live coverage right here on c-span 3 again starting at 2 pock eastern today. cia director nominee william burns testifies wednesday morning at a confirmation hearing before the senate select intelligence committee. watch live beginning at sock eastern on c-span 3, an line at c-span.org or listen on the free c-span radio app. >> joining us this morning is the mayor of dayton, ohio, mayor nan whealy, and she's also the vice president of the u.s. conference mayors here to talk about covid-19 pandemic and the impact it's having on city budgets. mayor whealy, the congress is debating over on the house side $1.9 trillion in economic relief around at the same time yesterday, we reached the milestone of 500,000 deaths in this country. what has been the economic -- the human and economic toll on

cities like yours? >> well, it's certainly great to be on this morning on "washington journal" and i think like most cities across the country we have seen the human impact, the loss of lives, the fear people have of infecting their friends and loved ones, really tamping down how people move around and, of course, nokes that still have to go to work and work in person, really laying that -- that fear and concern for their own health and the health of others on their daily lives for this past year coupled, you know, just the economic impact that it's had in you are a communities which has been -- both have been significant. you add on, of course, the social and emotional well-being. human beings are meant to be connected and -- and the -- be touched by one know, and the covid pandemic has wreaked, i mean, real havoc on our communities across the country. >> included in the $1.9 trillion

economic aid package proposed by the support $350 billion for states and localities. how would that money be spent? >> well, this is the piece of the package that i think mayors across the country are most focused on. since every other package had gone through the majority of cities had really been left on the chopping block. in may with the cares funding only the 38 top cities in the country received any funding, and what we know, too, greta, is that when cities get funding, we know what we need on the ground. we know what we need for each community. each community has different issues and different needs based on its time, and so allowing local communities to make those decisions we think are really important, both for revenue replacement and cities like mine and then, you know, for frontline services like in date ourngs know, without this funding well. won't have a police class or a fire class in 2021 without

federal help so making sure that we can have the frontline services for our community which are so needed during a pandemic which will be really important, and then finally this funding can help, really help the economy overall. you know, when you talk about ppp loans and other ways that the federal government has assisted. we've also seen the stories that the really big companies have been the ones that get that funding, and, you know, i always say that the federal government defines small business of 500 or less employees but in dayton, ohio, a small business is really 50 or less, you know. 50 or 500 is considered a big business in dayton and those small businesses really have had a very hard time accessing funding sources, and so giving money directly to local communities will help get that money to the ground and get it used where it's most needed. >> "the washington post" editorial board takes issue with the $350 billion tagged for

states and localities. in their editorial today they write biden asked what could be cut from his covid relief package? here are some ideas, and they write this about that money. it is increasingly clear that the pandemic reduced states and local governments' revenue far less than initially feerksd especially considering federal aid they have already received. moody's analytics latest stress test of state finances shows that 31 states have enough money to fully absorb the economic stress of covid-19 without substantial budget cuts or tax increases. yet the house bill contemplates $510 bill in new aid including $30 billion for transit, is 30 billion for public schools and 350 billion in unrestricted funds. by contrast, they write, the committee for responsible federal budget notes $200 billion would be enough to cover states' revenue losses and extra school spending through september 30th 2023. how do you respond to that? >> well, i think they need to get more on the ground to the

communities across the country that i'm talking to, like detroit, michigan, scranton, pennsylvania, like dayton, ohio. the fact of the matter is a lot of our communities have still not recovered from the great recession. dayton before the pandemic actually had two of its best months on income tax collection in january and february and then the pandemic hit. we still have not recovered from the job losses of a decade ago. because of that, coming out of this recession will be even more difficult, and that's about a quarter of the cities across the country. so, you know, my message back is that we have been the ones on the front lines that have been fighting this pandemic doing whatever we need to do regardless if there's been federal support or not to support our communities and to protect our families and our communities, and we simply cannot continue to do that without federal help. i understand that a lot of times when you're in washington, d.c., you can get pretty myopic about these issues and i can tell you

