def define_local(self, name, value):
    if name in self._locals:
      raise Exception("Local already defined: %s" % name)

    should_wrap_in_var = False
    if self._wrap_locals_in_vars:
      if isinstance(value, tf.Tensor):
        should_wrap_in_var = True

      # HACK(adamb) Unwrapping in here really isn't great, since auto-unwrapping can create unexpected behavior.
      if isinstance(value, RetvalBag) and value.len() == 1:
        if isinstance(value.get(None), tf.Tensor):
          should_wrap_in_var = True
          value = value.get(None)

    if should_wrap_in_var:
      variable = state_ops.variable_op_v2(
          value.get_shape(),
          value.dtype.base_dtype)

      with tf.control_dependencies(None):
        value = tf.identity(
          tf.cond(
            tf.is_variable_initialized(variable),
            lambda: variable,
            lambda: tf.assign(variable, value)
          )
        )
      print("value", value)

    self._locals[name] = value
    return value