Speaker 1: It's Nightside with Dan Ray on WBS Boston's news radio.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much, Nicole, and Happy New Year to you, Nicole.
Speaker 2: First time we had a chance to do the handoff
Speaker 2: here at eight oh six or so. My name is
Speaker 2: Dan Ray. As we head toward the midnight hour, four
Speaker 2: hours of Nightside coming up later on tonight, we'll talk
Speaker 2: with some very interesting guests. Not that we won't talk
Speaker 2: with interesting guests in the first hour tonight, but we
Speaker 2: will be talking with Massachusetts State Senator Nick Collins about
Speaker 2: his fiscal fight, if you will, with Boston Mayor Michelle Woop.
Speaker 2: Then we will talk with an author of former assistant
Speaker 2: secretary of State. His name is Robert Charles, a New
Speaker 2: England and native New Englander who worked for several presidents
Speaker 2: in the Secretary of State's office as an assistant Secretary
Speaker 2: of State. And he has just written a new book
Speaker 2: called Cherish America. And certainly in the wake of what
Speaker 2: we saw happening in the happened last night or yesterday morning,
Speaker 2: I should say early yesterday morning in New Orleans, very
Speaker 2: well timed interview with my guest, the author of Cherish America.
Speaker 2: I kind of imagine why anybody who lives in this
Speaker 2: country would have done with that that that fool did
Speaker 2: in in New Orleans. We'll get to that later. We
Speaker 2: have four guests tonight in the first night Side News
Speaker 2: update of the year. By the way, Rob Brooks is
Speaker 2: back back in the control room tonight. Welcome back, Rob,
Speaker 2: Happy new year to you as well. And we will
Speaker 2: get right to our four guests, starting off with Martin Fien. Now,
Speaker 2: Martin is talking about and is very concerned about a
Speaker 2: big increase in the deer population here in New England.
Speaker 2: Uh and uh, it's a it's a consequence not only
Speaker 2: to the deer, but it's also in consequence of consequence
Speaker 2: to us. He's with, he's the Massachusetts Wildlife's deer biologist. Martin.
Speaker 2: What's going on with the deer?
Speaker 3: You know, in general, deer populations have been rising across
Speaker 3: a lot of in the Northeast and particularly across southern
Speaker 3: New England, But in the urban areas around Boston and
Speaker 3: Worcester and Springfield, we've really seen deer densities rise with
Speaker 3: restrictions around hunting access.
Speaker 2: So as we have prevented or made it more difficult
Speaker 2: for the deer hunters to get into the woods and
Speaker 2: bag a deer that obviously has annured to the to
Speaker 2: the benefit I guess from the existence of the deers,
Speaker 2: but of the deer. But there are consequentially some other problems,
Speaker 2: which I assume include deer strikes on the roads. What's
Speaker 2: the downside? I mean, a lot of people are anti hunting,
Speaker 2: as you know, and they do not feel it's fair
Speaker 2: for the hunters to go into the woods. I don't
Speaker 2: necessarily abscribe to that viewpoint, but many people feel that way.
Speaker 2: What do the hunters accomplish and what are we preventing
Speaker 2: them from accomplishing?
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Really, when we're managing deer populations, we're first and foremost
Speaker 3: doing it from a conservation perspective. When you have over
Speaker 3: abundant deer, it has really negative impacts on forests. Essentially,
Speaker 3: the deer when they become overabundant, will start eating all
Speaker 3: of the new growth when trees are having seedlings growing
Speaker 3: up the saplings, and so when you have that, you
Speaker 3: essentially have no ability for new trees to eventually grow
Speaker 3: up into mature trees. And once you have the mature
Speaker 3: canopy fall just with age. If you don't have that
Speaker 3: force regeneration occurring, eventually you lose really force in general,
Speaker 3: and so it's really critical when we're talking about suburban
Speaker 3: areas where already force become a patchwork around all the
Speaker 3: different developments and such. If we want to preserve those areas,
Speaker 3: it's really critical to address over abundant deer Otherwise you
Speaker 3: lose that habitat for all this species that you have
Speaker 3: within the understory as well, because each of those little
Speaker 3: habitats within the understory and the canopy are where all
Speaker 3: the other wildlife lives. And so that's really the conservation impact.
Speaker 3: The other thing in Massachusetts, no.
Speaker 2: No, I'm sorry, I have a follow up question there,
Speaker 2: but go ahead.
Speaker 3: The other thing that we deal with in Massachusetts is
Speaker 3: the impact on coastal erosion. So we're already dealing with
Speaker 3: a lot of erosion due to climate change on Antucket
Speaker 3: and Martha's Vineyard, but just from regular deer behavior, they
Speaker 3: end up essentially creating game trails all throughout the areas
Speaker 3: that they move around the landscape, and on those islands,
Speaker 3: those game trails become cleve points where the edges of
Speaker 3: the islands are already regularly falling off. Here about houses
Speaker 3: that are having to be moved and really major implications
Speaker 3: on both islands, and with the deer, we're also seeing
Speaker 3: them being an additive impact on top of already the
Speaker 3: impacts from climate change.
Speaker 2: So essentially sounds to me like you're describing a political
Speaker 2: problem that there there has to have been some limitations
Speaker 2: put on the hunting community, which is a political decision.
Speaker 2: How does this get get changed, how does this balance
Speaker 2: get restored?
Speaker 3: You know, some of this is certainly political, particularly at
Speaker 3: the local municipal level that's where a lot of the
Speaker 3: decisions are made around different kinds of implement restrictions or
Speaker 3: land access. But some of this is also just an
Speaker 3: educational piece where many folks come from urban areas where
Speaker 3: you know, if you're coming from Boston, you may never
Speaker 3: have been exposed to hunting in your entire life. That
Speaker 3: was certainly my case that came from the city of Milwaukee,
Speaker 3: was never exposed to hunting and really didn't understand how
Speaker 3: important it is from a management perspective. And that's really
Speaker 3: what we try to do, is try to work with communities.