on the ground and communities across the country there are situations where families and communities are in dire situations. finally if we don't fund cities, we will see this rescue package go slower and -- and the rescue and coming out of recession be a slower recovery. economists on the left and right agree that giving funding to state and local is the best way to really make sure our economy has what we call a k-street recovery when we open upped rather than a u-shaped economy. i think that's why the biden administration has been so supportive of state and local funding. they know how important it is for our economy to really come out as we open the doors of this pandemic really, really strong and you simply cannot do that without strong state and local funding. >> mayor whealy is here to take your questions, your comments about policy here in washington but also problems that you see

hat the local level and how she's handling it as a mayor of dayton, ohio, but also what she's hearing from her fellow mayors has she serves as the vice president of the u.s. conference of mayors. here are the lines for you. republicans 202-748-0081. if you live in dayton, ohio, your line this morning is 202-748-8003. text us at that number with the first name city and city. mayor whealy, you said cities are doing whatever it takes, even with or without federal help, so what are some of the creative ways that cities -- mayors like yourself are responding to the recession from ten years ago and then this pandemic recession? >> well, i mean, for the recession ten years ago in dayton, you know, where a -- we're a manufacturing hub for

really the world and the change in manufacturing both by trade and automation have affected pretty significantly over the past two decades and the 2009 recession did a number on us. we lost about 69,000 jobs in this region overall and still have not recovered from those numbers because of automation so the work that we've done is real an effort to -- to redistribute our economy, really invest in brewers, rather invest in tech. dayton home to wright-patterson air force base, the largest single employee in the state of ohio. use the opportunity to extend research and innovation into the private sector off the bases which is, you know, the air force's reign as we talk about here in dayton and really leverage and grow those research and engineering tech jobs. i think we're really seeing coming into fruition right before the pandemic we have

invested in developing some significant prour hubs in downtown dayton and have seen the start of quite a renaissance in our community around these small businesses and opportunities. unfortunately, when the pandemic hit, these are the places that are felt the hardest during a pandemic and getting funding and getting them to make sure they can get to pre-pandemic operation as soon as possible after it's safe health-wise is something that's really important to us. during the pandemic in dayton, you know, we've worked really hard on access to vaccination. now i think all mayors across the country are pleased to deal with whatever level of offense as we've put. that's what we call the vaccines. serious supply issues, of course, like everywhere in the country ready to receive as many vaccines as the federal government can give us. repurposing our convention center, our high school gyms to

be makeshift vaccination clinics putting a vaccination clinic in as short as 48 hours with partners. i think most mayors across the country if offered vaccines will say yes, put them on the ground where they are most needed and work through an equity lens to make sure that particularly the african-american community in dayton gets first right to these vaccines considering we have such low numbers nationally around african-american vaccination rates. >> going back to the economic investments that you made, how much money did you spend, did the city of dayton spend on those investments? >> before the pandemic it was right around $10 million for our investment in that work. we hope to be paid back from this. it was actually the largest investment that we've made in about 20 years around entrepreneurship and small business efforts. so, you know, those kind of

efforts -- we took about $20 million out of our budget last year. we cannot do that work and so you can't really -- dayton is a weak market, and it needs public sector support to get those private sector ideas going forward and there's just simply no way to do that. that's why this federal funding is so important to cities, too, and i think that's why the bide en/harris administration know and they know innately, you know, that getting the money to the ground and to the people and to the groups that most need it is the best way to make the economy recover faster. we -- and i think, too, you know, president biden learned some of the good things when working with president obama and we've shared that with mayors of the biden/harris administration and are really forward with the form had a they put forward on this package as well as their complete understanding of what cities are going through. it's -- it's been very -- i think both democrat and

republican mayors support this, and i think we will all say that it's been affirming to have a partner in the white house that wants to lend a happenedout to help communities rather than really smacking us for any efforts that we have in our communities that we've seen in the previous administration. >> our first call comes from john in nevada, an independent. hi, john, you're on with the mayor. >> yes. this is my question. i would like to know, you know, when i go into debt i have to have a plan to get out of that debt, whether it be a monthly payment or i'm going to sell something or something. what i would like to know is is it we're going to go into this debt, how are we planning on getting out of it, selling our national forests or our redwoods? >> go ahead, mayor. >> yeah, i mean, thanks for your question. look, i believe that the federal government has been pretty thoughtless around this when they did the tax cuts a few years back on the very wealthy. you know, right now our taxing

