Doug Macias: Championing Community and Collaboration in Richmond

The journey from Alton, Illinois, to Richmond, Indiana has been anything but ordinary for Doug Macias. In this passionate conversation, we pull back the curtain on Doug's love for local business, education, employment, and business development. We get to know more about his vision for Richmond, his involvement in community projects, and the lessons he has learned along his path. Understanding the power of collaboration and community involvement, Doug shares his struggles, victories, and his commitment to the ACEs committee, Chamber of Commerce, and his personal project - Dugs Day Out.

In the second half of this enlightening chat, Doug opens up about the importance of recognizing addiction and seeking help. He helps us understand the critical role recovery networks play in the community and how they reach out to those in need. Not one to shy away from the truth, Doug grades the Richmond community a B+, recognizing the dedication of those striving to make a difference. He also talks about the power of networking and the value of being open to advice. This is a heartwarming, genuine conversation with Doug Macias that will leave you inspired about community-building, the importance of collaboration, and the bright future of Richmond.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:03

Welcome to another episode of our community. This is Alfredo Diamond, and I'm here with a very special guest, doug Macias Good morning sir.

Speaker 2: 0:11

Thanks for having me.

Speaker 1: 0:12

Tell us a little bit about yourself.

Speaker 2: 0:13

Where are you from? Originally from the St Louis area, southern Illinois, little town called Alton Illinois.

Speaker 1: 0:21

And what was it like growing up there?

Speaker 2: 0:24

I see a lot of similarities with Alton and Richmond. We were right on the Mississippi River, so right next to the rails as well, so we had a lot of manufacturing, as Richmond did as well. Not that we still don't hear, but very similar layouts, seeing how we were thriving and booming at one time and then we lost a lot of it, like a lot of places have so trying to rebuild. But small town very similar to Richmond, everybody knows everybody. Everybody knows each other's parents and grandparents, a lot of the local restaurants and things like that, so a lot of similarities.

Speaker 1: 1:09

What brought you to our community?

Speaker 2: 1:11

Oh boy. So I met some individuals at Natco Credit Union 20 plus years ago. My mom ran a small credit union in southern Illinois. I worked for her and Natco and my mom's credit union use the same data processor. So we met at a user's conference 20 years ago. We stayed in touch.

Speaker 2: 1:33

Natco was actually a client to mine at one point in time and I was offered a job in the Indianapolis area and I remember picking up the phone and calling Natco and saying hey, what do you think? So they actually helped me make the move out to Indianapolis. I was out there for about 10 years and then, when I was actually living down in Greenfield, I was talking to Cindy, the CEO at Natco, and I said you know what? I think I'm actually living closer to Richmond now than Andy, and that's when the wheels really started spinning. She called me one day saying hey, I think I've got something for you where I can bring in. It was a no brainer, it made sense. I moved out here in March of 21. And then moved my mom out here shortly behind that.

Speaker 1: 2:18

So you've been here about two, three years now.

Speaker 2: 2:21

Two and a half years, Okay, Okay.

Speaker 1: 2:24

And so what? What's you kind of? What did you do after high school? Did you go right in the workforce to go to college? Tell me a little bit about that.

Speaker 2: 2:31

I went right into work during high school. I remember mom and dad saying if you want a car, you got to go get a job. And I liked making money and I liked working hard right away. So I I did some school, some local college, but we just didn't get along that great. Uh, sitting in the classroom just wasn't my thing. Um, it was out there, out there working.

Speaker 1: 2:56

Right Sounds a lot like me. I was fortunate to go to college and spend some time doing that, but even with that, I pretty much worked and went to school the entire time. So with local business, education, employment and business development mind, which are so involved within the community, like you've got your own Doug's day out with the chamber and I thought that was so cool. I was able to tend a little bit of that to that. How did that happen? How did they come up with that?

