Guelph Politicast

This week on Open Sources Guelph, we've got fighting words. People are riled up here in Ontario about some more bad bills, and people in the U.S. are riled up about another week of living in Trumpland including his most dangerous moves against civil liberties yet. If you're a Canadian concerned about these things, you might want to listen to this week's guest because he has some ideas on how to fight back! This Thursday, June 12, at 5 pm, Scotty Hertz and Adam A. Donaldson will discuss: Six Weeks, 17 Fights. The Ontario Legislature rose last week after only sitting for a total of six weeks. And yet, in that small space of time, Doug Ford and his government managed to upset just about everyone from municipal leaders, to environmentalists, to Indigenous communities thank to the passage of the highly controversial Bills 5 and 17. These measures, which are supposed to create more housing, come at a time when housing starts are at their slowest level since 2009, so what is all this for? Battle Los Angeles. Last Friday, protest erupted in the Los Angeles area after agents for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) started arresting undocumented people looking for work outside a Home Depot. The raids seem to be the brain child of Stephen Miller, Donald Trump's most trusted advisor, especially on matters of racial animus. The eruption of protests, and the calling of the National Guard, has people concerned, especially now before Trump's birthday army parade. How worried should we be? Charlie in Charge. He may not be in Parliament anymore, but Charlie Angus is still making waves. Travelling coast-to-coast-to-coast now, Angus is aiming to rallying ordinary Canadians in the fight against fascism and to promote resiliency and resistance in local communities, and he's bring that message to Guelph in an event on Thursday June 19. Before that though he will join us here on Open Sources to talk about why you can't leave it to the politicians and how you can start to get more politically involved. Open Sources is live on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca at 5 pm on Thursday.

This week on End Credits, we're thinking about our elders. This is a multi-generational show today as we mark the special occasion this weekend and then get an early jump on an October holiday with a new movie. What holiday? Why Grandmother's Day, of course! We're reviewing Nonnas on Netflix and talking about movies focused on fatherhood!! This Wednesday, June 11, at 3 pm, Adam A. Donaldson and Tim Phillips will discuss: Father's Day Movies. This weekend is the annual celebration of fathers everywhere, and much fishing equipment, car accessories and neck ties will be spread in their name. But what about the movies? Yes, there have been many movies that celebrate fathers and fatherhood, and so we will use the occasion of Father's Day to celebrate those movies whether that's an adoptive father to a demon or the World's Greatest Dad! REVIEW: Nonnas (2025). We've talked about fathers, now let's talk about grandmothers! Or rather, Nonnas. It's based on the true story of a Staten Island restaurateur who used his inheritance to create an eatery dedicated to the fine, home Italian cooking of his mother, his grandmother and nonnas everywhere using real nonnas as the kitchen staff. Vince Vaughn leads an all-star cast of nonnas including Lorraine Bracco, Susan Sarandon and Talia Shire, but can they cook up something delightful and delicious movie-wise speaking? End Credits is on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca Wednesday at 3 pm.

When Doug Ford and the Ontario government announced that they were expanding alcohol sales to grocery and convenience stores it was seen as a positive move to break up a government monopoly, but The Beer Store still has one important piece of that monopoly: returns. It was an effective example of what we now call the circular economy, but in making alcohol more available, has it cost us the most successful recycling program we've ever had? Next time you buy beer or wine at the grocery store or the quick stop, look at your receipt: You're still paying the 10 or 20 cent deposit on every can and bottle. If you take your empties back to The Beer Store, you can get that money back, but it's becoming more convenient to get rid of your empties by dumping them out in the recycling. That undermines what's been an incredibly successful recycling program through The Beer Store, which, at its peak saw an 80 per cent return rate.  Large grocery stores that sell alcohol and are more than five kilometres from a Beer Store are supposed to be accepting returns but the words “supposed to” are doing a lot of work because, as you'll hear, this is being treated as more of a suggestion than a rule. In their own investigation, Environmental Defence only found one grocery store in Ontario meeting this criteria that is actively accepting empties, and this is only going to get worse as more Beer Store locations close.  One the people raising the alarm on this is Karen Wirsig, who is the plastics program manager of Environmental Defence. She joins us this week to talk about why The Beer Store's recycling program has been so successful, and why maintaining it has been such an afterthought for the government. We will also talk about why grocery retailers are fighting the effort to expand the return program to their stores, the coming danger in 2026 with Beer Store closures, and what you can do to keep getting your deposit back.  So let's talk about your empties on this week's Guelph Politicast! You can learn more about Environmental Defense at their website, or follow them on Instagram. You can follow Karen Wirsig on Twitter @ Karen_Wirsig where she posts about her advocacy efforts on reducing waste and plastic pollution. And if you want to support The Beer Store's recycling program, take your empties back no matter where you bought them. You're paying the deposit anyway. 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, 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.

