Guelph Politicast

Data is key to guiding health policy, and health units collect a lot of it, but formatting it, organizing it, and looking for patterns in it can be time consuming, meaning that you’re doing a lot of labour that has nothing to do with creating the actual health policy or solving a public health issue. If you’re thinking to yourself that this sounds like an ideal solution for artificial intelligence, you’re right! At May’s Board of Health meeting, staff members discussed “Innovative Public Health with AI and Automation”, meaning the ways that Public Health is using artificial intelligence to enhance their work. The report offered examples of success like using A.I. to process vaccine records, generate immunization notices, and process lab results. You might have interacted with A.I. yourself if you’ve clicked on the “need help” icon on the Public Health website. The staff at Public Health are very bullish about the possibilities of artificial intelligence, but for a lot of people there are no two scarier initia

This week on Open Sources Guelph we're talking war and price. No, you read that right. On the war front we're going back to Gaza where the prospects for peace have not improved, and along with that it's going to get tougher to express your thoughts on war if you're protesting in Toronto. As for price, that's what we've got our guest here to talk about as we dig into money matters with an expert. This Thursday, May 29, at 5 pm, Scotty Hertz and Adam A. Donaldson will discuss: *Now* It's a Genocide? Wednesday was the 600th day of the War in Gaza. What started with a terrorist attack led by Hamas on October 6, 2023 has gone on for nearly two years and has nearly decimated Gaza killing 53,000 mostly civilians in the process. But in recent days a tide has been turning. More and more people are saying outloud that Israel's actions in the last 600 days have not been about security, but about wiping Gaza of all Palestinian presence. Is the taboo finally off calling this a genocide? On the Bubble. Last week, the City

This week on End Credits, you're going to join us on an adventure. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to go with us on another globetrotting, death-defying sojourn with Tom Cruise and the gang in Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning, and we will also rewind to the very first movie in the series and talk about our lifetime of impossible missions! This Wednesday, May 28, at 3 pm, Adam A. Donaldson and Peter Salmon will discuss: In the Beginning... Before getting into the latest Mission, the eighth, it seems fitting to go back and look at episode one. The year was 1996, Mission: Impossible was Tom Cruise's first effort as a producer, and Brian De Palma was hired to bring it to the screen as director. It's hard to look back at that first Mission and see what the franchise ended up being 30 years later, but that's what we'll do before launching into the new one! MOVIE REVIEW: Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning (2025). It's all be leading to this... Quite literally. The eighth Mission: Im

Last week, Future of Good released their first ever Changemaker Wellbeing Index, which highlights the pressures facing the workers in the non-profit sector and the results paint an increasingly bleak picture. They also paint a coherent picture, putting together the various pieces that we’ve been hearing about these last few years: Organizations are struggling for money, staff and volunteers, and now we have the data! The Changemaker Wellbeing Index surveyed 1,100 Canadian non-profit workers, from frontline staff to senior leaders. Future of Good worked with GreenShield, ATB Financial, the Ontario Trillium Foundation, WES Mariam Assefa Fund, Definity Insurance Foundation and United Way Centraide Canada, while Environics Research did the heavy lifting with the surveying. What they learned was kind of shocking. Of the 1,100 people surveyed, 36 per cent said that they "often or always" feel burned out or exhausted, 31 per cent said that they experience food insecurity, and that rises to 48 per cent for frontlin

This week on Open Sources Guelph, we get back to basics, and by "basics" we mean our two favourite agitators. Yes, it's time again to talk about the two Ds, Donald and Doug. One is turning American democracy inside out and the other is turn provincial environmental policy upside down. And for the interview? We will get an education with our special guest, a teacher! This Thursday, May 22, at 5 pm, Scotty Hertz and Adam A. Donaldson will discuss: American Idiots. So much of Canadian news lately has been about going on in the U.S., but how are things going down in the White House with the Trump sequel? In a word: Badly. From cabinet ministers tripping over their own tongues in Congress to accepting a $40 million bribe from the Royal Family of Qatar, the Donald Trump administration is not covering itself in glory, and then, for the coup de grâce former President Joe Biden announced that he's got cancer. We'll catch up with the southern circus. Endangered Specious. Bill 5 is currently before the Ontario Legislat