Speaker 2: 3:23

You know what? I don't know. I remember when I first moved here Melissa Vance and Lynette Davis at the chamber. They set a meeting to sit down with me. I just followed my predecessors footsteps and stepped into the ACEs committee role and just saw more and more benefit from being connected to the chamber and then helping me make more connections across the community. So I still serve on a couple chamber committees. I'm the chairman of the Bi-Local Committee and once a month we try to do our pop ins and support local businesses and spread the word about what they're doing. My birthday is at the end of July and I think it's the last week of the month when we try to do these pop ins. If anybody knows me, I like to eat. I like to eat. You love Loulous, right, I love some Loulous. And then it just turned into Dugs Day out and it was a great day. I think we ended up hitting four or five probably local businesses that day.

Speaker 1: 4:30

So I tried to be. I think I joined you guys for Roscoe's. I think, yeah, it's good to see everybody. So let me backtrack a second. So I was asking you you know local business education and business development mind where would you like to see our community in the next five years?

Speaker 2: 4:47

Boy, that's a tough question because we've got a lot of challenges in all of those different buckets. But I also think that we're doing a lot of things right. I think we're doing a lot of things better. I think we've got a lot of good, a lot of good momentum right now. So I think it's really just continuing to do what we're doing and how do we do it better, and not get stuck in the pointing fingers that people places and things and saying it's everybody else's responsibility. We've all got a responsibility and I'm saying that when I'm not even from here but we've all got to work together. Work together better. Instead of focusing on the past and the negatives and what's not working. I think it's more continued collaboration.

Speaker 1: 5:40

I agree, I agree, and the fact that you've been here two and a half years and you're so involved and so passionate about where you live and making things better. I know we talk, we talk regularly, I feel like, and you share some great ideas and passionate about. You know we talk about housing and how can we improve that. We talk about personal development and teaching people, finances with the NatCon Empowerment Center and things like that You've got me do a couple of projects with. So what project or what idea are you working on now that that I know it's something incredible, can you share?

Speaker 2: 6:19

I don't know if I I thought about these questions before I came in and it's hard to come up with some of those answers because I would say we as a community are doing so much over at the empowerment center. We're trying to do a lot and we do a lot at the empowerment center. Our mission is people, uh, people, helping people in in helping people live better lives by whatever they want their life in their life to be better. It's not our job to sit on one side of the desk and say here's what you need to do, here's what we thinking to do. Support them, because what I want and what my definition of happiness is different from yours, um, and we do that through the four steps of empowerment connections to resources, job seeking, assistance, money management, counseling, and then a list of classes, trainings and workshops that we provide. So when you look at those four buckets, those speak to how many of the issues that we have going on here in Richmond, um, so, connections to resources, that's something that we do have.

Speaker 2: 7:20

I think a lot of people think that they can't get out of the situation that they're in and, um, they don't know and they don't know, um, so it's, it's helping, hopefully, and we and we do we? We have a lot of relationships in the community and hopefully we can help connect them to that resource that they're looking for jobs. I mean, we talk about it every. We talk about it and we see it and we all feel it every single, every single day. And then and then money management. I'm not going to sit here and try to act like an economist or a professional because we hear about it all the time.

Speaker 2: 7:51

When it comes to inflation, and and and and the, and the price of housing and the price of gas and the price of food, everything we're, we're all feeling it and it doesn't sound like we're. We're feel like things are going to get better anytime soon. They may very well get harder for for a lot of us, sure.

Speaker 1: 8:10

Just get perspective.

Speaker 2: 8:11

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 8:12

You know the ask everybody this question. You know what's one thing about our community that you'd like to see come back. You've been here two and a half years, so if there's something that that's gone to that two and a half years, you know, please elaborate on it. But if there's something standing, that was one thing that you think that we need.

Speaker 2: 8:32

Another good question. Like I said, I've only been here for two and a half years, so a lot of the common things that I hear are the promenade.

Speaker 1: 8:39

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 8:41

We're the rose city and things like that.

