Wednesday, September 9, 2026 - Part 1

0:00The views and opinions expressed on analysed this are entirely those of the on-air participants and do not reflect those of the station's board management staff or underwriters. Good morning everyone. This is Dwayne Henry, felonin for Neville James this morning on analyze this the premier educational program, radio program in the Virgin Islands we want WTJX 93.1 which is your NPR station in the Virgin Islands and the today we're going to have the candidate speaks and we have two candidates in the first hour we're going to have Mr. Gregory Smith who's an independent running in the St. Thomas St. John district and at nine o'clock we're going to pick up

1:06with Julian Viera senior here on St. Croix running in the St. Croix district. As we know the primary actually the election season is in full I guess we think it's in full gear I spent actually relatively quiet as Neville was mentioning the other day but hopefully interest will pick up as we approach the election which is actually less than 90 days away oh less than 60 days away so we've been offering these candidates the opportunity to come on and express themselves and so that the people of Virgin Islands can hear what they have to say and what they stand for

2:08they'll do of course you know we have the gubernatorial elections and the delegate the Congress so this is an addition to the senatorial races in supportive elections and education so this is what we call the the big election year the candidates that was on recently they did the you know the system started or rather the the candidates speaks started I believe around September second and it's been going since and yesterday Neville had well I can't it's slipping my mind no oh he had yesterday but there was a candidate yesterday and and Neville there was also a little Willis came on afterwards some of the important things in the

3:14news this morning is includes and let me double check here there's a the old pizza hut property and the international plaza on the St. Thomas waterfront is has plans to transform it into an open year boutique hotel I think this will be the first hotel built or kind of in the Virgin Islands in quite a few years there is one being constructed a smaller B&B type of Heron St. Croix uh they were the principles in that matter it seems it was doing really well in construction but I think they've been having some supply issues as is the case with a lot of construction projects around here and let's open the gallows be area but we've been looking forward to seeing that place

4:16open up for a couple of years now but hopefully they'll be open soon but this new place on St. Thomas is going to uh and it used to have the hardwack cafe I think back in the day and a bunch of retail stores and etc the it is a you know what they're calling a boutique hotel and if you know those are usually smaller hotels that kind of appeal to certain type of people while clientele's like you know you have like a lot boutique hotels in New York that may appeal to Gen Z people so those types of hotel usually don't offer much in terms of say dining so especially breakfast because most of the

5:18the younger population don't eat breakfast and so you'd have those hotels that may they're whatever dining facilities they have would be open later in the evening as opposed to early in the morning and a lot of them don't have too many amenities within the hotel because most young people don't spend a lot a lot of time in their actual hotel room there'll be more out in the city and stuff so those are the types of you know that's an example of a boutique hotel then I'm not sure where this one is going in St. Thomas but uh but that's one of the you know the things that we're looking at also the federal district court dismiss the McLaughire

6:20ballot challenge and uh they didn't answer a lot of um questions you know there are a lot questions to remain in terms of because the the fact that the the issues being raised in the case for never addressed so those issues um remain unanswered until someone else can raise those issues and then successfully take the trial and get an opinion but the board of elections and the supervisor elections that each move to dismiss um the case and uh judge are Ricky judge Evan Ricky the US district court judge granted the motion to dismiss you know and Tuesday some of the things he said uh included um you know it in his opinion he spoke about

7:33well he observed that there were count one and count two were questions of local law uh whether they the v i court authorizes a supervisor to reopen a completed petition examination after cures have been accepted and their five day challenge window had closed uh that's not been answered normally after there's a process of appeal and uh once you exhaust that you can't uh they they give you an opportunity to cure if your ballot come your your petition comes in and there's their defects in it they give you several days later to actually go and correct those get the correct signatures whatever the case may be and um once that if you haven't done that by the by the or when you've given up to the cure those defects then the supervisor will just

