um, but yeah, I have five kids. Um, I've been married to my awesome wife, Stephanie for 15 going on 16 years and another couple of weeks.

We'll have our anniversary. Cool. I'm very involved in my local church, um, you know, commander for the Royal Rangers.

And I'm, I'm, uh, one of the leaders at our youth group. I'm a chaplain at the local

YMCA, just involved in my community, um, try to try to do as much extra stuff as I can. Um, I love to fish.

I love to hunt. Love to go camping. Yeah. You know, when my buddies, we're not just friends, you know, people say,

Hey, I'm friends with so -and -so Greg and I, we hang out, you know, we're, we're more than just, yeah, we, we do have fun camping and you, we love your kids too, man.

Yeah. So we have a good time. Cause you got five, right? Yeah. Five kids. Uh, and you know, it's, it's fun is, uh, we both homeschool too.

So we know the challenges of that. We know the rewards of that, right? Today's day and age. I'm glad we are right.

You know, you hear all the stories of the bullying and, and I'm not saying all public schools are bad or anything's, you know, whatever.

But some of the stuff that's being taught, you know, I, I'm knocked doors, thousands of doors.

Yeah. People are, people are tired of it. Yeah. People are tired of, uh, stuff being shoved down their kids' throats.

That doesn't need to be. Right. Yeah. Not really having any recourse or yeah. A nine year old comes home from school or, or, you know,

I heard somebody in my office today walked in and was telling me they, that their kids in a private school and they came home and said to their parents that they're asexual now, she's a nine years old.

Yeah. What are these? You know what I mean? That stuff should not be being taught to our kids in schools. It's getting, it's getting pretty crazy too, because like I've heard stories where certain schools you go to, not just public schools, but schools in general, uh, like you go into a school district and the kids are like, okay, you have to pick one.

Are you bi? Are you trans? Are you gay? And like, if you pick straight, they, they like make,

Oh, you're just straight. They like make fun of you. They ridicule you. Remember back in the day when you had to, I mean, gosh dang, when we would have sex education, we were sophomores.

I know. Right. You know? And we had to sign consent forms from our parents. Yeah. What are the, what are the, what the heck's going on?

Right. Where did we get away from that? Yeah. It wasn't okay. Kids coming home from school and their parents are like, huh?

Right. You know what I mean? So I'm thankful that we are, you know what I mean? It's a, it's been such a blessing.

It's a lot of work, you know, for, for our wives. You know, when you have no downtime, you're with your kids constantly.

That is true. You know? And you, so you don't get extra time clean. So you gotta be creative with your kids, you know, pick it, pick a day.

Cause I call Friday, this is the clean day and each one of the kids has their chores and they're getting old enough now to where they can kind of help out and the house gets cleaned.

You know? Right. Wow. Your house gets cleaned once a week? Once a week. Every Friday. That'd be nice.

Everybody has chores. Well, let me ask you this, cause this is something I think we might share.

So you're, you're a full -time supervisor and you're, you're in the office, but you're at home sometimes.

And you're, you know what I mean? You might go home on lunch cause you're here in the area and I'm here because I do real estate.

Do you ever find it difficult that your kids don't know when you're working versus when it's like home time?

Like I mean, you, you could be home at lunch and you're getting calls still from people and they want to go, Oh, dad's home for an hour, a half hour.

I want to play with them. You're like, Oh no, I'm working. I get that all the time. My poor kids, I have to like go, Oh no, I'm not just on my phone looking at social media.

I'm, I'm working. So I try to come out here to the office or something. And that's kind of tough too, because you're always around them as a homeschool dad.

Yeah. You know, when I get home, I try to turn it off, you know, unless it's something important or, you know, attorney calling or, you know,

I mean, I, I try to give them that time and it's difficult, you know, especially in today when we're all attached to our phones.

Yeah. But if I can encourage anybody, get unattached from your stupid phone, right? Put it down, you know, stop letting it take over.

Cause it's easy for that to take over. Oh, sure. You know, your family time, your home time, your kids are noticing.

My kids notice too much. And that's when they start acting out and they're like, why is he acting out?