Speaker 2: 8:45

What do we need?

Speaker 2: 8:46

I remember I think it was last year when I was at a Qantas meeting and I was talking to chief Brett, because it's easy to I think it's easy for all of us to list off all the problems that we think that we have and that we see, and it's easy to look at data and number and statistics about what's what's not, what's not right and what is wrong.

Speaker 2: 9:07

And I asked the chief what he thought was the number one problem and the number one thing that we needed to do to change. And he said our mindset, um, and I, and I can still, I can still get behind that, because what I do see in a lot of people here that have been there their whole life is there's still that, that Richmond pride, yeah, um, so I think that's what we need more of. Yeah, I've seen. I've seen a lot of it and I've seen enough of it to make me want to stay and make me want to try to help do better. Cause, when I moved here from the Indianapolis area, people are going you're, you're going to work in Richmond.

Speaker 1: 9:54

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 9:54

You're now you're going to live in Richmond. Are you going to stay and why? Um, we've got some real problems here, but who does right everywhere? Um, but it's what it's. It's what I see and hear from the people that have been that, have that have been here, through the good and the bad and the ugly. Um, I think we're moving the right way. We just we need to, we need to keep doing it, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1: 10:21

So we're going to the segment I've got. It's going to be interesting here, you know, with you being here two and a half years, you know years again, uh, but uh, the row city, hot and ready or cold and steady. So, I'm going to just run through a few items and you just tell me what comes to mind. Yes, sir, sound fun. Yep, all right bro, all right so favorite park.

Speaker 2: 10:43

That's a tough one. We do have a lot of good parks. Our part, uh, denise and our parks department do a great job on on keeping up with things. Um, covid really exposed I mean COVID pushed a lot of people outside to our parks. Um, and and and maintaining and improving and keeping our parks safe is a lot of work. So kudos uh to Denise and our parks department. I'm going to land on Glenn Miller Um, very easily accessible. It's huge. It's huge and there's there's a list of how many things to do out there.

Speaker 1: 11:12

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 11:13

Um, and you've got the. You've got the Rose Garden right there as well, so Glenn Miller is an easy one for me to go to.

Speaker 1: 11:20

Okay, okay, I think I know the answer this, but Roscoe's or Starbucks?

Speaker 2: 11:24

Roscoe's. They know, you know pizza place. Mercurios okay. All right, ice cream, everybody knows all these.

Speaker 1: 11:38

Gallows, or olderage men in I.

Speaker 2: 11:41

Know it's a question, but I I want to say both. It depends.

Speaker 1: 11:45

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 11:46

I mean lunch, lunch I seem to go to, or or I more. Last night we did dinner on the patio out of gallows. I mean you've got it, you've got a great view at Gallows, but any of the gallows establishments do. They do a great job and they support the community too. That's, that's what's big. When I look at where do I go is Local. Yeah, I try to support the small local as much as possible.

Speaker 1: 12:09

I Place for a first date.

Speaker 2: 12:15

Ooh, the front window at cordial. Just kidding, I Mean you've got the cordial core, you've got the cordial cork. We've got old Richmond in, we've got Gallo, you've got the Rose Garden. We have a lot of options and there's there's a lot of good scenery here too. Like I love to go up to the city building and I people want to probably wonder why I go up there instead, a lot it's cool. I mean, we have some great scenic views for the sunset around here. So it's just it's. You can walk around the Depot district, you can walk around Main Street and downtown, so it's just it's. It's really just getting out and and seeing and experiencing our city.

Speaker 1: 12:58

I think you might not answer this, but you've asked me to go bowling too, but so golf or bowling golf. All right so you well, you're so involved you probably got one. So Erlum Ivy Tech, or are you east?

