How Private Equity Profits from Climate Disasters and Solutions with Azani Creeks

Show Notes:

When wildfires, hurricanes, and other billion-dollar disasters strike, private equity firms aren’t just watching—they’re cashing in. From buying up disaster recovery companies to profiting off the fossil fuel investments that fuel climate change, these firms have turned catastrophe into a business model. But how does private equity work, and what exactly do private equity firms do? In this episode of Oddly Specific, we talk to Azani Creeks, senior research and campaign coordinator at the Private Equity Stakeholder Project, to break down the high-stakes world of private equity.

From understanding the key differences between Blackstone vs. BlackRock to the ongoing debate of private equity versus investment banking, this episode exposes how these firms extract wealth, consolidate industries, and profit at multiple points in the same crisis. Azani explains how private equity plays a growing role in disaster recovery—both contributing to climate change through fossil fuel investments and cashing in on cleanup efforts.

We also discuss private equity’s increasing control over industries like healthcare, housing, and education, and what can be done to push for greater transparency and accountability. Let’s keep the conversation going—follow Oddly Specific and tell a friend to tell a friend about private equity!

 

Chapters and Markers

00:00 Welcome and Announcements

00:21 Live Show Dates and Social Media Workshops

01:35 Introduction to Private Equity Stakeholder Project

03:07 What is Private Equity?

03:55 Blackstone vs. BlackRock

07:41 Private Equity and Climate Disasters

14:42 Private Equity in Disaster Recovery

32:03 Conclusion and Thank You

Resources & Links:

Live Show - LA May 8: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/friends-only-tickets-1278304265469
Live Show- Boston June 25 & June 26: https://lilchuckboston.com/friends-only-live-with-meredith-lynch-molly-mcaleer-and-rob-schulte/

Sign Up for Social Media Workshops: Email me at meredithcollabs at gmail.com
Private Equity Stakeholder Project (PESP): https://pestakeholder.org/
Private Equity Climate Risk Scorecard: https://peclimaterisks.org/2024scorecard/
Hospital Ownership Tracker: https://pestakeholder.org/private-equity-hospital-tracker/
PESP Report on Private Equity in Education & Childcare: https://pestakeholder.org/reports/making-the-grade-private-equity-privatization-and-the-future-of-american-education/

More Perfect Union + Meredith Lynch- When Private Equity Is Your Landlord: https://www.tiktok.com/@moreperfectunion/video/7471033140279053598
Gretchen Morganson’s Book These Are the Plunderers: https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/These-Are-the-Plunderers/Gretchen-Morgenson/9781982191290

 

Meredith: Hi everyone, and welcome back to another episode of Oddly Specific. It's the podcast that covers everything from private equity to Pete Davidson. I'm your host Meredith Lynch, and while I actually do have a private equity episode for you today that I think is incredibly important, and I know you're gonna be interested in, I also have a few announcements.

Meredith: Firstly, I have three live show dates. This is a live pod recording that I'm doing with my friends, Molly McAleer and Rob Schulte, and they're fantastic friends and so are all of you, which is why we're calling the show friends only.

Meredith: It's an IRL night with your chronically online besties. We have special guests, we have hot takes. So many things that we can only say friends only. Okay, dates. Los Angeles on May 8th. We are at West Side Comedy doing the show and we can't wait to see you there. We have meet and greets available for that.

Meredith: And then Boston, we are in your city, June 25th and June 26th at Little Chuck in the theater district. Ticket links are in all the bios of my social media platforms. I will also link them here in the show notes. Would love to see you there and stay tuned 'cause we're working on adding more cities to this little tour.

Meredith: Also signups for my next round of social media workshops. That kickoff in late April are officially open. We are doing a Tuesday night and a Friday AM workshop, so shoot me an email if you want additional information on those. These are six week small group sessions that I love doing, and we work on a really personalized approach of how to grow your channels.

Meredith: Now let's get into today's episode. This week I have on Azani Creeks, a senior research and campaign coordinator at the Private Equity Stakeholder Project where she has written about private equity's impact on workers, students, incarcerated people, and more. Azani is based in Brooklyn, New York, and if the Private Equity Stakeholder Project sounds familiar to you, it's because they are. They are a nonprofit watchdog organization focused on the growing private equity and broader private funds industry. 

