Will Barrios of Dundalk sees the need for change on the east side of Baltimore County and brings his platform forward focusing on cleaner, safer streets and community engagement. He tells Nestor why there’s another Venezuelan-heritage fellow in the old neighborhood coming forward to lead as a potential councilman.

Overview

Will Barrios, a Venezuelan-American from Dundalk, is running for County Council in District 9. He emphasizes the need for change, focusing on cleaner, safer streets, and community engagement. Barrios criticizes the current political system, advocating for better representation and accessibility. He highlights local issues like the Key Bridge impact, the need for better infrastructure, and the environmental concerns of the Back River Wastewater Plant. Barrios plans to create an app for community complaints and hold regular office hours. He aims to restore trust in government and improve Dundalk’s standing, leveraging his personal connections and community involvement.

• [ ] @Nestor Aparicio – Host the Maryland Crab Cake Tour event at Sorrento of Arbutus on June 10 as part of the Maryland Crab Cake Tour promotion (presented by the Maryland Lottery).
• [ ] Build and deploy a community reporting app (working with an app developer) to allow residents to voice complaints and report local issues outside confrontational social media channels.
• [ ] Hold regular constituent office hours to make the county council seat more accessible to residents if elected.
• [ ] Educate district residents about existing reporting tools (promote Smell My City and Baltimore County 311) and increase community awareness of how to report odors, potholes, and other local issues.
• [ ] Work with the Back River Water Restoration Committee and advocate for restoration projects (for example, explore floating wetlands like the aquarium project) to improve local water quality at Back River.
• [ ] Advocate for local job and training pipelines (including CCBC underwater diver/welding programs) so district residents can access work related to bridge and infrastructure projects.
• [ ] Oppose and publicly advocate against the council ‘courtesy’ practice that enables pay-to-play influence, and educate constituents about its risks.

Introduction and Election Encouragement

• Nestor Aparicio introduces the show, emphasizing the importance of voting in the upcoming election on June 23.
• He encourages listeners to register and vote, highlighting the significance of democracy.
• Nestor mentions his efforts to engage with people from various backgrounds to improve the city, state, and county.
• He announces the Maryland Crab Cake Tour, sponsored by the Maryland Lottery, and thanks his sponsors for their support.

Introduction of Will Barrios

• Nestor Aparicio introduces Will Barrios, a candidate running for County Council in District 9, and mentions their shared Venezuelan heritage.
• Will Barrios shares his background, stating he has lived in Dundalk for almost 40 years and never envisioned himself in politics.
• He expresses his desire to change his hometown and improve the community, especially after having children.
• Will mentions his platform, which includes addressing inadequacies in the community and focusing on family and community values.

Will Barrios’ Platform and Approach

• Will Barrios discusses his platform, emphasizing the importance of listening to all people, regardless of political affiliation.
• He mentions his efforts to build a platform and create an app to allow people to voice their complaints online.
• Nestor Aparicio and Will Barrios discuss the importance of solving problems rather than just complaining on social media.
• Will Barrios shares his vision of making Dundalk cleaner, safer, and well-lit, and bringing hope back to the community.

Challenges and Personal Motivation

• Will Barrios talks about the challenges of change in the county and his role as an outsider trying to shake things up.
• He shares his personal motivation, which was ignited in 2016, and his frustration with the current political climate.
• Will Barrios discusses the shift in Dundalk’s political leanings from blue-collar Democratic to more conservative in recent years.
• Nestor Aparicio and Will Barrios discuss the impact of national politics on local communities and the importance of local issues.

Community Involvement and Local Issues

• Will Barrios emphasizes the importance of community input and modernizing government to make it more accessible.
• He discusses the impact of the Key Bridge going down and the need for local solutions to address transportation issues.
• Will Barrios mentions his opposition to cancel manic courtesy, which he believes allows pay-to-play politics to thrive.
• He highlights the importance of giving people a voice at the table and advocating for the district’s needs.