Well, because they're not getting any attention. They used to get from you, you know, cause your face is stuck in a device.

Yeah. You know, I would say, you know, before I come home or before, and I'm not perfect at it, you know, you try to finish your business, walk in the door with a mindset of,

Hey, I'm here for you guys now. Cause if you're not, if you're still in work mode, go back outside.

Right. Cause they don't want the halfway dad, you know, they want the full dad, they want all your attention.

And if you can't give it to them, go outside and finish your work and then shut it off and come in. You know, because it's, it's getting bad for a lot of families, you know, to where you can't turn it off.

You know, you got the phone constantly just, Oh, Facebook, flip, flip, flip, you know, schedule times, maybe at night where you look through it or, or in the morning, or I know if it's your job, shut your phone off and leave it in your car.

Be be take, take big action. If you want to see big results, you know, a lot of people are, you know, wonder why their kids are struggling in areas.

Well, get involved. Yeah. You know, get involved in what they're doing in their lives. You know, so I've, I've always said, you can tell, you know, people say,

Oh, it's the private schools. It's the public schools, charter homeschool. Oh, it's society. It's this. You show me a child who had two parents in the home that were involved in their education in their life.

Those, those now adults are doing okay. Well, it's just like church when the parents are saying, Oh my gosh, my kids not learning anything in church.

It's not their job to, to learn your kids about Christ. Yeah. Right. You know, they go there, they get married. Yeah. We need to help with that.

We need to get involved. We need to be the, the leader and, you know, make sure they're getting, you know, fed what they need to get fed.

And you know what I mean? So it's like, we can't put all the onus on the school system or the church or the, you know, we have to be, we have to be partners in that to be parents.

Yeah. So let's shift gears. So what is your kind of government philosophy overview? Like if, if someone's listening, they're in your district, which we haven't talked where the district's at, but I'll make sure

I link everything up to, or you can mention it where it's at. But so what's, what's your general overview?

I mean, we, we know you're conservative Republican, you're a man of faith, right?

So like, but generally speaking, you go, you get elected, you go to Lansing. What's kind of your general philosophy when it comes to that?

Work hard, be honest, be who you are, you know, don't, don't campaign on a bunch of stuff.

That's not really you. Right. Cause a lot, a lot of people do that. Almost everyone does. You know, it's like, you know, you know, when

I was interviewing for one of my endorsements, I just said, you know, when I, when

I'm done with Lansing, they're like, well, what do you want to walk with it away with? And I said, my integrity, right.

You know, I don't know everything about what goes on in Lansing. Right. No one does. You know what I mean? I don't know how to really get things done.

I haven't a good idea. I know what I've done to get things done here, but to treat it like we, we treat, like I said, our own home to, to, to be the normal voice.

People are tired of the whack jobs representing us. Yeah. You know what I mean? You watch the news and it's like, well, the heck is that?

Yeah. What the heck are they talking about? Be normal. Right. You know, the majority of people want normal things taught in their schools, math, reading, right.

Writing, right. History. You know, we don't want, let us teach our kids about, you know, critical race, sex education, you know, just transitioning and all that.

Yeah. You know, we need government, but we need less, right. We don't need to have, you know, things in every, you know, our fingers and everything.

It's like, you know, I get, I get why things are in place for certain things and, you know, I mean but we definitely can do better.

Right. You know what I mean? Our roads were a mess when I was a trustee. Yeah. You know what you do?

You figure out a way to get it done. Yeah. It's not rocket science. Look at the wasteful spending that happens.

Okay. We figured out a way to cut back, you know, six, seven, $800 ,000 at Township Hall, poured it into our roads.

Yeah. For 10 years straight, we have some of the best roads in the county.

We do. I mean, we do. We didn't tax. We do have the best roads in the county. We didn't do millages. When I was trustee, that was the thing they wanted to do, the board.

Oh, just throw another tax. They wanted to charge each homeowner $75. And I said, before you do that, and I'm not totally opposed to that, but before you do that, let's show good faith and spend the money we have sitting in our bank account.

Right. First. Okay. Be good with the money we have. And then if we're like, hey, we're out of money, we've done everything we can do.