This week on End Credits, we're having vacation thoughts already! How about an adventure on an island somewhere? We have a couple of options to consider today. One is a new film called The Ballad of Wallis Island where feelings might be hurt, plus we're going to talk about a well-know movie that's turning 50 this year where the danger is a little more physical. This Wednesday, May 21, at 3 pm, Adam A. Donaldson and Tim Phillips will discuss: Jaws at 50! Exactly half-a-century ago, a movie was released about a small island tourist town that was plagued by killer shark that stalked its beaches. No one knew that Jaws was going to be a hit *that* big, in fact there was every indication that it was going to be a disaster, but it turn out being one of the biggest movies ever, and one that we still talk about and enjoy today. So why does Jaws still have bite 50 years later? REVIEW: The Ballad of Wallis Island (2025). It's a fairly well-known story: former bandmates separated by creative and personal differences are

This week Guelph city council is taking a holiday break, and perhaps understandably, because it has been a very busy year in the chambers so far. The first four months of the year brought a lot of change, a lot of drama, and some pretty big decisions that tested the fiscal and political capacity of a rapidly growing Ontario city. Now, we will pause and take stock of just how far we've come so far... January began with some unfinished business from last year, quite literally. Council heard the budget of the local boards and shared services, which accounts for one-third of the total annual city budget. That seemed to go pretty smoothly, but it was a reminder that Guelph's fiscal picture, while stable, is facing tremendous pressures, which was a recurring theme through talk of debentures and risk management later. Housing continued to be a big theme in the first trimester of 2025. There weren't a lot of new housing development proposals, but there were a few big ones, and there was a few discussions about how he

This week on Open Sources Guelph, we're making a sad face. Not just about the condition of our New Democratic Party, but also because there's another flashpoint in the world that's using violent means to reach violent ends. At least everything local is cool, right? Well, not so fast, because we have another guest from city council who will be stopping by to set us straight. This Thursday, May 15, at 5 pm, Scotty Hertz and Adam A. Donaldson will discuss: Kashmir. In a violent world, the disputed region between India and Pakistan might be among the most violent and it certainly looked that way again when the two countries started attacking each other last week following a terrorist attack in the India-controlled portion. Keep in mind, these are two nuclear powers, and they've been fighting each other for almost 80 years, so why is this latest provocation so dangerous and what do both sides in this conflict hope to get out of it? The Dip. The federal NDP was routed in the election a few weeks, and are now leade

This week on End Credits things get freaky... er. Not really. Things are plenty freaky without this week's new movie, which just so happens to be called Freaky Tales. This one features an actor so big that he now has a whole summer of movies dedicated to him, but like many actors he had humble beginnings on a massive HBO show about dragons. Let's dig in! This Wednesday, May 14, at 3 pm, Adam A. Donaldson and Candice Lepage will discuss: Game of Roles. This week's movie stars Pedro Pascal, and it officially kicks off what we're called "Pedro Summer"! Pascal's been a working actor for years, but he got his big break o Game of Thrones, and like a lot of members of that massive cast he was able to parlay that success into bigger roles in bigger projects. To kick off this week's show, we will talk about some of the actors that won the Game for Hollywood success! REVIEW: Freaky Tales (2025). May 10, 1987. The Golden State Warriors are in a playoff game against the L.A. Lakers, and all-star "Sleepy" Floyd has the b

We have a weird situation: We’ve elected two new governments at both upper levels in the last four months and the hope is that they can turn things around, and yet, these are also, essentially, the old governments. How can we possibly expect better results from the new old people in charge, and are we even more alone than ever here on the local level? We’ll put this to one of the people whose job it is to advocate. This week, the Ontario government announced something novel: changing municipal planning rules and fees to make the construction of housing faster. Despite the numerous regulations rolled back and the growing amount of money deferred from municipal coffers, Ontario is at the bottom in Canada in terms of housing starts. As for the federal government, well, it remains to be seen what exactly Mark Carney can deliver over and above his predecessor. One of the groups designed to help co-ordinate the needs of fighting poverty locally is the Guelph & Wellington Task Force for Poverty Elimination, whos