District 9 and Community Connections

• Will Barrios explains the changes in District 9, which now includes parts of Rosedale and Fort Howard.
• He discusses the importance of making each district smaller to allow for more personal interaction and response to constituents.
• Will Barrios mentions his work with the Back River Water Restoration Committee and the need for innovative solutions to environmental issues.
• He shares his vision of making Dundalk a priority again and advocating for the community’s needs.

Technology and Infrastructure

• Will Barrios and Nestor Aparicio discuss the importance of technology, such as AI and electric cars, in improving the community.
• Will Barrios mentions the pushback on data centers and the need for community input in decision-making.
• They discuss the impact of the bridge issue on the commute and the need for local job opportunities.
• Will Barrios highlights the importance of modernizing government infrastructure while maintaining community input.

Education and Community Resources

• Will Barrios emphasizes the importance of education and making community resources more accessible.
• He mentions the Smell My City app, which allows people to report environmental issues, and the Baltimore County 311 app for reporting potholes and other issues.
• Will Barrios discusses the need for regular office hours for county council members to make them more accessible.
• He highlights the importance of representing diverse demographics on the county council and advocating for the community’s needs.

Final Thoughts and Vision

• Will Barrios shares his final thoughts on his candidacy, emphasizing his commitment to making Dundalk a better place for his children and the community.
• He discusses the importance of trust in government and the need for transparency and accessibility.
• Will Barrios mentions his vision of preparing for the future, such as the new bridge project, and making the community a priority.
• Nestor Aparicio and Will Barrios discuss their shared connections and the importance of community involvement in improving Dundalk.

Nestor Aparicio 0:01
Welcome home. We are W N S T A M 1570 Towson, Baltimore. We are Baltimore positive. We’re positively into the election season here as we get up on june 23 I’m encouraging everyone, vote. Damn it, if you’re registered, vote. If you didn’t register, get registered. Make sure you’re available to vote. We need you in this country, democracy dies in darkness, and I’m here to shed some light on that. And I’ve been talking to Republicans, Democrats, black, white, male, female, east, west, county, city. And if folks want to come on and talk about making my city, my state, my region, my county, my area, my country better, I’m here for all of that. We’re going to be doing the Maryland Crab Cake Tour, doing exactly that at Sorrento of Arbutus on the 10th. We are moving around town, doing the Maryland Crab Cake Tour, presented by the Maryland Lottery. I will have Maryland Treasures Scratch, let’s play a Maryland Scratchers. Look at Ocean City, Maryland, it’s 80 degrees. I feel like I want to get over the bridge. I got a bridge one too. Here, there you go, go over that bridge. Also, our friends at GBMC and Farnon and Dermer, they are the comfort guys, keeping me comfortable. I am made more comfortable by the fact that people actually listen to this show. No one listens, but everyone hears, especially in my homeland of Dundalk. This guy hails from the east side of town. I think we have more in common than I realize. I do not know a Will Barrios or Barrios in in, he is a Venezuelan descent, as am I. Will I don’t know that I’ve ever met you. I do eat some Chick-fil-A food from time to time when I’m over the east side of town, and I’ve seen your messages, and a lot of other messages, because I live in the county, and your stuff suits me. And we’ve got two more seats. A lot of county people don’t know that, so I’m trying to educate people that if Ertel was your former councilman, you may be into, you know, a different.. you may be in David Marx’s. Things are moving around, things are shifting, including up in the Hereford zone. Dude, you’ve rolled your sleeves up, you’re like not a politician at all, you’re an East Side guy, Todd Crandall. How are you, Todd, by the way? And I went to middle school and high school together. I’ve known Todd 45 years. He sent me a text, quite frankly, about the Orioles melting down about two weeks ago, and I heard from him, but I haven’t had him on the show. You’re running in a seat that there’s gonna be some change in the East Side of the county, will, and I think she wanted to be a part of, so I don’t know you at all. Welcome on a pleasure, and even more so, I don’t meet anybody whose dad’s from Venezuela who’s a gringo like me. So, shout out to you, bro.