We need more to get this done. Then go to them. Well, guess what? We cut where we needed to cut, and we didn't cut on services, and we were able to get all the roads fixed.

Yeah. It's not rocket science. It's just about working hard, thinking outside the box, and you know what

I mean? Yeah. It was funny because we had, oh, who was, I can't, I think his name was

Earl, and he, I can't remember his last name, but he was the head of the Michigan Housing and Urban Development.

And he came down here for something for the road, and he comes, and he comes walking up, and, oh,

I'm Greg, the county commissioner, this is state rep, I think it was Jason at the time. We know, Jason Shepard. And he goes, man, you guys got some good roads.

As soon as I hit Bedford Township, it was just like smooth sailing. Yeah. And this was like right after you'd started that initiative, and we were getting those roads paved.

And then I've had two other people say that, guys from Tammacog said the same thing when I was down at General Assembly a few weeks, a few months ago.

Man, you guys got some good roads coming over the state line there, because we're very close to Toledo here, for those listening,

Toledo, Ohio. And I just went, people do notice when you do the right thing. I mean, could you imagine if you would have went to everyone and said, yeah, we want another hundred bucks or 75 bucks, and then you got five million sitting, and then they go, what?

No plans on anything for it. Well, it would probably would have got voted down, and then everyone would have been discouraged. Oh, they don't want new, and you came in and said, well, no, let's figure out creative ways to do this.

The biggest thing is, is once you fix them, you have to maintain them. A lot of people fix them, they'll stick a million bucks in the road, then they walk away from it for 10 years, and guess what?

It's already filled with potholes. You have to crack seal it, you have to micro seal it, you have to chip seal it, you have to do the things to maintain it.

And if you keep up on them, they last a lot, lot longer. So that's the kind of stuff that I get excited about, if you get into Lansing, is when you have certain bills come in, you will see, oh, we have to do this or that or budget stuff, right?

You're gonna have 500 lines of budget, and each under those lines, headings, you have another couple hundred lines.

I mean, it's a couple thousand lines of budget. You could look at road funding and have an idea, right, of how it's done.

That's what I told people. You know, how could you go represent us in Lansing if you've never represented us locally?

Yeah, or don't even know how. There is so much to understand and to learn locally, and that's the advantage I have over my opponent.

He has zero local government experience. You know, I could see if I was a state representative for 50 years, and it's, oh, my gosh, we've got this, you know, career politician.

No, I was park board, trustee, supervisor. I'm working my way to where I, which I think you should do that, because I can represent you a lot better having that local government experience in Lansing, because I could be sitting there and understand, oh, yes, we can do this.

Oh, we could fund this. Oh, I know Stearns Road needs a turn lane or Smith Road needs a turn. You know, how to write or, hey, we lose business in Toledo because we don't have the good incentive programs because I've watched this company go.

Yeah. You know, or just understanding how budgeting works at the local level, how revenue sharing works with the state and federal, how grants work like that was a learning curve for me at the county level of going, oh,

I have to do these steps to apply for a grant, get a grant, only certain grants in areas, and then, oh,

I only get 12 percent of my revenue back out of the 13 percent I give to the federal government because the state takes a bit.

Right. You understand all that because you have to deal with the budget every year. Someone who doesn't understand that they could be spending six, eight months a year of that first two year term going,

I don't, I need people to help me here. So then have you really elected that person to represent you or have you elected the people that are telling them what to do?

Yeah. You know? Yeah. A lot of people don't know. We only keep one and a half percent of your taxes. The rest goes to the state.

Right. Yeah. So that's what we work with. You know? Well, and then the state would look. Yeah, but the state is going to look at you and go, hey, we only keep

X amount and the rest goes to the feds. Yeah. Yeah. It just goes up. Everyone gets a what's their beak all the way up.

Yeah. It's it's crazy. But no, I I think it's it's time we we have people that are willing because I stood up to the good old boy system in Bedford Township.

Yeah. You know, and that's why I have some people that don't like me here. Yeah. But I'm willing to put myself out there and stand up and do the right thing.

