If I am six forty, you're listening to wake Up Call on demand on
the Heart Radio app. It's time for your morning wake up call. Here's
Jason Middleton. Morning everybody. This is your wake up call for Tuesday,
July fourth. I looked on the calendar, can't figure out what today is
special for. So we're gonna get through the rest of the show and see
if something pops up. Person headlights. Coming out of the newsroom. Five
people are now dead and two children injured after a mass shooting in Philadelphia.
Police say six people were shot in the attack. More on this in just
a minute. Authorities are calling the deaths of six people in a South Carolina
house fire home homicide. One surviving victim was found in critical condition at three
year old man is in custody, and travelers are still dealing with issues at
airports as we head into the fourth of July. Flight Aware reports around three
hundred flights have been delayed already this morning. Nearly two hundred flights have been
canceled across the country as well. And some other stories coming out of this
morning's newsroom. Five men have been killed in a shooting in Philadelphia. Two
boys ages two and Thirteen were injured in the shooting last Monday night. Police
Commissioner Daniel Daniel Outlaw says the shooter was arrested this mail was wearing a bulletproof
vesse what multiple magazines in the vest. He also had a scanner and an
AR style rifle and a handgun. She says. Investigators are trying to find
out figure out why the man targeted innocent people and some pet owners on the
East Coast had their dogs backs and a couple of bear fights over the weekend.
Two dog owners, both over sixty, fought back at black bears after
their dogs were chased on their properties. The first was in Maine on Friday,
when a woman punched a bear in the nose after a bear was chasing
her dog near her home. The bear bit her hand for her trouble and
then ran away, according to the Main Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife.
The second incident was on Saturday, when a man in Connecticut was hurt fighting
off a bear when his dogs started chasing it as the bear was attracted to
bird feeders. Wildlife experts say the best way to stay safe in a black
bear attack is to fight back. Brian Brewman KFI News if Califire could get
pay raises for life. A bill that would allow for automatic races is making
its way through the state legislature. Califier Union president Tim Edwards says a starting
firefighters hourly rate is fifteen dollars fifty six cents compared to the rate of twenty
two an hour target and in and out if past, salaries for CalFire employees
would move to within fifteen percent of the top twenty highest paying fire departments in
California, and the union would no longer have to negotiate rates of pay with
the Governor's office. The HP has had automatic races for years. Steve Gregory
came, if I knows well the first topic for today on wake up call
is July fourth, related with the fireworks. But but as fire in the
story angle, it means we have to have the LAFD on because they know
the best. David Ortiz is one of lafd's public Information officers, also known
as a PIO. Please tell all of LAFD thank you so much for everything
they have to do this week. It's a heavy lift, for sure,
it's a heavy summer. But particularly I know when the pios go out.
It's kind of a big deal. What is the main thing people want to
talk with you about this week? The big message that we are getting out
this week is fireworks, fireworks safety, and the halves are that fireworks pose
to our neighborhoods. All right, well, let's start with just an example,
Long Beach. You can't have any fireworks. All fireworks are illegal in
Long Beach. Would you guys like to see that happen across Los Angeles?
Well, that is the law in the majority of municipalities throughout the County of
Los Angeles, About seventy six out of the eighty eight municipalities in Los Angeles
Counties have outlawed any type of fireworks, even those that are called safe and
sane. So there are a few small cities in the County Los Angeles that
you can purchase these supposedly safe insane fireworks, but it is illegal to bring
them into the other seventy six cities, including the City of Los Angeles,
including city of Long Beach, it is illegal. And the reason is these
are not toys. These are not safe for children. And we're trying to
protect our communities and change the culture where people still see these fireworks as toys.
So, David, what if I see a neighbor who hasn't gotten the
message and decides he wants to blow off a couple of fireworks, especially when
it's one hundred degrees for a few days a row, what should I do?
Well, The message that we're getting out to the folks is that fireworks
are illegal. Obviously the law enforcement agencies have they're handsful. You just have
to go outside of Fourth of July and look at the Los Angeles skyline and
see all these fireworks that are aerial shows. All these fireworks are illegal in
the state of California. Period. Any aerial firework is illegal in the entire
state. Even in areas where they do sell safe and saint fireworks, aerial
fireworks are illegal. And the reason is you cannot control where they land.