Meredith: You might remember we've actually had on Azani's colleague, Michael Fenne, talking about veterinary care and prisons and healthcare in previous episodes.

Meredith: And we're really excited to have you meet Azani. So without further ado, let's get Oddly Specific. 

Meredith: Hey everyone, and welcome back to another episode of Oddly Specific, the only podcast that covers everything from private equity to Pete Davidson. I'm your host Meredith Lynch and y'all we have a fantastic guest for you today. We have a private equity episode. I've been promising you a private equity episode.

Meredith: I'm giving you a private equity episode. I have Azani Creeks with us here today from the Private Equity Stakeholder Project. You know about them because we've had Azani's colleague Michael Fenne on before. I know y'all love him. I'm really excited for y'all to meet Azani. 

Meredith: Azani, welcome to the podcast.

Azani: Thank you. It's great to be here.

Meredith: It's great to have you here. So I always start off these private equity episodes, especially when I have an expert like you here. I always start them off by asking folks what exactly is private equity?

Azani: Great question. So private equity firms are large investment managers, which pool funding mostly from institutional investors, such as pension funds or foundations, sometimes wealthy individuals. This money is then pooled and then used to invest in companies, different than how we invest on the public stock market. So, for example, you and I could go buy a share of Amazon stock or a share of Walmart stock. That is not possible with private equity-owned companies. Those investments are held privately by these large firms which manage billions and billions of dollars.

Meredith: Yeah. Something I've been seeing over the last week actually on social media is some confusion around the difference between two specific entities, Blackstone and BlackRock. Would you be able to just walk us through what the difference is between Blackstone and Blackrock? Because I've been trying to tell people like, first of all, they're just different. They're different. Also the way that they operate is actually different. So I wonder if you could just walk us through that, using that example.

Azani: Yeah, exactly. So Blackstone, is an example of a private equity firm, kind of in the most traditional sense that we talk about. So Blackstone, for example, will go to your local pension fund and ask them for a commitment of say, $50 million. They'll get that commitment from the pension fund and then use that money to invest in a company. Blackstone will then hold that company for, you know, anywhere from five to seven years, and try to sell the company at the end, making a large profit and large returns for their investors. Those investments are kind of locked in and the investors that have given Blackstone that money, such as the pension fund, don't really have any kind of control over how their money is invested.

Azani: BlackRock is also a large investment manager, but it doesn't really work in quite the same way. They don't necessarily do these funds and, you know, go ask pension funds for money. It is more of a typical stock investment. It fluctuates much more. It's not that they're holding a company for a certain length of time and trying to squeeze out all the profits as quickly as possible. They're a much more flexible investor. And yeah, it's just a different structure. It is all technically private, you know, in the sense that we can't, as regular people, invest in BlackRock either, but the points of leverage that we have and the investors that do invest in those two are, are a bit different.

Meredith: And so if you wanna answer this, you can, and if you don't, that's okay. But I feel like in the, in the in the minutia of it all, there is a big difference when you confuse Blackstone and BlackRock. 

Azani: There is, yeah, there is. 

Meredith: People were telling me they were like, meh, Meredith. Potato. Potato, that's a little nuanced. And I was like, Just because private equity is my special interest doesn't mean that, and listen y'all, I am not speaking for Azani, but I am not saying like long live BlackRock. I'm just saying we need to be aware that there are differences in these. And one of the things that I think I've found in talking with Michael and talking with Gretchen Morganson is that these places actually love it when we confuse them and we don't fully understand what they do because it actually helps the way that they operate. 

Azani: Exactly. I mean, that's the whole point of having investments be private, is so that people don't understand and people don't have access to the information. Like, it is helping them for us to not understand. And things are a bit complicated, you know, as with economics, generally, it's kind of made to be a little bit confusing and convoluted, but that's why we're here, at the Private Equity Stakeholder Project, to simplify some things. 

