Guelph Politicast

GUELPH POLITICAST #161 - The State of the City 2019

The State of our City remains strong, but there's room for improvement. That's the "too long; didn't read" version of this year's State of the City address. There's been a lot of discussion and analysis about Guthrie's fifth State of the City, but as with past speeches in the last few years, the Guelph Politicast is giving you the chance to hear from the mayor directly.
What's the deal with the State of the City? It's an annual event held by the Guelph Chamber of Commerce so that members, leaders of the business community, can hear from the Mayor of Guelph about his or her goals for the year, and the political and economic standing of the city from the point of the view of City Hall. This year's State of the City was held at the Delta Hotel and Conference Centre on February 4.
Like Throne Speeches or State of the Unions, it’s a good way to get an inside look at the political thinking of our leaders: What’s important to them? What are their priorities? A clear priority this year for Mayor Guthrie was his Task Force on Homelessness and Community Safety. Guthrie said it was his intent to use the State of the City as a call to action to get the business community involved in his initiatives to address poverty and need in Guelph, and you'll hear that directly from the mayor.
But along with getting action on homelessness, Guthrie touches on the forthcoming Community Plan, Guelph’s status as a finalist in the Smart Cities Challenge, the Clair-Maltby Secondary Plan, the upcoming budget, the Transit Service Review, affordable housing, and many references to the NBC sitcom The Office. #NeverForget
So let's get into the State of the City on this week's Guelph Politicast!
The original coverage of the State of the City can be found here.
The host for the Guelph Politicast is Podbean. Find more episodes of the Politicast here.
Remember that the Politicast Podbean channel is also the host for podcast versions of Open Sources Guelph. The previous Thursday’s episode of Open Sources will be posted on Mondays.

PODCAST SPECIAL: Student Groups Push Back Against Student Choice Initiative

Nothing sours your journalistic objectivity more than being emotionally invested in the story, but that's the way it is for proposed changes to post-secondary funding called the Student Choice Initiative. The move might take away important funding for campus groups, and it might take away funding for an important factor to Guelph Politico's success.
In case you don't know, the Guelph Politicast is recorded at CFRU, which receives substantial funding from student fees collected by the University of Guelph. That could change if the Student Choice Initiative from the Provincial government is approved. The measure will allow undergrad students to opt out of all student fees save for athletics and recreation, thus putting a lot of campus groups at risk for losing as much as 50 per cent of their current funding.
That includes CFRU. I also co-host two radio shows on CFRU, one of which features interviews with local councillors, Members of Parliament, and Members of Provincial Parliament. It's the only venue of its kind in Guelph for long-form interviews with these important newsmakers.
More than that, I got my start at The Ontarion, the U of G's independent student newspaper. If I had not wondered in there to volunteer one Thursday evening on a whim, then it's quite possible that you would not be reading this right now. There would be no Guelph Politico.
I say this because the anecdotes and advocacy about "freedom of choice" that will surely come out of the provincial ministries will not take into account the freedom of discovery. They will not take into account how one choice can change your life and lay out a whole new path for you to consider. Who might be robbed of their chance to discover who they might really be because there was no one to guide them at our university and college campuses?
This goes not just for the media, but for any of the numerous opportunities provided by student groups on campus. Student government is often a gateway to careers in politics, environmental and human rights groups create tomorrow's activists and advocates, and whole communities are formed and allies created through various student-run ethnic, religious, and gender-based groups.
But now the question must be asked: Can they survive Doug Ford, and what happens if they can't? This past Monday, CFRU hosted a live panel in the University Centre courtyard to try and answer those questions.
Moderated by CFRU's Marketing & Outreach Co-ordinator Andrea Patehviri and Volunteer & Mobile Studio Co-ordinator Jenny Mitchell, the panel also features Rachel Schenk Martin of the Guelph Resource Centre for Gender Empowerment and Diversity (GRD-GED); Natalie Euale, the Co-ordinator of Organizational and Policy Development of the Ontario Public Interest Research Group; and, VP External of the Central Student Association Kayla Weiler. 
The following is a podcast special, a recording of this panel hosted by CFRU and hopefully a warning about what stands to be lost if the Student Choice Initiative goes forward.
So what happens next? The Ontario Legislature returns on Tuesday, so stay tuned.