Speaker 3: The other thing is by really grounding deer management in
Speaker 3: something that people understand, and that is really you know,
Speaker 3: providing food to the table and this Two years ago
Speaker 3: we launched our Share the Harvest program where hunters can
Speaker 3: actually donate their deer to one of our processors that
Speaker 3: we pay to have the deer process, and then those
Speaker 3: actually go to food banks throughout the state. Through this program,
Speaker 3: we've now served more than fifty thousand meals across the
Speaker 3: state and it's really showing to many folks in many
Speaker 3: urban areas that have never been exposed to hunting how
Speaker 3: critically important they can be to addressing food and security
Speaker 3: and not in the state at the same time addressing
Speaker 3: those conservation needs.
Speaker 2: Okay, last question, I don't know if you can quantify this,
Speaker 2: but either in terms of how many deer should be
Speaker 2: taken again I'll use that euphemism, how many more deer
Speaker 2: need to be taken or what percentage of deer need
Speaker 2: to be increased? Put this in some sort of figures.
Speaker 2: Are we talking about the difference of a couple one
Speaker 2: hundred deer will bring everything in balance? Or is it
Speaker 2: a more significant number than that.
Speaker 3: It's a much more significant other than that. So, like
Speaker 3: our average annual deer harvest across Massachusetts is usually right
Speaker 3: in the fifteen thousand to sixteen thousand range now, and
Speaker 3: so really to be able to bring balance in particularly
Speaker 3: the eastern portions of the state, we would have to
Speaker 3: see significant rises in the multiple thousands to really just
Speaker 3: stem growth, let alone bring densities back down to healthy levels.
Speaker 2: You're talking about getting it from fifteen to sixteen thousand
Speaker 2: a year up to what twenty or twenty five thousand
Speaker 2: a year.
Speaker 3: Yeah, certainly into those ranges would be necessary to just
Speaker 3: stem growth.
Speaker 2: Okay, and how can that be accomplished if you have
Speaker 2: to fight at every local city councilor board of aldermen.
Speaker 2: Is there something that the state legislature could do with
Speaker 2: a broad stroke, because it sounds to me like this
Speaker 2: is a very you see, this is a very serious problem.
Speaker 3: The legislative routes. The things that are certainly barriers to
Speaker 3: hunters include setback restrictions, which are that you have to
Speaker 3: be at least five hundred feet away from an occupied
Speaker 3: dwelling to be able to hunt, and that includes even archery.
Speaker 3: So reducing that setback would really help in those suburban areas.
Speaker 3: In particular, there's a restriction on Sunday hunting, which is
Speaker 3: another one that certainly impacts you know, folks who have
Speaker 3: to work six days a week, not being able to
Speaker 3: hunt on Sundays is a major barrier. And then lastly,
Speaker 3: there's a barrier with crossbows where you can only use
Speaker 3: a crossbow if you're permanently disabled. And many folks in
Speaker 3: urban areas where you do have implement restrictions not along
Speaker 3: the firearm, would hunt with a crossbow if they were allowed.
Speaker 2: To be Okay, let's let us do this, Martin. Let
Speaker 2: me have my my producer get in touch with you.
Speaker 2: Maybe we'll do an hour on this, because this sounds
Speaker 2: to me like a much more important problem than I understood.
Speaker 2: And let's take some phone calls and maybe try to
Speaker 2: educate people or give you an opportunity to educate people
Speaker 2: in a more in a longer format, an hour with
Speaker 2: phone call listener participation.
Speaker 4: Fair enough, Yep, I'm good.
Speaker 2: Okay, Martin Fien, we will set that up. Thank you
Speaker 2: very much, Martin Fiann of the Massachusetts Massachusetts Wildlife's Dear
Speaker 2: Biologists will be back on nights. We have two segments
Speaker 2: coming up dealing with New Year's resolution resolutions, the psychology
Speaker 2: behind them and also what do you need to make
Speaker 2: them successful. We'll talk about those as well as some
Speaker 2: tips on protecting yourself in large crowds. You should understand
Speaker 2: why that is so important after what happened in New
Speaker 2: Orleans earlier this week. My name's Dan Ray. This is Nightside.
Speaker 2: We are back on track here right after this a
Speaker 2: couple of messages here on w Z Boston's news radio.
Speaker 1: Now back to Dan Ray live from the window world
Speaker 1: Side Studios on WBZ News Radio.
Speaker 2: All right, New Year's resolutions. We may talk about those
Speaker 2: later tonight. Everyone makes them, very few keep them. Let's
Speaker 2: talk now with Professor John Kelly. He's a professor of
Speaker 2: psychology at Endoclott College, one of my favorite schools. Professor Kelly,
Speaker 2: what is indeed the psychology behind New Year's resolutions? Why
Speaker 2: do we feel we have to make those every year
Speaker 2: because we are so most of us spectacularly unsuccessful.
Speaker 5: Well, first, cheth, thanks for having me on tonight, Dan,
Speaker 5: I really appreciate it. I do think part of it is,
Speaker 5: you know, it's a custom. So we you know, we're
Speaker 5: creatures of habit, and so we all kind of feel
Speaker 5: motivated to just do what other people do. But I
Speaker 5: agree with you, it's a real problem.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 5: I was actually at the gym this afternoon, and like
Speaker 5: every year, it was packed and it was difficult for
Speaker 5: me to complete my workout because there's a lot more people.
Speaker 5: And for one month that'll be true or so, and
Speaker 5: then a lot of people will will stop. So it's
Speaker 5: definitely a problem. Making resolutions is easy. Keeping them is
Speaker 5: really the problem. I can speak a little bit more
Speaker 5: to that. I mean, I think part of it is
Speaker 5: that people make resolutions that are are unrealistic. I think
Speaker 5: we should be looking for sort of what you would
Speaker 5: call the Goldilocks kind of resolution, not to not to
Speaker 5: you know, not.