Meredith: Exactly, and y'all don't worry. Obviously there's a lot of private equity firms, right? And there's, you know, the major players. But Blackstone's really my white whale. It's like, that is my, I don't know why, but like, since day one I have just been, I have, I've been riding Blackstone and, uh, we're gonna get, we're gonna get to that because they play a role in the topic that I've invited Azani here to speak with us about today. So specifically, last time that Michael was here, he and I talked a lot about, private equity in veterinary care. But I invited you here because I was wondering if you could tell me a little bit about the role that private equity plays in the billion dollar climate disaster responses.

Azani: Yeah, Private equity is involved in a couple of different ways in the disaster recovery industry. This industry is growing, of course, so as the number of billion dollar climate disasters and less than billion dollar climate disasters increases, private equity is taking up a larger and larger share of that sector. Historically, the disaster recovery sector has been run by local mom and pop businesses, that are really dedicated to cleaning up the communities that they live in. It is a very kind of fragmented sector, because of that. It's a lot of small businesses and private equity firms love a fragmented industry, because then they're able to come in and consolidate the sector. Put a bunch of small businesses together and repackage them as this larger company that can then be sold off for profit. And of course, you know, some of these small businesses really need investment. Maybe they don't have anyone to pass the company down to, or as disasters are increasing in their area, they need to expand. Private equity firms are going in there offering to purchase them or contribute capital to them, hoping to make that kind of quick profit. So that's one way that we see private equity investing in the billion dollar disasters, through cleanup itself. But also we've seen, of course, private equity contributing to the climate crisis through emissions and other dangerous practices. Last year, we worked on a private equity climate risk scorecard, and we studied 21 private equity firms. Those firms manage $6 trillion worth of companies, and two thirds of the energy companies in their portfolios are responsible for over a gigaton of emissions. A gigaton doesn't even sound real to me, but it's a little over 1 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide, through investments in upstream oil and gas, liquified natural gas and coal fired power plants. So that level of emissions is more than three times the amount of energy used to power all of the homes in America, just from these 21 firms. And it exceeds the global aviation industry. Private equity firms are contributing to climate change through these emissions, through these harmful practices, and then also profiting from cleaning up the disasters at the end of it. So they're making money on both ends. 

Meredith: Wow. 

Meredith: Okay. We have a lot to unpack here. First of all, I think I have to take back some of the things I've said about Taylor Swift and her jet use. Now that I, that like, but I think what's so interesting here is, first of all, this reminds me very much of what we're seeing with private equity buying up electricians and, and plumbing, et cetera.

Meredith: It's sort of like, okay, here are these things that have operated for a really long time as mom and pop, maybe a family owned business. And you get to this point where you're like, okay, what do I do with this, right? My kids don't wanna run it. None of my employees want it, or they can't afford to pay me even like what it might be worth.

Meredith: And then private equity comes in with this really attractive offer of Hey, we will buy this from you. And I find it really challenging to fault the small business owners there. I don't think that's the problem. And I've had people push back, you know, 'cause we we're seeing this with veterinary care as well. I would say it's a very similar sort of model and it gets kind of crazy when you look at it and you realize, oh, they're just kind of doing the same thing again and again. 

Meredith: Which is also sort of how Taylor Swift approaches her albums. Wait, no I didn't say that. I didn't say that. Uh, no, but, I think that's, that's really important to note is that when we actually break this down, we're talking about the transparency, we're talking about the confusion, the fragmentation. When you look at the private equity playbook, it's actually pretty consistent and pretty much the same. So there's that piece of it.

Meredith: But then I guess my follow-up question to you is there's this link between private equity firms profiting off of fossil fuels, and could we just break down how we can draw a through line between that and all of the climate crisis crises that we keep enduring.

Azani: Yeah. I think that in some cases, private equity firms directly own fossil fuel companies or coal fired plants or other things, and own a disaster restoration company. You know, I'm not the climate researcher, but from what I understand, emissions and those things are contributing to the issues that we see, like the LA wildfires. It might not be that these specific emissions that come from this private equity- owned company caused this specific disaster, but investing in fossil fuels overall, not committing to the kind of benchmarks that folks have set over the past years of, you know, by 2030 we're gonna cut emissions down to this. Or by 2050 we're gonna cut emissions down to this. We know that not committing to those things is continuing to invest in climate crisis, and continuing to profit from climate crisis. And as public companies divest from these things, private equity firms are picking up the things that they're divesting from, right?