Speaker 2: 13:12

So that's another one I can't give you a direct answer to. That's like saying I, that's like saying Hoosiers are Purdue Because people are gonna be listening to this. I Want to say all the above. I mean that's another thing. When we say, what does Richmond have to offer? When you look at, we have Erlum, ivy Tech and IU East here and they and they all do great things. Yes, I mean that's, that's one of the things that you hear people in Richmond talk about is the pride that they have and going to Erlum and and those other universities. So very just grateful that all three of them are here. They do what they do and they help us so and they help support the community as much as they do.

Speaker 1: 13:52

Yeah, yeah. So could you share a memorable moment or experience from your involvement in the community?

Speaker 2: 13:58

another great question, and we could spend a lot of time just on this or the one that really stuck out to me was it's related to Sierra officer Burton the evening that they put her cruiser in front of the city building. I had just moved up here to Main Street and and I decided to walk down there and there was a good amount of people that were coming and going and there was a few of us that that went up there and were hanging out for a while and they had the board set up to attach a ribbon to. And somebody came up and there was no more ribbons. So me and and my buddy, mark Broker, we started getting on our phones and texting calm people 10 o'clock at night, where can we get some ribbon at? And Monica coach lined, ended up bringing some more ribbon up and we're sitting there cutting ribbons and the next car that pulled off was a fireman that just got off duty. So that was the light bulb inside my head that said we got to make sure that there's ribbon, ribbon here, something as small as that, yeah. So we went back the next night and people were bringing up candles, but the candles weren't staying lit. So somebody said we need to do some luminary bags. So somebody went and got bags and Roxy dear. She said you know what? We need some markers in case kids want to write on there.

Speaker 2: 15:25

And then what we saw start to happen. You'd see families come up and sit down and make bags with their family and kids sit down. You'd see grown men come up and hit a knee and they'd be in tears and what? What I saw was a community that was hurting. You saw a community that was also hungry for change, hungry for healing. So something beautiful came out of something so, so tragic, and that was one of those moments for me that drives me to do what I do here in Richmond and beyond.

Speaker 2: 16:02

That's why I got this blue ring on today. It's Friday, right, I wake up and I can very easily want to be lazy and selfish and complain about, yeah, cadillac problems, but when I? That's why I put the ring on this morning, to remember what it's about and and why we need to get up and go out and do what we do every day. Yeah, we can. Some of us, a lot of us, have the luxury of going to Roscoe's every morning and spending that five to seven bucks on a cup of really good of coffee. But there's a lot of people out there that that don't? There's a lot of people out there that need us to do more for them.

Speaker 1: 16:40

Wow you're such a good dude thank you, you too. I can go on about that man not feel about but so it's involved as you are. What advice would you give someone who wants to get more involved in the local community efforts but may not know where to start?

Speaker 2: 17:03

I'm a very frank, blunt person, sometimes get out yeah get out. Yeah, I mean opportunities are there we.

Speaker 2: 17:10

We live in a world where we're know it all, and what I mean by that is if we don't have an answer to something, we all go to our phones, right? Yeah, we go to Google and find out the answers we need to get out. I mean, for me it was a chamber of commerce. It was getting involved with Kiwanis. I've now I mean, I'm on the Girls Inc board now I'm on birth to fives board, I'm in on safety villages board, so it's really getting out and showing up for things.

Speaker 2: 17:39

Yeah, and the way that kind of I approached it, with me being a community development manager, I can easily sit at my desk and do emails and look at reports and data and statistics and this and that, but I feel like I need to be out developing and managing relationships in the community to see what we need to be doing. I need to be seeing, I need to be seeing it, hearing it and feeling it. So I think it's it's really just getting out, but also finding out what's important to you. What's important to you, what? What makes you mad? What are you? What do you not like?

Speaker 2: 18:18

What's going on here in Richmond or the world, and get out there and connected to it, whether it's whether it's your church there's how many youth serving organizations it's really just getting out, getting out of your comfort zone. Yeah, I mean, for me, a lot of times it's it's doing the things that I that I don't want to do, but they need to be done because it's it's the right thing to do, right. So I don't know if that's a very clear answer, but it's. It's just getting out yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1: 18:52

If you collaborate with someone on a project that you haven't collaborated with, what would the project be and who would be the person?