GUELPH POLITICAST #160 - Paul Tavares, Homelessness Advocate

Homelessness is a hot issue right now. In the midst of an incredible winter cold spell, it's probably quite timely that we should think about the people who have no choice but to live out in the elements. But one man is living out in the cold voluntarily, and he's hoping that his example will galvanize more attention to the plight of homelessness in Ontario.
This week on the podcast, we're joined by Paul Tavares. A long-time homelessness advocate, and a one-time candidate for Mayor of Cambridge, Tavares is presently in the midst of a campaign called 90 Days and Nights in the Cold. It's a stretch he's done before, camping out in a Cambridge park and raising nearly $14,000 for the cause, but his current 90 Days is a bit more ambitious.
Since early January, Tavares has been setting up in an Ontario city for a one-week hitch to raise awareness about homelessness in the area. He's been through Cambridge, Kitchener, and Hamilton (he tried three times to set up in Guelph), and he'll soon bring his tour to Sault Ste. Marie, North Bay, Ottawa, Kingston, and Toronto, and more. The goal is to not just to raise awareness, but to learn about how different communities are working on the issue. What can we learn from each other, and from different approaches?
So in a free-flowing discussion about his mission to raise awareness about homelessness, Tavares talks about whether the media’s holding up its end, his own personal experience with homelessness, why it drives him, and what it’s taught him about the best way to deal with the issue. He also discusses why it might be more beneficial to appeal more to private groups and individuals to act instead of putting more pressure on governments and aid agencies, and why homelessness is a community effort that should be shared by everyone.
So let's talk about being out in the cold on this week's edition of the Guelph Politicast!
Paul Tavares' 90 Days and Nights in the Cold tour presently sees him setting up camp in Belleville. To follow along with the campaign, you can go to the Facebook page here, or follow Tavares on Twitter here.
The host for the Guelph Politicast is Podbean. Find more episodes of the Politicast here.
Remember that the Politicast Podbean channel is also the host for podcast versions of Open Sources Guelph. The previous Thursday’s episode of Open Sources will be posted on Mondays.

Open Sources Guelph - February 7, 2019

This week on Open Sources Guelph, the state of the union is deeply cynical with a hint of despair. We'll talk about Trump's latest attempt to pivot to presidential, and we'll talk about the Ford government's latest pivot away from transparency. After the break, we'll consider if a serial killer can teach us something about the present tolerance for the queer community, and if a city councillor not taking the bus can tell us something about our transit system.
This Thursday, February 7 at 5 pm, Scotty Hertz and Adam A. Donaldson will discuss:
Stealthcare. Although we're still over a week away from the return of the Ontario Legislature, the press room has been very busy lately with a couple of NDP document dumps from a government whistleblower about plans to overhaul the healthcare system. Official Opposition leader Andrea Horwath called it a doorway to privatization, experts are concerned about a loss of oversight by creating a "super agency" to oversee several specialized health agencies, and the guy that leaked it all is concerned about finding a new job. But what's with all the secrecy, and should Ontarians be concerned?
Day at the Speech. After a brief delay because of the government shutdown he caused and got absolutely nothing for, President Donald Trump made his way to Capital Hill to deliver the State of the Union. Scuttlebutt before the speech was that Trump was going to strike a more harmonic tone, reaching for some more of that bipartisanship we've heard so much about. It was also the first State of the Union for Trump literally in front of Speaker Nancy Pelosi. But how well can Trump unify, especially in front of Congress, which is less than two weeks away from another shutdown over the, sigh, wall?
The Lost Village. Bruce McArthur has plead guilty to the murder of eight gay men, and is in the process of his sentencing hearing this week. McArthur's plea allows some closure for friends and family of his victims, and spares them from having to sit through a lengthy trial and the disposition of the horrid details of their loved ones' death. But what about the Toronto Police? Does McArthur's plea also let them off the hook in term of the mistakes they've made as a serial killer stalked the Village undetected. How are the Toronto Police going to win back the trust of the LGBTQ+ community?
Transit Pass. Guelph Transit has some issues, and now the whole country knows about it. Ward 3 Councillor Phil Allt tried taking the "Transit Challenge", where one tries to get everywhere they need to go in a week using the bus, but he gave up part of the way through because, apparently, it's impossible to take the bus in Guelph and keep a full schedule. After Allt did an interview with the CBC, the story got picked up by other CBC outlets, which is probably not the story the City of Guelph wants out there a week after the completion of the service review. We'll talk about why a first-hand perspective matters when talking about transit's issues.
Open Sources is live on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca at 5 pm on Thursday.