8:33simply not put your own ballot you'll be disqualified um and i think one of the things that Mr McLeft he was attempting to do was um was to have an additional opportunity uh beyond just the cure period based on citizens complaints and count two of his uh his complaint had spoke about the whether investigative authority belongs to the supervisor or to the board uh there is there's a question there because the the summer that authority is actually vested in both uh the board and the supervisor depending on what the exact issue is uh you know issues of

9:36of uh administrative or housekeeping issues pertaining to the propriety of a petition etc is normally reserved for the administrative side of the elections on the board elections would be the supervisor uh and then the board sets more policies and and and more general non-day-to-day uh no for has more the the doesn't participate in the day-to-day functions as such but it's it's more of an oversight uh responsibility certifications they sort of stuff generally goes to the board uh the judge had said specifically that um total 18 the Virgin Islands Code section 411 alpha um which directs that the identity of capacity

10:44of the signage that if the identity of capacity of a sign of a petition is challenged the supervisor or a deputy must hold a public hearing in the district but then three days after the close of the nomination period uh summoning the signer and material witnesses but the the um the defendant's in this case the supervisor and the board had argued that 411 grants open ended authority to investigate and this qualify until ballots are printed um judge Ricky noted that the judicial president they relied on um addressed candidate qualifications on the 411 Bravo not petition examinations on the 411 alpha which has its own uh you know set of uh rules so um that's one of the things that

11:50you know the judge didn't specifically he raised those questions or reiterated those questions but um because the case was dismissed there wasn't an actual ruling on it and therefore those questions actually still remain uh and you know we we with statutes and laws you know the legislature passes these things and we don't get um it's not a problem until somebody says it's a problem you know and and that's so um things might be going on for a while until somebody says well you know this is right or you're doing this wrong and then they challenge it in court and that's how statutes get struck down but until someone challenges something there there is you know these laws can be enforced um without you know any problems the one of the things though

12:56is that you actually have to have standing to bring any case um in court and so only a candidate or a perspective candidate that has been um there has been um believes that they have been wronged can actually bring those because that that that's what they by this person have been standing so I want to be able to just simply raise those questions because I think they're wrong I would have had to have been affected by it in order for me to bring in law a script so these cases don't come up until something you know and somebody feels that they're wrong so they can go on for years that you know the the current system whether it's right or wrong without people uh

13:59without a court actually ruling on it in the court can't just um as we say so a spontaneity side that oh I'm gonna review this law um the case has to be brought so so that that saying that to to explain that that you know some candidates say but why wasn't this brought up before and it's because nobody brought it up before and now that with the case dismissed um we guess you know that nothing will really change uh because these answers hadn't been um um these questions have been raised there was also an August 24th uh 20 general gone array had had issued an uh an advisory opinion um and then in you know but before he did

14:59that the justice department had declined to defend either the board or Fox in in the federal case to quote preserve public confidence in the departments perceive impartiality and so the board actually had to retain outside counsel uh normally the attorney general represents government agencies by law and it's really interesting because is in in this case the same agency that asked for advisory opinions also was asking for representation and so now the AG um mysteryer um wanted to make sure that um there was no you know but the people can come back afterwards and say well you know you you're on both sides the the fence here and and that's conflict so it took a while for this case kind of wind

16:06through the system but that actually means pretty fast for for this record but again considering the expediency of the matter that the court um fast-tracked it and and then eventually dismiss it um and the weird thing um judge Ricky um actually mentioned that that the AG opinion was issued months after the board had already acted so um there was like some question as to whether that opinion simply robust that the action of the board or um you know that they all or whether it was truly um advisory since the act that already taking

17:06you know I think he exact he said that evaluating election of election officials against the exposed factor legal standard would be unjust and incoherent and he declined to disturb the frontline statutory interpretations on that basis so he did not offer an opinion because he thought that it would not be right uh the other the federal constitutional claims that he had came up with um um the clafety of his clafety had had um stated that um the delegate to congress is a statutory office created by congress at night a constitutional office created by articles one section two um so um there you know there was an issue with that also

