Guelph Politicast

End Credits #283 - February 8, 2023 (Aftersun)

This week on End Credits, we're once again on vacation vicariously. There have been a lot of movies about life-changing things happening at resorts while on vacation, and Aftersun is definitely one of them. In other news, we're returning to another favoured trope on this show: movies that don't exist yet, but we definitely want to see them when they are.
This Wednesday, February 8, at 3 pm, Adam A. Donaldson and Tim Phillips will discuss:
Paint it Blacklist. Despite all the complaints that there's nothing new under the sun, or in the movie theatre, screenwriters are still plugging away on original ideas, and many of them end up on the Blacklist, the list of the so-called best unproduced screenplays in Hollywood. This week, we're going to check out this year's Blacklist and talk about the scripts that we would like to see make it all the way to the finish line and into the cinema.
Aftersun (2022). You may not have heard of Aftersun until star Paul Mescal won an Oscar-nomination for Best Actor a couple of weeks now. Now part of the conversation, Aftersun is waiting on VOD to take you on a trip through time and memory. Based in part on writer and director Charlotte Wells' own life, the movie follows a father and daughter on vacation at a Turkish resort where the surface level fun in the sun hides a lot of complicated issues underneath the surface. So is this another subtext-filled vacation we need to take?
End Credits is on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca Wednesday at 3 pm.

GUELPH POLITICAST #360 – When Ambulances Are the Emergency

The story is familiar at this point: A Code Red is called, and there are no ambulances available to respond to an emergency. It’s a piece of the healthcare puzzle that doesn’t get a lot of attention; we sit up when we hear the words “Code Red”, or when we see those line-ups of ambulances on social media, but the problems are ongoing, and in many ways they’re the same problems affecting other aspects of our healthcare system.
A couple of weeks ago, the Ontario Public Service Employees Union (OPSEU) local 231 posted a picture of a long line of ambulances on Delhi Street. The message was that the same sort of burnout previously discussed with doctors, nurses and other hospital workers are affecting paramedics. They burnout too! If you and your colleagues are doing 9,400 hours of overtime, it doesn’t seem so far-fetched to think that some paramedics might be wanting a career change.
You don’t hear about these issues as loudly from the paramedics point of view when compared to nurses or doctors though, so it takes some doing to get that first hand perspective. How are the people who man - so to speak - our ambulances dealing with this current healthcare crisis?  Today we fix that by talking to Nick Di Ruzza, the president of the OPSEU Local 231, who take us behind the scenes of the Code Red state of emergency.
Di Ruzza will talk about what a day in the life of a paramedic looks like both before COVID-19 and today, and he will also talk about Paramedics Services’ success despite their challenges. He will tell us about the human resources issues his local is trying to overcome, and how paramedics approach standards of care beyond answering emergency calls. Later, he will discuss the problems around doing advocacy on behalf of paramedics, support from management and what the community can all do to help.
So let's make room for paramedics in the healthcare discussion on this week's Guelph Politicast!
You can follow OPSEU Local 231 on Twitter. Guelph Wellington Paramedic Services Chief Stephen Dewar has been delivering a monthly report about the demands on the service at the Wellington County Social Services Committee Meeting, and the next one's in March. To learn more about our local paramedic service, you can find them under the “Living” section of the City of Guelph website or on Twitter.
The host for the Guelph Politicast is Podbean. Find more episodes of the Politicast here, or download them on your favourite podcast app at Apple, Stitcher, Google, TuneIn and Spotify .
Also, when you subscribe to the Guelph Politicast channel and you will also get an episode of Open Sources Guelph every Monday, and an episode of End Credits every Friday.