End Credits - February 6, 2019 (Velvet Buzzsaw)

It's another week on End Credits, your friendly neighbourhood film criticism show that's happy and not pretentious at all. Speaking of pretentious, we get into the snooty art world of Velvet Buzzsaw this week. We also get into the mind of a Hollywood master of transformation, and we get into the minds of the people running the DC movie universe. We also talk about the world of streaming, and whether Netflix is evil, or at least Canadian evil.
This Wednesday, February 6, at 2 pm, Adam A. Donaldson and Vince Masson will discuss:
Uneven Steven. Steven Soderbergh has got a new film coming out this week, but he's taking a little time for some self-reflection on the junket tour. Looking back at his last two movies, Logan Lucky and Unsane, Soderbergh is still left with the quandary of how best to market a movie, what works, and what doesn't? Speaking of what works, Soderbergh is now with Netflix, so Vince, our resident Soder-expert, is going to talk about the filmmaker's latest reinvention.
Not Batman Forever. To few people's surprise, Ben Affleck was unceremoniously dumped as the Batman of the DCEU, and just as the studio was about to launch another solo Dark Knight adventure. While Wonder Woman and Aquaman have been tremendous successes, this episode shows that there's still a lot of work to do to right the proverbial ship that's the DC Universe. But is firing all the people that played the heroes the way to rebuild?
C.B. See B.S. If you thought the days of imperialist powers was over, then you haven't talked to the CBC lately. The President of the CBC, Catherine Tait, said that Netflix represented cultural imperialism akin to the British and French colonial empires of the 17th and 18th centuries. There's no doubt that Netflix is taking over the world, but Netflix also takes a lot of Canadian hits abroad and makes them international hits. So does Tait have things backwards?
Streaming Dreams. When the internet closes one door, it somehow opens a window. It was announced last week that the cloud site Ultraviolet is shutting down in July, putting a lot of digital libraries at risk since a redemption code has come with almost every disc sold since 2011. If you're bummed, that's okay, you can take comfort in the fact that the Criterion Channel is coming, and it's coming to Canada too. So it is it a good week or bad week for streaming?
REVIEW: Velvet Buzzsaw (2019). The last time that Jake Gyllenhaal, Rene Russo, and Dan Gilroy teamed up it was for Nightcrawler, Gilroy's audacious directorial debut about the cut throat world of "If-it-bleeds-it-leads" journalism in Los Angeles. Back with another L.A. tale, Gilroy cuts throats, and other body parts, in this art world satire that's part 80s slasher, and part snarky takedown of self-important gallery taste makers, but can Gilroy make the two halves of his movie work, or does high concept not make for high art in this new streaming hit?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XdAR-lK43YU&t=30s
End Credits is on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca Wednesday at 2 pm.

GUELPH POLITICAST #159 - Guelph Stuff (Parkland, DCs, Transit and Students)

Contentious meetings about development charges and parkland, demands for improved transit, a fight between students and the provincial government about post-secondary funding. Discussions about issues this contentious demands a couple of straight shooters respected on all sides. It's time for another "Guelph Stuff!"
This week on the podcast, we're joined again by Guelph Politico contributor Eli Ridder as we tackle some recent news items from the Royal City. We call this free-flowing discussion of Guelph topics, "Guelph Stuff," and we try to do it on a semi-monthly basis. (The last one was pod #153 on December 29 FYI.)
The first topic this month is money matters. Both the Development Charges update and the Parkland Dedication Bylaw update came forward last month at city council, and both generated significant interest from citizens. How did the meetings play out and were people satisfied by the outcomes?
Then, there's the matter of the Guelph Transit Service Review. The review was long in the works, and there were many promises made in its name in terms of resolve the transit service's many issues, but the results that came back though were hardly surprising. Where will the transit debate go now, and what does one councillor's "failure" with the transit challenge tell us about the bus service in Guelph?
And finally, the Ontario government has caused a kind of kerfuffle with post-secondary students in this province with proposed changes to OSAP, tuition cuts, and opt-outs of certain student fees. Since Eli is a current post-secondary student, the University of Guelph-Humber to be precise, he will provide valuable insight into how students are being affect by the changes, and the protest of said changes.
So let's dig into some "Guelph Stuff" on this week's edition of the Guelph Politicast!
Stay tuned for more coverage of the fight for post-secondary funding, and all the latest Guelph news here on Guelph Politico. "Guelph Stuff" will return sometime next month.
The host for the Guelph Politicast is Podbean. Find more episodes of the Politicast here.
Remember that the Politicast Podbean channel is also the host for podcast versions of Open Sources Guelph. The previous Thursday’s episode of Open Sources will be posted on Mondays.