Azani: Um, and so it's like we're making progress in one area and all these public companies that were actually able to hold accountable through these public processes, but we're not able to do that same thing with private equity. And so private equity is just picking up all of the bad, the bad things that are left behind.

Meredith: Yeah, That makes sense. Well it's actually so interesting that you say this because it reminds me of something that I'd bring up all the time, which is oddly specific, but I don't care.

Meredith: When I was like in college, there was a reality TV show and it was called Sunset Tan. It was about a group of people who ran and worked at a tanning salon. It was a very different time, 

Azani: Azani. It was a 

Meredith: very different time. The millennials, like we did ourselves no favors.

Meredith: So anyway, the guy who ran it who was really into tanning is still in LA. He now runs a med spa where a big focus of it is, like age spots, over exposure to sunlight, like treating all of those things. And so in a way, it kind of reminds me of private equity. It's like you caused the problem, or at least contributed to the problem and made money off of it, and now you're at the other end when it all goes to shit. And we have age spots that we have to get burned off. You're the one who's there. So anyway, that's my oddly specific reference. The only thing I'll give him credit for is he wasn't running the med spa and the tanning salon at the same time, which is kind of what private equity does. Right. So what are the consequences then, of private equity firms dominating the disaster recovery industry?

Azani: I think that what we tend to see in these industries that private equity goes into is that they really are able to set the tone and set the pace for the industry because they're such big players and they have all the lobbying dollars and things like that. So it might seem like private equity just has a small percentage of the industry or whatever, but they have this kind of outsized influence because of all of the power that they have. And so some of the issues that we already see in the disaster industry in terms of repairing damage. It's just like a normal construction industry. Construction is very dangerous. Historically, that doesn't really have anything to do with private equity. However, because of the private nature of private equity, it's harder to hold them accountable for when things go wrong. So, it's very difficult to get restitution for workers who have been harmed on the job or when there's wage theft.

Azani: The private equity firms are suddenly not liable, even though they have billions and billions of dollars, and they don't need to be stealing money from workers. It's not, you know, just a local mom and pop shop that missed a check or something like that. This is a trillion dollar private equity firm in the case of Blackstone, which owns one of these disaster restoration companies, pretending to not be responsible for their workers. Those issues are being exacerbated through the private equity firms, through the lack of transparency, the lack of accountability because of the private nature of the investments.

Meredith: Well, and I would also imagine that there becomes a monopoly on this because if private equity is buying up all these places, then who else can you turn to? So you're like, we need to bring in recovery. It's, and it's also too, it's like a desperate time, right? When you're an area that's recovering from disaster, like, we have to bring somebody in and we don't have time to comparison shop or look for the most ethical one.

Meredith: And I'm also thinking, what is the cost, of, of all of this? Because private equity is buying up all these places, are they able to increase the cost of these things? Because it's like, well, we're the only ones doing it.

Azani: Yeah, that's a great question. I don't know that we have data on if they are raising costs more than any others. I have found several examples of price gouging at private equity owned firms. There was a settlement in North Carolina a few years ago, where a private equity backed company, you know, the attorney general accused them and found them in violation of price gouging. So that definitely is something that we see in these private equity backed companies. I don't know that it's at, you know, I don't have concrete numbers that it's at a greater scale than other investments, but it's certainly happening. 

Azani: And definitely with the, monopolizing that you were talking about. I mean, the same firms that were helping with the cleanup of Hurricane Helene, were helping with the LA wildfires, so that's like a coast to coast thing. Again, it's not your local business helping the community that they live in. It's this, you know, sometimes transnational company that is coming in and setting the tone again for all of the workers across the country, for all of the projects that they take on, and setting the standard that way.