Will Barrios 2:31
Appreciate you, sir. Yeah, so like you said, I’m from Dundalk, lived here my whole life, almost 40 years, and you know, never really envisioned myself jumping into politics, but I really, you know, really wanted to change the hometown where I grew up, right? It helped shape me, help make me become the man I am. Really very family-oriented, focus on the community, and you know, I realized the older I got, my oldest son’s now going to be five in August, and my youngest boy will be two in September, but you know, you really start to notice the inadequacies and things that are going around in your hometown the longer you kind of stick around, and then once you have kids yourself, right? My son

Nestor Aparicio 3:17
lives in your district, so talk to him in his wife, because they’re gonna vote. Yeah,

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Will Barrios 3:21
yes, sir. Yes, sir. Beautiful. So, and then I know you too, you know, talking about the Dundalk High School expansion and things like that. That’s great. You know, that’s kind of where my head is. My children are young enough where I’m trying to start now and kind of plant that seed, so that way it’s able to grow in the future. But you know, it’s an uphill battle. Change is hard. Nobody likes change. Things have always been done a certain way in the county, right. And so I’m coming in sort of as an outsider, I guess you’d say, and trying to shake things up, right? Like you said, your platform, you talk to all people, Republicans, Democrat, Independent. I think the best ideas really should win. I don’t think it should matter what political party you come from. I really think at the end of the day, if you’re trying to genuinely improve people’s lives, that’s what should matter, right. And so I’ve come, you know, yes, I might not have been prepared to run originally, but once I made the decision, I made sure I leaned into it fully, right. So building my platform, starting last year, working with the app developer to create an app, so that way people can sort of voice their complaints online, but in a sort of different way than social media, you know, where social media is very confrontational, sort of things get posted, there’s a lot of attention on it, for one day, and it kind of disappears. Social media

Nestor Aparicio 4:34
were more focused on solving problems, right? Like, here’s the problem, let’s not bitch about it, hold our nose fingers, like, Who’s responsible? and who’s going to fix it, and that’s really what government’s about, man. And that’s why I got involved with Baltimore Positive, like I’m like you, dude, I chase rock stars and athletes around all of my life until the shit hit the fan in the city, and the city’s on fire, and everybody’s going to prison, and then then this clown takes over the government 10 years. Ago, the federal government, so I’m all in. That’s why I’m sitting here talking to you today, instead of talking about the Orioles today, right? Like, so I am. I’m the angry Venezuelan gringo from Dundalk, who is, you know, has a little bigger, a bit of an audience here over the time, and I feel like I’m not trying to spoon feed anybody anything, but I think you said inadequacies. I love that word, because that, that doesn’t, that, that, that, that just means like we can make it better, you know, exactly.

Will Barrios 5:27
So, so I know, and I know it’s a big vision, right? The simple vision is cleaner, safer, well-lit streets, right? It sounds simple, it’s not, it’s easier said than done, right. We have a lot of problems here, especially since the key bridge went down, so I’m trying to address all those, but the broader vision, right, which is a much tougher one, is to bring hope back. You grew up here, you know how things used to be here. I hate saying it like that, makes me sound older, but the steel plant used to be here, GM. I have two grandfathers that both retired from GM, one also worked at the plant. I have another cousin that worked at GM, here they shut the plant down. He moved to Dover, they shut that plant down. My father-in-law, so I didn’t even know that, but when I met my wife, he was working at the Allison plant out in White Marsh. So industry connects everybody here from Dundalk, I don’t care who it is,

Nestor Aparicio 6:17
community, right? Yes, sir. And I

Will Barrios 6:19
know sometimes they call you, I heard they call you that, you know, the Kevin Bacon of Baltimore. We have a lot more connections too. We can get into that later after I give you my pitch, but yeah, really, that’s what it came down to. I don’t, I don’t like saying pissed off, but it really came down to being pissed off. And finally, just was there a moment,

Nestor Aparicio 6:37
was there something that pushed you over the top? I mean,

Will Barrios 6:41
so ever since, again, I try not to talk about national politics, but ever since 2016 that’s when the real fire got ignited to me to want to run, right? When this person, surrounded by