They can land on your property, they can land on a gas station.
They start dozens of rubbish fires, they start the dozens of tree fires,
and the fire department runs around, runs through, wheels off on the Fourth
of July trying to catch up. We do encourage the public to let law
enforcement know that you know your neighbors are using these. But the main thing
that we worry about is the people that are selling these These fireworks are stored
in manner that is not safe, in garages that reach very high temperatures,
are not well ventilated. And just a couple of years ago we saw Ontario,
they had a very large explosion where two people perished and the whole neighborhood
got reigned on debris from this fireworks garage full of fireworks that exploded. And
that's just one example that unfortunately, these people that are selling them out of
their garages are not trained, are not certified, are not licensed, and
it's a hazard to communities. Not only are they a menace, not only
are they a danger, but they also cause injuries. Every year in the
United States, there's thousands of children, especially young children of the age of
four, who received permanent injury from fireworks blowing off fingers, blowing off or
burning themselves. And we just had a press conference last Friday where a brave
young little girl aged twelve at the time a year ago, who lost most
of her fingers on her left hand because she thought this was just the smoke
bomb, and unfortunately she was wrong. And yeah, we see these injuries.
You know, children running around with little sparklers that you know, their
heat is a thousand degrees. One touch of these sparklers into another toddler's eyes
or their own eyes and they you know, they lose an eye immediately,
so there's no forgiveness. They explode very quickly, quicker than any human can
react or get out of the way, and there's no forgiveness. The only
reason why they continue to be sold here in California is because it's a tradition
of a small group of people whose lielihood depends on selling fireworks every season.
So I feel for these people that you know, they make their living off
the sailing fireworks. But unfortunately it's it's not safe. It is not safe
for our communities. It is not safe for our neighborhoods. We just had
a winner with a lot of grass in the hills. It's all dried out.
It's prime for any spark to start a brush fire. Yeah, I
know, that's a tough anecdote about that poor girl. We're speaking of.
David Ortiz, he's a public information officer with Los Angeles Fire Department. Let's
talk about the four legged friends that we have. I know, my puppy
at home is not a fan of fireworks. What do you have on that
one? Yeah, number one day for animal services to receive lost animals that
many times are not reunited with their families. And unfortunately a lot of these
animals are going to have to be put down because they run out of room
to keep them in animal shelters. And so, yeah, they get a
lot of animals that run away from home horrified of the sounds. But even
worse is our veterans. Our veterans that came back from fighting in Iraq,
came back from fighting in Afghanistan, and a lot of them suffer from PTSD.
They get to relive the horrors of war once again on the fourth of
July when people are shore enough fireworks and there are even people who shoot their
guns into the air in many areas on the fourth of July, those bullets
are coming down somewhere and we at the fire station. Actually we actually stay
in the fire station as much as possible to avoid these falling rounds that come
down in the neighborhoods. David, thank you so much for raising awareness this
morning. I do hope you have a good festive and safe Fourth of July
celebration. We've been speaking with David Ortiz, He's LAFDS public information officer.
Thanks again, David, thank you, thank you for having us. Now
another one for July fourth. More than one in three Americans don't know exactly
what the fourth of July commemorates, the signing of the Declaration of Independence back
in seventeen seventy six. That's according to a survey out from One Pole,
which quizzed a thousand people who identified as Americans on their knowledge of civics and
history. A couple of quick stories coming out of the K five to twenty
four hour newsroom before we go to break, A man in San Diego has
admitted to hiding his mother's death for more than thirty years so he could collect
benefits meant for her. Prosecutors say the man pleaded guilty last week to social
security fraud and money laundering, which resulted in the theft of more than eight
hundred and thirty thousand dollars. He agreed to pay back the money and any
fines, and to give up the house he bought in his mother's name.