Whether people like I was never in this to get reelected. I don't need this job. Right. OK, I go back to iron working tomorrow and make more money.

So I'm doing this because I really love it. Yeah. I enjoy it, you know, and I didn't give up my 30 year 30 and out retirement, you know, for nothing.

It's like, right. I have a passion and I know that if I go to Lansing, I won't be one of the guys that just lays down to the to the to everybody in the system.

I'll stand up and stand out of the crowd. Yeah. No, it's we need more people like that. We do need more people like that.

And here's the thing, ever since the Roe v. Wade and then we have some other stuff coming down the line with the

Supreme Court, the the the rights of the states, they're returning rights to the state as they should, as they should.

So people like you make some mess of it. They do. So people like you are going to become that much more important.

You're going to have more power at the state level, which I think constitutionally it should be right. Like essentially, we set it up to where the governors are a little president.

You guys are Congress, you know, the legislature and both chambers. And then we elect our representatives.

And I think it's just going to be in the next like this. This race is so important for people across every state, obviously yours as well to here in Michigan, because state legislatures are going to become extremely important over the next four, six, eight, 10 years as the

Supreme Court rightly returns power to those states. And guess what? You're much more reachable than sometimes my federal congressman.

Well, I'm the only person that probably gets out his cell phone number on every business card I give out. Right. Which has been 10 ,000.

Yeah. I have myself personal cell number on there. Yeah. And you'd be surprised. Not many people call me. Yeah. Oh, I would say.

Yeah. But, but, uh, you know, I'm very available. Yeah. You know, I'm on Facebook and you can shoot me a message and, and I return stuff.

It's been difficult now running some of the people that are sending me all these emails about, you know what

I mean? It's, it's difficult to return them all, but it's, um, cause I'm, you know, I'm campaigning and stuff and trying to get elected, but, um, you know,

I'm very available. So let me ask you this question before we get into our last segment and wrap this up. Um, is, has there been anything you've seen at the local level where you go, if I get elected to Lansing, I would like to attack that problem or fix that, or there's an issue, or is there anything near and dear to your heart to where you go?

When I get to Lansing, I really think I could contribute by writing this bill, eliminating that bill, tweaking this.

Is there anything specifically if, if, uh, voters are listening right away, the 1931 dog law that says if somebody's livestock is injured in Bedford Township, a local government and the township supervisor oversees the case in court.

Oh, did that happen to you? It's multiple times. Really? So, and it's ridiculous. It should not come to the township.

It should go to the law enforcement. Right. Period. Yeah. Because they do animal control. Animal control. Okay. So it's, it's something that township gets wrapped up in.

And, um, so wait a minute, if a, if a dog or something attacks another ant, any animal or like cattle, livestock, so any type of livestock, chickens, is it like a hearing they have to have or what does it cost the township a bunch of money?

You know, it's, it's crazy the way it's probably, that would be, that's just one of them. You know, there's a lot of goofy stuff like that that are all old and inundated.

That I know about because I deal with it. That's the difference. When you do local government, you learn these things.

You could clean them up and get them off the books. You could clean up some of those things. Um, incentives. We have to be better with incentives to keep business here.

Right. You know what I mean? Yeah. We have to really be better at that. Especially as a borderline community.

I've watched businesses go. Borderline community. We see it. Post Ohio, yeah. You know, um, you know, cause a lot of our, our, uh, businesses have

Toledo employees. Right. You know what I mean? It's probably 60 % sometimes. Yeah.

Um. Cause they just come in off, you know. The grant system has to be better from MDOT. Yeah. For the roads.

You use the grant system from MDOT for TAP grants. Whatever it is. It costs more money.

To. At the end of the day. If I hire, and you can't hire local people unless they're certified through MDOT. Most people aren't.

Right. You know, uh, the setups for it. You know, it's gotta be small business, old minority, minority contract.

The contractor that we got for our, our other project. I won't name their name. It's terrible. Right. They were out of town.

They're not going to care like my local people. Right. So that's gotta be cleaned up. So yeah. Give. You know, we need to give it to the locals.