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Nestor Aparicio 6:50
people that you love and care about, who are buying into that, and yes, we’re all, we’re

Will Barrios 6:55
all, and that’s another thing, is our town used to generally be a more blue-collar, blue vote Democratic town, in the past four years, I would say it definitely has shifted to that more rare stone minute. So,

Nestor Aparicio 7:07
I, you know, I come from that era, right? I mean, and I talked to Ted Venetoulose many times about the issues in Dundalk in the 70s and the 80s, and what my father went through, being a Bethlehem Steel, you know, employee. My son lives in the house my father bought in 1953 Colgate, you know what I mean, like my son is of Hispanic descent, he’s got a Venezuelan grandfather as well, so we’re all here, and you know, my son talks about his neighborhood with Latin immigrants and pulling the shades down, like, like, you know, like, like, this is Amsterdam, that’s really scary, you know what I mean? Like, Anne Frank diaries are being written in Colgate, right? Literally, yesterday,

Will Barrios 7:49
my mother-in-law, and I will say this, this is interesting about the election. I knew when I put my name on the ballot, literally half of my family probably wouldn’t be able to vote for me, just because who they registered for, right? Because in primaries, you can only vote your party line, and I have some family members that literally can’t vote for me in the primary, right? So yesterday, my mother-in-law experienced the same thing. She thought it was the regular police, but it actually was ICE that came knocking on the door. The family has to move out, literally yesterday, so they’re on their way to Silver Spring, where there are a lot of resources. But again, I really am trying to focus on the local things that I can change. I can repair the potholes, I can pass local bills that can help protect the waterways here. And then I can also advocate really big for our district. Right? I know you mentioned you were friends with Todd Crandall, he’s done a lot of great things for our area. A lot of people point to Trade Point Atlantic, and I’ll talk about that in a minute, but Fort Howard is probably one of the biggest things that he’s used as cancel manic courtesy to help protect our area, and that was a big thing for people in our area, making sure it didn’t get overdeveloped, making sure it was protected. I actually am one of the few opponents that are against cancel manic courtesy, and when I came in, I was kind of, you know, uneducated, didn’t know, really started learning a lot from Nick Stewart, and what council made it courtesy on the surface, it sounds like a good thing, you know, you’re able to say yea or nay, or kind of what comes into your community, but that is actually kind of what allows pay to play politics to happen. It’s got sort of like a fiefdom, or you’re sort of like a king of your own district, and you can, you know, you get to say what comes and what goes, and that’s essentially how pay to play works, because these developers come to whoever’s in charge at the time, and either there’s back-end deals or things that happen where the people aren’t put first, right? Politics and money is put first over the people, and that’s really what I’m trying to get back and focus on. Nestor is just let people have the voice at a table, specifically our district, Dundalk, Turner Station, Fort Howard, like I was just talking about before the show, we’re talking about Yaya, is right. So, Yaya is actually going to be in our district when we transition to the nine districts. That part of Rosedale will become part of the new District Nine. So, really just kind of outreach and District

Nestor Aparicio 9:53
Nine, what’s in and what’s out as an audience standpoint. Yes, speak to that, because I can put a map up, dude. Yep. I live here. I take this ish seriously. I put a lot of time into this. I’ve got Izzy on later today. I’m chasing Julian down. I’ve had Nick on, you know, Dyer on, like, and I think the people in this county don’t know how quickly things can change from, you know, one councilman to another council, council person to another council person, but what happened in this county with Kathy Klos Meyer and Johnny O leaving, and these seven people getting together and putting forth a person to run the county that I don’t even feel comfortable that I could interview on my radio show lucidly it as a taxpayer, a business owner, a citizen, and a voter in the county. What’s going on in the county is I don’t want to – it’s not catastrophic, that’s the wrong word, it’s just a big change, and it could be catastrophic if we don’t know what the hell we’re doing here, right? Yes, sir. So we couldn’t make good decisions in this election, because the expansion from seven to nine, and a fresh look at what a county executive is going to be for the next four eight decade, wherever it’s important for our county. That’s why I’m putting it’s super important. Well, you know, this is

Will Barrios 11:16
one of the most important elections that we’ve had in our county. For one, it could be one of the most historical elections, too. It’s been a while since we’ve had a woman in county council, but it could be the first time we have an African American woman in the council. And then myself, too, running as a Hispanic – they’re actually, I believe, three – don’t call me the exact number, but there are three candidates running that could be possible for Hispanic candidates in county council. Yang type for one second, that’s when I’ll explain the map real quick,

Nestor Aparicio 11:39
please.