Sentencing is set for September. And a fifteen year old boy has been attacked
by as shark while surfing in Fire Island at New York. Police say the
shark bit the boy in the foot yesterday, but he was able to swim
back to shore. They say his heel and toes were intact and he was
treated for non life threatening injuries. Park officials say they are increasing drone patrols
over local beaches ahead of the busy summer season. The strike by thousands of
hotel service workers during one of the busiest holiday periods of the year continues without
any sign of progress. Members of Unite Here Local eleven began striking this past
weekend at more than a dozen hotels in LA and Santa Monica after their contract
expired. The Dodgers have placed their ace on the injured list. LA has
moved Clayton Kershaw to the fifteen day injured list because of left shoulder soreness just
before the All Star break. If it bears in the woods, fly over
it and leave it alone. That's how the San Bernardino County Fire Department reacted
after nine one one calls yesterday from Mount Baldy. No humans were involved in
the interaction. At the bottom of the hour, Former Olympic gymnasts and metal
winner Shannon Miller is going to join us. We'll talk about the recent Simone
Bile's announcement to return to performing. We're also going to cover Shannon's own fight
and defeat of a cancer diagnosis right now. I wanted to do a whip
around when it comes to business stuff because the markets are off today, which
gives us the chance to kind of reset. But there was enough news otherwise
to really get going here. Walk now some Twitter and anti Twitter news,
and that's an excuse to use a little music bed too. Meta. Facebook's
parent company is launching its answer to Twitter Threads. The Facebook and Instagram parent
company teased its microblogging app yesterday by putting it up for pre order on the
Apple App Store ahead of its US release this Thursday and its world wide release
the following day. There's no better time for an app to be taken on
Twitter, let's be honest. Ever since Elon Musk's controversial takeover of Twitter back
in October of twenty twenty two, Old Man, is that a dog year.
The platform has seen an exodus, to say the least. I've referred
to it on several shows as a dumpster fire and a diaspora. Rivals like
masted on Hive Social and others have managed to lure some Twitter users to their
platforms, especially after Musk ordered unpopular changes such as the purge of those unpaid
blue ticks that some celebrities push back against as well as other power users,
and the devaluation of content moderation which changes the tenor of the conversation period on
Twitter. Now this week, after Twitter set tweet viewing limits, Blue Sky,
which is a decentralized Twitter like social network built by former Twitter employees after
Musk's mass layoffs, was overwhelmed despite invite code only sign ups and had to
pause registrations. I am on Blue Sky. It's still in beta. If
you could get a code to get in, go ahead and do it.
I've been testing it for a few months and it's worth it. The tenor
of conversation is better, the feed is more reliable as far as a platform
goes, it's more stable. What's not mentioned here was actually Blue Sky was
being what they called dog fooded in within Twitter while Twitter was still Jack Dorsey's
company before it was sold to Elon Musk for that buyout. So this is
this was kind of an existing project that exited when all the mass layoffs happened,
but it already started within Twitter. At the time looked like it was
maybe going to be built as a version three point zero Twitter. After the
Twitter went from well increased its character count. Now this is a more traditional
type of metastory. Greta Gerwig's Barbie opens globally July twenty first, but not
in Vietnam because of disagreements over a line, a demarcation, a geopolitical reason,
a first, a quick scene center the best day ever. It is
the best day ever, so is yesterday, and so is tomorrow in every
international forever. But Barbie is far from the only film to be banned over
the nine dash line. That's what it's called. It first appeared back in
nineteen forty seven. This is when China drew a line geopolitically in the waters
around South China Sea to say this is what is our territory. And it
was pushed back against back in nineteen forty seven up till now. In July
twenty sixteen, China was told that the line could not be used to state
claims to parts of the South China. See that's a reiteration of a previous
warning. And this is mostly about Taiwan. Of course, China does reject
the ruling from the Hague. As for band films, September twenty eighteen,
Crazy Rich Asians was delayed until several edits were made. In October of twenty
nineteen, the animated film Abominable ran for a week before being pulled. There
was a map in the film that China objected to. This exact nine dash
line map appeared in a scene and it had to be pulled. In June
of twenty twenty one, Netflix pulls Pine Gap from Vietnam because it also showed
the nine dash map within the film, and the Philippines pulled Pine Gap in
November of twenty twenty one, and then in March of twenty twenty two,
Uncharted at Start, Tom Holland is pulled for the same objection to the nine
dash map being shown. No bueno if you're in China, you can't show
that in anything, and Barbie is the most recent victim of the nine dash
line demarcation. Also, geopolitically speaking, the trade war with China may not