system i believe is very unbalanced putting the weight on the middle class hand the poor rather than the very wealth, and that is something that congress can quickly change and do the right thing by. to call for austerity today considering these enormous tax cuts to the very wealthy which has made our country frankly the most unequal it's been in decades is something that i think is really bad policy. now is not the time to when communities and peoples are in so much need now to say oh, now i'm worried about the bottom line. congress can fix it quickly by doing the right thing and ending some of these tax cuts for the incredibly wealthy in our country. >> brad in savannah, georgia, democratic caller. >> good morning, greta. good morning, mayor. >> caller: i'm originally from pickle, ohio soyy know something about dayton. >> yes, you do. >> caller: i grew up there during the good old gm days and things there have changed quite a bit and there's no point in arguing that savannah is vastly

different in a constitutional makeup than dayton, but as i look at the stimulus monies going forward i know that dayton as well as savannah has a separate local income tax as well as property tax where the majority of the revenues are generated. savannah being a tourist town was really hit and so, you know, their shortcomings are looking at just maintaining the public workforce. i wondered what position dayton was in and what the comparison is. is this money going to be stimulus money for infrastructure projects that were unaffordable prior to the pandemic? is this just to stop the bleed? somewhere this money going to go? >> well, it's great to talk to someone formerly from pickway and certainly savannah is a beautiful town and i've heard a lot about the troubles that the pandemic has had because of the lack of tourism and tourism cities have a significant challenge considering that's where most a lot of the funding

comes from. in dayton our funding does come mostly from income taxes. property tax is more for the school districts. it has been a more stable funding source because it is lags and the real estate market is one place that hasn't been affected that much by the pandemic unless it's commercial real estate in our communities, so -- so, john, what we will do with the funding depending on the level that it is and we're hoping that it's a full amount it's first. we will put back in place to things that we have cut to balance the budget this year, and like i said those are police recruit class every year and the city of dayton has one police recruit class that covers the number of police officers that are retiring and so, you know, if we don't have that class this year that will affect the number of police officers that we have sworn officers on the street and then the fire class as well. again, you know, those are two places that we cut this year, so should -- should we get the

funding from the federal government. those are the first two places to really fill those areas. secondly we took last year in june, we had so 2 people retired through a voluntary separation program, again, just, you know, to stop the bleeding because of the loss of income that we saw because of the pandemic, and those that created holes across the whole organization that i hear that just aren't sustainable so we'll be able to fill those holes back in, you know, and do some realignment there that i think will be really important. those will be the top priorities for us. next, we think, you know, there's -- there's places that we cut in capitol, one-time expenses, and this can be everything from snowplows to -- to police officer cars, you know. we slowed down our capitol recovery as well as, you know, paving of different streets. you keep on a paving regiment to keep your streets up to day and do we slow down? you know, when we've had

recessions before and, unfortunately, dayton, was a city commissioner at the time that we had a really big recession where, unfortunately, we're too good at this because we've had to manage with less over and over again and it's caused significant pain for our community that has had less because of these incredible difficult recessions, so next would be capital outlays that we can put back in place and should there be money after that. yeah, we have opportunities to get small businesses in a way that the federal government simply can't, so i know a lot of mayors are talking about how they can help small businesses. small businesses are the lifeblood of local communities and they have been -- hit the heard of the, and, again, when i'm talking about small businesses i'm talking about those places that are less than 50 employees not less than 5 up. those are places that maybe have the ability to do arduous paperwork that the federal government requires. cities can really walk through and really hand hold those small businesses so they are

successful. they are so important to our communities and so i know that's a lot of discussion from mayors across the country that we're looking at that, and then finally, you know, there will be opportunities to galvanize we hope with this funding, you know, for economic recovery. we don't think that it will be frankly enough to -- to take on, you know, the need that we'll need to really do what i call juice the economy, but it will give us a start coming out of the pandemic, so all of those things are really important. i also didn't mention, that you know, a lot of this will be used by public health for vaccine distributions for making sure that we come out of this pandemic. the money coming soon will help cities be able to really do that. we're doing that stuff right now on a shoestring and if we have some funding we'll be able to do that. the other thing that i want to mention that "the washington post" said that cities who have received money. let me be clear. the make and cares act in may, only 38 cities, cities over 500,000 received direct federal aid so that means like cities in