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Speaker 1 11:41
Bubba, Bubba, Bubba,

Will Barrios 11:46
so when we’re talking about the Net Map Nestor, the biggest change in our district, so we used to be District Seven, now we’re District Nine, you know where the 702 bridge cuts across over to Essex, that that’s basically been cut off, so all that is the new district eight our district goes, excuse me, from where it’s been all the way down to Fort Howard, Sparrow’s Point, obviously Turner’s, and then the new area we’ve, we’ve absorbed is up in Rosedale, so like I was mentioning, the end of it is up where Yahya’s Bakery is, and then it sort of travels south down, we’re gonna resort Rosedale, yes, sir, Route 40, basically to the west of Route 40. So, the good thing is, is it’s made our each district a little bit smaller, and I feel that it is going to allow the councilman to have a little bit more either personal interaction or sort of response to the constituents. The other thing I want to achieve that is by modernizing our government. I know you’re a big AI guy. There is a lot of pushback on AI data centers, but I do see a lot of benefits. But in terms of the actual infrastructure, I’m totally against that part of it. But in terms of the technology, I do support it, and I think there’s a lot of great benefits. I know when you

Nestor Aparicio 12:54
fight technology, you’re chasing your ass with your elbow, because for me, you know, electric cars would have changed everything here. Driverless cars are going to change things and save lots and lots of lives. So, like, and I can fight on all of this, but like, I remember talking to the old white guys that are running the country now, the Trump era Republicans, those rich people, when I started telling them about phones and how they looked at me and their eyes crossed, Steve Beschotti, Ed Hale, I mean, literally, these people, I know them. I showed them a phone in 2007 and said, this is going to, you’re going to connect to the internet and have her, and they looked at me like, well, we got to stop that. What’s going to happen to the typewriters? Yes, you know what’s happened to the fax machines, you know. So I’ve seen this with Napster, with my kid who’s your age, telling me, like, I’m gonna text you. I’m like, don’t ever text me, I’ll never text with you, you know. And then, so then you become a textaholic. I think the AI thing just speaks to me being a first adopter early on, and I think it’s very, very shortsighted to think that we’re gonna stop AI here and let the rest of the world have it, will you be nuts, like 1000

Will Barrios 14:03
safe, responsible ways to do that, and then in terms of, you know, why are we trying to use, we have so many miles of beautiful waterfront here in the county, you know, I think the memorandum, the pause that was put on data centers was important, it’ll give us here to kind of reflect and look on that, but Nestor kind of goes back to just everything we’ve been talking about, community input. I went to a meeting for data centers out in Towson, and I’m telling you, Republican, Democrat, Libertarian, Green Party, everybody there was about three or four people who were for it, in the sense of they either had some sort of profits or they had interest in the data centers, right, but I’m telling you, there were even people who worked on the data centers in Virginia, and were coming here in Maryland, telling us how they didn’t want us to become like Virginia, literally putting up 100 mile fences and animals would get trapped in there, and just kind of seeing the devastation, and again they go up to start to speak, and you would think they’d be totally for it, because it’s their livelihood, they work, that’s how they get it. But the data shows that after the project is done, it takes about five six years, so that’s the first thing. People hear data centers are popping up, they think it gets connected to the grid within a year. It takes about five to six years before that set center is even brought online and connected to the grid. So that’s the first. Well, this is really about

Nestor Aparicio 15:15
leadership and federal leadership, because this is like the bridge, it’s not a local issue, it’s not a local issue, you’re 1,000%