Speaker 2: I use that phrase in many respects. Go right ahead,
Speaker 2: I know exactly what you're going to.
Speaker 5: Say, absolutely, you know. And I think just even just
Speaker 5: the idea of resolutions, I think people I don't know,
Speaker 5: you know, I think it's I don't tend to make
Speaker 5: a lot of resolutions. I see it more as you know,
Speaker 5: it's better to have a kind of a change in
Speaker 5: your life. Like people will say, Okay, I'm going to
Speaker 5: lose fifty pounds and you know, look great for the summer,
Speaker 5: and that's my goal, and they set this really unrealistic
Speaker 5: kind of resolution, and even if they were to succeed,
Speaker 5: it's not something you know that you get to a point,
Speaker 5: You get to that end point and then you sort
Speaker 5: of stop. You know, it's much better for people's health
Speaker 5: to sort of change your health as a kind of ongoing,
Speaker 5: kind of permanent change rather than you know, an extreme
Speaker 5: kind of change that you try to come up with
Speaker 5: it with a resolution. I think that's the really But by.
Speaker 2: The way, by the way, I must say that that
Speaker 2: is why I endorse Awake. In one eighty I lost
Speaker 2: thirty five pounds. It wasn't through a New Year's resolution.
Speaker 2: But the program that we endorse here at Night Side, Yeah,
Speaker 2: teaches people that it is a long term solution, and
Speaker 2: it's not just to get somewhere. It's to get somewhere
Speaker 2: to where your ideal weight is and stay there.
Speaker 5: Same way, agree completely, and you're trying to get to
Speaker 5: a point where this becomes a lifestyle. It's the way
Speaker 5: that you're approaching is not a temporary thing. And I
Speaker 5: think that's the problem with resolutions. They're sort of they're
Speaker 5: not set up that way. At the beginning, the person
Speaker 5: doesn't think this is going to be temporary. But I
Speaker 5: think they often set such high high goals and then
Speaker 5: the isn't like what you're saying, a program that you
Speaker 5: can follow through to make sure that this actually happens.
Speaker 2: Now, when you talked about the Goldielock the Goldilocks solution,
Speaker 2: it's sort of not too hard, not too not too easy,
Speaker 2: just right. I mean, some people say, well, my New
Speaker 2: Year's resolutions would be to climb Mount Everest. They have
Speaker 2: never climbed the Blue Hills. How are they going to
Speaker 2: climb Mount Everest? It's it's impossible, or that My new
Speaker 2: year's resolution is I'm going to brush my teeth at
Speaker 2: least once a day. Well, here should brush your d
Speaker 2: at least once a day. You don't need a New
Speaker 2: Year's resolution to do that. Are there's some resolutions that
Speaker 2: you that you advise people that if they're serious, that
Speaker 2: there's there's some that that are achievable and actually can
Speaker 2: have a positive impact. Are there any that from your
Speaker 2: studies have come to would come to mind quickly?
Speaker 5: I mean, I think really this is all about expected
Speaker 5: One of the things I study is expectations. It's trying
Speaker 5: to manage expectations. So it doesn't really matter what the
Speaker 5: resolution is, but your expectations have to be in that. Again,
Speaker 5: that sort of goldilock zone where you're not setting something up. Well,
Speaker 5: you say, I'm gonna lose fifty pounds in the next
Speaker 5: three months, but in your head you know this is
Speaker 5: never going to happen. Probably you know that, and so
Speaker 5: you don't have this kind of the motivation is not
Speaker 5: necessarily there. And the opposite would be something that's too small.
Speaker 5: I oh, I just want to brush my teeth once
Speaker 5: a day or something like that. You need some sort
Speaker 5: of moderately difficult thing where there's constant feedback too. Right,
Speaker 5: you can see each week or each you know, period
Speaker 5: of time that you're making progress towards that goal rather
Speaker 5: than and as you said, right, not that there's a
Speaker 5: final goal. And you know it's sort of all or nothing.
Speaker 5: It has to be kind of, you know, good enough
Speaker 5: each step along the way, good enough if you get
Speaker 5: to the gym, even if you don't work out as
Speaker 5: hard as you intended to, you got there. You know,
Speaker 5: it's consistency, it's habit, kind of boring in a way,
Speaker 5: you know, and that but that's what it is. You
Speaker 5: have to make sure that you continue this on a
Speaker 5: regular basis.
Speaker 2: I call it January. Sometimes at the gym it's Amateur
Speaker 2: Hour and people community.
Speaker 5: I don't like to be too negative about it because
Speaker 5: I'm hopeful some fraction of those people will will succeed,
Speaker 5: you know, and get where they want to be. But
Speaker 5: you're right, there's a lot of people who show up,
Speaker 5: and you know, it's great that they're making an effort
Speaker 5: and maybe some at some point it'll actually work, you know.
Speaker 5: But I think there has to be more of a plan,
Speaker 5: you know.
Speaker 2: And I never did a New Year's resolution on gym
Speaker 2: going to the gym, but all of a sudden, about
Speaker 2: ten or twelve years ago, I kind of said, I
Speaker 2: got to get back in the gym and work out,
Speaker 2: and so I did, and it's been very consistent. As
Speaker 2: a matter of fact, in twenty nineteen, the year before COVID,
Speaker 2: I actually hit the gym three hundred and sixty three
Speaker 2: days out of that calendar year, which I can never
Speaker 2: repeat because I'm just too busy. But the one New
Speaker 2: Year's resolution that I made that came back to haunt me,
Speaker 2: and I will admit to this. This has to be
Speaker 2: I'm guessing maybe twenty years ago I said I'm going
Speaker 2: to have a dry January, and dry January worked out,
Speaker 2: and I said, yeah, make it a dry February. What
Speaker 2: about a drying March? And I got to Saint Patrick's
Speaker 2: Dany said, let me see if I can get to
Speaker 2: April first, and unfortunately I woke up one morning with
Speaker 2: kidney stones. And because really I had not been supplementing,
Speaker 2: you know, enough liquid, the liquids all my God stayed
Speaker 2: away from. I had not you know, supplemented with just water. Yeah,
Speaker 2: and so I was successful, but too.
