GUELPH POLITICAST #477 - Buses and Brant (feat. Steve Petric and Daniel Kaufman)

There’s no rest for the weary on this Canada Day week, especially if you’re engaged on housing and transit, and there has been some interesting news on those fronts in the last couple of weeks. No matter your holiday status this week, we’re not going to load you down with a policy deep dive, but we’re going to stop with two special guests to re-calibrate ourselves and remember: Progress is slow, but we need to be in this for the long haul!

A couple of weeks ago staff unveiled their plan to proceed with the electrification of transit at a special workshop meeting of council, which was well received but without much interest on the part of council. One of the people that noticed council’s seeming lack of engagement on transit matters is a member of a local transit advocacy group who has some ideas that he wants to share some on the matter.

On the housing file, some good news broke a few weeks ago when Michael Klein, pejoratively referred to as Ontario’s “King of Renovictions”, withdrew the N13s issued to residents of three apartment buildings on Brant Avenue in Guelph. It was a true David Versus Goliath story, and per the legend David ended up winning…. This time. The Brant Avenue residents won the battle, but now they're wondering if they have won the war?

So this week, Steve Petric, head of advocacy for the Transit Action Alliance of Guelph, will join us to talk about the lessons that council has not learned about transit planning from our municipal neighbours and the over-reliance on buying new EV buses. Then, Daniel Kaufman, who is one of the people who organized residents at the three Brant Avenue apartment buildings, will discuss  the lessons other tenants in Guelph can take from their example and the current state of things on Brant Avenue.

So let's dig into buses and Brant on this week's Guelph Politicast! 

You can learn more about the Transit Action Alliance of Guelph at their website, or you can visit them at the Guelph Farmers’ Market on Saturday morning. ACORN is doing a lot of organizing against Michael Klein, and you can check out their 12-page report into the so-called King of Renovictions at their website. If you need help as a tenant, or any legal advice really, you can reach out to the Legal Clinic of Guelph and Wellington County at clinic [at] gw.clcj.ca or 519-821-2100.

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