Let us get the grant. Let us use the local contractors and the people we know and trust. Yeah. That care about their work when they're done.

The people that did it, they don't care. They're gone. Yeah. You know what I mean? No, absolutely. Man, you sound fired up about this. Well, I do.

I love, I love this stuff. You know what I mean? And that's why I get fired up because I've seen the difficulties of it.

Yeah. A lot of minutiae can get lost in there. You know, in roads. You know, we're, what, $400 billion underfunded in Michigan?

Come on. Yeah. You know, we've got to figure out ways to be better with our road system. My grandma died on Erie Road hitting a pothole.

Wow. That was as big as this flipping table. Yeah. You know what I mean? That can't happen. Right. We've got to be better about that.

No, I agree. Yeah. You know what I mean? So it's, you know, there's just a few things. Yeah. You know, but.

Cool. Well, I'll tell you what. Let's shift gears here. I didn't tell you we were going to do this, but we do this with a couple of guests. It's called

Fresh 10. We ask you 10 random questions, personal questions, fun ones. You can answer off the top of your head so people can get to know you a little bit more.

You want to stick around and play it? Sure. Let's do it. Can we kick that one more time? Let's go. I'm fresh.

I'm fresh. I'm fresh. I'm fresh. All right.

Here's Fresh 10 with Paul Perroni. Question number one, who's a figure in history you look up to or that inspires you?

Let's go with the historical figure outside of Christ since we're both believers here. I think that'd be a go -to.

So who's, I don't know, maybe a president or a philosopher or,

I don't know, a sports athlete. It's always fun to ask someone this. He's really thinking about it.

There's no wrong answer. Maybe Abe Lincoln. Abe Lincoln. You're the second person on this show to answer that.

I love his story. Yeah. I love the history of him. All right. Question number two, what do you do to relax?

You had a long day. Sit in the sun. Sit in the sun. Close my eyes. Take a nap. If I, listen,

I stopped taking naps because I typically get punched by a kid or something when

I take a nap and then I get, I wake up obviously and I'm mad for a while, so I'm doing that.

You're doing that. All right. All right. This is a two -part question, three and four. We touched on it a little bit. What's the most rewarding part of homeschooling?

And then question four is going to be, what's the most difficult part of homeschooling? So what's the most rewarding part you think? Rewarding is our kids actually being taught by us and them learning from us, not somebody we don't know and hoping for the best with that.

And the most difficult part is alone time. You're never alone.

Yeah, that's true. Yeah. It's hard to get away and kind of, and our kids are old enough now to root and just kind of take off. Right. And, you know,

I'll have the oldest one watch them and stuff, but it's, you know. When they were all little. When they were little, it was tough like that. It was tough like that. Yeah.

Especially for Steph. Yours are all within five, within what, an eight year span maybe? Yeah. Eight or nine years.

Thirteen to six. Thirteen to six. So yeah. All right. Question number five. What three albums are you bringing with you on the deserted island?

Three albums? What's three albums or three songs or three artists? Your favorite three. You're on the deserted island.

You only can bring three. Oh. Kenny Chesney. He's got a lot of island songs, you know?

Okay. All right. Plus he's my mom's cousin. No way. Yeah. My mom's name is

Carol Chesney. Oh, wow. Yeah. Well, so why haven't we had him show up at a fundraiser or something singing for you?

Get him on the show. Are you a big music guy or not?

No, not really. Just you listen to whatever? I listen to whatever. So Chesney. Yeah. Chesney and two other random ones, or do you got a second or third one?

Oh, we need to get a little bit of Christian music in there. Okay. Who's a good

Christian? I don't. Tobey Mack. Okay. Tobey Mack.

Oh, he's going deep. My daughters. Just got introduced to Tobey Mack. Oh, yeah?

Yeah. He does good concert. Does he? Yeah. Yeah. I don't know.

Okay. We'll just go with those two. So, what property do you try to buy when you're playing Monopoly and why?

Oh, boardwalk, because it just gets the most money. But it's most rewarding when the kids hit it and the game's over.

