[Danielle Balocca]: Hey listeners, this is Danielle. And Shelley. Shelley is a radical Dravidian and racial equity activist.
[Chelli Keshavan]: And Danielle is a community mobilizer and changemaker. And this is the Medford Bites podcast. Every two weeks, we chew on the issues facing Medford and deliver bites of information about the city by lifting the expertise of our guests.
[Danielle Balocca]: Join us in discussion about what you hope for the future of Medford. And as always, tell us where you like to eat. All right, thank you so much for joining me tonight. If you don't mind introducing yourself just with your name, pronouns, and a bit about who you are.
[Mossalam]: Yeah. Hi, my name is Nicole Musallam. She, her, hers. You know, I've been living here in Malden going on 10 years, very active member of the community. And, you know, I'm running for state representative for both Medford and Malden at the moment. And of course, I am a mother with three children in the Malden Public Schools.
[Danielle Balocca]: Thank you. And your district covers part of Malden and also part of Medford, Zachary, that's correct? Yes. Awesome. So we are going to start off. It's been a little while. I'm a little bit rusty here, but just by asking you the question that we ask everyone, what's your favorite place to eat and what do you like to eat there?
[Mossalam]: Yeah. So our local favorite, Doo-Wop Diner, you know, changed, isn't there anymore. We've adopted a new place, Classic Cafe. It's nice because we go there for what's known as Eid, the celebration after Ramadan. It's a family meal. We go for breakfast. I love my French toast.
[Danielle Balocca]: Is that in Medford? That's on Spring Street? Is that in Medford? Yeah. Great. I've heard good things about that place. Lamb shank. You wouldn't expect that. Thank you. I wanted to start off, I know this is your third time running for this position, right? In between your last time running and now, I know you've had some unfortunate, unexpected things going on with your health. I don't know if you wanted to give us any updates about that.
[Mossalam]: Yeah, so as you said, this is my third time going for the seat. I really don't count the first one since it was in 2020 during You know, COVID, everything got shut down during the pandemic and my family and I, we all caught COVID ourselves. So it was a really difficult campaign year, but I really wanted to see that through. So, you know, we kept going. Then I ran in 2022. That's when we were really able to dig into it and reach out to the community. We fell just 50 votes shy. It was really close. So of course, you know, at that point I was like, okay, third time's a charm, we've got to do this. But I also believe, you know, everything happens for a reason. And as painful as that loss was in 2022, I realize now, you know, as a woman of faith myself, that God had a plan. was diagnosed with breast cancer last year. And of course, that would have been really difficult to handle if I had been elected to office. So I'm thankful that things worked out the way they did so that I was able to focus on my health and recovery and being with my family. But I'm so thankful to still be here. It was a miracle. that we caught it when we did. I was in the middle of stage three and stage four, and they caught it right before it spread to the rest of my body. I ended up having a rare form of breast cancer. I didn't even know this, but there is a type of breast cancer that doesn't show up on mammograms. So I had started getting breast cancer, you know, several years previously, and had already, you know, had a lumpectomy and, you know, had been going in for mammograms and screenings. I had found, you know, they had found a cyst previously, but they kept telling me, oh, there's nothing there. We don't think it's anything. I really wanted them to do a biopsy, but I was like, you know, the special snow. All right. We'll just, you know, keep an eye on it and let it go. Um, I really wish I had listened to my gut. Um, so we had to. I had to make the very tough choice. I got a double mastectomy. Thank God that I did because afterwards they found out it had already started to spread to the other side, even though there had been no indications of that in the testing. I did end up having to do chemotherapy and radiation. And I gotta say, you know, it was family and community that really pulled me through. you know, I've done a lot of aid work for the community. I've done a lot of activism. And thankfully, those relationships were very, you know, very meaningful, because we're there for us during that really dark time. And looking forward to running again and being there for the community was something that helped, um, you know, give me a goal, something that me pull through in addition, you know, to being there for my children, of course. Uh, but. You know, it's good to have, um, you know, other goals and aspirations in life than, you know, just motherhood and, um, Yeah, I'm really excited to get back going again. My energy is every day, slowly coming back. And I think this is good for me because in kicking off, you know, the campaign this time, and I've already started hitting out on the doors, I really needed that motivation to get up and become active again. And so it's really nice to have that energy start to build up on itself.
[Danielle Balocca]: Thank you yeah thank you for sharing that and I'm glad to hear you know that things are moving moved in a positive direction for you health wise. And like you said, I think the timing is really important and, and I think your, your, you know, first two campaigns were. The timing I think was really good for our community to you know I think people were ready for that ready for that kind of energy. 50 votes is like so close. Yeah. And like that connection to the community I feel like you know it sounds like it benefited you in terms of the support that you needed while you were sick and, and I think your energy definitely benefited us in terms of mobilizing people and getting people out there. But I wonder, you know, if you could sort of think, like, let us know a little bit about this time around, kind of what your sort of major priorities are for this campaign, and if elected, kind of what those major priorities would be.