This week on Open Sources Guelph, we're going dull. You can't make friends with salad? We disagree! And to help prove that we're going to get out the scorecards for the first two weeks of business with the new Canadian government and the first year of business for the U.K.'s government. In other news, we'll go super local looking at one neighbourhood with that area's council representative! This Thursday, June 5, at 5 pm, Scotty Hertz and Adam A. Donaldson will discuss: Carney's Version. It's week two for the new Canadian government under Prime Minister Mark Carney and while he's definitely made the case to the electorate that he's not Trump, he still seems kind of concerned as Bill C-2 enters the picture. The second major piece of legislation from Carney seems to accept some of Trump's bonafides that Canada is an epicentre for fentanyl and our border security needs reform, and civil liberty groups have notes. Has Carney already gone too far just over a month since Election Day? Going Kier. It's been almost a year since Kier Starmer and the Labour Party were elected to lead the United Kingdom and Northern Ireland, and now there's some considerable regret in the electorate. Not exactly a surprise, but nipping at Starmer's heals are Nigel Farage and his alt-right Reform Party who are waiting to seize on any doubt in the electorate that the government just doesn't work. Should we be concerned about a populist revolt in the U.K., and is there a lesson for Carney and Canada's Liberals? The Goller. There is a lot going on in downtown Guelph. Some serious construction projects are getting going and it's just a taste of what's to come, poverty support groups are getting traffic tickets from bylaw, and there was more than a little controversy about where exactly a daytime shelter should go. Here to help us out with all of that thinking is one of the people who represents Ward 2, which includes downtown. Rodrigo Goller will join us to talk about balancing all the needs facing downtown Guelph and what his own political future looks like. Open Sources is live on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca at 5 pm on Thursday.

This week on End Credits, we fear the reaper. Well, sort of. You don't go into a movie where the literal personification of Death is the main character if you're afraid of the reaper. So we will show no fear and dive into Final Destination Bloodlines, and assuming we survive we will also talk about the sixth entries in long-running series, the good ones! This Wednesday, June 4, at 3 pm, Adam A. Donaldson and Candice Lepage will discuss: The 6ixes. This week's movie is the sixth entry in its series, and this week's new release, Karate Kid: Legends, is also a sixth entry. Not many movie franchises make it to the sixth picture, and many of the ones that make it that far aren't exactly exemplars of film excellence. Still, in honour of these movies, and all the other sixes in cinema history, we will pay tribute to our favourite hexalogies, which is a real world. (Look it up.) REVIEW: Final Destination Bloodlines (2025). Twenty-five years ago, a new horror franchise made audiences afraid of Death. As an entity. After taking several years off, Death is back and he's out to get three generations of a family that never should have been born because the family matriarch avoided disaster 50 years earlier. The surprise hit of the summer so far, Final Destination Bloodlines has seen theatres packed with new and old fans who've all welcomed back Death while saying goodbye to the late, great Tony Todd (RIP), and this week we'll have our say. End Credits is on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca Wednesday at 3 pm.