Open Sources Guelph #411 - February 2, 2023

This week on Open Sources Guelph, it's Groundhog Day! This week on Open Sources Guelph, it's Groundhog Day! Now that we've got that out of our system, let's talk about what we're doing on this week's show. First, we will talk about a recently passed Ontario politician and the parts of her career most people aren't talking about, and then we will talk about the very sad sequel to last year's biggest blockbuster protest. For the interview? We're going to have some municipal money talk.
This Thursday, February 1, at 5 pm, Scotty Hertz and Adam A. Donaldson will discuss:
The Hurricane. Former Mississauga Mayor "Hurricane" Hazel McCallion passed away last week at the age of 101, and given her accomplishments and longevity, the plaudits were immediate and they were many. But have we white-washed McCallion's legacy? Her conflicts of interest, the sprawl she rubberstamped, and the fact that she had Doug Ford's back on shaving the Greenbelt right up till the end are all concerning notes despite McCallion's accomplishments, so we will take a good hard look at her legacy.
Convoy the Silence. A comparatively smaller group got together last weekend in front of Parliament Hill to protest COVID mandates(?) and mark 365 days from the day the so-called "Freedom Convoy" arrived in Ottawa. Yes, we're still dealing with the fallout of the Convoy with the report on the Federal government's use of the Emergencies Act is coming later this month, and the Alberta government interfering with court cases around the Coutts blockade, so where are we one year later on "Freedom"?
Count Downer. Guelph City Council confirmed the 2023 budget last week after nine hours of shaving and padding that got the final levy increase down to 4.46 per cent for the year. That's not the end of the discussion though because the pressures on this year's budget are still going to be there when council debates the next multi-year budget at the end of 2023, and Ward 5 Councillor Cathy Downer joins us this week to look ahead, and behind, at the big fiscal picture at City Hall and the increasing challenges.
Open Sources is live on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca at 5 pm on Thursday.

End Credits #282 - February 1, 2023 (M3GAN)

This week on End Credits, it's playtime! We're finally catching up with the biggest hit of 2023 (so far) by making friends with M3GAN (pronounced "Megan" if you're unaware), you're new best friend or worst enemy depending on what side of her programming you're on. And speaking of friends and enemies, we're going to talk about the Oscar nominations.
This Wednesday, February 1, at 3 pm, Adam A. Donaldson and Peter Salmon will discuss:
Oscars So Trite? The Oscar nominations were announced last week, and if you were a fan of Everything Everywhere All At Once, The Fabelmans, Elvis, and All Quiet on the Western Front, you had a good day. On the other hand, there were some definite snubs, and the most notable was a distinct lack of women nominees for Best Director after women have won the last two years in a row. We'll break down the categories with the hits, the misses, and the likely-to-wins.
REVIEW: M3GAN (2023). An early social media phenom for the year, M3GAN came out of the gates as the first must-see hit of 2023. That should hardly be surprising, every couple of months there's a new horror movie from Blumhouse eager to receive the warm embrace of the audience, but might there be something special about M3GAN? We've gotten killer robot movies before, and killer doll movies, but M3GAN combines the two thanks to an inspiration from Conjuring godfather James Wan so is M3GAN bigger than the hype and ready to be your friend till the end (credits)?
End Credits is on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca Wednesday at 3 pm.

GUELPH POLITICAST #359 - Starting Fresh

For this first new podcast of 2023, let's clear the air. In the process of going non-stop 52 weeks a year on all the issues that come at us on a regular basis, how often do we just stop and take stock? How can we keep up with everything and not get caught in the undertow? How can we overcome that feeling that we’re not doing enough and stay hopeful in an ever changing world?
Let’s stop and think about where we are on Wednesday February 1, 2023. The pandemic isn’t over, even if we’re pretty much acting like it’s over. We have issues with homelessness and mental health, but despite a community-wide response it feels like we’re only making a drop in the bucket. We’re faced with economic inequality, social inequality, environmental degradation, and, oh yeah, the Nazis are back! No wonder we have a mental health crisis.
It’s easy to get stuck in this feeling of malaise. Public participation is down with pitifully low voter turnout and a dramatic decrease in the number of available volunteers. People are feeling tapped out after three years of being on their toes, always adapting to a shifting landscape that often pivots on a dime, so it shouldn’t be very surprising that people don’t have the energy for even paying attention to politics, let alone changing the world. If you’re somewhere between anger and exhaustion, you’re not alone.
To help us sort these conflicting feelings, we're joined by John Borthwick, who is the minister at St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church in downtown Guelph. He's going to talk about how to centre ourselves in the maelstrom of issues coming at us everyday, and why we should embrace the adaptability of human beings. He will also discuss the struggle to listen and understand each other despite our differences, and why nostalgia is both attractive and damaging. And finally, he will talk about his 20 years in Guelph, and how the community has changed for the better, and the worse, in that time.
Let's talk about starting fresh on this week's Guelph Politicast!
If you’re in need of spiritual guidance you can find Reverend Borthwick at the pulpit every Sunday morning at St. Andrew’s on Norfolk Street, which is also still broadcast on YouTube on the church's channel @standrewsguelph. For something a little more secular, you can follow him on Twitter.
The host for the Guelph Politicast is Podbean. Find more episodes of the Politicast here, or download them on your favourite podcast app at Apple, Stitcher, Google, TuneIn and Spotify .
Also, when you subscribe to the Guelph Politicast channel and you will also get an episode of Open Sources Guelph every Monday, and an episode of End Credits every Friday.