18:09but we're gonna take a break and we'll be back and hopefully we have our first kind of a prepared it looks like you're own you healthcare costs are continuing to rise Bank of St. Croix offers health savings accounts for individuals enrolled in qualifying high deductible health plans hs a's provide a way to set aside pre-tax funds for qualified medical expenses such as doctor visits prescriptions and other eligible health care costs contributions

19:15may be made by account holders employers or others on behalf of the account holder accounts may be opened with a minimum deposit of twenty five dollars earn interest over time and our FDIC insured bank of st. Croix offers health savings accounts through its local banking centers and online more information is available at bankofsynccroix.com bankofsynccroix member FDIC ready to hit the road without breaking the bank find out what's new under the hood on motorway our experts have the scoop on this year's top rise and then know how to keep your daily driver running right it's simple it's quick and it saves you money we're driven to bring you the best coming down the pipe i'm john davis it's all right here every week on motorway tune in Saturdays at 3 p.m. on wtjxtv channel 12

20:18if you think it's hot outside the interior of park vehicles are even hotter children can die from heatstroke after being mistakenly left in a car this can happen when there's a change in the team make it a habit to place your phone or bag next to the child's car seat park look then lock if you see a child alone in a car call 911 immediately this message was brought to you by the virgin islands office of highway safety good morning again this is doing Henry on analyze this filling in for naval james and we're on 93.1 wtjx your np r station in the virgin islands uh we have the candidate speaks this morning

21:22oh yeah where we this morning we're going to have in the first hour mr. Gregory Smith and in the second hour we're going to have julienne Vera as we know there's uh uh there are approximately uh like in centomas district 22 people running for senator and in the san koi district there are 26 people uh running for the seven seats that available in each district uh just to remind people the uh elections is coming up soon in the first Tuesday in November and so that's uh less than 60 days so um it's been a quiet election season but hopefully things start picking up in we tried to early in the week on the table talk we were talking about

22:23why it may have been so quiet and the best possible answer that anybody could give was really funding the money doesn't seem to be flowing to candidates is you know as much this season as as they had before okay so we're going to begin with mr. Gregory Smith who is uh on centomas he's running for the senatorial seat there one of the seven seats well mr. Smith is a businessman but um we're going to have him tell us more about himself good good morning mr. Smith how are you hello good morning sorry for uh to what here i thought it was a phone interview so i had a video shout 30 seconds ago it's fine um so Gregory Smith who are you can't let's allos who you are

23:24yes sir uh like i said i'm a local businessman here we have a couple of restaurants and uh employee over 50 islanders uh been down here for quite a while my my history though as i aviation i was a fire pilot for the forest service for about 25 years fighting fighting wildfire with the airplanes and helicopters then retired moved down here um but yeah we're just it's just looking for growth on the island you know that's uh that's where we're at and it's just not happening so that's why to decide the run i was reading an article in the source that's actually at the tipping point i made it decided to run with uh the reading an article in the source and it spoke to uh wapa crime education hospitals infrastructure roads hospitals and i you know i was going to yes yes yes we got the bottom of it two page article and it

24:26was written in 2012 and i was like this is absolutely the you know the nothing's changed we've gone through hurricanes and pandemics i've said and and uh that hasn't got any better so it's you know we just need to move this forward we're we're we're just hit nine years since the storm and uh there's still one of my businesses there's still two cars out there from the storms nothing has really changed so uh it's just time to change and and look at things through different set of eyes you know let me ask you this um what if you could label yourself as iami x candidate uh what would that be what do you stand for i stand for growth and change neither one of those are being handled down that's why i'm running as a independent because i

25:26you know just label and yourself as a party i don't find a lot of value in that um you know there's good bat on both sides and and i believe in just taking the the good and the bad you know it's like it that's why that you know an independent is just more of a we can have the ability to just choose what's best not what's you know we're told to tick what would you say a top four issues are uh well the hospital is ridiculous i mean that's where i worked in third-world countries with better medical hospitals education their report is they're about to pull the wall overs uh that their report that's gonna hurt everybody uh with what they're doing um okay that's structure you know this like we have to you know if it's infrastructure so your car is running