Speaker 2: 19:04

Obviously, I'm not good on giving clear cut answers, because I thought about this one too. I don't know Um, I feel like I I know a lot of people here in Richmond. I've I'm very grateful for the amount of people that have um given me their their time over the past two and a half years. Um, I try to connect and network with as many people as possible. There's probably a lot of people out there that I still people, places and things that I still don't know, that I want to know, that I that I need to know. But honestly, I want to connect and try to collaborate with as many people as I possibly can.

Speaker 2: 19:44

Um, there's a lot of times where I'll get up and I'm out the door at seven o'clock in the morning and sometimes I don't get home until eight, nine, 10 o'clock at night, cause that's what I'm out there doing is connecting and networking with people. But beyond that, serving yeah, um. So I want to. I want to try to connect with as many people um as possible. But at the same time, I think part of that is um a big part of where my passion lives is in the recovery network. I mean, I got sober about six and a half years ago. Um, those are some of the issues that we have right here on Main Street. Um, I live on Main Street, we have an office on Main Street. I see it on Main Street morning, morning, noon or night people walking up and down that need that help. So what's?

Speaker 1: 20:33

you don't touch much on it, but what if you can give someone some words of encouragement right now? That may be looking for some answers? What would you say to that person in their guards? In their guards?

Speaker 2: 20:52

I would say, hmm, be willing to accept somebody's suggestion, Um, be willing to say, be willing to say yes, Um, I mean, that's what it was for me. I would say, I mean, that's another. Another thing that we do have here in Richmond is if you are, if you're struggling with alcohol, drugs, whatever it may be, there's, there's lots of help out here. There's lots of help, there's lots of solutions. Um, I mean, you've got the 228 Club, you've got recovery rocks, you've got Brianna's Hope, you've got recovery church. I mean, then you've got the Meridians and center stones and, um, there's a lot of people out here in Richmond that want to help with whatever you're struggling with. But I think, at the same time, the hardest thing for anybody to do is say I got a problem. They've got to realize they got a problem. And then the hardest thing to do um is say, hey, me being a man, our ego, sometimes our pride, hey, I'm struggling.

Speaker 2: 22:00

I need help Um and then, once you have surrendered and and admitted that to yourself and somebody else, where do you go?

Speaker 1: 22:10

Right.

Speaker 2: 22:10

Um, and so it's not easy, it is hard, um, but at the same time, I think that's where we as a community have to do a better job of meeting people where they're at. Yeah, uh like, we see people every single day, but how many of us don't see them? We drive, we drive right by him and what I try to remember is that person, it's somebody's daughter, it's somebody's son, it's somebody's, it's somebody's parent, it could be it's somebody's parent, right? I think we have to do a better job, um, of helping, of helping people more.

Speaker 1: 22:48

Final question, fun question If you give our community a grade A through F, what letter grade would you give us?

Speaker 2: 22:59

Thought about that one too. I'm going to go with a solid B, if not a B plus, because I don't want to say C. We're not average. The things that that we, that a lot of people, are a part of the work that we're doing, it's not average. It's not average, and and a lot of the people that are trying to be part of the solutions, they're just not putting in eight hours a day. They're waking up early, they're working through their lunch hours, they're staying late. A lot of us are doing whatever it takes To hopefully make things a little bit better.

Speaker 1: 23:49

Man Well, you're certainly inspiring to me, and a lot of others are everywhere. Keep doing what you're doing, bro.

Speaker 2: 23:55

Thank you, you too.

Speaker 1: 23:57

Thank you for being my friend and thank you for being here today with me. I really appreciate you.

Speaker 2: 24:00

Yes, sir, I appreciate your time, thank you.