Will Barrios 15:22
right. So, and that’s.. I get a lot of questions too when I’m knocking the doors. You do hear a lot about that. The bridge is a big issue here. It’s definitely impacted the commute, but as a county council person, you know, my impact on that will be limited because it is a state issue. That being said, I will push for everything I can for, you know, jobs from people in our district to go there, they have a great program starting up at CCBC for the underwater divers to learn how to weld underwater and things like that, so those are the type of things that I look for for our district. Going back real quick to the map, and then just sort of how things work, and with advocating for our district. So currently, Essex Essex is in our district. The 2027 budget has a 4242 or $47 million budget line for renovations, which is, which is awesome. The library is going to get renovated, they’re going to renovate that shopping center there, you know, where the MBA and all is. Of

Nestor Aparicio 16:12
course, Town Hall Essex should be what Catonsville is, right?

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Will Barrios 16:15
All there should be that, right. But, but my point is, is what about the Dundalk Library? So, the Dundalk Library is closing this summer for renovations. They’re fixing the HVAC, right? So, my point is, is

Nestor Aparicio 16:26
Point Library, correct?

Will Barrios 16:27
Yes, sir. The North Point Library. Sorry, I called it the Dundalk Library, but my point is, is Dundalk, or our district, is always left playing catch up, you know? Literally, our renovations are just to meet the bare minimum, whereas other counties or other districts are making huge improvements, great renovations. And again, back to Crandall’s credit, you know, he did push for this. Essex was in our district, so you know, technically it’s something good, but again, going back to next year, it won’t be in our district any longer, right? So I think we need somebody who in office who is going to fight for those who really feel like they don’t have a voice. Trust in government is an all-time low, both at the local level, obviously, in the national level, but I’m trying to restore that trust here at the national level, right? By the way, will

Nestor Aparicio 17:09
Barrios, or Barrios, B A R R I O S, if you’re in District Nine and you don’t know it, you live somewhere in Essex, Dundalk, Rosedale, East Side, my side of town, Key Bridge Side, Trade Point Atlantic, Poop Plant, all deal, where my people are from, and it turns out you’re one of my people, without even knowing, and not just Dundalk, but also a Venezuelan father. The poop plant, I want to talk about this, like Crandall, and I always were going back and forth with that. I mean, it’s the first thing you smell when you come to Dundalk, it’s the way it is, I mean, it’s always way it’s always been thoughts on that is as a general source of what becomes the middle of your district in regard to when people visit, you know what I mean, and they don’t understand that it’s city, the city’s incredibly, that’s exactly where I was gonna go,

Will Barrios 17:55
they’re heavily involved, that’s part of the problem, I’d either like to get full county control back with that, it’s in our backyard, they don’t have to smell it, or this is even better, because it works also too with our law enforcement, keeping the street streets safe, but build a better relationship with the city government. Right, Dundalk Avenue shares a border with the city as well, and I think our police officers are stretched thin, both on the county side and city side, so any sort of resources working together will help that, but in terms of the Pluto plant, I’ve been working with Back River Water Restoration Committee, they do a lot of great work for the, you know, the organization, the community, there’s a lot of people

Nestor Aparicio 18:34
that care, some of them are running for, oh my goodness,

Will Barrios 18:36
they care so much, yes sir, and I think the solution is there’s no one easy solution, but look at what we’re already doing in our great state. I love Maryland. I love Baltimore. I love everything about us. And then at the aquarium, you know, they, they have the floating wetlands exhibit, which took a long time. I think it was a 10 year project, $14 million on cost, which does sound like a lot, but if we can replicate that at Back River, I think we’ll have so much success. I mean, granted, yes, I do think it’s a little bit dirtier here than it is the harbor, but the harbor is filthy, right? So, if that floating wetlands, it’s been successful just in the one two years that it’s been launched officially, high price tag, 14 million, but yeah, for clean water, I don’t think you can put a price on that, right? The basics, it’s really going back to the basics, clean air, clean water, but I want to get innovative with how they’re using that other thing on the poop plant Nestor that people might not know, six of the dryers have been offline. There’s usually six dryers that are out there drying the material to be shipped off, which is crazy that we ship it off too. That’s a lot of calls. Why don’t, why don’t we have that here? But all six of them have been off since January, right? So that that increases the smell, that makes it worse. And again, these people aren’t here to actually smell that. We are the ones that live in the community. There is an app, so it’s called Smell My City. If you download the app, you can report every time you smell something funky wherever you’re living.