This week on Open Sources Guelph, we're throwing shade. What do you do when you're in the White House and forced to do a media availability with a crazy person? Make faces at the camera, of course. We'll talk about Carney's new place as everyone's favourite anti-Trump figure, some complicated feelings post-election in Alberta, and then we'll talk to the man who now formally represented Guelph in the House of Commons. This Thursday, May 8, at 5 pm, Scotty Hertz and Adam A. Donaldson will discuss: Separation Anxiety. Alberta Premier Danielle Smith announced on Monday that if enough people in the province agree, the rest of Canada won't have Alberta to kick around anymore! Smith says that if enough people sign a petition, she will hold a referendum on separation. There's quite a vocal constituency in the Wildrose Province who want to put Confederation in the past, but are there enough of them to make a formal go of it? And do they even understand the logistics of leaving Canada? Pundit? Just Leave It. Prime Min

This week on End Credits, we finally embrace summer!.. movie season. We're struggling to get summer-like weather outdoors, but conditions are hot in the movie theatre now that Summer Movie Season is officially here and it starts with the movie we're reviewing this week, Thunderbolts*. What else is coming? We're going to talk about that too! This Wednesday, May 7, at 3 pm, Adam A. Donaldson and Peter Salmon will discuss: Summer Movie Preview Part 2. Obviously, we did a sequel. There were so many unanswered questions from last week's first part of the Summer Movie Preview like what's coming out in July and August? So this week, we will pick up where we left off by talking about the rest of the summer movie slate including more superheroes, some romance, some dinosaurs, and at least one instance where a serious actor tries slapstick! REVIEW: Thunderbolts* (2025). The Marvel Cinematic Universe. Have you heard of it? It's seen better days, and you can call it over saturation or call it a creative lull, but what th

The recent federal election was the formal turning of the page from the premiership of Justin Trudeau to the one led by Mark Carney. For long-time political observers, the difference between the two men in both style and substance is stark, but there’s no doubt that the change in leadership in March is at least half the reason the Liberals got a near majority last week. And yet, the question remains: What happened to Trudeau-mania? The date was February 7, 2013. The location was the Brass Taps, the pub on the second floor of the University Centre at the University of Guelph. Packing them in that day was Justin Trudeau, then a candidate for federal Liberal leadership. At this point, the Liberals were in the political wilderness, but there was a new kid on the block who had different ideas. The pundits didn’t really take Justin Trudeau seriously, but the young people in the Brass Taps that day did. They really, really did. How did the excitement about Justin Trudeau and his “Sunny Ways” sour so completely that

This week on Open Sources Guelph we get back to normal. No more election talk for at least a year now. Well, maybe a bit more election talk. We will talk about everything we didn't know on election night and what it means, and then we will get back into the normal work of proctoring developments at the Ontario government and Guelph city council, and on the subject of the latter, we have a guest for that. This Thursday, May 1, at 5 pm, Scotty Hertz and Adam A. Donaldson will discuss: Carney Me Home (aka: It's Poili-over!). The magic number is 169. That is the number of seats that the Liberals have as they form a new minority government under Mark Carney, seen above celebrating (?) with Down With Webster. There was considerable less celebration at Conservative HQ where leader Pierre Poilievre isn't out yet, even though he's out of his seat, unlike Jagmeet Singh who's definitely out. We will wrap up the 2025 Canadian election and start looking ahead to what comes next. Drama Queen's. While we've been focused on

This week on End Credits, things get spooky! That's a weird thing to say when summer is almost here, but in today's episode we'll confirm that Summer Movie Season is definitely here, and we will talk about what you can expect in some of the weeks to come. After that, we get into the spooky stuff with a ghost story from someone we recently talked about on this show. This Wednesday, April 30, at 3 pm, Adam A. Donaldson and Tim Phillips will discuss: Summer Movie Preview Part 1. This is the last show for April, on the last day of April, and you know what that means... It's Summer Movie Season! This requires a preview, and in our endless quest for completism, we will keep doing this until we get through all the movies that are coming out this summer starting with what's being released between now and the first week of June including good guys, bad guys and something weird. Presence (2025). We've already done one Steven Soderbergh movie this year, Black Bag, but did you know that two Soderbergh movies have been r