be top of my news, but things are starting to speed up with literally
new laws and rules of engagement, not only for business, people who want
to do business in China, but any American headed to China. The US
on Friday warned about a new Chinese counter espionage law that became law on Saturday,
saying American and other foreign companies in the country could face penalties from Chinese
authorities for regular business activities, just regular doing business, soop stuff. Chinese
lawmakers this year past that wide ranging update to Beijing's anti espionage legislation. It
goes into effective course over the weekend, now banning the transfer of any information
related to national security and broadening the definition of spying overall. That could be
a zoom meeting based in China. The US is recommending Americans reconsidered traveling to
China period. The State Department in an updated advisory, said there's a risk
of wrongful detention and that US citizens could be detained without access to US consular
services or about their alleged crime. The State Department even went so far as
to say, even if you live in a US state where marijuana is legal,
don't do that thirty days before you travel there because any kind of any
kind of testing can be used under this law. Let's get some more news
coming out of the KFI twenty four hour newsroom. Now the restaurant John and
Vinnie has added a note to the end of customer bills regarding its eighteen percent
service fee, following a lawsuit filed by former servers two weeks ago. The
workers say the restaurant denied them tips and short changed them, violating state gratuity
laws. Added that the note clarifies the service fee is not a tip,
but some servers say even though the language is clearer, it has not made
a difference, with some customers writing included in the tip line and others expressing
frustration about the fee and where it goes. Three more racehorses have died from
racing or training injuries at tracks in southern California. Officials say one of the
deaths happened at Los Alamitos and two at Santa Anita, and which make a
level and deaths at that track so far this year. The State Horse Racing
Board says analysis shows that out of California's three busiest tracks, Santa Anita is
the deadliest. At least ten Palestinians in the occupied West Bank have been killed
in a large scale Israeli military operation and drone attack. More than two thousand
troops were sent to the Jannine refugee camp yesterday to uncover weapons and explosives.
Doctors Without Borders say at least forty eight people have been killed this year in
Israeli defense raids on the camp. The group has also accused Israel of blocking
access to patients. The La City Fire Department says the elderly should take special
care during a heat wave. People over the age of sixty five are at
the highest risk for heat related emergencies. The departments Margaret Stewart says dehydration can
cause heat exhaustion or heat stroke, so be consistently drinking. If you are
thirsty, then you're already dehydrated. She says if you don't have air conditioning,
you can visit cooling centers to beat the heat. You can think libraries,
senior centers, park facilities. People can visit the City of LA's website
to find resources close by to help them stay cool. In La. Chris
Adler Ka FI News OC Animal Care says pets could run off because they're afraid
of fireworks. The shelters Jackie Tran says it's best to tire dogs out by
playing with them. Or running them around before dark, going for a long
walk will really help them release all of that energy before the fireworks shows begin,
so that way they're not stress when it's happening. Trans says people should
also make sure that pets tags and microchips have the most updated contact information in
case they do escape. A window indoor business in Riverside is recovering after a
homeless woman allegedly burn the place down. Majestic Windows Indoors owner Sherry Gillette says
her business and others have been dealing with issues from homeless people daily, and
the police have a lot more important things to worry about than you know,
homeless people or people on drugs that are running around in your parking lot naked,
so it's very frustrating. The homeless woman was arrested last month. She
was seen on video throwing lit rags soaked in hand sanitizer through a window.
All of the business's equipment and inventory went up in flames. The La County
Sheriff's Department has opened a use of force investigation in connection with two people detained
after a grocery store robbery in Lancaster. A witness recorded the encounter June twenty
fourth on video. The deputies have been reassigned during the investigation. Sheriff Robert
Luna says the department will release body warned camera video from the encounter. Walgreens
is expecting to close one hundred and fifty stores in the US and three hundred
stores in the UK. Walgreens CFO announced the closings during an earnings call last
week. The company, based in Chicago, operates nearly nine thousand stores in
the US. CNN reports Walgreens will start closing stores next August. USA Today
says it's unclear which stores are closing. And competitive eater Joey Chestnut will try
to break his own record at the annual Nathan's Famous Fourth of July Hot Dog
eating contest on Coney Island. I'm gonna be sweating. It's not gonna be
pretty, but I'm gonna do whatever it takes to get those dogs down.