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Nestor Aparicio 19:49
Really? Okay. Yes, sir. Yeah, and it is

Will Barrios 19:51
really good to kind of have those resources, but again, people don’t know about that. So, a big piece of my platform is education, just getting the word out there, letting people know that these. Resources already exist, but then also creating new resources to make it even more easy, you know. We can hop on our phone and order pizza. It should be just as easy to report a pothole, which again it is. There is an app, it’s, you know, Baltimore County 311 app, and you can report potholes or power lines or anything you need. But my issue is that it’s county wide, right? So I’m trying to focus on all of these districts, especially with expansion of two new districts coming up, and seeing how we can make local government more accessible to the average individual, but then again, just making sure everybody’s voices are heard, a voice at the table, you know, we talk about the previous county council and sort of make up of older and typically Caucasian folks, right, so we’re trying to just have the demographic be represented on that council, and it’s, it’s going to be a lot of work, but, like I said, if we can focus on those basics of safer, cleaner, and well-lit communities, I think that’s going to make people want to invest in Dundalk again, and sort of get that, you know, Dundalk used to be the highest per capita, you know, in the whole state, there are more people from

Nestor Aparicio 21:01
Dundalk than from anywhere, because there were more of us there, because there were 90,000 of us crowded in there, you know, at one point, and, and still a lot of homes, and a lot of affordability, lot of potential,

Will Barrios 21:12
lot of potential, yeah,

Nestor Aparicio 21:13
and you know, we could talk prime safety schools, education, Latin involvement, you and me growing up, and, and getting older, and and we’re not going anywhere. We’re not going to Venezuela. I’ll tell you that we’re going to Dundas for sure. Will Mario’s is here. You can vote for him on the 23rd if you’re in the ninth. He’s on the Democratic side of the ticket. He has admitted there are a lot of Republicans in Dundalk. I don’t understand it either. I try to educate, I try to do Schoolhouse Rock. Here, last parting shot for you. Just in a general sense, I mean, I go to your website, it’s Borrios for Baltimore. Let me make sure I get this, Brios for Baltimore county.com is the way to find that. Protect our community, stop illegal dumping, protect our environment, safe neighborhoods, jobs, and small business infrastructure and investment. These, this, you have a whole platform up there. Just parting shot for you. I guess I’ll see you at Heritage Fair. I mean, Dundalk, for sure, like to me, Dundalks. I’m there all the time, I’m at Casas, my son lives there, I’m in your district all the time, and I want it to be raised. It’s my home, you know,

Will Barrios 22:14
yeah. And I appreciate that, Nestor, and I know just again, having the fact that you’ve grown up here and have so many local connections, it means a lot more to you than than other parts of the county. I’ll end with saying this. I’ll tell that