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 initials right now than "A" and "I". In the realm of public health, there are even more pronounced concerns around privacy and the sharing of information, and there's also an important need to share accurate information as well. So how are Public Health staff managing these big considerations?  Wellington-Dufferin-Guelph Public Health's Manager of Data & Analytics Michael Whyte and Data Scientist Justin Angevaare will tell you all about those considerations on this week's pod. They will talk about the work that public health is using A.I. to achieve, and how they've decided the best ways to use it. They also talk about the ways that public health is governing the use of A.I. with policy, how they determine which programs they want to use and why, and what they're working on right now. So let's get some good A.I. news on this week's edition of the Guelph Politicast!  You can learn more about what Wellington-Dufferin-Guelph Public Health is up to in the realm of artificial intelligence by reading the staff report from last month's Board of Health meeting, or Guelph Politico's coverage of that meeting. You can stay up-to-date on everything to do with public health at their website, or on social media at @wdgpublchealth on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube. 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, 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. Photo courtesy of Disney/Lucasfilm.

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 of Toronto passed a new bylaw saying that you cannot protest within 50 metres of a school, childcare or place of worship. The 16 councillors who voted in favour say it was a necessary move to guarantee security, while the nine who voted against it consider it an erosion of free expression and freedom of assembly, and on top of that, the city solicitor's apparently unsure of it's constitutionality. Has Toronto bitten off more than it can chew here? Inflation Agent. The rate of inflation is trending down, which is supposed to be good news, right? The Chartered Professional Accountants of Canada is not so sure. According to their analysis, any loss of inflationary pressures is short-term, and then there's the rampant unpredictability in the market right now thanks to the tariffs. David-Alexandre Brassard, Chief Economist of CPAC will join us talk about his perspective on the current economic picture and why we're not out of the woods yet! Open Sources is live on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca at 5 pm on Thursday.

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: Impossible movie aims to not only pay off all the plot laid out in the previous movie, Dead Reckoning (Part One), but to also be the capstone to 30 years of Mission: Impossible movies. Tom Cruise returns - "one last time", we're told - to kick ass and save the world from a fiendish A.I. and the Machiavelli forces that want to control it. But with so much at sake, can this Mission possibly get accomplished? End Credits is on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca Wednesday at 3 pm.

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 frontline staff,  and one-in-three non-profit workers said that they're ready to quit. At issue is low wages, and half of entry-level workers say they're struggling because of it, so what lessons can we take from this survey and what solutions can be put in action? Anouk Bertner, who is the executive director of Future of Good, will join us to talk about those lessons and more on this edition of the podcast. She will talk about how they put together the Index, and the methodology they used to get the most accurate picture possible. She will also talk about the perceptions of non-profit work, why arts and culture workers are being hit the hardest, why compensation is not the end of the story here, and why more money may not be the answer. So let's talk about the state of Canada's non-profits in this week's Guelph Politicast! You can learn more about Future of Good at their website, which is where you can find a direct link to their Changemaker Wellbeing Index and get all the information and statistics that we talked about on this pod. If you're interested in helping out local non-profits here in Guelph and Wellington, you can can see the list of various community services at 211 Ontario, and you can see a list of volunteer opportunities through the United Way 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, 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.

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 Legislature, and it's the latest in a long line of bills brought by the Ford government that unites almost everyone against it. In this case, the bill uses the tariff war as justification to overrule environmental oversight and other planning measures in order to get mining and construction projects going. Does it sound like the Ontario government is trying to chop up the rules to help out their friends again? We will dig into that very question. Teacher's Fret. Another issue on the provincial file is education, and things are getting so bad that that teachers' unions have started organizing. On Thursday night, there will be an education forum at Centre Wellington High School in Fergus to talk about the tremendous issues facing Ontario's schools, but before that we will be joined by one of the organizers. Andrew Aloe, Occasional Teacher President at Elementary Teachers' Federation of Ontario, will set the table for the forum and talk about the state of our schools. Open Sources is live on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca at 5 pm on Thursday.

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 thrown back together again by fate and circumstances. The Ballad of Wallis Island is also itself a kind of reunion. Writers and co-stars Tom Basden and Tim Key, now joined by Oscar nominee Carey Mulligan, stage a feature length version of their short film from 2007 about a former folk duo who are thrown back together again by a millionaire on a small island, but does this movie sing? End Credits is on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca Wednesday at 3 pm.