dayton had to go and get scratched from the state which we did, you know, and a lot of that money went, for example, you know, the small amount that dayton got providing masks for our communities, providing those first, you know, ppe for our first responders and for our citizens, those kind of efforts is what we use the funding for because, you know, like everybody else we weren't prepared to deal with the pandemic so needed a lot of those changes of our -- the way we do our business every day and the way we provide services to citizens. that is what that funding was used and that funding came at the very end typically when the state really didn't know what else to do with it. it wasn't really funding that cities could use smartly or as wise as what we're talking about with this package coming across to the house and senate today. >> you called it scraps. how much did dayton, ohio get? >> a little less than $15 million, and it was very specifically had to be used obviously on cares. it was used for the pandemic

itself. for example, dayton has about 140,000 people in the community. we distributed around 375,000 sks ma. i mean, most of our citizens didn't have access to masks, doesn't find them. obviously -- i have to say, greta esthat's one of the things that i wandered do the coffee shot. i'll see someone with a dayton mask so i can say they have been used across the city. we've used them for some back filling of public services for funding for first responders that had to be helped during the pandemic as well. >> all right. we'll go elaine, olimpia, washington, a republican. >>. >> caller: hi, you said that the city had really not recovered since the recession. however, i'm sitting here looking at the bls stats for dayton, ohio, and in january 20 so your unemployment rate was

12.7%, and it got down to 3% as late as december 2019 and right now it's at 5%, so i think it's really misleading that you're giving this poor pitiful me, you know, story to the listeners when the stats don't hold up what you're saying. >> all right. well, let's get a response from the mayor. >> well, i think you're right about our unemployment numbers, and, frankly, there's the just a lot of people that opt out of unemployment numbers. as we know they are one snapshot of a community. the way we define our regions come out of reinvestigations is actually through the total job number and can i tell you one out of every four regions have

not come out of the great recessions job numbers so that mean the dayton region job numbers are lower than they were when the great resome things began. that's how the -- the definition that economists take and how we follow as mayors how hour economies are doing. we put a report out every year about this number, and i look through and see how dayton stacks up on the job numbers through communities across the country. i can tell you, too, this is an issue of midwestern middle-sized cities across the country. we're not alone. the manufacturing recession. this idea of people would just move or that jobs would come back has really affected our community further. you talk about that unemployment rate. what happens in dayton right now is the wage is incredibly low and so what -- what most people do have jobs, you're right. they usually have two or three because they can't afford to even take care of their family

with the low wage that is in these jobs right now and i quite frankly don't think that's real american. you know, i believe that if someone works every day that they should have enough money to provide for their family and sadly that's not the case in most communities across the country. >> what impact would raising the minimum wage as is being proposed in this 1.9 trillion aid package, what impact would that have on small businesses in dayton, ohio and those -- the residents of your city? >> well, i think it would have a tremendous effect over all. you know, every issue that we have in our community comes back to the wage, so, you know, i'll give an example n.2019 before the pandemic we put together an eviction task force. dayton is a very, very affordable city to rent a home in dayton is around $750 so i know a lot of people across the country would say, wow, i can afford that. because the wage is so depressed

here coming out of this recession priest very many have an affordability issue with that rate and i think raising the minimum wage is a key for places that have seen no recovery from the recession and i'm talk '09 and '010. the data bears it out how unequal this has come. i would like to point out that the discussion about the $15 an hour wage is almost -- it's almost sad, frankly, greta, because if you take tat 1969 wage in america and put it into an account what have it would be today, it would be $22 an hour for minimum wage. secondly, $15 an house, still won't move a person into the middle class. it is still lower -- a lower level of, you know, really providing for their family, and so i think that this is a quintessential question about what we're about as americans. do we really believe, and as ohioans i think this is our core