His record is seventy six hot dogs and buns eating in twenty twenty one.
On the women's side, eight time champ Mickey Pseudo will try and defend her
title after eating forty dogs and buns last year. Contestants get ten minutes to
scarf all they can, and the winners each get ten thousand dollars. Five
people are now dead and two children injured after a mass shooting in Philadelphia.
Police say yesterday's attack was carried out at multiple locations. The suspected gunman is
in custody and is described as a man with an AAR style rifle, a
handgun, multiple magazines, body armor, and a police scanner. The IRS
says you may have an unclaimed tax refund. To get it, you have
to file a return for your twenty nineteen taxes, but you have until July
seventeenth. The average unclaimed refund is about nine hundred bucks. The US is
recommending Americans reconsider traveling to China period. The State Department, in an updated
advisory, says there's a risk of wrongful detention and US citizens could be detained
without access to US consular services or information about their alleged crime. And then
coming up a little bit later this hour, we are going to have Maggie
mckayon, and we're going to talk about vidiots, and if you've lived in
LA for a while or coming gone, vidiots was in Santa Monica for a
long long time and then it went away, right around COVID and then it
came back and now it's an Eagle Rock. So we're going to talk with
her about their new initiative as being an neighborhood anchor. But right now on
Wake Up Call, Olympic medalist and Jim Nas Shannon Miller is going to join
a Shannon is a cancer survivor and a spokesperson for cancer awareness. June was
cancer prevention month, so Shannon's going to discuss cancer prevention, of course,
but we're also going to talk about active gymnast and Olympic hero Simone Biles.
Welcome in, Shannon, and thank you for giving us some time. I
definitely want to talk about the cancer survivor. It's a fascinating story and I
want to get your take on it. But I kind of want to lead
a little bit because you're such a deck rated Olympic athlete and we have a
little bit of Olympian news happening recently and at Simone dials and I was told
to be okay if I mentioned or asked you about that she is going to
return to competition. Are you surprised by that? I, you know,
I don't know that I'm surprised as an Olympic athlete that went back for a
second and even trying for a third. You know, something just about the
sports if you love, pulls you back. But Simone is obviously super talented
and it will be a lot of fun to see her out competing again.
It's going to be a really exciting year leading up to and through the twenty
twenty four Games, because not only do you have Simon, but you know
some of our collegiate athletes that have been inspired to return to elite like Jordan
Child, current Olympic champion Sunny League. You've got Olympic floor champion Jay Kerry
and twenty and twelve Olympic champions Gabby Douglas. So those are just some of
the previous Olympians and then you add to that the world medalists and the upcoming
talent, and it's going to be a crazy year of gymnastics. Right on,
One more quick Olympics question. It's about you though. After you competed,
do you ever go back. Do you go back to Olympics to see
competition or do you stay at home like the rest of us and watch it
on television. Yeah? Well it's interesting. So after my first two Olympics
in nineteen ninety two and nineteen ninety six, I actually started working the Olympics
as an analyst or commentator. So I've worked every Olympic Games, every summer
Olympic Games since I've stopped competing. So it's been a lot of fun.
I get that up closed and personal view of the Olympic Games, and there's
just nothing like it. I love it. Well, thanks for that insight.
That's very cool. Now let's get into what we are here to really
talk about, which, of course, is National Cancer Survivors Month. You
yourself, as you mentioned at the very top, are a survivor of cancer.
Let's start with your story of how were you diagnosed and what was the
process, and then I guess we'll get into like what you had to do
after that. So in late twenty ten, you know, there was I
was an Olympic athlete at a gold medalist, and I wasn't thinking that much
about whether or not I was healthy. But I was busy. I was
a new mom, I was young, and towards the end of the year,
I just was crazy busy and called up to cancel my doctor's appointment because
I felt healthy and thankfully I didn't skip it. I went in and it
was that morning that my doctor found a baseball science system. I left ovary
and after surgery, I learned that it was ovarian cancer. But I would
say I got very lucky. They caught it early and after an aggressive chemotherapy,
I am twelve years cancer free. And that's one of the reasons I'm
here talking about this and teaming up with Athleck to really get the word out
and to encourage others to get to those wellness visits. I don't want others
to leave their hells up to luck like I did. Right, Okay,
there's a couple of places we could go. Let's go to the pandemic recently.