26:29to bottles every day your maintenance goes up and it's you know the single mother can't afford new car every day and it's just like it starts from the bottom up right let's talk about the let's talk about the hospitals uh what do you see the current problem is with the Schneider Regional Hospital in St. Thomas. The lack of resources i mean there's there's wonderful doctors nurses over there they're just hamstrung with with no facility um and again we're coming up on nine years since the storm and there's still rooms without water i mean how makes no sense okay now that you've identified the problem what solutions are you offering to correct those naturalization we need yes sir we need uh we just need oversight you know there's there's just so many things are just going left untouched uh there's nobody's in charge of anything yeah is it is there is there uh a chief executive officer and then is it there a board that

27:38there is and there's also board and then why aren't you doing anything that's our message is so the board and the CEO are not doing anything and you would propose to fix that how as a senator how what what what authority would you have to fix that or well you have oversight of the federal funds you know we can you know add or subtract funds and then that money motivates people so if you start taking the money away which they don't have but they're the money is available but it's not being put to use so we either need to find uh somebody that will put it to use or change the game but i understand that but you have a position to that and i'm trying to you know we all have problems with different things in society there's some things we can change we have power individual person might have power to change and there's a lot of things

28:43that they cannot change uh asking you as a senator how would you make that happen by withdrawing money no you can't because because earlier you said that resources was an issue but the house resources and huge issue so you would restrict the resources in order to no we don't have to you have to be accountable for the resources so like where is this money because there is money there why is it not being used and who is not using it can you give us can you give us an example of money that's not being used in the hospital that's that's available but not being spent no i can't not uh okay okay but i do i spoke with lots of doctors and nurses and they're saying you know they're just hamstrung with with lack of availability you know it's not that they're bad

29:47doctors and nurses but it's like there's nothing there uh-huh but uh basic needs right and that's what i'm saying so as an independent individual senator what action would you take they'll fix that i would find words not going and why uh i a lot of being a senator is like that's not a magic one but it's it's you got to have uh the ability to ask questions and and come over over oversight i'll tell you how not good no i was saying i agree with you this oversight uh but um it's there do you think that you as a single independent senator um can can can can be effective it i think 15 of us can i mean it's so you so you would you would cooperate you would cooperate with your colleagues

30:51is what you say absolutely okay it's not a one-man show you know because you can't you know maybe i have two good ideas maybe somebody else has four maybe i got one and somebody else you know i said it's a team sport you know there's no one man gonna do it all um but if uh but something has to be done and like say i i don't run a hospital i don't know how to run a hospital but i do know how to run a business and if you run it into the ground you have to start over you know if if the means new you know new board members or or uh it just be more involved i guess and i'd like to say it take it it's gonna take 15 of us to do it okay uh but let's uh move on yeah your next one was education what are what are the issues there again oversight money and uh funds being lost we're right now they just they just installed uh

31:57signs up in front of every school big lit signs sixty five thousand dollars per coffee so that turned out to about three quarters of million dollars which i think is great i'm school pride i'm i'm big fan of that but if you have a big fancy sign and there's no paper pencils um i'm gonna choose papers and pencils of course it's like i you know it's just it things like this or you know do we need a new sign or do we need air conditioners um you know four kids or it can't even start school because the water is back you know it's it's uh uh it who's who's making those decisions to buy new signs when they can't buy pencils let me ask you this is twice you mentioned about water at the schools they know um can you tell us what school and particularly is effective i just saw something yesterday it is uh school is delayed in st. croit um due to some water issues um and that you know that's all i can

33:04okay okay okay so yes there is um one school in the Fredericksett area as well i'll help you out here um because i spoke about this last week Fredericks said that the governor last monday had um declared his state of emergency uh and correct and the reason for that is um there were serious problems with water production it's a confidence of storms came together one time uh number one Fredericksett is currently um we built in the the water infrastructure now that's my effect i spoke about the streets being torn up for months second Fredericksett has had a problem with the um the quality of portable water for over two years