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 hey can use the tools to make more affordability housing options happen, and make them happen faster, but the options are still fairly limited. Plus, council revisited the Public Space Use Bylaw in the process. Although it doesn't make the headlines, council also shook up itself. One councillor went on maternity leave and another took a leave of absence to run for higher office. There were also changes approved to council governance and a re-launch of the advisory committees of council, and at least one of them caused some blowback on city council before April was over. All this just constitutes the tip of a very big iceberg, can we cover it all in one pod?! So let's get into the event of city council in 2025 so far in this week' Guelph Politicast! Council is taking this week off, but will meet again on Tuesday May 27 at 6 pm. You can get all the previews, recaps and follow-ups on this website, Guelph Politico! 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, 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.

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 leaderless with seven seats in the House. And yes, while many people strategically voted Liberal, many more formally NDP seats in working class ridings in Ontario and B.C. went to the Conservatives. So what the heck happened, and how does the NDP climb back to official party? We will discuss what the New Democrats have to do to appeal to their base again, and why what they have been doing, isn't working. System of a Downer. It's been a busy few weeks at city council. More discussion about the state of housing, a new plan to tackle climate change, new legislation from the provincial government, a potential issue with fees around a student residence, and a new vacancy in Ward 6. That's a lot to figure out so we've recruited a very experienced and well-spoken guest to help us make sense of it all. Ward 5 City Councillor Cathy Downer will join us to lend some insight from the council chambers! Open Sources is live on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca at 5 pm on Thursday.

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 best game any NBA player has ever had. These are things that actually happened, and they are among the many events that unfold in Freaky Tales, an action comedy anthology set in Oakland, from Oakland-born filmmakers Anne Boden and Ryan Fleck. The movie blends fact and fiction, fantasy and reality, but this week we'll answer the question: Is Freaky Tales good or is it bad? End Credits is on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca Wednesday at 3 pm.

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, whose goal is to work collaboratively, and informed by diverse voices of experience, to take local action and advocate for system and policy change to address the root causes of poverty. It's a worthy mission, but one that's getting harder to accomplish as community frustrations about higher costs and limited options. So, can we still fulfill the project of eliminating poverty? Dominica McPherson, who is the director of the Task Force for will talk about the current state of advocacy with all three levels of government and whether or not things have gotten better or worse on the poverty file in the last few years. She will also talk about why the focus needs to be on permanent housing solutions, how Guelph and Wellington have actually done well on developing those options and how we can keep that momentum going forward. Also, what are the efforts the task force is undertaking right now? So let's stay on mission with this week's edition of the Guelph Politicast! You can learn more about the Guelph & Wellington Task Force for Poverty Elimination and get involved at their website. After recording this interview I did get an update that the Wellington-Guelph Health and Housing Community Planning Table will be releasing a report about the work that's been done since the Health and Housing Symposium next month, so stay tuned for more information sometime mid-June 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, 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.

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 Minister Mark Carney's visit to the White House this week was considered a success because he managed not to get yelled at by Donald Trump. Carney's Trump handling abilities scored him points from many American pundits who have all hailed the PM as the leader of the resistance they've all been waiting for, but what about us Canadians? Why isn't anyone talking about the issues we want fixed? Do Canadians even matter when it comes to our own politics anymore? So Longfield. For the last 10 years, Guelph has been represented in Parliament by Lloyd Longfield. The former President of the Guelph Chamber of Commerce was elected along with the rest of Justin Trudeau's first class in 2015, and unlike many of his colleagues, Longfield happily went about the regular, everyday work of doing Member of Parliament stuff and avoided cabinet ambitions and political power plays. In his last professional appearance on Open Sources, Longfield will tell us how he did it, and what comes next. Open Sources is live on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca at 5 pm on Thursday.

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 the MCU really needs right now is a winner. So here come the losers! Thunderbolts* follows a group of black ops agents - the ones who exist between heroism and villainy - and asks the question, why not us? Led by indie darlings Florence Pugh and Sebastian Stan, can the Thunderbolts stage the superhero comeback the industry needs right now? We'll see. End Credits is on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca Wednesday at 3 pm.