By the time you're listening to this you know how it all turned out: Carney's the PM, a plurality of voters went Conservative though not enough in Carleton to send the leader back to the House. The NDP are decimated, the Greens are down to one seat again, and the Bloc have called a truce in the name of "national unity"(?). What an election! Let's live through it all again!! From 8 pm to midnight on Election Night, the tag team of me and Scotty Hertz, plus CFRU programming director (and renowned Wikipedia editor) Christopher Currie, were live to air covering the results as they came into the CFRU newsroom... through the CBC's live vote tracker page. The focus was local, with coverage of the two Guelph ridings, but our view was nation-wide from coast to coast to coast. And there were some special guests as well! Over the course of the night we heard from Emily Blake, the associate editor of Cabin Radio, a Local Journalism Initiative reporting on the Dehcho region and the Northwest Territories' housing crisis th

This week on Open Sources Guelph we get to the end... of this election. (Sorry, we always make that joke.) It's been a long, hard election covering two ridings, and in this final pre-election episode we will cover one person from a new party, one person from a still newish party, and one person that's been involved in politics for about 20 years. For the last time in 2025, let's hear from the candidates in this super-sized episode! This Thursday, April 24, at 5 pm, Scotty Hertz and Adam A. Donaldson will discuss: Michael Drop. If there's a lock this election, it just might be the return of Michael Chong to the House of Commons. His riding's boundaries might have changed, but there's no doubt that Chong is still a force to be reckoned with in Wellington County, so the question is whether he will be now be a force in South Guelph. Chong will join us to talk about why the country should take a chance on a Conservative government and why Wellington-Halton Hills North should stay the course with him as MP. The Fu

This week on End Credits, in keeping with the theme immediately following the Easter weekend, we will talk about people coming back from the dead. Creatures of the night aren't the only ones making beautiful music in Sinners, which features a potent combination of leading man and filmmaker, and that's making us think of other great movie duets, so to speak. This Wednesday, April 23, at 3 pm, Adam A. Donaldson and Candice Lepage will discuss: Teams. This week's movie features once of the most potent modern film teams of a great actor and a great director: Michael B. Jordan and Ryan Coogler. In film history, there have been all kinds of actor and director teams who did great things together not just once, not just twice, but three times or more. To begin this week, we will talk about some of the greatest who ever did it, and how they did it together! REVIEW: Sinners (2025). Ryan Coogler's fifth movie is his first wholly original work, the story of two bootlegging brothers who come home to Mississippi to go into

If you listen to this show promptly on Wednesday then it’s just five more sleeps till Election Day! About a quarter of us have been so excited that we just couldn’t wait to vote; 7.3 million Canadians made voting part of their Easter weekend festivities, a new record. What’s been driving all this excitement? What about the party platforms? The manoeuvres of the national party leaders? And what the hell happened at those post-debate scrums? Once you might have been right saying that the electorate was eager to replace an old and tired regime under Justin Trudeau for the slick sloganeering of Pierre Poilievre, but as he usually does, Trump changed everything. Not content to make himself the main character of American politics, the U.S. President’s large shadow has been cast over the 45th Canadian general election, and that means it could be Mark Carney’s game even more than Poilievre. But this is the Guelph Politicast, so let’s talk about Guelph, which is a riding, but not the only riding with Guelph in it. Gue

This week on Open Sources Guelph, we've got two hours! If you thought the show was over at 6 o'clock today, you're wrong because we have so much election coverage we've got to double the size of the this week's entry. Completing our all-Guelph, all-female set this week we will welcome back to the show one long-time labour activist and one-long time doctor and medical professional. Their goal: Convince you to vote for one of them! This Thursday, April 17, at 6 pm, Scotty Hertz and Adam A. Donaldson will discuss: The Notorious JFD. Janice Folk-Dawson has been a labour activist in Guelph for years, you've seen her face just about anywhere you've seen organised labour locally, but for the first time she's put her face on a campaign sign. Running for the NDP is not easy these days, but Folk-Dawson has been calling them the "conscience of Parliament", which is the reason why she hopes Guelphites might send her there. Folk-Dawson will joins us to talk about why she's ready to make trouble in Ottawa, and why you sho