Speaker 5: Successful unintended consequences, right right, right, Yeah, you.
Speaker 2: Got to think about stuff like that even.
Speaker 5: And I don't and I don't think it's and I
Speaker 5: don't think it's a one size fits all. I think
Speaker 5: that you have to find the right thing for you.
Speaker 5: And so I think there is no absolute'll here's you know,
Speaker 5: the Goldilocks thing or something. I mean, I think that's
Speaker 5: good advice, but I think you know what works, because
Speaker 5: some people like what you're talking about. Struck the thing
Speaker 5: you said about the gym. Some people are like that.
Speaker 5: They go every day, you know, three sixty five, and
Speaker 5: they're kind of addicted to it almost, and so long
Speaker 5: as it doesn't get completely out of hand, it works
Speaker 5: for them. And if that was you, that's that's the thing.
Speaker 5: But other people that they can't, you know, that doesn't
Speaker 5: work for them.
Speaker 2: I've cut it back to like I do four or
Speaker 2: five six times a week, which is which is adequate.
Speaker 2: And I also think that as you get a little
Speaker 2: bit older, you need a couple of days of rest
Speaker 2: every once.
Speaker 5: I think that's right. And I think I do something similar,
Speaker 5: which is say I plan to try to go every day.
Speaker 5: I say in my head, okay, this week. Every week,
Speaker 5: I try to say I'm going to try to go
Speaker 5: each day, but I know that I'm going to miss
Speaker 5: one or two because of work, because you know, things happen,
Speaker 5: and that's okay. So if I get there five times
Speaker 5: or six times, good enough, you know, Because I think
Speaker 5: that's another problem people have. They say I have to
Speaker 5: be perfect on this new New Year's resolution, and when
Speaker 5: they fail to be perfect, they kind of just let
Speaker 5: the whole thing go, as opposed to saying, you know,
Speaker 5: that's good enough, I'm moving in the right direction, that's
Speaker 5: what you want.
Speaker 2: I think there's a phrase life happens. You know, that's
Speaker 2: the day you have a flat tire, the day that
Speaker 2: you have to go to the store or whatever. Life
Speaker 2: Life simply happens, Doctor Kelly. Again, I'm a huge fan
Speaker 2: of Endicott College, a great fan of Doc Wiley who
Speaker 2: put that school back on track thirty years ago.
Speaker 5: Wonderful buss.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it is a fabulous place, a school that I
Speaker 2: recommend highly for every parent to look at for the kids.
Speaker 2: And I think the simply the most beautiful campus in
Speaker 2: all of New England.
Speaker 5: If it all it is extraordinary.
Speaker 2: Yes, absolutely, doctor John Kelly. I appreciate the opportunity we've
Speaker 2: had you before. We'll have you back again. Thank you
Speaker 2: so much.
Speaker 5: Thanks, thanks Dan very much, have a good evening. Bye bye.
Speaker 2: You very welcome. They had all my friends up at Endicott.
Speaker 2: And when we get back right after the news at
Speaker 2: eight thirty, we're going to talk about the things the
Speaker 2: need that you need to succeed in New Year's resolutions.
Speaker 2: We're going to talk with them Ober the Boston College
Speaker 2: faculty about the three things you need to succeed. So
Speaker 2: if you make a resolution, you want to listen up
Speaker 2: and stay with us right through the news. My name
Speaker 2: is Dan Ray. This is Nightside. It is a Thursday night,
Speaker 2: January second this year is just the fly and by
Speaker 2: back on Nightside right after the break at the eight
Speaker 2: thirty newscast.
Speaker 1: You're on Night Side with Dan Ray on w b Z,
Speaker 1: Boston's news radio.
Speaker 2: So just a moment. A moment ago, we were speaking
Speaker 2: with professor and doctor John Kelly of Endicott College about
Speaker 2: the psychology behind New Year's resolutions. We're now I'm going
Speaker 2: to talk with doctor Matt Popsol. Have I got that correctly, Matt?
Speaker 4: I hope, yeah, pretty hose Dan Matt Pepsol.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Pepsol, okay, who's a member of the Boston College faculty,
Speaker 2: an author, a veteran, and a podcaster, and he's going
Speaker 2: to tell us about the three things you need to
Speaker 2: succeed when you make a New Year's resolution. I'm very
Speaker 2: interested as to what those those the secrets to the
Speaker 2: sauce are here to have a successful New Year's resolution
Speaker 2: or two?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I love it. I love it. Let's do it.
Speaker 2: Go right ahead, run the air, go ahead, sir. We're yeah.
Speaker 6: Well, I'll tell you that one of the big things
Speaker 6: I think that a lot of people really want to
Speaker 6: reconcile is their relationship with work. We spend so much
Speaker 6: time at work. So many times we talk about New
Speaker 6: Year's resolutions, having to do everything all other aspects of
Speaker 6: our life, but I think work is really important for
Speaker 6: us to prioritize. And one of the reasons is because
Speaker 6: work has been weird for a while now, if we
Speaker 6: think about it, Dan and when you think back to
Speaker 6: the pandemic, it's been almost five years, but a lot
Speaker 6: of us are still waiting for it to return to
Speaker 6: some sort of new normal, and that's just not going
Speaker 6: to happen. So here we are ready to move on.
Speaker 6: And I think that making a new Year's resolution about work,
Speaker 6: making sure that we're happy, successful, feel like we're making progress,
Speaker 6: it's a really important component for many of us when
Speaker 6: it comes to those New Year's resolutions.
Speaker 2: So give me the example of the sort of new
Speaker 2: Year's resolution that someone might make about work. Well.