Meredith: Yeah, you bring up, you know, things like wage theft, et cetera, and that is because there is a lot of private equity ownership in not just the restoration companies, but also the staffing agencies. So could you just walk us through what that model is? 

Azani: Yeah. So again, private equity firms can invest in a range of different companies. There isn't really a limit to what they can invest in. And so sometimes they like to invest in things that can make them money multiple times. Um, so there's this example of a private equity firm that owned both a disaster restoration company and a staffing company that the restoration company used. As is common in construction, a lot of these disaster restoration companies are franchised and have a lot of subcontractors and sometimes use staffing agencies for that subcontracting. So the private equity firm was actually taking a percentage of the profits from both the staffing company and the disaster restoration company, kind of double dipping. This is something that we see a lot actually across sectors. We see it in healthcare, we see it in education. Um, private equity firms being able to invest at multiple points in the same process and profit multiple times.

Meredith: Is there ever a place, just switching gears for a second, where there could be regulation that could, guardrail that a little bit

Azani: Yeah, I think that would be great. I think there are a couple of issues that could be tackled in that. One is just general liability, right? So because they are,

Azani: it's franchises and then there's all these subcontractors. Usually the private equity firm and maybe even the company that they own, are not ultimately liable for whatever happens with the subcontractors or whoever else that they hired.

Azani: So there can be definitely some, some guardrails around that and kind of enhancing liability. And then also, yes, placing guardrails on having companies with the same owner be profiting from the same project. I think that that could be very easy to do, honestly, with FEMA money and putting guardrails on. I mean, not easy to do because nothing's

Meredith: Right. Yeah, I mean, you know, everybody that I've had on here who has talked to me about private equity, whether it's Michael or you or Gretchen Morganson or Senator Markey or Senator Warren. Guys let, like, I'm just name dropping the, the greatest hits of private equity, 

Azani: a 

Meredith: very elite group.

Meredith: No, but you know, the thing we talk about is regulation and one of the big things that folks get wrong, I think about what I talk about and what I'm doing is they're like, you just wanna end the industry completely. And I don't think that's possible. So what I wanna do is I wanna put guardrails on it.

Meredith: I want there to be protections. And we're seeing that happen in some places. For example, in Colorado, there is legislation that is going through that will make it so there is more transparency around private equity firms who own daycares. Y'all. That's, that's really important. That's our children, that's our future of the United States, et cetera.

Meredith: So there's that. So I don't think that guardrails or legislation, et cetera, is something that has to be ruining private equity. And I also don't think it has to be impossible. So I'm really happy to hear you say like, yeah, there could be regulation there. A lot of people come on my social media accounts and it's like, this girl just wants to end private equity.

Meredith: And I'm like, well, I mean, yeah, but I know that's not possible, so I'm trying to meet people in the middle. So my, my next question for you is, how does private equity benefit from the real estate side of a climate disaster?

Azani: Yeah, that's a good question. I have seen some things floating around about private equity firms calling people immediately after the fires and trying to buy their properties. I don't know that we have any kind of concrete examples of that? Private equity firms are usually not necessarily like real estate developers, and so I don't know that they would kind of like, buy land that needs to be completely rebuilt. Um, they typically buy existing buildings, existing commercial and residential properties, but of course any kind of crisis that takes away from the housing supply is, going to put more pressure on the housing crisis in general, which private equity definitely profits from. As I'm sure everyone knows, um, private equity is notorious for wild rent hikes, evictions, terrible living conditions. There was a piece recently about black mold in private equity backed housing. All of these things that our housing team has continued to look into. So I think that private equity, even if they're not going in and buying up the plots that have burned or whatever, um, they still are going to benefit from an increased crisis in housing.

Meredith: Sure. I see, I see exactly what you're saying because I actually did a bunch of research before we met trying to see if any of these firms were like, oh, I'm getting calls from Apollo or something for my land. I couldn't find that here in Los Angeles. And I think that I was kinda like, oh, I wonder why.