34:06now probably like three years um in addition uh water pipe broke that or rather a switch pipe broke in christian state that may have contaminated the system and they found equal i and then um the other issue was um the wapper had to stop production of of water on st. croit on seven seas in order to secure that that that system in addition we're in the middle of a drought which has caused water supply levels to be really low which again causes the problem of contaminants in the system because there's no water pressure uh so hard you fix all of that that's a little bit of a question and uh forgive me but uh my wife i dropped off for the first

35:09minute or so of that um but i i get the chance of water sand um well it's infrastructure you got to you got to modernize it we're dealing with 50-year-old pipes yes longer for what we're asking to do that those pipes are like a hundred years old uh but you also we haven't had a chance to do some work since then uh do you know that fema's federal fund there for infrastructure or not being utilized well slow down fema fema fema has allocated something like three million dollars or something to redo the entire replace all these pipes throughout the entire virgin islands that that's something that's going to take probably 20 years for obvious reasons you can't just stop water production

36:09and just replace all these pipes you know so it has to be done in in small stages and it's going to take about 20 years so um do you expect to be a senator if you were to get that ball moving would you um you expect to be a senator when the project is done 20 years from now no okay that was another way of asking you how long did that that's another way of asking you i don't need no career i'm just trying to help the people of virgin islands of course uh how long did you think you know how many terms do you think you would need to be effective or what's the do you have a limit on how long you would stay and to set it if you got elected okay we lost uh mr. Scott missus made we go get him back in a second uh i'm here trying to get him to articulate his positions sorry about that uh okay you're living in the country right you did warn me uh

37:14so yes yes we're here we're here uh yeah thank yes we're you did warn me is what i'm saying so what types are you know i wasn't like you're saying i'm not surprised because you did warn that you may drop off is what i'm saying so it's okay uh yes um okay so airport let's talk about the airport okay well let's get back to the water okay here's what we know that project excuse me we're gonna go to a break and you pick up exactly where you want to pick up when we come back okay which is water okay just hang on we'll we'll be back

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40:29good morning we're back on analyze this this is dween henry fellenin for neville james and we're on wtjxtv.1 your npr station in the virgin islands we have a candidate speaks this morning and we have mr. Gregory smeth who is running in the centaumasid john sanitorial district for one of those seven seats mr smeth you were beginning to speak about you wanted to elaborate on the water condition before we went to break yeah and good morning to everybody again appreciate the opportunity but yeah just the you're speaking to a 20 year project fema started giving us money nine years ago you know so we should be

41:29almost halfway through and we haven't started basically that's those are the kind of things that I just have I have more questions than answers like why who was who was trying that that that that that that that's not moved well I don't know what's happening on st. Thomas but I know it's in kroy last year they because I complained about it they had the entire town of christian stead ripped apart for several months and you know they finished that and they doing fregx that town now so that they they I don't know where that money came from a you know sensibly came from the federal government the female or or or or the prominent here whoever it may be yes but they have been doing infrastructure work on st. kroy at the same time you know the system continues to break as as what happened in in golden rock

42:30last week where the the sewage the major sewage line going into the lbj uh pump station as we like to call it um and uh and and and that cut that's my effect I drove through the that that is still being repaired and um as we speak so that's been the they began having hiccups um not apologize if a waste management or anything but I I am stating that you know I don't know about st. Thomas but I know they began working on st. kroy but let me um I wanted to talk about the airport real quick uh what what yeah you you mentioned earlier that um there the the plans are going to cost us so much money um what what what problem do you have with the current uh proposals for the airport well the the cost for employment is

43:34going to put us all out of business they're they're talking about adding currently the the cp is about twenty three dollars for her passenger and that they're going to raise it to her twenty six dollars well at the end of the project that's a five hundred percent it right because uh at the end I mean it's a phase in but November first they're doubling it it's going to start it's going to start I believe okay let me ask you this let me ask you this because your business when I know you fly in a not a st. Thomas airport all the time uh would you not agree first of all for both airports that don't you not every almost every island in the Caribbean by now has jet bridges except the Virgin Islands so we shouldn't get jet bridges no that's that's not what I'm saying no no I'm asking you that in particular yeah we absolutely need to get okay so that's going to cost money all right uh no I'm not saying that