belief. if you work hard, you should be able to provide for your family, and sadly that is not the case today. >> let's hear from mary in indiana, republican. hi, mary. >> caller: hi. i was kind of curious for the fact that she said that, you know, for corporate we need to raise the taxes. well, here's the thing. you do that, you're back to your high unemployment because, you know, they pay higher taxes, you lose people. when you go and talk about the minimum wage, well, most companies start out $8, $10, $12 an hour. government shouldn't be determining how much a company should be paying a person. when you go and push it, you're going to lose jobs again. you're going to have people who will want to count on the government. we here not trying to count on the government. get out there, work and support your family, but always keep in mind you have to think about what you're going do for the

future. >> i don't disagree that you should get out there, work and support your family. i think it is government control to make sure if you're able to go out there and work to support your family that you should be able to support your doesn't be, this whole idea of, you know, not taxing the very wealthy and suddenly we get, you know, better jobs. it's not born to be true. since the federal government has tried this avenue, we've seen people, you know, quality of life get worse and worse. and all i'm saying is the government should play a role in making sure that if you work, you can support your family. i think that's what we believe as americans. i know what ohioans believe. we have come here to work. we believe in working hard. but i do believe if people work hard, they should get paid enough to not worry about how to get to the food bank that evening to support their children and making sure they're fed. that's what's going on right now in places like dayton and that's not american and it's not okay. >> we're talking to the mayor of dayton ohio, nan whaley.

first elected in 2013. greg is from your city. go ahead, greg. >> caller: here in beaver creek we would like to thank you for shutting down the two golfs as our golf course has record years. why did you keep the golf course in keterring open when it's not in the city of dayton. >> one of the things we did during the pandemic was shut two of the golf courses down that the general fund was funding and supporting. the third golf course you mentioned actually funds itself and so the funds itself, we kept it open. these are tough decisions we had to make during the pandemic when we're trying to provide frontline services like police and fire services. you make my point on some of the tough decisions we've had to make during this pandemic. sometimes you have to take a hard look. and those golf courses that you mentioned that we had to close,

frankly, were not making enough money. every single year, we would put general fund dollars into those golf courses and we had to make the decision that we thought our frontline services were more important. >> mayor, here is a text -- a tweet from one of our viewers who writes, i would love to hear what she has to say on local law enforcement's ability to pick and choose what to enforce. for example, when we enacted a mask mandate, local sheriffs refused to enforce making it defunct. how do you deal with a belligerent department in a pandemic? >> i'm proud of our police officers and the work that they've done to do their best to just encourage good behavior. dayton was the first city in the state to provide -- to require a mask ordinance. we worked with the mask ordinance like every other issue that is -- what we call a lower level offenses, to get to

compliance and not to be authoritarian in it. and i think dayton police has done a pretty good job of that. that's not saying that i haven't had issues where officers have refused to wear masks and we've had to deal with those issues. our police chief is a terrific leader and we've been able to move through that. as we've continued to learn how important masks are. as i go across the community today, i don't see anyone inside not wearing a mask in our city. and i think it says a lot just about how people respect each other in our community and how they've learned to followed the science. i have to say for those of you who don't watch, dayton has had a tremendous two years. we dealt with tornados because of extreme weather, a klan rally coming from indiana in may and a mass shooting that killed and injured many.

our first responders have done a tremendous job. in 2020 with the pandemic and civil unrest, we're undergoing police reform efforts that involve the community and hundreds of people involved on zoom calls to do this work to see how we can be better with police and community relations. i think dayton, because it has gone through such difficult 2019 and 2020, there's a strength and resilience in this community that makes me proud to be its mayor. >> we asked our viewers earlier this morning, their priorities for the president's attorney general. wondering what your priorities would be. >> well, i'm certainly excited about hopefully a smooth confirmation for hopefully attorney general designee garland. i know there will be discussions around how we look at police reform. i'm hoping that the attorney general does engage mayors in cities across the country since we've been on the front lines

again doing that work and i think we have a lot to say and a lot of opportunities on how we can work together. you know, i think the big issue for me and the attorney general is, you know, to really take the politicizing that we've seen over the past few years out of it. we have great workers, great people that are committed to the justice department and it is such a cornerstone of our democracy. really putting the pride back into the justice system of being a place that is fair and nonpartisan will be very, very important. >> john is next from illinois. independent. >> caller: how are you doing? >> hi, john. >> caller: my question has to do with money. >> okay. >> caller: we currently realize this tax system where we have people trying to defend corporate interest and everything else and then we have people worrying about, you know, how much money we're giving these poor people and everything else.