Speaker 6: I think one of the things is that if you're
Speaker 6: unhappy in your job, that's not a good sign. What
Speaker 6: tweaks can you make rather than just try to go
Speaker 6: through the drudgery of yet another year. It's a matter
Speaker 6: of how can you change up that job a little bit,
Speaker 6: maybe change your approach, What new skills can you develop,
Speaker 6: what new contacts can you make. There's lots of different
Speaker 6: options we can incorporate in small ways. If we're not
Speaker 6: ready to make a big change, there's little things we
Speaker 6: can do and feel that much better because we have
Speaker 6: to remember what we experience at work, we take home
Speaker 6: with us, we take into our community, and so we
Speaker 6: get work right.
Speaker 2: There's no question a lot of people still have not
Speaker 2: gone back to the office, and I know a lot
Speaker 2: of people are struggling with that. I'm broadcasting remotely, haven't
Speaker 2: done actually been in studio regularly since before the pandemic.
Speaker 2: What do you tell people who have been able to
Speaker 2: work from home, you know, they don't have to go
Speaker 2: in the office, and all of a sudden the boss says, hey,
Speaker 2: we've got to get you in the office three times
Speaker 2: a week or maybe five times a week.
Speaker 4: Yeah. It's a real tug of war, isn't it.
Speaker 6: I mean, it's so amazing thatlawyers are definitely wanting to
Speaker 6: bring people back. The question is for what reason are
Speaker 6: we trying to boost productivity or we're trying to restore
Speaker 6: the culture in some way. If you find yourself on
Speaker 6: the receiving end of having to go back into the office,
Speaker 6: I think it's one of those opportunities to say, how
Speaker 6: do I make the most of this. How do I
Speaker 6: make the most of my time, do the advanced planning right,
Speaker 6: and just reconcile the fact that, you know, if this
Speaker 6: is a job that I like, it's company I like,
Speaker 6: I'm not ready to make a move, how do I really,
Speaker 6: you know, make the most of that opportunity and realize
Speaker 6: that you know, this is everything's changing so fast, that's
Speaker 6: that's just what's happening.
Speaker 2: So so is it is it realistic to incorporate these
Speaker 2: changes that many people are either experiencing now or they
Speaker 2: experience Is it really realistic to put it in the
Speaker 2: context of New Year's resolutions? Or or I just look
Speaker 2: at New Year's resolutions as things that people, after having
Speaker 2: had a couple of glasses of wine or maybe a
Speaker 2: couple of beers on the night of December thirty for us,
Speaker 2: tell their friends that this is what they're going to do,
Speaker 2: and if they remember them in the morning, that's a start.
Speaker 2: But the chances are that very rarely does a New
Speaker 2: Year's resolution turn into a real significant lifestyle change.
Speaker 4: Well, then I think that we'll make of them. Right.
Speaker 6: So what happens is when there's this natural energy in
Speaker 6: tearing the calendar off putting the new one up. And
Speaker 6: I think New Year's is such a great opportunity for
Speaker 6: us to really set the goals that we want to
Speaker 6: have for the next year. And I think sometimes New
Speaker 6: Year's resolutions are these superficial behavior changes that might have
Speaker 6: good intentions, but we don't put a real sort of
Speaker 6: oom behind them. And I'd rather see us take these
Speaker 6: resolutions and make sure that they're meaningful to us, not
Speaker 6: have too many, but make sure that they're aligned with
Speaker 6: those dimensions of our life that we really want to fix,
Speaker 6: and make sure that we're making significant progress in them.
Speaker 6: And in that, I think we can really feel good
Speaker 6: about resolutions as something more than just a passing fad
Speaker 6: and something that it's okay if we don't accomplish it.
Speaker 6: This is our life we're talking about, whether it's our relationships,
Speaker 6: our finances, our work, our wellness, whatever it is. You know,
Speaker 6: use the opportunity of the springboard of New Year's resolutions
Speaker 6: that everyone seems to naturally gravitate toward, and really lean
Speaker 6: into them.
Speaker 2: Now, have you yourself, without getting very personal here, have
Speaker 2: you ever benefited from a New Year's resolutions? You know,
Speaker 2: significantly in terms of your career or your profession, or
Speaker 2: your livelihood or your your you know, without getting too personally,
Speaker 2: And have you ever had a New Year's resolution that
Speaker 2: is memorable in your mind?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I've had to go both ways.
Speaker 6: And one was when I realized that I wanted there
Speaker 6: was something bing from my career and I recognized in
Speaker 6: January that I wanted to do something about it, but
Speaker 6: I didn't know what it was. And about the summertime
Speaker 6: of that year, I had spent about six months trying
Speaker 6: to study what I was going to do differently to
Speaker 6: change the trajectory of my work. And that's what led
Speaker 6: me to enroll in a PhD program and to earn
Speaker 6: my doctorate and really did open up all kind of
Speaker 6: new doors for me. But it was directly related to
Speaker 6: setting that New Year's resolution of identifying a gap that
Speaker 6: I felt and saying, I don't know exactly what this is,
Speaker 6: but I'm going to stay on this until I've found
Speaker 6: my solution.
Speaker 2: So that was a successful New Year's resolution. Have you
Speaker 2: ever had a disastrous New Year's resolution? I mentioned one
Speaker 2: in the last segment that several years ago, probably twenty
Speaker 2: years ago, I thought to myself, you know, I'm going
Speaker 2: to go for that dry January thing, and it kind
Speaker 2: of worked out and that turned into a dry February,
Speaker 2: and I said, why not, I'll get to Saint Patrick's Day,
Speaker 2: and I did, and I thought I can get all
Speaker 2: the way till April first. But between Saint Patrick's Day
Speaker 2: and April first, I developed kidney stones. And I found
Speaker 2: out the reason you get kidney stones if you don't
Speaker 2: know incline to get them, is you have not had
Speaker 2: enough liquid intake. And not that I was a huge drinker,
Speaker 2: but I had not replaced over time what I had
Speaker 2: decided to step away from. I wasn't I did. I
Speaker 2: was able to stick with the decision of to nob
Speaker 2: don't need a coarse beer tonight, but I didn't compliment
Speaker 2: that or balance that off with a glass of water
Speaker 2: or something like that. So that was one New Year's
Speaker 2: resolution that I came to regret, and I don't think
Speaker 2: i've made a serious one since.