Have you seen or have you been informed or did you just anecdotally know
that the pandemic maybe had people not going to the doctor as much. And
as your case is so emblematic, it's early detection is critical. Early detection
is critical, and there are so many reasons why we skip stout as appointments.
I mean, there just are, whether it's financial, or pandemic or
lack of awareness. The athlet Wellness Matter survey found that people were skipping their
appointments one and four in fact, we're skipping equipments because they felt healthy.
Some don't want to share bad news. We don't have the time. It
conflicts of our work schedule. I mean, the list goes on and on.
We don't like those paper downs. You have to sit in it.
True, there's all of these reasons why we don't go. I think my
focus and hopefully sharing my story will help others see that. We just have
to make our health of priority. We have to cut through all of the
excuses and get in there because our health is not going to wait. Cancer
doesn't care that you're busy, it doesn't care how young you are, it
doesn't care how many gold medals you have. We have to be on top
of that. And one way that we can fight cancer is by early detection,
and that means getting to those regular stamps and screening. We've been speaking
with Shannon Miller, Olympic gold medalist cancer survivor. Thank you so much for
giving us some time in some context around National Cancer Survivor's Month, as well
as your own story. Very much appreciated. Absolutely, thank you so much
for covering this. It's such an important topic and a reminder. We will
have links in the show notes for data and other places you can look for
more information about getting your own screening, because, as Shannon just said,
early detection is critical. I'm gonna put those show notes up on my show
page k IF I am six forty dot com slash macro. And to clarify
which we kind of threaded the needle with this one, because February of this
year was cancer prevention month. October is cancer awareness month, so we're we're
right in the middle there, just keeping the keeping that needle moving on awareness
when it comes to cancer. Let's get back to some of the stories coming
out of the KFI twenty four hour newsroom. Police in Philadelphia have arrested a
man accused of killing five people and injuring two others please Commission. Danielle Outlaw
says they're trying to figure out why the man shot innocent people last night,
including two kids. At this point, we don't see a connection to any
of the victims and the shooter, so we're still trying to piece it together.
She says. A second person who may have picked up a gun and
returned fire, was also taken into custody. Police in Riverside have arrested a
homeless woman accused of burning down a Window and Door business. The alleged arsonist
was caught on video throwing lit rag soaked in hand sanitizer through a window at
Majestic Windows and Doors Owners Shared. Gillette says the city is not doing enough
for small businesses and preventing issues from homeless people missus fire. This is worst
case scenario. But before this, it's the constant urination, the defecation on
your front doorstep, it's the tagging on the buildings. Gillette says. OLIVERR
inventory and equipment burned up in the attack last month. Investigators say the homeless
woman confess to the arson. Blake Trolley k if I News Okay officials say
fireworks are not going to be the only thing lighting up the night sky.
The first super moon of the summer is making appearance of the fourth. The
Old Farmer's Almanac says the moon is much brighter and about seven percent bigger than
other full moons, and if you miss it, you'll have three more chances
to see it August first and August thirtieth. In September twenty eighth. I
gotta looking to see what that meant. In folklore and things, like that,
students at Standford University will get a chance to deep dive into Taylor Swift's
music career. The class is called the Last Great American Songwriters Storytelling with Taylor
Swift through the eras It'll be taught by Stanford student Ava Jeffs, and we'll
examine the singer's songwriting through her ten albums. Jeff's is already teasing a week
by week breakdown of the course on our TikTok page. She created her own
syllabus and reached out to nearly every professor in the English department until she found
one to serve as a sponsor to help ensure the academic integrity of the class,
and it's greating. Sandy Wells k if I News Elon Musk says he's
trying to be ahead of the game by limiting the number of posts users can
read per day. He says bots are trying to get valuable information from the
social media platform. Forrester Vice president and research director Mike Prue says Musk is
taking another risk. Advertiser's care about reach an engagement. Twitter in this case
is moving in the exact opposite direction. Unverified users were told over the weekend,
they can only skim six hundred posts a day, and new unverified accounts
can only read three hundred. Verified users get six thousand, and the new
CEO at Twitter has no comment just yet. A project management firm in Australia
has sued Twitter for allegedly not paying its bills for work done in four countries.