Meredith: And now this all makes complete sense, right? However, I'm sure these private equity firms, like, you know, there's a lot of talk that a lot of people from LA will relocate to places like Orange County, et cetera, because just cost of living, right? So I'm sure those places, where there might be already an established apartment building that now that it's backed by private equity, that they've been running for a year or two and running, potentially, into the ground, they see that as a gold mine versus like, oh, here's this plot of land where we'd have to build a beautiful home and then we'd have to sell it. Private equity doesn't want to do that. 

Azani: They're lazy. 

Meredith: Honestly, you guys in another world. This would've been the perfect job for me, like, because I get how it's working and I can be a little lazy. But anyway. 

Meredith: I think that's such an important point to make and I think it also helps us really understand like that private equity playbook is they like to come into things that are already established, and that's really what we've seen and that's why I think another problem with private equity is that it's not really creating innovation. 

Azani: No. It's not. They like to say they're creating jobs, that they're doing all these new things. They're also not creating jobs. In fact, they're usually cutting jobs. They're acquiring more and more companies and putting them together, and calling that creating jobs. But the jobs already existed. You know, it's not that they're adding new positions or new work, because they're not building anything new, to your point.

Meredith: Yeah. I did a video, y'all with More Perfect Union a couple weeks ago about a private equity firm that owns, they own 136 federally subsidized housing complexes. And there was a fire in one of their complexes in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. They're called Vitus. That's the name of the private equity firm, and I'll just say that since my video came out, uh, they have taken their website down. 

Azani: Wow. 

Meredith: It has been, I'm pretty sure it's still under, it's been under maintenance mode for almost a month now. But this is the kind of pressure that I feel like private equity needs.

Meredith: They need to know that people are paying attention. And so I, I wanna ask you this question because it's something that my listeners constantly ask for, and. They wanna know like, oh, okay guys, wait, breaking news. Vitus is still in maintenance mode. Okay. Um, no, but one of the biggest questions that my listeners ask is just like, what can I do? Even today I made a video yesterday where I talked about the fact that Dunkin' Donuts is the number one employer with employees on food assistance in the state of Massachusetts. And it's a private equity backed company, and there's a link between private equity- backed companies and food assistance, y'all.

Meredith: So Gretchen Morganson writes about it in her book. Then I have people in the comments and I get it. I get where they're coming from. They're like, "well, then where do you want me to get coffee? I'm not gonna boycott Dunkin' Donuts. What do you want us to do?" So first of all, one of the things that I just wanna make clear is I'm not telling you to not go to dunkin Donuts. I think it's almost impossible to avoid private equity in your day-to-day life. You are going to places that are backed by private equity, buying things that are backed by private equity all the time, and you don't even know it and you'll drive yourself nuts. I think if you try to eliminate all of those things. Maybe Azani disagrees with me, but, my question for you, long-winded way of getting there, is what can we actually do to push back against private equity? Because I don't think it's like never going to Dunkin' Donuts.

Azani: Exactly. Yeah. And like you said earlier, private equity itself isn't going anywhere. And so the question really is how can we implement guardrails and best practices to make sure that there are some regulations, some limit to what these private equity firms can do. Some things that individuals can do is like, support unions. If you see organizing at a private equity backed company or something, definitely like offer your support or if they're striking, don't cross the picket line, things like that. Some other things that folks can do is push for increased public funding of some of these things. 

Azani: For example, with the childcare example that you gave, this is a crisis that's been going on for a really long time because we haven't figured out how to adequately fund childcare. So if we figure that out, private equity is not going to be able to have as much of a stronghold in that industry, and it should be that way with all of these things that are kind of fundamental.

Azani: I mean, healthcare, disaster recovery, should be seen as fundamental, right? Like these are people's homes, people's businesses, they need to have these things, and it shouldn't just be kind of a purely profit driven kind of sector. Putting pressure on our local, state where we can, federal government to increase alternatives for these things would be great.

Azani: And then also staying informed. We have lots of resources at PESP for example, discover who owns your building or, um, look through companies that have recently gone bankrupt because a private equity firm ruined them, like our dear Joanne.

Meredith: Oh my gosh, the Joanne's community is not doing well. 

Azani: They're not okay.

Meredith: Are you a Joanne's person? 

Azani: I'm a Joanne's girl.

