Ep045: Rural Election Issues 2026

Ep048: Habitualizing Homelessness (Guest: David Marlon)

Homeless population growth has been a problem in both Las Vegas and rural areas such as Pahrump and Elko. Crystal and Scott sit down with David Marlon of Vegas Stronger, a Las Vegas non-profit dedicated to breaking the cycle of addiction, mental illness, and homelessness by providing compassionate, trauma-informed, evidence-based behavioral healthcare. They discuss the role that that drug addiction and mental illness plays in the homeless issue, why many strategies to address homelessness do not work, and some possible solutions.  David Marlon is also running for Las Vegas City Council, Ward 6. Vegas Stronger: https://vegasstronger.org/

Ep046: Redistricting Revenge (Guest: Dr. Sondra Cosgrove)

Mid-decade redistricting and charges of gerrymandering continue to roil national political discussions, leading 775 Alive to revisit the issue. Dr. Sondra Cosgrove of the College of Southern Nevada and Vote Nevada joins Crystal and Scott to break apart some of the national and Nevada concerns. After looking at the history of gerrymandering, we delve into what should be the basis of “communities of interest” in redistricting: political parties? Race? Socio-economic status? Shared life-style? Local governmental units? And who decides—legislatures or independent commissions? Vote Nevada: https://vote-nevada.org/ Vote Nevada blog: https://vote-nevada-blog.org/ info@vote-nevada.org

Ep045: Rural Election Issues 2026

With the 2026 Primary Elections getting ready to start in Nevada, Crystal and Scott dig into some of the pressing issues for the 775 Alive. Two key ones emerge: data centers and water rights. Both of these are dominating a heavily-contested Congressional District 2 (CD-2) race in northern Nevada and are central to an emerging rural-urban election divide across the country.

Ep044: Nonpartisan Primaries for Nevada? (Guest: Chad Peace, Independent Voter Project)

With the rapid increase in the number of nonpartisan voters in Nevada, Crystal and Scott sat down to discuss some of the reasons for switching to a nonpartisan "open primary" with Chad Peace of the Independent Voter Project. Chad developed the voter outreach strategy for the initiative that created California’s current nonpartisan primary system. The conversations range over the motivations for a nonpartisan primary system, the rights of political parties compared to those of individual voters, examples of various non-closed primaries and ranked-choice systems, and lots about the current situations in California and Nevada. The Independent Voter Project:  YouTube: www.youtube.com/@Independent-Voter Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1VnqtqjZh9EbmDtVxvHF3R?si=d0ecbf0fae384b14 Applepodcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/independent-voter-podcast/id1680559155 To find more about the Independent Voter Project, visit IVN.US

Ep043: Arguing Affordability (Guests: Patricia and Garland Brinkley, Talk With A Conservative)

Crystal and Scott sat down with our good friends from Talk With A Conservative, Patricia and Garland Brinkley, to discuss the biggest buzzword of the 2026 Election: Affordability. What does affordability mean? Is it a measurable economic factor or a political narrative? Garland Brinkley's background as a PhD Economist guides us through topics such as housing costs, inflation, energy costs, the impact of tariffs, and generational wealth transfer, as well as looking at historical parallels. We conclude with a discussion of whether affordability will be the dominant issue in the 2026 Midterm Elections. NOTE: There are some audio issues as we were experimenting with some new equipment. We apologize for that. Talk With A Conservative is a weekly radio show on KSHP (1400 am/107.1 fm) in Las Vegas each Monday from 7-8 pm  PT. It can be streamed live from the KSHP app (https://www.kshp.com/) and is available next day on most major podcast platforms.