we blame them for reading the rules and acting like rich people on our welfare programs. i wonder what would happen if we finally started looking at our revenue system as a business and realize that for the 98.6% of the country who makes less than congress's 1.74, we only pay 17% of the nation's income. and that 17% of the nation's income utilizes 67% of the irs resources. now, wouldn't it be more advantageous for everybody, if we implemented a 1% sales tax on the purchase and selling of corporate bonds, stocks and commodities. it frees up the irs to go after the major tax coffers and considering that more money is

lost in medicare and medicaid fraud, than is collected from this 98.6%, it would seem to me that all of our situations, all of our problems lie in the fact in how we collect our money. if we had public corporations who are on the stock market, having their sales of their stocks being taxed, well, then, we could -- we don't have to worry about their income tax level. because their income tax is not being paid anyway because they're utilizing all of the loopholes that we put in there. if every american new they were getting a $250,000 tax free, and if you're married, $500,000 tax free, it wouldn't matter what our government is spending its money on because we're not paying those taxes. >> okay. i'm going to leave it there so we can get in other voices. your reaction to what you heard? >> john, you've clearly looked

into this more than i have. i'm going to take your word for that and look it. as far as how the tax system is done in the federal government, i just haven't researched it enough to give a qualified opinion back to you. >> alan in ohio. republican. >> caller: good morning. i want to talk a little bit about minimum wage. this isn't my opinion. the only one that's going to make out on this is the government. you're supposed to be helping the lower-end people and by raising their minimum wage. okay? now, when their wages go up, everything else goes up all around the country. even the people that ain't making minimum wage. we have to pay a lot of money out. and you're not really going to help them people if everything they purchase, whatever, goes up. you're to the really helping them out. not one bit. and i want to say, thank you, joe biden, gas is up 50 cents a

gallen. and immigration, oh, my god, someone has to help us. >> that doesn't bear out. this idea that everything raises to the number of the minimum wage number, that doesn't -- economists show that's not true. there is slight increases in some things, but overall, putting more money in people's pockets actually helps people. i'm not saying, you know, this is some sort of free ride. i'm saying, pay people enough so they can support their family. somewhere along the way, we've lost our way into making sure that we give tax cuts for really wealthy people on the backs of people that are working hard every day that have to really work and receive income to survive. and we've -- you know, even those of us who do it, act like that's all right. we have to say, is it okay as americans, are we okay that if

someone works 40 hours a week, that they can't support their family? i'm not okay with that as an american. i think that's really just the basic question we're asking when we're asking about the minimum wage. all of the data shows that we should raise the wage. we show when the wage started, it would equal $22 an hour today. it's not okay to have a system that is so capitalistic that people that work can't pay for their food. that's all i'm saying. >> mayor, let's go back to the economic investments that the city has made. what makes a thriving downtown in u.s. cities? >> well, certainly, i think -- this is what's so hard during the pandemic, right, this whole idea of collision and walkability and destination building. something most communities long to get back to, right? the experience of a downtown is a place that, you know, is that collision of ideas and different people and that is walkable and

has great spaces for people to explore and that are unique and local, i think, is really important. for us in dayton, we've really worked in our downtown to also make it, you know, not be priced out for folks. we can make sure that people can of all economies live downtown, still half of our housing in our downtown is subsidized. so we can get that real mix of both race and class in our communities. we think that's the best way to really drive new ideas and to really grow our communities. there's this fundamental belief, i think, in cities that, you know, diversity is the way towards growth. and that it also promotes different ideas and creates these collisions that you don't know what's going to happen. and in dayton's history, we've

experienced that. dayton is known for being the home of the wright brothers who taught the world to fly. and they collided regularly on the streets with charles keterring who created the engine and one of the best african-american poet laureates all colliding in dayton. this isn't a supernew idea over 100 years, but we need to be intentional about it. how we can close ourselves off, only talk to who we want to in siloed community via our devices. and so downtowns and community places that build community are really the breakers of creating the democracy where people can connect and consider new ideas that may not be in their siloed idea space. >> we'll hear from joseph next in houston, texas, on our line for democrats. >> caller: good morning. >> you're on the air. >> caller: thank you so much.