Meredith: You are. All right. I mean, and here's the thing, Azani, the writing was on the wall. I, 

Azani: yeah. We knew. 

Meredith: I'll tell you my next prediction. Pickleball is gonna crumble because of private equity. 

Azani: Probably. 

Meredith: And pickleball is, like a bit like here in LA. Like you thought the Joann's people are intense. Like these pickleball people are like, they're really 

Azani: they might riot. 

Meredith: Yeah, exactly. I mean they already basically are out on those courts. I don't know what's going on out there. Do you play pickleball?

Azani: I don't. 

Meredith: Me neither, but I just learned, somebody was like, yeah, part of the court is called the kitchen and you can't go in that part of the court. And I was like, all right, then like, why is it on the court? Like I'm very confused, but I also like, I don't, I feel like not knowing is actually the way for me to go. Like the more I know about it, the more, the more it gets in my head. So. Anyway. I love your website. I also love, you have a hospital tracker, which I think is fantastic and, so many other resources.

Meredith: The report that you referenced is fantastic and we will link that in the show notes. Anything else coming up for PESP that you wanna tell us about? 

Azani: I think just generally it's a very interesting time for private equity. There was a bit of a lull in private equity activity last year due to some stuff with interest rates and generally, you know, the market overall. But I think that private equity firms are kind of finding themselves in a bit more favorable environment this year and kind of looking ahead.

Azani: So I expect to see a lot more deal activity, a lot more acquisitions this year. So yeah, we're gonna be tracking all of that. 

Azani: There have already been some disaster recovery companies acquired this year. We'll definitely be following those things. I am writing a report about the thing that you mentioned about the Colorado legislation, not about that specifically, but about private equity and education and childcare, curriculum development, teacher staffing, things like that. That's coming out this week. It's another one of those public goods that private equity really honestly should not be invested in at all, because it's a public good. But again, the question is what do we do about it now that they're already there? That's what I'm working on.

Meredith: Awesome. Well, thank you so much for spending some time with us today, and especially on such a big week when you have a report coming out. We really appreciate it. And Azani is at the Private Equity Stakeholder Project. I want y'all to follow Private Equity Stakeholder Project, keep up with what they're up to and we'll be sharing that education report when it comes out. Thank you so much, Azani. 

Azani: Thank you.

Meredith: All right, everyone. That is a wrap on another episode of Oddly Specific. Thank you so much for hanging out. I wanna thank my guest, Azani Creeks. I want to thank all of the ticket buyers out there because I know so many of you immediately just put down your phones and were like, I'm buying tickets. No, but I really, I wanna see you guys this summer.

Meredith: It'd be so fun to have you at the shows. If you're in LA, May 8th at West Side Comedy. If you are in Boston, June 25th and June 26th at Lil Chuck. I would love to see you there. And of course, as always, we gonna give a special shout out to all of our Patreon Pals. They keep this little ship going. I'm so grateful to you.

Meredith: These are the folks who subscribe at the Patreon Pals level. It's 15 bucks a month. You get all the tea that's too hot for TikTok. So let's send those big shout outs to Annie Schreiber. Bree Prizernick, Caitlyn Duffy, Sean Sweet, Cheryl Gunderson, Darcy Ray Johnson, Debbie Perillo, Grogu M, Hayden Young, Jake Jabber, Jennifer Nash, Jennifer Yarrington, Jess, Julia Loggins, Katherine Demezio, Kim Dunham, Kristen Zanotti, the Lady Swamp, which gives no fucks, Lindsay Butler. Lisette Porter Guerrero, Macy Malicheck, Mark Nudsonn, MJ Cormier, Raya, Robin Johnson, Tasha L, Tom's Law Firm because it's certainly about Tom, Tuna Pup and San Fran gal. I truly could not do it without you all. And of course, all of my lovely listeners, I hope you enjoyed this conversation.

Meredith: Please go follow Private Equity Stakeholder Project. They do such important work and I'm so grateful to have them as partners in this. Thanks so much for hanging out y'all. See you real soon. And as always, don't forget to tell a friend to tell a friend about private equity.