Open Sources Guelph - January 31, 2019

This week, Open Sources Guelph is going to get complicated. In Venezuela, there are some tough decisions about how to handle the tense political situation there. The House of Commons is dealing with some of the same old, same old, but police forces in the country are concerned about a new threat. And finally, we ask the question of our time: do we really need billionaires? 
This Thursday, January 31 at 5 pm, Scotty Hertz and Adam A. Donaldson will discuss:
Maduro Notes. Things have gone from bad to worse in Venezuela. Already suffering from economic recession, President Nicolás Maduro was elected in a vote that many around the world see as less than legitimate. Then, last week, opposition leader Juan Guaidó basically declared himself president, and was promptly recognized by many world leaders including Canada and the U.S. But the chaos has begotten chaos, and some are wondering if military intervention is coming. Is there salvation for Venezuela?
Attack the Block. Centre Block is closed for long, long term renovations, but the change of venue did not create a change in attitude in the temporarily re-located House of Commons. From the firing of John McCallum, to a security threat in Kingston, to all the back and forth about carbon tax, pipelines,  economic development, and all the typical political posturing, it's just more of the usual except this time, with a Federal Election just months away. We'll talk about the start of the winter session.
Sleeper Incel. Last April, Alek Minassian killed 10 and injured 16 others because he was romantically unsuccessful; "the Incel Rebellion has already begun," he wrote on Facebook. A report by CBC's The Fifth Estate has tried to raise the alarm that incels, the so-called involuntarily celibates, are becoming more and more of a threat that law enforcement will need to address. Are we taking the threats of incels and toxic masculinity as seriously as we should, and what can we do about it?
Meh-lionaires. A few weeks after Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez proposed a 70 per cent marginal tax rate for people who make over $10 million in the U.S., the idea of taxing the rich seems to be carrying more currency. How do we know? The uber rich hanging out in Davos, Switzerland are already trying to throw cold water on the idea. But it seems like it's too late as people are starting to ask a new fundamental question: How much is enough? If we have a minimum wage, then why don't we have a maximum one?
Open Sources is live on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca at 5 pm on Thursday.

End Credits - January 30, 2019 (The Kid Who Would Be King)

This week on End Credits, we accept our destiny to become the greatest movie show on community radio in Guelph! No mean feat to be sure. We'll pull the sword from the stone and review the Arthurian-themed The Kid Who Would Be King. We'll also talk about an award-filled week in the news including Oscars, Razzies, and Chainsaws, and some rather disgusting developments in terms of one of Hollywood's top talents. 
This Wednesday, January 30, at 2 pm, Adam A. Donaldson and Candice Lepage will discuss:
Oscar the Grouse. The Academy Award nominations were announced, even if there has still yet to be a host named for this year's ceremony. Roma and The Favourite were the two biggest nominees, and diversity still seems top of mind for Oscar voters, unless, of course, you're looking for a female in the Best Director category. We'll talk about who's missing from the nominees presented, and which people made the cut that probably shouldn't have.
Embolden Raspberries. If the Oscar nominations are out, then so are the nominations for the Golden Raspberries, the annual, uh, honouring of the Worst of the Year at the Cinema. But does something feel different this year? Do the Razzies feel more petty than usual? They are nominating low-hanging fruit like John Travolta for Gotti, archival footage of Donald Trump in documentaries about him, and Johnny Depp for voicing an animated gnome. Why bother?
Chainsaw Calibre. Fangoria magazine has published its annual list of nominees for the Chainsaw Awards, honouring the best of horror movies and TV in the last year. If you're disappointed by the fact that there were no nominations for Halloween, A Quiet Place, and Hereditary, then these are the awards for you! Still, were our favourite horror people left off the official list of nominees? Probably!
Singer and the Pain. A new article in The Atlantic painted a disgusting picture of the years and years of accusations against X-Men director Bryan Singer, going all the way back to his second movie, Apt Pupil. People have long figured that it was only a matter of time before #MeToo got Bryan Singer, but they didn't think it would take this long, especially since Singer is still getting movie projects, and a movie with his name on it (Bohemian Rhapsody) is an Academy Award-nominee . So is Singer finally done?
REVIEW: The Kid Who Would Be King (2019). A dangerous enemy, a country in peril, a leaderless people looking for someone to seize the day and lead them to a brave new future. Sound familiar? Yes, the tale of King Arthur has been told, and retold (and retold), but this time, it's a quartet of middle schoolers in modern England who must form their own Round Table before the world ends. If you can't be the coolest kid in school, you can at least lead your classmates in a fight against the walking dead and an ancient sorceress!
End Credits is on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca Wednesday at 2 pm.