Open Sources Guelph for January 26, 2023

We're got none! Open Sources Guelph is taking the week off due to special programming on CFRU, the celebration of the station's birth many decades ago. What you can do instead is tune in between 5 to 8 pm where you can listen to some of your favourite programmers spin tunes and celebrate 50-something (Shhhhhhh!) years of your favourite campus and community station, which this time is broadcasting live from the Bullring! Tune in on the radio or brave the snow to be there in-person!! As for the OSG gang, we'll see you again next week!!!

End Credits #281 - January 25, 2023 (The Menu)

This week on End Credits, it's time to eat! Although our show plays at mid-afternoon every Wednesday, perhaps you might enjoy a small snack while you listen because, this week, we're going to make you hungry. Along with our review, which is about The Menu now streaming on Disney+, we will talk about some food-based movies to tease the palette. 
This Wednesday, January 25, at 3 pm, Adam A. Donaldson and Candice Lepage will discuss:
More Eats. Movies centred around eating, or the business of eating, have provided so much rich fodder for numerous movies over the years that's it's almost its own subgenre. From a luscious drama about the transformative power of chocolate to the brutal history of betrayal behind the most famous fast food chain on Earth, we will look at some of our favourite movies about food and eating, and yes, there will be cannibalism!
REVIEW: The Menu (2022). Finally, a movie for foodies, about foodies! A dozen people head out to an exclusive restaurant on a secluded island for a meal they will never forget... Their last! That's what The Menu is about in a nutshell, but there are a lot of intricacies to this overlooked movie from last fall which features Ralph Fiennes as the famously eccentric chef and Anya Taylor-Joy as the mysterious dinner guest who throws a wrench into the chef's thoroughly planned out meal. The result? A meal of a movie with nourishing themes and acting!
End Credits is on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca Wednesday at 3 pm.

GUELPH POLITICAST #358 - The State of the City, A Year Ago

Every year, the Mayor of Guelph is invited to an event called the State of the City where he or she gives a speech to the members of the Chamber of Commerce about the current issues facing Guelph and how city council plans on addressing them. It once was said that to understand the future, you have to look to the past, so what was on the mayor’s mind last year when he talked to the Chamber?
The 2022 State of the City took place on March 31, delayed from the usual late-January/early-February perch for the event due pandemic circumstances at the time. (Remember, there was another lockdown last January.) It was an election year, so Guthrie was going to be called on to set the stage for his then-undeclared re-election campaign, not to mention some advocacy and politicking that could be done in the then-upcoming provincial election too.
So how much has changed since the last State of the City? Guthrie was re-elected, and so was the Progressive Conservative government in Queen’s Park, and while COVID-19 has receded further into the background, the effects of the pandemic are still lingering. But cities have also been whammied by massive policy changes from the Province that don’t seem to address the problems and only create new headaches for municipalities like Guelph to deal with.
There’s an entire suite of issues that might make the final cut in this year’s State of the City, but on this edition of the podcast, we’re going back to 2022. Mayor Guthrie used the conceit of the then-internet phenom Wordle to lay out the City of Guelph’s priorities in five-letter word chunks, and you'll also hear from Medical Officer of Health Dr. Nicola Mercer who was honoured by Guthrie during the State of the City for her leadership during the pandemic.
So let's go back in time to last year's State of the City on this week's edition of the Guelph Politicast!
The 2023 State of the City hosted by the Guelph Chamber of Commerce is Thursday February 2 at 7 am at the Delta Hotel and Conference Centre on Stone Road. Tickets are $50 for members and $70 for future members. To find out more information, call the Chamber office at 519-822-8081 or go to the Chamber’s website.
The host for the Guelph Politicast is Podbean. Find more episodes of the Politicast here, or download them on your favourite podcast app at Apple, Stitcher, Google, TuneIn and Spotify .
Also, when you subscribe to the Guelph Politicast channel and you will also get an episode of Open Sources Guelph every Monday, and an episode of End Credits every Friday.