i appreciate you answering my call. mayor, you're the best guest i've been waiting for for a long time. i wanted to ask you a simple question, economics 101, but before the covid-19 pandemic, businesses had a behavior that was not polite to consumers. and now that we're in a pandemic, we're living in a different means of exchange or business structure. my question to you is, how can i agree with politicians up and down the list when politicians feel that small businesses are important but our attitude as a consumer feel like they have taken advantage of us as customers and in the capitalist way that i was taught was that

let the consumer decide whether the business should be open or not. and it seems like politicians are dictating what we want to believe they should be supported to open their doors. now, i want to make this clear, i'm a democrat and i believe in increasing people's wages. but the business owners have to change their behavior back to what it used to me. can you answer that question, about how the transition between covid-19 versus non-covid-19 how consumers feel more -- are more supportive of opening up small businesses and supporting tax-funded businesses, small businesses, please. >> well, i'll try to answer your question the best i understand it. i think what we really have when it comes to small business versus large companies is, you

know, you want to talk about an unbalanced playing field that exists. amazon today has paid no money in taxes. think about that. this enormous conglomerate that most of us have something that comes to our doorstep isn't paying any taxes and then that small business has a lot of challenges on its front doorstep, right? paying property taxes that likely didn't get evaded because it wasn't as large and didn't have the attorneys that the large companies that were bringing these large number of jobs in have. it does have challenges, keeping stock up, to make sure it sells to its community. when we talk about retail, the pandemic has just had incredible effects on retail and small business. i think we have to be cognizant of this, almost like two different worlds we're talking about. and particularly with these

large companies, i think that's where i'm most upset. they don't pay taxes, they're not paying a decent wage, and, you know, they're making incredible profits for their stockholders or for, you know, the people at the very top. i think that's the big challenge of our country. for us, with the small businesses in our community, they're our life blood as to what makes us unique. supporting them is key, making sure they have the resources when we come out of this pandemic. making sure they can get the ppp loans that the big companies get very easily, is really, really important. i hope i answer your question. but, of course, you know, there will be local businesses that you may not agree with. and it's up -- again, it's your democratic right to decide where you shop or not to shop. one of the things that is becoming difficult is some of these businesses are becoming so large, it's almost impossible not to shop at them.

it might be the only place to get something that you really need anymore and i think that's the concern that we have around these really enormous businesses, really just, you know, eating every small business in our communities. >> you said you're not going to run for re-election. what is your political future? >> it's been a bittersweet decision to not run for mayor. it's a great city and i've had the honor of serving the people of dayton for eight years. i've been at city hall for 16. i was 12 when i started there. i think it's time to do something different. we're working that through with my family and friends. and we'll make an announcement in the coming weeks. >> you were one of the youngest women ever chosen for a commission seat. >> yeah. >> mayor, thank you very much for your time this morning. appreciate it. >> thank you, greta. today at 2:30 p.m. eastern, we'll hear from technology

companies as they testify on foreign hacking and cyberattacks. live coverage right here on c-span3, again, starting at 2:30 eastern today. weeknights this month, we're featuring american history tv programs as a preview of what's available every weekend on c-span3. the atom mick heritage foundation created the voices of the manhattan project oral history collection to preserve the stories of those involved in the secretive world war ii project to build the atomic bomb. we hear from lawrence o'rourke who helped develop the process for the separation of uranium. watch tonight beginning at 8:00 p.m. eastern. enjoy american history tv every weekend on c-span3. health and human services secretary nominee xavier becerra

testifies today. listen on the free c-span radio app. ♪♪ you're watching c-span3. you're unfiltered view of government. c-span3 was created by america's cable television companies. today we're brought to you by these television companies who provide c-span3 to viewers as a public service. the federal communications commission holds an open meeting to discuss their agenda, including the emergency broadband benefit program, expanding access to telehealth and protecting u.s. telecommunications networks. >> good morning. welcome to the february 2021 open meeting of the federal communications commission. madam secretary, would you please introduce our agenda this