Nestor Aparicio 22:26
to the people. I’ll

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Will Barrios 22:27
end with saying this. My name is William Barrios. I’m running for county council, and you know, I never thought I’d be in this position or want to be a politician. I’m not running for the title, I’m not running for the office. I’m running to make my district a better place for my children, for your children, for everybody. It does upset me, you know. Our voting system, and how it is in the primaries, it’s closed primary, which, you know, anybody could vote, but I believe the best idea should win. I don’t think left, right, Democrat, Democrat, Republican, we’re fighting the wrong fight. We’re fighting each other, right, instead of sort of seeing it’s a top-down thing, it’s the powers that be that are sort of trying to distract us with these things that we fight each other, and you know, dumpster shot, dumpster fire is distracting us from the bank robbery, right? And I feel for like a long time government hasn’t done its job to be here for the people and make it less difficult to get the services you need or to have your voice heard. So that’s what I want to do when I’m elected county council, I want to make it so that anybody can reach me. Right now, Nestor, they don’t have office hours for county council members, which I think is crazy. I’m going to hold regular office hours so people can reach me now to get in touch with me, but I just want to be the most accessible candidate, accessible candidate that’s been in office, and I just want to make the hometown and place that raised me a better place for my children, and going forward, the Woods quote, you know, you might plant a tree, might plant a seed in a tree that you might never sit in the shade of, right. So I know some of these things are longer-term projects, but some of the shorter things we can fix immediately, you know, the potholes, the infrastructure, the safety, right, and get prepared for when that bridge is that new bridge is ready, 20, you know, 2030 2031 whether we’re talking now with the sooner than that. Let’s get ready, hopefully sooner, right? So, but you got to live in Nestor, you were here in Dundalk’s heyday. I was just a kid growing up, right? But I want to get back to that. I hear all our elders tell me about it when I’m knocking on doors, how it used to be. I saw it in my own family, people were able to retire from GM. That’s not even a possible loved my childhood,

Nestor Aparicio 24:24
Dundalk. So, I’ll just say that out loud, bro. I love that.

Will Barrios 24:26
Thank you for saying that, man. Not a lot of people do, and that’s real quick. I’ll end with that. That’s one of my things, too. Prepare me

Nestor Aparicio 24:31
for life, for as long

Will Barrios 24:32
as I know, and has always been a punchline, right? It’s always been a punchline. Oh, the poop plan, or it stinks, or the crime, or this and that. I wanted to be a priority, right. I’m tired of Dundalk being a punchline, I’m ready for us to be a priority, and I’m ready to fight for that and advocate for us and do whatever it takes.

Nestor Aparicio 24:46
Yeah, the last time that they sent Dundalk, Venezuelan to Towson, it was me. Look at how that turned out, you

Will Barrios 24:54
ruffled some feathers, Nestor. Hey, man, I really appreciate your time, I know it’s tight, you got. Go, man, but real back to the Kevin Bacon thing. We have so many connections that are unrelated there. John Z, and I used to play in the Baltimore Ravens marching band, so I played there from 99 to 2000 Actually, got to be in the Super Bowl parade. I saw you had Sean Merriman on your show last week. My work with Chick-fil-A, which is actually with Little Blue Menu, which is like a one-off restaurant. We can, we can get into that conversation later, but I helped them with this coat drive, my second year there at Little Blue Down in College Park to help him with his coat drive. Lights out, so it was really cool that it worked out. And then just the whole Venezuelan thing, man. 50% Venezuela, my dad’s from Venezuela, grew up in Dundalk. And then my dad was really big, man, on baseball, on, you know, my parents were separated, but when I did see my dad, he was always big on that, and always loved telling me about Venezuelan players. This is one of the 73

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Nestor Aparicio 25:43
aparicio. Look at

Will Barrios 25:45
you, yeah, man, one of my most like literally prized possessions that I got from him. Okay, and I just, you know, I’m thankful every day for people like you, really just trying to spread the word, do good in the community, and come from a genuine place of sincerity. So I’m gonna come have a sandwich

Nestor Aparicio 26:00
with you at some point, and we will, man. I had a Venezuelan Uber driver in Pittsburgh two weeks ago. I didn’t even mention I went to Pittsburgh, I snuck in, I saw Springsteen, but I had an Uber driver from Venezuela that I will share with you offline, but he was a person like you running for the mayor, and, and he was an assassination person, and the American government got him out of Venezuela and put him in Pittsburgh, and he drives Uber and brought his family for Venezuela six years ago, and he’s working a life in America because Maduro was going to have him killed,

Will Barrios 26:40
that’s crazy,

Nestor Aparicio 26:41
like, and I literally jumped in an Uber with that. That’s what’s going on in Venezuela. Yeah, we didn’t have that going on in America. So, Will Barrios is running for a ninth district councilman in Dundalk. You can check him out at Barrios for Baltimore County. I am Nestor. We are WNSTA in 1570 Towson, Baltimore. We never stop talking, making Baltimore better and Baltimore positive. Stay with