Speaker 4: To be honest with you, Well, I'm sorry that that happened.
Speaker 6: I had not a similar situation, but I can give
Speaker 6: you one example of my own. I decided that I
Speaker 6: would do a sit up every day, and I would
Speaker 6: add one each progressive day. So by January third, I'm
Speaker 6: doing three setups, then four. I thought you can always
Speaker 6: add one more setup, right. Didn't come to realize until
Speaker 6: any about a.
Speaker 4: Month and a half later.
Speaker 6: This takes a lot of time to sit down in
Speaker 6: the morning and do one hundred or one hundred and
Speaker 6: twenty setup, So I did abandon that pursuit. I did
Speaker 6: not make it to three hundred and sixty five sets.
Speaker 2: I would have been surprised if if you made it
Speaker 2: to Thanksgiving.
Speaker 7: No, it right over one hundred, but not far beyond that.
Speaker 2: But we down example, where did that idea come from?
Speaker 2: I mean, that's one that that you're a smart guy.
Speaker 2: I mean you know, well, thirty day April June and
Speaker 2: you know of that poem. Thirty days April June or November.
Speaker 2: Those days add up.
Speaker 4: They certainly do well.
Speaker 6: There's definitely a prevailing theory out there about one percent better?
Speaker 6: Can you get one percent better every day? And how
Speaker 6: those incremental gains really add up over time? And I
Speaker 6: think that that's that can be true. There's also one
Speaker 6: hundred push up challenge where even if you can't do
Speaker 6: that many push ups, there are programs to help you
Speaker 6: kind of get to that point. I think I probably
Speaker 6: just went a little too overzealous with it, and I
Speaker 6: think that far ahead.
Speaker 2: Yeah, hundred push ups, Huh. I could see if you
Speaker 2: said to yourself, I'm going to do one for three days,
Speaker 2: and then I'll try to do two, you know, for
Speaker 2: three more days, and you kind of build yourself up slowly.
Speaker 2: That makes sense, Is that one hundred You get to
Speaker 2: one hundred push ups sometime in November or late October.
Speaker 6: Yeah, depending on your page and how you want to
Speaker 6: do it. There's ways to train for it.
Speaker 4: But I think what we're.
Speaker 6: Really talking about, and it's fun to talk about, you know,
Speaker 6: some of these more entertaining New.
Speaker 7: Year's resolutions, but I still go back.
Speaker 6: To the fact that people really I see people suffer
Speaker 6: and struggle when it comes to various aspects of work
Speaker 6: or life. And I think that new Year's resolutions, which
Speaker 6: we kind of you we kind of talk about them
Speaker 6: tongue in cheek, I hate to overlook the potential that
Speaker 6: they have to actually make meaningful changes in our lives.
Speaker 6: It's really this call to action to say I've got
Speaker 6: a whole.
Speaker 4: Year to work with.
Speaker 6: People really underestimate what can I accomplish in a year
Speaker 6: If I really stick to it, and so I'd like
Speaker 6: to really, you know, lean into those New Year's resolutions
Speaker 6: and may sure that we're putting them to good use.
Speaker 2: Well that's great. What do you teach at BC?
Speaker 7: By the way, I'm just curious leadership and human resources?
Speaker 2: Oh? Is that an undergrad a graduate program?
Speaker 6: It's a graduate program at Woods College of Advancing Studies
Speaker 6: at Boston College.
Speaker 2: Yeah. No, I'm very familiar with PC. We have the
Speaker 2: admissions director on every year we do a College of
Speaker 2: ISIS program generally in November or December with Grant Goslin
Speaker 2: from BC and Bill Fitzsimmons from Harvard, and so I'm
Speaker 2: very familiar with those programs and BC has done very
Speaker 2: very well. Have you been there for a whilely, I
Speaker 2: love your enthusiasm. It's great, Matt. How long have you
Speaker 2: been there?
Speaker 6: I've been working with them for about a year, and
Speaker 6: I've got to tell you, I just blown away by
Speaker 6: the caliber of the students, the energy that I get
Speaker 6: from them, and they're just so anxious to learn, and
Speaker 6: so for me it's been very gratifying later on in
Speaker 6: my career now to have gone come up through the
Speaker 6: ranks and really applied and learned as much as I
Speaker 6: can about the world of work, but now to be
Speaker 6: able to give back a little bit. But they're really
Speaker 6: just such a great group and such a great community
Speaker 6: around the school and really in Boston in general. When
Speaker 6: you think about all of the great education that we
Speaker 6: have here, there's so much great energy and just intellect,
Speaker 6: you know, flying around. It's just such a great place.
Speaker 6: This is just the epicenter of where things are happening
Speaker 6: when it comes to certainly management, discipline, commerce, finance, all
Speaker 6: these great things.
Speaker 2: I can tell you. You didn't grow up in Boston.
Speaker 4: No, I didn't. I grew up in Missouri.
Speaker 7: But I married a woman from Cape Cod and dan
Speaker 7: turned out all right.
Speaker 2: I get it. But when you when you pronounce the
Speaker 2: word commerce, uh, we of course would not pronounce it
Speaker 2: as commerce. It would be common or something or something
Speaker 2: like that. So welcome to Boston. Thanks for coming on
Speaker 2: a night side. It says that you're a veteran as well.
Speaker 2: Thank you for your service and the enthusiasm that you have,
Speaker 2: uh is going to serve you well in your career
Speaker 2: as a faculty member. I couldnot imagine a student being
Speaker 2: sitting in one of your classes and not be uh interested,
Speaker 2: excited and involved. So that's the highest compliment I can
Speaker 2: pay to a college professor, and I and I and
Speaker 2: you certainly seem to embody that spirit, which is great,
Speaker 2: great for you, and it's also great for your students,
Speaker 2: and it's also great for Boston College. Thanks again, Matt.