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 his mere removal from the ballot made the party he revived competitive again? Was it the right-wing smear job? Was it the rise of Trumpism and anti-woke sentiment? Was it the lingering social and economic effects of the COVID-19 pandemic? It could be all three and it could be none of it, but it's one of the great questions of this political era, and this episode of the podcast. To answer it, we're joined by Mustafa Zuberi, who was, for a time, the president of the Young Liberals at the U of G and served as the Liberal candidate for Guelph in the recent provincial election. Zuberi was one of the thousands of young people drawn to politics by Trudeau and his idealism, so he will help us understand how he inspired so many young people, why that youthful energy started to move to the right in recent years, and how Trudeau might have been more of a victim of circumstance than ability. So let's talk about the rise and fall of Justin Trudeau on this week's Guelph Politicast! You can follow Mustafa Zuberi on Instagram. You can check out the coverage from Justin Trudeau's stop at the Brass Taps in 2013 on the original Guelph Politico Blogspot. And obviously, we will be keeping up with the latest developments from the new Canadian Prime Minister every Thursday at 5 pm on Open Sources Guelph on CFRU 93.3 fm or cfru.ca 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, 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.

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 the federal election, the Ontario government finally got back to legislating for the first time since early-December. So how's it been going? Well, they've announced that they're going to be forcing financial oversight on some school boards, they're tearing up environmental regulations in the name of resource extraction, and they've announced more tough on crime measures. We'll catch up on everything you didn't get a chance to know about at Queen's Park. Allt-ernative Media. We're also going to play catch up with Guelph city council, where there is now a vacancy after Dominique O'Rourke won the Guelph seat in the House of Commons. Her colleagues at city hall meanwhile are dealing with a whole slate of issues from housing, to water supply, to relations with Guelph's disabled community. There's a lot of ground to cover after our month-long break from council business, and to help us get caught up we will lean on old friend and Ward 3 City Councillor Phil Allt. Open Sources is live on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca at 5 pm on Thursday.

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 released - so far - this year? The other one is now available on VOD, and it's called Presence. It's a ghost story, but it's from the ghost's point of view, watching the strange dynamics of this family that moved into a new house and struggle with all their internal drama including Chloe, the one member who senses... The Presence. We will talk about why you shouldn't ghost on Presence. End Credits is on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca Wednesday at 3 pm.

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 that's funded in part by the Government of Canada. We also heard from Kim Siever from The Alberta Worker, an independent media outlet that focuses on labour and politics founded in April 2020. So let's relive the 2025 Canadian Election on this week's Guelph Politicast! Keep tuning in to Open Sources Guelph Thursdays at 5 pm on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca! 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, 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.

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 Future Party is Now. A lot of emerging parties have been taken for a test drive in Guelph, and in this election  it's the Canadian Future Party that is dipping their toes in the waters of Guelph. Yurii Yavorskyi is Guelph's CFP candidate, one of 19 across the country trying to make the case for a non-partisan, evidence-based approach to governance. In fact, right on their party platform is a message to the major parties to steal their ideas. Yavorskyi will join us to talk about why the CFP's ideas are worth stealing. Three Times the People. Syl Carle is a successful businessman and former RCMP officer, and for the third time he's trying to become the People's Party MP for Wellington-Halton Hills (North now). So he must be pretty dedicated, right? Why don't we let Carle speak for himself. To wrap up our extensive election coverage, we will talk to Carle about what keeps him coming back to the PPC, how he intends to finally get past Michael Chong and why he wants to sit in the House of Commons for this riding. Open Sources is live on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca at 5 pm on Thursday.

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 business for themselves only to find a bigger monster than the KKK. To play his hero, Coogler has relied on the man who's been featured in each of his movies so far, Michael B. Jordon, and he has to bring his considerable charm to this genre bending movie that's equal part horror, musical, thriller, crime drama and racial reckoning. Can a movie this bold possibly live up the hype? End Credits is on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca Wednesday at 3 pm.

