Each week journalists Leah Fleming and Charles Richardson of the Telegraph get together to talk about issues on the minds of Middle Georgians. This week we recorded the segment outside with an audience of listeners from the Middle Georgia area. Scroll down to watch it.

HOT TOPIC #1:

President’ Obama has laid out his executive order on immigration. The plan will shield from deportation nearly 5 million immigrants now in the U.S. illegally. In Middle Georgia’s Houston County there is a large immigrant population who work in the agriculture industry. Richardson says he’s a little disappointed because there’s not a thing Obama said Thursday night that he couldn’t have said six years ago. “The problem existed then and it exists now. So why did he wait six years? It’s political. Personally I like politicians who take bold action when there are political consequences,” said Richardson.

Moises Velez is editor of Que Pasa, the Spanish language newspaper in Middle Georgia. He said reaction to the executive order has been positive. “I spent the night talking to excited immigrants.”

HOT TOPIC #2

The Macon home of Charles Douglass, a prominent black businessman in the early 1900s, has been torn down. On Tuesday a group of people gathered across the street to protest its demolition. This is the second historic property in the downtown area surrounded by Navicent Medical Center to be demolished to make way for a new Dunkin Donuts and parking lot. Richardson says historic preservation groups in Macon are reacting to properties being torn down rather than proactively documenting the buildings and saving them before they are in danger.

Tags: Leah Fleming, Charles Richardson, immigration, Que Pasa, Moises Velez