Speaker 7: We'll have you back, Okay, appreciate Dan, thanks for having
Speaker 7: me on.
Speaker 2: Thank you much, Thank you very much. When we get back,
Speaker 2: we're going to talk about something a little bit more serious,
Speaker 2: and that is protecting yourself in large crowds. Obviously, everyone
Speaker 2: at this point knows what happened in New Orleans about
Speaker 2: three twenty or three twenty five on New Year's morning.
Speaker 2: We'll be talking with Matt Horrera, director of Safety and
Speaker 2: Security for the International Association of Venue Managers. We'll explain that,
Speaker 2: we'll explain what you might be able to do to
Speaker 2: make the chances of if you're ever in a bad situation,
Speaker 2: being able to avoid the ultimate horror, horrific faith that
Speaker 2: fourteen people and dozens of others have been badly injured
Speaker 2: down in New Orleans. Back on Nightside right after this.
Speaker 1: Now back to Dan Ray live from the Window World
Speaker 1: night Sight studios. I'm WBZ News Radio.
Speaker 2: Carried. Our fourth guest during this nightside News Update hour
Speaker 2: is Mark Horrera. Mark is the director of Safety and
Speaker 2: Security for the International Association of Venue Managers. So, Mark,
Speaker 2: first of all, that's a very impressive title. Tell us
Speaker 2: exactly what the director of safety and Security for the
Speaker 2: International Association of Then you Managers does.
Speaker 7: Absolutely. Dan, first of all, thank you for having me,
Speaker 7: and I appreciate your informing the public. So, as a
Speaker 7: director of safety and Security, my job is I oversee
Speaker 7: an academy for venue safety and security. So I focus
Speaker 7: on with the faculty, coordinating efforts to staff an academy
Speaker 7: that trains venue managers globally on risk management, emergency planning,
Speaker 7: security operations training, and then I do all the live
Speaker 7: security training pretty much globally. I'm at about five hundred
Speaker 7: and eight, so that I'll do communitywide critical incident training
Speaker 7: that involves active threat out, the shooter preparedness, predictive behavioral profiling,
Speaker 7: the escalation strategy and techniques, and then how to build
Speaker 7: how to build your resilient security posturing teams with the
Speaker 7: right leadership in place so that they can mitigate against
Speaker 7: all the different types of risk that both into or
Speaker 7: outdoor venues could encounter.
Speaker 2: How long, has in your opinion, at least in our country,
Speaker 2: there been in need for this. I mean, I think back.
Speaker 2: I'm old enough to remember the Texas Bell Tower shooting
Speaker 2: back in the mid nineteen sixties, which seemed to me
Speaker 2: to be one of the first you know, public shooting events.
Speaker 2: Of course, we've seen everything else, Las Vegas, Columbine, you know,
Speaker 2: the Boston Marathon here back in twenty thirteen. But it's
Speaker 2: been about fifty years. Has it not that that that
Speaker 2: this problem has intensified and and something that now has
Speaker 2: to be on people's minds when they're out in large crowds.
Speaker 7: That's one hundred percent ride. It's we've evolved in not
Speaker 7: so much in a good way when it comes to
Speaker 7: active red you know, affecting mass gathering seems to be
Speaker 7: the targeted choice. That's where the you had the highest
Speaker 7: probability and regarding risk. Again, what you're looking at is
Speaker 7: a lot of people think, well, you know what, it's
Speaker 7: just the terrorists that we need to focus on. Not
Speaker 7: necessarily true, although the ideology comes from our foreign lands.
Speaker 7: The you know, you're talking about political religious motivation, but
Speaker 7: our homegoing on extremists. You know, we get a lot
Speaker 7: of encrypted message that comes to our homeland on how
Speaker 7: to affect mass gatherings and our homegrow vin extremists are
Speaker 7: the ones that are taking it and running with it,
Speaker 7: or those that are affiliated or associated with some of
Speaker 7: these cells of these terrorist groups from from our foreign lands.
Speaker 7: So you know it's Jake Papper asked me on CNN
Speaker 7: one time, he goes, why is old world upside down?
Speaker 7: At the time it was during COVID. I said three reasons.
Speaker 7: I said, at the time it was post COVID anger
Speaker 7: now mixed with political and social issues. Those three things
Speaker 7: turned our world upside down. And I expressed that we're
Speaker 7: probably gonna have more mass shootings within a couple of
Speaker 7: years than there are days in the year. And that
Speaker 7: is the case.
Speaker 2: Dan boy sadly, Okay, so what do you say. One
Speaker 2: of the things I believe that we're going to talk
Speaker 2: about is how individuals can protect themselves in large crowds.
Speaker 2: I saw the video tonight on one of the network
Speaker 2: newscasts of this fool driving his truck down the street
Speaker 2: at a really high rate of speed on Bourbon Street,
Speaker 2: and you see, I saw people who missed being killed
Speaker 2: by a matter of inches. You've seen that video. I
Speaker 2: assume today.
Speaker 7: I did, Dan, I sure did.
Speaker 2: And there were people who literally a nano sacond was
Speaker 2: the difference between being clipped by the front right fender
Speaker 2: or front left fender or him missing. So obviously you're
Speaker 2: going to tell me people should be alert, but give
Speaker 2: us as much as you can for people when they're
Speaker 2: out with their family, either going to the movies or
Speaker 2: going to a Red Sox game or Bruins game, selt
Speaker 2: the game here in Boston, or any large event. You've
Speaker 2: got to keep thinking about real the exits are I
Speaker 2: assume and what do you do if something bad happens?
Speaker 7: Ben This is a really good question because it's not
Speaker 7: just doesn't pertain to what happened in New Orleans. This
Speaker 7: is something that happens that anywhere you go. The problem
Speaker 7: with the world today is we're so consumed, and especially
Speaker 7: when you look at that younger generation, they're so consumed
Speaker 7: with technology that they're missing the elephant in the room.