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. Guelph is now carried over two ridings: Guelph and Wellington-Halton Hills North. That means when the election is over, about 20,000 Guelphites will have an entirely different MP from the rest of the city, and if the polls are to be believed, they will each be represented by two different parties. Perhaps the post-election period is going to be even more interesting than this whole election... But that's a conversation for a later day. This conversation is with Open Sources Guelph co-host Scotty Hertz, back by popular demand, to talk all about the election. We'll discuss the added level of difficulty of covering two local races, the impact of splitting Guelph between two ridings, and the considerations being made by local voters. We will also talk about how people seem to be embracing stability, the politics of independent media, and why you shouldn't move your stuff using a Cyber Truck(?).  So let's talk about the Canadian election campaign in 45 minutes or less on this week's Guelph Politicast! You can tune into election night coverage on CFRU 93.3 fm or cfru.ca on Monday starting at 8 pm, and if you're interested in hearing interviews with the candidates running in Guelph and Wellington-Halton Hills North, tune in on Thursdays on CFRU or download OSG on Monday on this feed. You can also watch the interviews on Open Sources new YouTube channel. I will also be appearing at this week's Breezy Breakfast at DeBar to talk more about the election, assuming that you haven't had enough already 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, 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.

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 should want to send her there. Doctor Change. Do we need a doctor? Anne-Marie Zajdlik thinks we do. Well known in the Guelph community for both her medical practice and her leadership on fighting the HIV/AIDS epidemic, Zajdlik is now getting political with the Green Party. Hoping to make history in the mold of Mike Schreiner and Mike Morrice, Zajdlik thinks that the region can be a Green powerhouse, and now she just has to convince you and several thousand Guelphites. Zajdlik will talk about why Guelph's colour is still Green this election! Programming Note: This is the second of back-to-back episodes of Open Sources Guelph this week and airs at the special time of 6 pm!

This week on Open Sources Guelph, we get really super-sized! Come for one regular hour of the show and you will get a second bonus hour of the show for no extra charge. What are we doing? We're put together a slate of interviews with candidates running in the riding of Guelph, and to kick things off we've got a well-known character from the show, and a brand new friend making her first appearance! This Thursday, April 17, at 5 pm, Scotty Hertz and Adam A. Donaldson will discuss: Crimson Dominique. You probably already know Dominique O'Rourke pretty well, especially if you live in Ward 6 where she's still one of your city councillors. Now she's seeking higher office. O'Rourke is looking to make a move to Ottawa as Guelph's next MP, the fourth Liberal representative that Guelph has had in the last 30 years plus, and a few months ago that might have seemed dicy but now...? O'Rourke will join us to talk about why she wants to go back to the House of Commons (you'll see) and why she thinks Mark Carney is the man for the moment. Dual of the Baetz. Guelph is not unfamiliar with the Communist Party of Canada, it started right here in town on Metcalfe Street, but the socialist flag this election is being waved by the Marxist-Leninist Party and Elaine Baetz. Who are the Marxist-Leninist Party and why should you throw your vote behind one of the 35 people they've got running across Canada this election? Baetz will tell you, and she will also explain why there's an opportunity this election to build a more consensus-driven governance, and why she thinks Guelph is ready for a real change. Open Sources is live on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca at 5 pm on Thursday. Programming Note: Another episode of Open Sources Guelph will immediately follow this one on CFRU!

This week on End Credits, we're on our phones. No, we're not being rude and using our phones in the movie theatre - we're not savages! - but this week's movie is about what happens when bad guys spend too much time on *your* phone. Don't meme yourself because we're checking out Drop and in that spirit, we're going to talk about other times tech has gone wrong!  This Wednesday, April 9, at 3 pm, Adam A. Donaldson and Peter Salmon will discuss: Tech Gone Bad. This week's movie features a premise where a smart phone is used to taunt a woman into doing something sinister. Technology can be used to do great things, but it can also be used to do some very bad things and in honour of the release of Drop we will drop other titles where technology leads to some very bad outcomes for both people and the world at large, and we're not just talking about horror movies or Terminators! REVIEW: Drop (2025). First dates are hard enough, but imagine being a widow on your first date after your husband's untimely (and unnatural) death and your phone starts going off with threats from an anonymous person: Kill your date or your little boy and your sister die! Christopher Landon, the filmmaker behind Happy Death Day and Freaky, puts White Lotus season two star Meghann Fahy through her paces in modern take on a classically Hitchcock affair, but can Drop get the drop on two cynical movie reviewers? End Credits is on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca Wednesday at 3 pm.