44:39we don't need to do anything in airports at all okay they need major work exactly and and and and there's a cost for that right absolutely so if the cost if the cost if the cost is one billion dollars this is a hypothetical should we say no that's too much to pay for improvements let's just not do this and not do that as the airlines are proposing no the airlines are are praising that at all there everybody's clearly they are that the airlines have clearly said I've read their proposals and on the airlines have clearly said that there's certain things including jet bridges that are not important right now uh what the airlines are proposing as some you know some basically I said put paint on the buildings and um you know maybe repair like the baggage now I know St Thomas Airport I know in fact has had air conditioning issues for years

45:45and I know this and yes and and and I know this because I used to work at DPR and R and DPR and R used to be and I don't know if this they are on the second floor the airport and at one point months employees had to leave early because it was too hot I have traveled through St Thomas's airport and have seen huge fans trying to cool people off as as they wait in you know TSA lines and customs lines and stuff like that right clearly the infrastructure there is dilapidated uh uh that's gonna you know I don't set the prices is you know it's you know if the price is too high that maybe the businesses that are providing these these services need to to bring their prices down well it's it's kind of a chicken and egg problem so it's uh if people so I spoke with uh with

46:47director at at uh Sky City and he said that um what's the big deal price goes up that he said the average price of a vacation is $3,500 per person and uh he said so if that $3,500 goes to $3,700 you're still gonna come and I was like if that's just how easy it was but it's if that $200 goes to the top of the plane ticket you're just gonna go someplace else it's it's like why would you spend you know people shop you know you're say you're in New York and it's cold from the snowy outside and you need to go the crib into the weekend uh-huh you get on Google Google flights and you go what's cheap and if St Thomas is $700 more than Puerto Rico you're going to Puerto Rico you're taking your wallet with you and then that you know that just keeps that goes to I wanted to open a third restaurant I put the brakes on

47:51that just because I'm down 35% uh over across the board and I'm not the only one with the same numbers uh just since like the budget airlines have left you know spirit frontier um yeah solar you know it's people and they make their decision to go someplace it's not it's simply not just adding $200 to your vacation which is like can kind of but the way they just throw it out out there is like what's the big deal it's only gonna be $200 it is gonna be the big deal when you look at that plane ticket and say I can go I can go to someplace else for a third the price and have more money to spend one there well actually yeah but that already exists uh you mentioned Puerto Rico you can get a flight from Puerto Rico to New York for uh that I'm picking Puerto Rico to Miami for less than $300 it's $800 from the Virgin Islands and and we haven't even started anything and and

48:58how did the airlines justify that? So my point is if it's the y'all we're not the one setting the prices here we're the consumers we're not setting anything it's these corporate entities are they? The landing fees have gone up we've got the lot we've we've got the lowest landing fees in the entire Caribbean we've got the lowest landing fees in the entire Caribbean I noticed because I researched this so why the airlines? St. Croix has the lowest period so why is it twice as much to flight to the same destination from 40 miles away St. Thomas and St. Croix. Because right now that's this whose fault is that? Oh it's the airplane demand you know every flight leaving out of St. Croix packed so I don't know what they're talking about. I don't know what they're talking about

50:05well until they get enough people that want to come here and enough flights that there are empty seats there's there's never an empty seat on any flight to mail. That's what I just said uh every flight is packed yeah St. Croix doesn't have any supply and demand are you kidding me? Every flight is packed coming in and leaving. Well it but in order to add extra aircraft that comes or price and so they they believed it it's not worth it to them to add extra aircraft and that's you know so like all this pile them in and then keep running up the price till the people stop buying tickets. Which is not going to happen because it's you know the people that are traveling from St. Croix traveling because of necessity they have those points of people who in the medical research. Yes exactly exactly and there's no there's no discount there's no discount. You have to go to Miami for the medical. No but but you see my point that all is that. So uh they

51:16make it so tell me okay let's move on from there because we're coming close to the end of the hour but I wanted to actually big up your forest service contributions and thank you for that it's a an a noble thing to be occupation and I wanted to ask you. Thank you. Now being involved of an emergency response like that. Do you think, how does that help you as a senator? I've built teams my whole life. And teams that matter. I was flying helicopters, send the hires, and you know, if you don't trust every man, one and a child working with, you got a problem. Great. And they're big decisions. They're life and death. Right. And, you know, you're saving somebody's house. You're going to go as far as you can to do the best you can.