[Mossalam]: Yeah, so, you know, since I ran last time, and everything that I've been through, the relationships with the community, I feel have only deepened. And, you know, a lot of families are struggling right now. We, by forming those connections and being there in the community, I really see what's impacting a lot of us, especially financially. Many families, working families are struggling to make ends meet with the rising inflation. Our schools are definitely feeling it. Now that my oldest is in high school, we're seeing, you know, I'm getting a new outlook with all of that. Mental health has been a big thing, especially in our public schools. You know, my own son has been struggling with the transition into high school. And I'm hearing this across the board from the teachers that for this particular generation, and they feel it's, you know, a big portion of that was because of the schools being shut down during the pandemic. And everything that's been happening, it has been affecting the children. And, you know, as well as a lot of other things in the community. So basically what it boils down to is our state budget. is facing a crisis at the moment. Even though we passed the fair share amendment overwhelmingly in our state, recognizing that we need that money for our schools and for public transportation with the tea catching on fire, they immediately passed tax cuts to the wealthiest earners of the Commonwealth. And now it blasted a big hole in the state budget. So instead of helping families that need it the most, they're busy offsetting what the fair share amendment was going to bring in. So I really want to focus on being more fiscally responsible, making sure that we bring in more for our budget so that we can continue to sustain our public infrastructure. especially transportation. Studies show that for every dollar that we invest in public transportation, we get $4 back in economic growth. We need to invest in our children and their education. Every year that our schools are underfunded and our children's education suffer, it's compounding, it's affecting their future. Our economy is going to pay that bill when we don't have an educated workforce, especially in the trades. It's not just academics, but it's teaching our children real-world experience. And we are seeing a labor shortage in the trades as well. We've got, you know, potholes in our potholes. You know, that's definitely something that I've been hearing a lot from the community as well. And also, you know, being inclusive of our community. One thing that I've been seeing, you know, here in Malden, and I'm seeing it in Medford, is we're beginning to see that generational change, where, you know, some of our older neighbors are beginning to retire and move away. And we've got younger families, more diverse families moving in. So, definitely those demographics are beginning to change and it's revitalizing our communities. So we need to make sure that we have things in place that engage them, investing in our libraries, investing in our parks and outside spaces and keeping the community healthy overall. So I know that's quite a bit. We're still listening to everybody, but those are the big ones that we've been picking up on.
[Danielle Balocca]: Thank you, yeah, and I've seen your, I've gotten some of your emails about the campaign and door knocking and canvassing. And so, you know, you mentioned kind of listening and hearing what people, what's on people's minds, what they want to see going forward. So I wonder how, like, what's the best way for people to, like, communicate that to you or to get involved if they're interested?
[Mossalam]: Yeah, please check out my website, NicoleMasalem.com. Basically, you can send me an email, all my contact information is on there. If we've knocked on your door, you've received an informational card that also has our contact information. So there's a variety of ways, social media, email, phone, feel free to get in touch with us, because we really do want to hear what you have to say.
[Danielle Balocca]: Thank you. Yeah, I keep thinking about the 50 votes. And so can you share kind of when people should expect or should plan to go out and vote?
[Mossalam]: Yeah, so it's a Democratic primary. Our election will be on September 3rd this year. I think what's very important for people to know is given that our state is a very one party state, your true choice is during the primary season. you know, everybody pays attention to the general election in November. And I get this a lot on the doors, people ask, Oh, yeah, you know, they say, I'll go vote for you in November. I was like, No, no, no, no, not November, September. Because by then, there's really only one name on the ballot at that point, because we don't have anybody from other parties running. But you get to choose, I tell them, you get to choose your flavor of Democrat in the primary in September.
[Danielle Balocca]: Well, is there anything else that you think is important for people to know?
[Mossalam]: You know, stick together, really. You know, I'm hearing, especially during the budget process, as well as you know other issues facing our communities, especially what's happening, you know, abroad with Israel and Palestine at the moment. There's been a lot of dialogue within our community. And sometimes it's not always friendly in nature. But I'd like to remind everybody that we are all neighbors to one another. And we all want the same things. We want to be able, you know, to support ourselves and to raise our children and have thriving communities. We may have different ideas about how to get there. But we all want the same thing. And so really, that's what, you know, I plan on emphasizing in my campaign this year. You know, I've always kept a clean campaign centered around the issues and the community. And so thankfully, I have that reputation. So now I want to take it one step forward and say, you know, now it's time to bring it together, to be more unified. And so I let people know, I don't care where you're at on the political spectrum. I don't care how you identify, I want to hear from you. I, you know, I'm going to put you first. So that's why this year, we're saying we're putting our neighbors first, because Um, we're, we're not gonna let, you know, all of this divide us. We're not going to get distracted by all of these, you know, shiny bits. We're going to get, we're going to dig down into our community.
[Danielle Balocca]: Thank you. And are there any other like events or things that you want to plug while we're, while we're here?
[Mossalam]: Yeah. So, um, we are excited that we're having the campaign kickoff, uh, in, uh, uh, excuse me, April 21st. So Sunday, April 21st, uh, at the Fort. We're excited to have that campaign kickoff, um, to have all the community come. And so I would, uh, that's another opportunity, you know, to come up and talk to me. I'll be right there. So feel free to come and say hello in person and, uh, share what you need to.
[Danielle Balocca]: Great. Well, thank you, Nicole. Um, this was like short, but sweet. And we look forward to kind of watching the rest of your campaign. Thank you. Thanks so much for listening to today's episode. The Medford Bites podcast is produced and moderated by Danielle Balacca and Shelly Keshaman. Music is made by Hendrick Guidonis. We'd love to hear what you think about the podcast. You can reach out to us by email at medfordpod at gmail.com, or you can rate and review the podcast on Apple Podcasts. Thanks so much for listening. Guys, what's the name of the podcast? Never Bites. Never Bites. Good job.