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Thank you so much . Thank you general 

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for having us here today . It's it's a 

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wonderful day . I know it's been a 

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legacy that you're finishing that so 

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many leaders of the community have had 

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to bring the housing here . They asked 

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me if I wanted to get prepared 

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statements my staff . I said no because 

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I think I've been around as long as 

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this thing's been fighting for , along 

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with a couple of other people here . 

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Commissioner Diaz Mayor's Lesnik from 

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coral Gables . And I see here have been 

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ardent fighters who remember when we 

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went to D . C . To fight . And I know 

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the congressman remembers to keep 

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Southern command here in Doral and in 

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south florida , which was step number 

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one , but today is a wonderful day . Um , 

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and and I think that , you know , both 

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the lieutenant governor and the mayor 

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uh have understood that keeping 

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in in the city of Darrell and keeping 

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in District 12 and keeping in Miami 

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Dade County . South com was very 

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important from the day that we started 

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fighting for the day that South com 

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moved from Panama here . Other places 

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were already thinking about trying to 

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uh to uh get South com and luckily with 

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the help of congressman Diaz Balart and 

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Governor Bush , former Governor Bush . 

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Uh , there was a great effort made by 

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the state to make sure that the 

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beautiful facility that was opened up 

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uh , and that all of you working the 

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men and women and let me begin by 

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saying , let me thank the men and women 

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of , of South com who have done a 

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fantastic job and you are a key part 

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not only of rural district 12 , but 

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also South florida and also the men and 

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women of the police departments , 

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including the new Chief of Police . So 

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I see here and the Miami dade County 

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Police and all the police departments 

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that make it possible . You know , the 

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as the general said , this is a great 

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day when and when she came back , she 

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made it one of her priorities . Um the 

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reason why I say that is because this 

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began and I know Pepe and don will 

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remember this , this began probably the 

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housing issue in the early two 

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thousand's . I think I was coaching , 

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you know , lieutenant , the lieutenant 

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governor's daughter , my daughter 

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played basketball together . I think I 

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was coaching them when the process of 

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trying to uh to bring uh housing 

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started . But it picked up as the 

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general said in 2015 . And I want to 

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thank you know , everybody general for 

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the great job that you have all done to 

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bring housing because when you , when 

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you say housing people get scared and I 

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can tell you this now as an elected 

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official , people get scared military 

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housing . Oh , it's going to be X is 

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gonna be why . Uh and truthfully the 

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design has turned out to be and the 

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process has turned out to create 

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something that I think will be very 

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unique . So it's wonderful that we're 

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finally getting it here . And in 

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particular , I do want to thank 

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obviously uh Mario Diaz Balart are 

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congressman who was known for a long 

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time before he was even a congressman 

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who has fought so hard for the men and 

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women uh in the military and General 

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Richardson for really giving this the 

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final push because this was an uphill 

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battle . And I know that anybody has 

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dealt with the Department of Defense 

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knows that no offensive department 

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defense , that it took a lot of 

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convincing to say , how are we gonna 

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build this housing on federal land ? 

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And why are we gonna do this in a place 

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where there aren't traditional military 

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bases ? So thank you General Richardson 

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for putting us over the top and getting 

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us here . So I think that as we move 

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forward , I don't leave you with this . 

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And I know the congressman and I have 

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spoken about this before , we need to 

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continue to make sure general that the 

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other 1315 100 individuals that come to 

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work here on a daily basis , we find 

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the opportunity to get them as close to 

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south common as possible because I do 

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know some of them are pretty far away 

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because some of them are friends of 

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mine and uh as much as I enjoy uh , 

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seeing them here close , uh many of 

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them are too far away and I think uh 

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the congressman and I have spoken when 

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I was married , Darryl and I hope we 

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continue to uh work on trying to make 

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sure that we also help facilitate some 

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sort of program that will help the 

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military families here in south cone . 

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And I can't get away from having my 

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mayor hat . So the only thing I'll tell 

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you , madam mayor is get freebie out 

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here . Since that way we can get 

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everybody out to the , to the 

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restaurants quickly . General . That's 

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a , that's an unsolicited lobbying plug . 

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So uh , thank you all very much . It is 

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a great day to keep them and , and it's , 

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it's key for us for those of you who 

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are not from south from south florida 

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or maybe you're not familiar with why 

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this is so important . It has been a 

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key issue in the past when we've 

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discussed keeping south common south 

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florida and this goes a long way . So 

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God bless you all for everything you do . 

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God bless the men and women of the 

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United States military who day in and 

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day out , defend us and help us and 

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keep us living in the world's greatest 

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democracy . Thank you