52:19And I think that as a senator, I mentioned before, there's 15 of us. I'm eight. I'm not, you know, I'm a wall senator. I'm a six-year-old. If you can't build a team, you've got a problem. Yeah. Okay. Trust your team. Better together that's your slogan. Give your final picture in the last minute or so. Well, everybody's wanting to change. You know, we obviously, it's, we're in, we're in a spot right now where we can't change. I think everybody's had enough of just what we've been doing. You know, we have the opportunity to change. And again, one man can't do it by himself or one woman, one person, one anybody. We can't, we can't just sit here and complain about what. We can't sit here and complain about poggles. We can't sit here.

53:20No, we need to, let's build a better team. Let's get it together and we're better together. And then we can move on, make the Virgin Islands what this should be. You know, it's one of the most beautiful places on Earth. And there's garbage on every road. Like we need to, there's just a lot of, you know, we need some pride in our ship. We need to come together as a community and islanders any of the islands and make it just what we deserve. We need, we need proper education. We need proper healthcare. We need proper transportation. We need infrastructure needs to be what it should be. The money is there. It's just not these projects are just sitting there staring at it. And we can't just continue to do the same thing. And I think it was, I'm. Yes.

54:21My name is Senator Deidreway. Thank you, Mr. Smith for being on with us today. That's Gregory Smith. He's a candidate in the St. Thomas and John District for Senator in the upcoming elections. And Mr. Smith is a businessman on St. Thomas. His slogan is better together. I think he has a website, GregoryPismithVI.com. I believe it is, but you can Google him and he does have a website where you can find out more about his ideas. So once again, that was Gregory Smith. And I was Gregory Smith running from St. Thomas. You know, I didn't get a chance to really speak much, but I did commend him for his service. He went to make a clear. He's retired from the US Forest Service. He used to fight forest fires out in the West. And I think it worked with the state and the body also

55:22in a similar capacity. But that is an extremely dangerous job. It's because a lot of times those helicopters, they're so laden with stuff. It's flying helicopters in itself is dangerous, but that type of work is so I commend him for that type of work. And wishing the best in the elections that's coming up, we're going to, and this second hour, we're going to have Mr. Julian Rivera. I'm sorry, from St. Croix. And this is, I think, going to be Mr. Vierre's third shot at it. So what we're going to do is we're going to go ahead and take our top of the hour break. Once again, this is Duane Henry, filling in for Neville James on analyze this, your MPR station in the Virgin Islands, WTJX, 93.1.

56:27Hello, I'm back with you. The views and opinions expressed on analyze this are entirely those of the on-air participants and do not reflect those of the station's board, management, staff, or underwriters. And sit-cups, when someone has a problem, they just blurt it out and move on. Well, I lost my job and my parakeet is missing.

57:31How is your day? But the real world is different. Managing life's challenges can be overwhelming. So what do we do? We get support. The Huntsman Mental Health Institute and the Ad Council have mental health resources available for you at loveyourmindtoday.org. That's loveyourmindtoday.org. See how much further you can go when you take care of your mental health. I never thought I would be a ballerina. And yet she became one, welcome to the world of dance, with Prima Ballerina Tyler Peck. One of the most extraordinary ballerinas in the world discover how she relates to dance from early success to coming back from a career-threatening injury and then becoming a choreographer. The jump's good, so we'll keep it. Enjoy Tyler Peck's spending time. What is life without dance? On great performances. Tune in September 18th at 1030PM on WTJXTV Channel 12.