I May Be Wrong But I Doubt It - Charles Barkley [41]
There are various ways to go about it. People ask me all the time, “Charles, are you going to run for governor of Alabama? Are you going to run next term?” And I say, “That’s next year!” I just retired. I’m relaxing now, enjoying myself, trying to figure out what life holds for me. There are a lot of things I want to do, and I have to identify the important ones and identify what I’ve got the best chance to get done. I do know I want to help rebuild downtown Birmingham, which is essentially vacant. I’m trying to help rebuild my hometown, Leeds. I’ve been meeting with people for the last two, three months and it’s interesting that none of those people are closely involved in politics.
It’s more daunting for the simple fact that you think you can run for public office and you have this enormous power. But unless you’re part of the larger process with a state legislature, it doesn’t mean anything. That’s the thing that’s caught me off guard the most, how many people you have to have moving in the same direction with you. If you don’t have that army of people, what you do is irrelevant.
This past spring and summer, I had some weeks where I had two and three meetings a day with home builders, community planners. There are some ways, I believe, to help bring about some serious changes that don’t have anything to do with the political process. One of the things I have to figure out is, do I want to pursue a job with one-tenth the money, 1,000 times the stress and aggravation 365 days a year? I had a resident of Alabama come up to me the other day and say, “Please run for governor.” And I said, “Hey, slow your roll. Let me do some things over the next few years that let people know my heart is in the right place. Let me be involved in this effort to rebuild parts of Alabama. Let me take some small steps first.” It’s important to me, because without economic opportunity, all this other talk is irrelevant. I can talk about all the grand plans in the world, but until we do something about a school system that’s tens of million’s of dollars in debt it’s just a lot of talk. Let me see if I can help attract some businesses to move into our state, so we can increase the tax base. There used to be a Parisians, a Sears, those types of big huge stores. But now they’ve moved. They’re not downtown anymore. I’m not saying Birmingham is the only place where this has happened, but Alabama is my home, so this is close to me. There’s a community called Hoover which is like our own little Buckhead. There are beautiful developments all around it, which is great. But the businesses left the downtown area, and now we’ve got too damn many vacant buildings and the downtown isn’t viable anymore.
I’ve just started getting involved, but the support has been phenomenal. I think the business and political leaders at home want to do better. They’ve been beat down for so long, the image of the state is so poor. But you know what? The image of the state is deserved. We always say, “Thank God for Mississippi and Arkansas or we’d be dead last in everything.”
I’m not about to rule out politics. But I don’t know yet how it’s going to turn out. The National Republican Black Caucus sent guys from Alabama and guys from D.C. to talk to me back in April. I understand how the game works. They want me to be involved. They need black Republicans in Alabama. President Bush wants to use me in different ways nationally. I understand and appreciate that. I want to play the game. But the party has to give to get. I’m not a dummy. They’ve got certain issues they want addressed and need addressed. And I’ve got certain needs I’d like to see met, like refurbishing my hometown, Leeds, and downtown Birmingham, which are both ghost towns now.
Leeds is the story of every small town. When Wal-Mart went up across town, so many of the small businesses went away. It’s a complete