Open Sources Guelph #410 - January 19, 2023

This week on Open Sources Guelph it's Blue Thursday, the saddest Thursday of the week. To celebrate, we're going to talk about the Code Blue in our healthcare system that Ontario's inglorious premier thinks he's solved, and then we're going to talk about some issues around Toronto's men and women in blue, the members of its police service. But it's not all depressing because we've brought in an old friend to talk about all the math city council will be doing next week!
This Thursday, January 5, at 5 pm, Scotty Hertz and Adam A. Donaldson will discuss:
Doug's Anatomy. Premier Doug Ford and Health Minister Sylvia Jones announced that the Ontario government will lean on private clinics to help clear the surgery backlog, which now sits at nearly one million procedures. Of course, Ford says that you will only ever have to "pay with your OHIP card and not with your credit card", but the whole province is understandably freaked out that Ford is opening the door to two-tier healthcare. Do we have to hit 9-1-1 on this policy direction?
The Money Split. Last month, Toronto Mayor John Tory announced that he was looking at a $48 million increase to the police budget. This comes after months of Tory warning about a budget crunch from legislative changes, and it comes after years of discussion about social justice reform. It also comes at a time of several funerals for officers killed in the line of duty, so maybe "Defund the Police" isn't as politically neutral as it once was. So how do we make sense of these conflicting issues and talk straight about policing?
The Allt in Our Stars. Next week, Guelph City Council will sit down to ratify the 2023 budget, but a lot has changed since last December when the City's first multi-year budget was passed. Ward 3 Councillor Phil Allt will join us to talk about those challenges including the financial fallout of Bill 23 and Mayor Cam Guthrie's proposed levy to raise funds to combat homelessness and mental health issues. We also talk about the varying definitions of affordability and the fate of big infrastructure projects like the library.
Open Sources is live on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca at 5 pm on Thursday.

End Credits #280 - January 18, 2023 (White Noise)

This week on End Credits we have unfinished business. The calendar says 2023, but we've still got some work leftover from 2022 as we finally get back into the regular swing of things. First, we've got to talk about that list that got so many people up in arms before the holidays, and then we're going to talk about one of the last movies to be released in 2022.
This Wednesday, January 18, at 3 pm, Adam A. Donaldson and Tim Phillips will discuss:
The Flack List. Before the break, Sight & Sound magazine released their decennial update to the 100 Greatest Films of All Time list, and we have some notes. Now critics and directors contribute to the list, and essentially the whole thing is done by ranked choice voting, so we aim to do some direct editing by talking about the movies that should still be on the list, the movie that's yet to make the list, and the new entry that might still be there for decades to come.
REVIEW: White Noise (2022). In 1985, Don DeDillo published a book that was popular, but widely considered unfilmable. At the beginning of the pandemic, Noah Baumbach accepted the challenge and started to develop this story about a Hitler studies professor and his family whose consumerist domestic bliss is assaulted by an "Airborne Toxic Event" from a nearby train crash. It's impossible not to see the pandemic allegory in White Noise, and maybe that's the point, but has Baumbach done the impossible and made the unfilmable filmable?
End Credits is on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca Wednesday at 3 pm.