The company filed the suit in California last week, claiming breach of contract
over Twitter's failure to pay its invoices. Court filings that show the company is
seeking payments of about six hundred and sixty five thousand dollars. Travelers are still
dealing with issues at airports as we head into the fourth of July and into
this morning. Flight Aware reports around three hundred flights have been delayed already,
nearly two hundred flights have been canceled across the country. And it's five fifty
in the morning Pacific fifty, and we have Maggie McKay with us this morning.
She's a founding partner and managing executive from Vidiots with a V. That's
a locally legendary video store that's first opened in nineteen eighty four in Santa Monica,
then a brief operational respite, and now Vidiots has reopened an Eagle Rock,
this time at a ninety four year old movie theater. Hi, Maggie,
thank you so much for giving us some time. I'm in love with
the Vidiots. I did not live in Los Angeles long enough to understand the
cultural landmark status that Vidiots had, So maybe you could start with giving us
some context around that you've just relaunched after a closing, If you could just
give us a bit of a timeline. Sure, So we opened in nineteen
eighty five. Are sounders Patty Pollinger and Kathy Tobber have really made such an
enormous impact through Vidiots film going in Los Angeles and film loving in Los Angeleos.
They opened an eighty five with eight hundred teaps because they saw a gap
in the culture and day one to be able to watch movies that they at
that time we're not getting their own access too. They also really wanted to
create a community hub in Los Angeles. They wanted to have a space where
people could come in, hang out, get to know each other, talk
about the thing that they had in common, which, of course, in
our case is film. Okay, Well, that was in Santa Monica back
in the day. Now you've reopened, and that's what I've visited in Eagle
Rock a couple of times now. My daughter came with me both times.
She's finding stuff that she can get. You guys have expanded beyond the eight
hundred titles you know that they started with back in the day. Tell us
about your new digs oh love too. So we're now sixty thousand titles on
DVD and blue right. We expanded radically over the course of now about thirty
eight years. We close our brick and mortar in twenty seventeen when it just
became infeasible to stay in Santa Monica in the footprint that we were in our
landmark building, So we started looking for a new place where we could both
reopen the video store but also create a space that would be financially sustainable.
So it was always a plan to expand videots, to include new revenue streams
and figure out how do we maintain access to the video store in the twenty
twenties and still have a financially sustainable model, And of course that came in
finding the Eagle Theater, which was a historic theater, is a historic theater
in Egle Rock, which ran from nineteen twenty nine until two thousand, when
the projectors turned off and it became a church. The space that we're in
now allows us to greatly expand both our influence, our ability to serve audiences
with the theater and flexible microcinema and community space and of course the video store.
The flexible microcinema is very intriguing to me, and first of all,
it doesn't look flexible. I know that you can adjust it, but when
you're there, it feels very permanent. It feels very cool, and the
lobby area reminds me of an old school theater a movie house. Yes,
so the lobby area is it is an old school movie house. Again.
It opened in nineteen twenty nine and we made some pretty significant changes to the
building, but they're mostly structural and we are designers with architecture. They did
such a good job of really making our new lobby, which back in the
day was really just a hallway. The theater was about a nine and the
lobby wasn't really a lobby, It was like a hallway. We expanded that
we knew we needed a smaller screening space, but a much bigger gathering space,
and so the lobby now feels very sort of in keeping with the era
of the theater, but that's all new can instruction, and we put a
huge amount of resources into soundproofing and into bringing the technology up to where the
standards are today. We also, as far as the microcinema you mentioned,
we really wanted to have a space that the community could use both a sort
of small black box theater. We have so many filmmakers on our side of
town, so many film critics and writers and industry folk who have historically been
driving all the way to the West Side to go to an award screening or
to host a friends and family feedback screening, and we wanted to create that
space for them. We also have a really amazing community of young film lovers
and young people. We wanted to be able to host birthday parties and create
a space where it's our beloved community members needed to have some kind of a
meeting, they could do that there and do it affordably. And so the
micro cinema, as much as it feels when the door is closed like a
really high end black box theater, when that movable door opens up, it
really does create this incredible community space. We could even put voting goods in
on election day. It's a real flexible space. We've already had some events
and parties in there that have been really lovely and joyful. You veered into
the cultural touchstone that I was going to ask about next, because when you
have a retail development, you have what they call an anchor store. You
have a community development, you have like an anchor, and you guys are
helping provide that an existing and cool community in Eagle Rock. Now, I
know you're buzzing really positive right now. You guys are seeing a lot of
foot traffic and your shows are great, and hopefully the concessions are flying out
there too, because I know there's a profit margin involved with that, not
that you're looking for profit anyway. Would you were going through this process,
did you run across any obstacles that you might want to share with somebody who
might be considering something similar to this. Did did you get need to push
back from the city, from the county, from the state, things like
that. So we had almost we really had unanimous support from and city entities
like our neighborhood Council, our Chamber of Commerce, and the Ego Rock Association
is another nonprofit organization that advocates for all kinds of great things in Evil Rock,
and we had very unanimous support in all those spaces. We definitely have
encountered very serious challenges. We have a one neighbor in particular who was not
particularly happy about our existence, and yeah, that's made things very difficult.