Speaker 7: You have to be hyper vigilant in today's world, more
Speaker 7: so than ever before. You have to know and understand
Speaker 7: that there's a lot of people out there with unresolved
Speaker 7: personal experiences and then you may end up being on
Speaker 7: the receiving end of that. So how do you protect
Speaker 7: yourself going into these mask at number one? First of all,
Speaker 7: we have to number one, know that we can't be complacent.
Speaker 7: Complacency that's the number one thread in the world today.
Speaker 7: Somebody asked me in all these shootings that that's the
Speaker 7: threatening fact. I said, no, the number one thread in
Speaker 7: today's world is complacency. When you do the same thing
Speaker 7: over and over again and expect the same outcome, all
Speaker 7: of a sudden you have an environmental or a conditional
Speaker 7: change that you never expected to see and you're not
Speaker 7: prepared to identify the hazard and respond immediately to control
Speaker 7: or mitigate mitigate the risk. So the question is how
Speaker 7: do you do that? First of all, you got to
Speaker 7: take your head out of the sand man' that's the
Speaker 7: first thing. You got to know that there's an element
Speaker 7: out there that it doesn't matter, it does not discriminate,
Speaker 7: it will affect any life out there. You have to
Speaker 7: be aware to your point of all of your entry points,
Speaker 7: your exits. You have to know what type of event
Speaker 7: and the event type that's being hosted.
Speaker 4: You have to read.
Speaker 7: You should read up on what are the safety and
Speaker 7: security measures that are in place for that specific event
Speaker 7: before you ever attend the event. And again, once you
Speaker 7: get to the attent, are you looking to the event?
Speaker 7: Are you looking at the the You know for the
Speaker 7: longest time, the worst thing that you could say is.
Speaker 4: To profile, to profile individuals.
Speaker 7: But when I talk about profile, I'm talking about we
Speaker 7: should be highly highper vigilant on profile and behavior, not people.
Speaker 7: Behavior that doesn't fit the environment, that doesn't fit the baseline,
Speaker 7: that's suspicious, those behavioral indicators. That's something that's very suspicious
Speaker 7: of an individual that should be reported. I always tell
Speaker 7: you I spoke to eight thousand school children, Dan, and
Speaker 7: I said, let me explain. I said, I said, once
Speaker 7: the bell rings, you can't unring it. So if you
Speaker 7: see something that's unusual, the Department Homeland Security has the
Speaker 7: adage of you see something, say something, but do something
Speaker 7: about it, and let's start reporting it. So being cognizant of
Speaker 7: all of your exits, your evacuation points, where they located,
Speaker 7: try not to get yourself hemmed up in the middle
Speaker 7: of heavy crowd density because, as you and I know, Dan,
Speaker 7: once that crowd shifts or panics. You're not going to
Speaker 7: move the crowd. The crowd's going to move in the direction,
Speaker 7: and the flow is going to move in the direction
Speaker 7: that's that it's going, and you're not going to be
Speaker 7: able to go the opositware or even get out.
Speaker 4: Of it for that matter. Question, do you listen, Dan, Dan?
Speaker 7: Do you listen to the sounds? Because the vehicle's got
Speaker 7: to accelerate. People are yelling and screaming. Rather, it's a
Speaker 7: different scream than an excited stream of just happy, joyful.
Speaker 7: It is out of tear. When you hear that unusual
Speaker 7: scream and you hear vehicle accelerating, that is a clue
Speaker 7: that it's a vehicle coming your way potentially on that roadway.
Speaker 7: You have to expect that. Are you looking at your
Speaker 7: elevated points for potentially someone that's posted up and shooting,
Speaker 7: because the vehicle might have been a primary means of
Speaker 7: attacking the mask gathering. But I'll tell you right now,
Speaker 7: the threat is thinking beyond that. They're looking at how
Speaker 7: how can I provide a secondary threat vector within that
Speaker 7: event or that facility.
Speaker 2: Now, one of the things that I do a lot,
Speaker 2: and I know that if I'm walking somewhere and I'm isolated. Uh,
Speaker 2: and I pass someone passes by me. I sometimes will
Speaker 2: take a quick look over my shoulder after a second
Speaker 2: or two to just make sure that individual is continuing
Speaker 2: to pass by me. And you know, someone will say, well,
Speaker 2: you're got to be a little paranoid there. Well, I'd
Speaker 2: rather be a little paranoid than not to be unprepared.
Speaker 2: And again, trust your.
Speaker 7: Gut, Dan, Intuition is the key, and you said it best.
Speaker 4: Let me just say this.
Speaker 7: Somebody said, you know what, when we implement so many
Speaker 7: security measures, it makes people paranoid. I said, on the contrary,
Speaker 7: preparedness beats paranoia. If I give you the tools, Dan
Speaker 7: to mitigate against all the different types of risk, and
Speaker 7: I can mentally and visually prepare you and inoculate you
Speaker 7: the conditions that you could see and give you a
Speaker 7: plan of action, you're more confident in carrying out your
Speaker 7: day to day activities that you're less paranoid.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, Mark, I appreciated the time and I appreciated the information.
Speaker 2: I hope people listened tonight because you never know when
Speaker 2: something bad may happen, and you can't necessarily live your
Speaker 2: life staying at home. You got to get out there
Speaker 2: and enjoy and enjoy life, but also be cognizantble what's
Speaker 2: going on around you. Mark Correra, appreciate your call so much.
Speaker 2: Appreciate your time tonight, my friend. We'll talk again.
Speaker 7: Thank you, Dan, my pleasure.
Speaker 2: Absolutely. We get back on to talk with Massachusetts State
Speaker 2: Senator Nick Collins. He has been in the middle of
Speaker 2: a pitched battle financial battle with the Mayor of Boston,
Speaker 2: and we're going to talk with Senator Collins, who has actually,
Speaker 2: I think made a name for himself and has presented
Speaker 2: his position pretty effectively. We'll talk about it. It's interesting
Speaker 2: inside politics at its best.