Spectrum's flag program and broadband trends

We are celebrating Veterans Week all week and talking about some of the ways the community has been giving back. This morning, we've got Tanya Ortega, Director of Communications at Spectrum with us to tell us more about how they're giving back and to talk more about the broadband trends. Before we get into the news, first off, good morning, Tanya. Welcome to Austin Live. Thank you so much for joining us. How are you doing, my friend? I'm good, good to see you guys. I know I feel like the elephant in the room, right? I was a reporter and anchor at Fox for a long time. So if anybody watching is saying, she looks a little familiar, that's why. Well, and we've talked about how we've gotten upgrades here and we, the team, Dennis, myself, the producers behind the scenes, we have been itching to do a Zoom interview in a nice, clean way. And we thought, why not? Let's ask our friends. And it's funny, when Tanya was, when we were introducing her, if Tanya, if you were wondering why it took about like a drum roll, Roll three seconds or so. Amanda's working hard back here just to punch everything up right. So yeah, that was the little drum roll delay. So let's get to the subject at hand, Tanya. We'll start with the flag replacement program. We talked a little bit about this on Veterans Day here on Austin Live. Give us more details, please. Yeah, of course. And this is a really great time to launch this program, right? It's called Project Stars and Stripes. And basically, it's a really great way for our spectrum technicians that are out in the field. If they notice a flag that's tattered, maybe has some damage, maybe too much time in the sun, they're able to knock on the door of that homeowner and ask them, hey, do you mind if we replace your flag for a new one? Right? And so this is a great program because it doesn't cost a homeowner anything. And we actually take the flag if they want to keep it, that's fine. But we take it and we dispose of it in proper way to do so with it for an American flag. And this is just a way to, again, honor veterans, honor the American flag. And obviously, for us, we're 100% US based workforce. So it's just another way that we're trying to give back. And so the The flag program, it did launch this week. So again, this is just, as people on our technician team, field operations team see the flags, they will be asking the homeowners if they want it. Tanya, I thought that was a really cool thing that you guys are doing. But your company also has other ways that they're giving back to veterans. Tell me about these job opportunities. Yeah, we've been hiring a lot for our, especially for our field operations team, but we have quite a few call centers here in Texas. But we do have, we're part of this national program called Hiring Our Heroes, and it's a fellowship. So whenever these military members are still active duty, they can basically submit their resume and they get a fellowship. They get real hands-on experience in the civilian world, and they're also guaranteed a job whenever they make the transition into civilian life. So I know that we have a few of And from this last year in San Antonio, we had a very high ranking Air Force official that now does HR for us. I think it's a really great way to honor people who have served. And I think for us, hiring veterans is a really important piece of Of who we are. So about 8% of Spectrum's total workforce are veterans. And that's a lot of people that we have across 45 states here in the US. So for us, it's just really important to give them these opportunities. We know that they have some really great skills that they acquire while they're in the military, like leadership. And those are all transferable to the civilian world. And we also have different programs for them once they join our workforce, like a veterans business resource group. And so basically what they do is they talk Talk about just being veterans, also some of the challenges they face, how they can help each other. It's just a way to kind of surround them in the civilian world and give them that extra help if they do need it. Tanya, a couple of more questions for you. You talked about your veterans program to hiring our heroes, but there's a lot of work being done in rural parts of this state and to try to get, tell us about that part, the expansion work. Of course, for the last few years, Spectrum has been doing a lot of expansion work, especially rural communities. And we know how large Texas is. And a lot of these communities, they just didn't have access to strong broadband. Maybe some of them had to rely on satellite, some of these other options that were really expensive for them. So we've been doing a lot of work in the community. And there's tens of thousands of new connections all across the state. We've been doing this all across the country. But for us here in Here in Texas, you and I, we live. Here in Austin, and we don't even think about, am I going to be able to talk to my doctor virtually? Am I going to be able to pay my electric bill online? And I think that these are a lot of things that maybe we all take for granted. But whenever you take into account the rural nature of some of our communities, I think it's a really great opportunity for them. And again, for medical reasons, job seeking reasons, and even for kids, they have a lot of online assignments nowadays. And if somebody doesn't have an internet connection at home, Then you know that's going to hold Just hold them back a little bit. So this is just really great stuff for them. Hey, we have to ask you at least a media type question. It's a weird time right now. It changed a bit from when you were working here. You have all these ways to get content out there and I think a lot of people are realizing that buying these individual streaming apps might be a la carte. It's gotta like be careful what you wish for. Do you have anything to say about that as a spectrum rep? Dennis, I think about how back in the day, maybe we were all getting like an app or two and then all of a sudden it turned into 20 and you're just like, where am I going for content? I mean, I know that Fox has their own app. So it's- And ours is free. We must work that out. Right, right. But I think that it's really interesting how through the shift into streaming, people started realizing that they were spending so much money buying those individual apps. And so a lot of people in this trend that's happening are looking into these traditional cable or video packages that we offer, Spectrum offers, other providers offer. But for us, it's really important for people to know that whenever you buy one of these packages, that includes access to a lot of different apps. So, you know, you're actually end up saving money by buying one of these. And you don't even have to worry about your passwords because you just log in through your provider. And believe me, people come over to my house and they say, oh man, you got all the apps. And I'm like, I know, I don't even have to think about it, right? And then of course, I get to watch Fox 7 Austin live as well. I know. Love it. There you go. Tanya Ortega with Spectrum. Thank you so much for joining us today and helping us along as we navigate. Austin Live and the media landscape. We always appreciate it. Come back. Thank you. I feel like we just cut the red ribbon to the lives. We did. We did. Thank you, girl. Girl.