We really exist only to serve the community. You mentioned profit. Certainly,
we have to run a sustainable business model, but you don't open a video
store and a community run movie theater in twenty twenty three to make money.
You do it because you believe in the mission of it. And we're already
seeing families bring their kids in for their first, very first movie in a
movie theater. We're seeing and preteens who've really historically had nowhere community centric in
Eagle Rock to go in a space that's really seventies a week open to the
public. We see lots of kids hanging out in malls and parks and things
like that, but we really there hasn't historically been a space that's open to
them seventies a week, that's affordable, that they're welcome and safe, and
that they can come and get a hit of like inspiration and feel that they're
in a space that they belong. And so all of the obstacles, including
a global pandemic which for a five O one C three nonprofit, made things
incredibly challenging with fundraising, we have really overcome a lot of those obstacles and
we're doing our absolute best to be very very integrated into the neighborhood, be
very thoughtful and mindful of our neighbors, and take people, take care of
people as best we can so that the theater is something that's wanted and used
and appreciated by the neighbors. And honestly, for the most part, a
lot of our customers, a lot of our audience members are actually people who
are walking to the theater from their homes out of the neighborhood, which we
expected and are really really happy about. Yeah, it's definitely a walkable neighborhood.
On both of our visits, we came to visit you guys, then
we were like, hey, let's go down the Senior Fish and get something
to eat, and then we came back. So, yes, it's very
walkable. There's lots of stuff to experience and have fun with. We've been
speaking with Magie mccayshy's executive director at Vidiots. Where can we guide people online
to learn more about Vidiots, maybe some showtimes, etc. Please visit us
at vidiots the Idiots Foundation dot org. Yes, and that's where you can
find all of our showtimes. We're screening movie sevent a week. You can
find the hours of the video store and our operations where you can come and
have a glass of beer or wine hanging out with us, talk movies,
a little bit of adult beverage, you know, if that's your scene.
Absolutely, we have the best popcorn in town, so we've heard. Okay,
I'm coming back for that too, Maggie. Thank you so much for
your time today. Hope to see you soon. Thank you so much.
The lobby there is really fun, i have to say. And it is
a really cool old theater. They kept a lot of the bones. It's
easy to navigate anyway. If you're into a cinema and you like the shiny
disks. Because it has the commentary and special features, that's definitely the place
to go. With sixty thousand titles, one quick story Weather and then we
get into handle on the news with Wayne Israel's defense Ministry says the military operation
against a refugee camp in the city of Janine is its biggest raid on the
West Bank in more than twenty years. Some three thousand Palestinians have fled and
at least ten have been killed since the incursion began yesterday. Israel, which
claims to have arrested one and twenty sus bex says it's targeting terrorist infrastructure belonging
to a Janine battalion. That's a militia. Palestinians accused Israel of a war
crime. Israeli forces repeatedly rated Janine in the past year as violence flared in
the region. We lead local live in the KFI twenty four hour news room.
I'm Jason Middleton. This has been your wake up call. You've been
listening to wake up call. You know you can always listen live on KFI
AM six forty weekdays from five to six am, and anytime on demand on
the iHeartRadio app.