And you're like, gotcha! Yeah. That's funny. Oh, that's a good one. All right, what book should everyone at least open up and read outside of the

Bible? What's a good book you'd recommend to anyone to just say you should at least pick it up one time and check it out?

It can be fiction, nonfiction, maybe something you read in the past that you found interesting. Mm, gosh, what's that marriage book that Matt Moraga teaches?

Love and Respect? Love and Respect. Read Love and Respect. You know what, with marriage failing in this world, read

Love and Respect and act upon it. I like it. Number eight, we're almost through them. Where's your favorite place to vacation in Michigan and why?

Probably Van Buren. Yeah, oh. Because the water's beautiful. Oh, up there in South Haven. You feel like you're on vacation.

Yeah, no, Lake Michigan's gorgeous around there. All right, you're jumping into your time machine. The flux capacitor's running, you got your

DeLorean. Would you rather go into the past and meet your ancestors or go into the future and meet your great -great -grandchildren?

Go into the past. Okay, that's a consistent answer on here. Now, why go to the past? Because. Oh, we're going to the future to see what's going on up there with your great -great -grandchildren.

I mean, both would be interesting, let's be honest. But I mean, the past would be kind of cool to see kind of how they were raised and grew up and stuff.

Yeah. I don't really want to see probably the future, what it looks like. All right, number 10, last question.

What is the most concerning issue facing state and federal politics today, in your opinion?

We went easy on nine of them and now you get the tough one. Probably, I mean, what's coming to the states now.

I mean, with the Roe versus Wade issues, going to be laws on that. Because it's not, you know, it's not just cut and dry.

We need to get to work on it. Because there are situations to where we need to get involved as a state and help some of these people.

You get the, you know, the rape and incest situations for a young girl and we need to help them out. We need to, you know what

I mean? Those are the situations where I feel very strongly. Do you think the state has an obligation to help them out or do you think it should be left to churches, charities and nonprofits?

I think it's both. Okay. To be honest with you. I think, you know, if a 13 -year -old girl gets raped and is pregnant,

I think there's gotta be ways that we can help in those situations as a state. Okay. Well, that was, we really ended on a serious note there.

Yeah, you did. Usually it's light, but yeah, that was Fresh 10. All right,

Paul, thanks for being here. Why don't you throw out maybe some social media websites, people can get ahold of you.

I'll make sure we link this up so when the show goes live, they can click on it and check it out, but throw it out there anyway for the listeners.

Yeah, so voltperroni .com is my website and I'm on Facebook. Same name.

I'm on TikTok now. Instagram. Are you personally on TikTok or is it someone from your team's on TikTok?

No, I'm personally on it. No way. Yeah, yeah, I just posted my first video a couple days ago, so. It was funny because someone goes, are you guys on TikTok?

I said, look, after like Twitter and Facebook and Instagram and Truth Social and Gab and Discord and all, you know, all these, all these,

I'm like, I'm done. I'm drawing the line at TikTok. I can't add another one. But, you know, a lot of elected officials do short little videos on TikTok.

That does really well for us. So I'm starting to do that. But let me be honest. If I'm out of politics, okay,

I would shut it all off. You'd shut it all down. All of it. Right. So it's just kind of a necessity.

I think it's terrible. Yeah. To be honest with you. I'll tell you what though. It's a great way for constituents to reach out.

It is. No, it's great for that. Like, I feel it's great. You know, like I'm in a position. I answer a lot of questions.

I get a lot of, you know what I mean? Yeah. But, you know. Cool. Not for me with a family. Well, Paul, thanks for stopping by again.

We appreciate you being on. It was cool learning a little bit more about you, letting people hear about you. And I hope you do well.

You got my vote in the primary coming up in a few weeks here in Michigan. And guys, for anyone listening, make sure you go check out, it's

Vote Peroni. Vote Peroni .com. Vote Peroni .com. We'll link it up. You can check him out.

As always, we appreciate you guys leaving reviews, checking us out at dmwpodcast .com. God bless.

Peace. There we go. Cool. Be sure to follow us on Facebook and Instagram at deadmenwalkingpodcast for full video podcast episodes and clips, or email us at deadmenwalkingpodcast at gmail .com.