GUELPH POLITICAST #158 - John Clarke, Ontario Coalition Against Poverty

Even under the best of circumstances, the Ontario Public Interest Research Group and the Government of Doug Ford would be on opposite sides of any policy debate. But a few weeks ago, it was announced that changes were coming to university funding that would put the existence of groups like OPIRG at stake. It's almost enough to make you want to rebel...
The annual Rebel Symposium hosted by OPIRG takes place from February 8 to 10 at the University of Guelph. This year's theme is "The Fight Against Ford: Resisting the Tory Attack." Provocative, right? Who could give voice to this push to rebel against the Ontario government? Perhaps an old adversary of PC governments of the past.
Enter John Clarke. He started his career in anti-poverty activism when he helped to found the Union of Unemployed Workers in London, Ontario in 1983. Seven years later, he moved to Toronto to become an organizer with the newly formed Ontario Coalition Against Poverty. It was just a few years after that when Mike Harris and the Progressive Conservatives were elected to deliver a "Common Sense Revolution," and then things got heated.
What happened next? Well, that's all still fairly easy to Google despite the fact that it happened at the turn of the century, but the point is that Clarke has found himself again having to gear up to fight a PC government to protect the poor. Already the Ford government has cancelled the Basic Guaranteed Income pilot, rolled back previously announced increases to social assistance,stopped the minimum wage from going up to $15, and, most recently, proposed changes to OSAP that would turn grants into loans.
So is Clarke ready for a fight? He seems to be, and this week on the podcast he talks about that, plus how activism and protest strategies have changed in the last 16 years, and how the fight against Ford is different from the fight against Harris. He also talks about what he wants people to take away from his speech at the symposium, how he’s going to try and encourage people to get out of their comfort zones, and there's even a little chat about the best way media should cover poverty issues.
So let's talk about rebelling with a man that knows how on this week's Guelph Politicast!
John Clarke will be speaking at OPIRG's Rebel Symposium on Saturday February 9 at 12 pm in room 442 of the University Centre. You can find out more about the Symposium by clicking here.
The host for the Guelph Politicast is Podbean. Find more episodes of the Politicast here.
Remember that the Politicast Podbean channel is also the host for podcast versions of Open Sources Guelph. The previous Thursday’s episode of Open Sources will be posted on Mondays.

Open Sources Guelph - January 24, 2019

This week on Open Sources Guelph, we get an education. Here in Ontario, we learn that you don't get something for nothing when it comes to post-secondary education in the Ford era. In Canada, we learn that relations with China are complicated, at least so far as their telecom executives are concerned. South of the border, we learn that sometimes a picture is telling a different story than you might have thought. And in the U.K., we learn that... No, we already knew it was a gong show.
This Thursday, January 23 at 5 pm, Scotty Hertz and Adam A. Donaldson will discuss:
Bad Education. We don't talk about Doug Ford for a couple of weeks, and look what happens... In the latest scandal from the Ontario Government, they cut tuition fees and took a victory lap about saving money "for the people", but the reality is not as obvious. In order to pay for the "tuition cut", Ontario's universities will have to work with current funding levels, which means they might increase fees. And did we mention that changes to OSAP will mean that low income students will have to borrow more, while they've eliminated the six-month grace period for repayment after graduation? And wait, there's more... But you'll have to tune in to hear it.
The China Syndrome. It's rocky times for Canada/China relations, but that seems like it's putting things mildly. Late last year, Canada detained an executive from the Chinese telecom company Huawei at the behest of the United States. This prompted a strong response from China as they started rounding up Canadians working in China, and sensed one man charged with drug offenses to death. It's a mess, but an added dimension has emerged as Canada's security experts are saying that Huawei products should be banned from the coutry's 5G networks over security concerns. So is there a way out of this diplomatic fiasco?
The Kids Are Not Alright... Complicated. A viral video of a teen in a MAGA hat smiling rather creepily at an Indigenous protestor and Vietnam veteran on the National Mall in Washington sparked outrage, and prompted the school, an all-boys Catholic School in Kentucky, to even threaten expulsions. Further examinations brought the Black Hebrew Israelite protestors into the picture, and that's when most people retreated to their "both sides" posture. Could people have misjudged the MAGA kids? It's debatable, and it's being debated, but was does it say about modern life that a white male teen has more power than an Indigenous elder who's also a veteran?
Plan B. Although she survived a no-confidence motion, Theresa May seems no stronger in her efforts to get a Brexit deal everyone can live with. On Monday she announced that she will be looking again at the "backstop", which is the area of probably the most friction in the Brexit deal, but she also swore that there would be no suspension of Article 50, and no new referendum since it would threaten the social cohesion of the U.K., so that may be out of the question too. Still, March 29 gets ever closer, and it seems like there are no new or better ideas on how to do Brexit while people are across the U.K. are preparing for the worst. Is it time to panic?
Open Sources is live on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca at 5 pm on Thursday.