We're at the end of another school year, and while some students are looking forward to summer, they're also looking forward to next fall. Or perhaps even stressing over it. Housing is a big issue in Guelph, and it's somehow even bigger when it comes to student housing. Last summer, the largest first-year student enrolment ever weighed on students and the greater Guelph community, but relief may be coming if city council doesn't get in the way(?). So what, city council doesn't want student housing in Guelph? Let's just say it's complicated. This is about phase two of the Alma, which is on the site of the former Holiday Inn at Stone and Scottsdale. The renovation of the old hotel was phase one, and phase two will add another nearly 600 beds, but there's a snag and it's whether or not Forum Asset Management has to pay over $15 million in development fees. The Ontario government has made student residences exempt from DCs, but there's some question about how you define “student residences”; does that apply only to student residences owned and operated by a post-secondary institution itself, or can it also apply to a private for-profit development like The Alma that just so happens to be on land owned by a university? This will be a question that council will have to answer on April 29, and this week, we will hear about the stakes. Owen Ellis, who is the president of the Real Estate Students Association at the University of Guelph, is the guest this week to talk about the current state of student housing in the city, and what options that students would like to see when they're looking for a place to live in the Guelph. We also talk about the expectations and responsibilities for the University of Guelph, private developers, and why we all need to organize to do better for student renters. So let's dig into another great housing debate on this week's Guelph Politicast! You can check out the website for the app he's working on here. City council will look at the appeal of the development charges for phase two of the Alma on Tuesday April 29, and that agenda will be published on the City's website this Thursday. Remember: If you're interested in hearing interviews with the candidates running in Guelph and Wellington-Halton Hills North (which includes parts of Guelph), tune in to Open Sources Guelph on Thursdays on CFRU 93.3 fm or cfru.ca, or download OSG on Monday on this feed. 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, 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.

This week on Open Sources Guelph, we've got bonusing! In our grand effort to cover all the candidates in Guelph and Wellington-Halton Hills North this election, we will be hitting your ears at the above average length of 90 minutes so you can hear from three of the dozen or so candidates running for the two local federal offices, our first interview with a Guelph candidate and two more for Wellington-Halton Hills North! This Thursday, April 10, at 5 pm, Scotty Hertz and Adam A. Donaldson will discuss: Swack and Field. In their first election, the People's Party secured over a thousand votes in Guelph. In their second election, it was over 3,000 votes, which was nearly 2,100 votes less than the fourth place Green Party. So what about 2025? This time, the PPC flag is being hoisted by Jeffrey Swackhammer, a 23-year-old Guelph resident who, like a lot of young people, has a lot of concerns about housing and affordability, so does he have what it takes to make it rain purple in this election? Stiles and Substance. It's not easy being Green these days. The Green Party of Canada is struggling to hold on to two seats and fending off a serious challenge to stay relevant in what looks more and more like a two-party race. In Wellington-Halton Hills North, a first time candidate will try to make a case that there's still room in the discourse for an optimistic take on a more environmentally-friendly future, and Liam Stiles will tells us why you should take a closer look at him and the Greens. Get to the Chopper Pilot! Sean Carscadden has a hard job, and we don't just mean his day job as a Ornge air ambulance pilot. He's asking voters in Wellington-Halton Hills North to send him to Ottawa, to join a Liberal government already in progress, and to fire a well-known, well-liked, and popular Conservative MP to do it. Carscadden believes that a case can be made, and he will tell us why he's just the sort of fresh face and voice that help make voters think that the Liberals are ready for more. Open Sources is live on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca at 5 pm on Thursday.

This week on End Credits, we're on stakeout. We're going to go back in time and ride shotgun with FBI agent Jude Law as he takes down the bad guys in the new movie The Order, which might be classified as a political thriller. Say... That would be an interesting topic to tackle at the beginning of this show, so let's do that!  This Wednesday, April 9, at 3 pm, Adam A. Donaldson and Tim Phillips will discuss: Things Get Political. What makes a political thriller? Well, it's got to have, at least, some action, there has to be some mystery component, and it was to have a politically-motivated plot or characters. Sometimes there based on actual events, sometimes they're just inspired or are else completely made-up, but they otherwise forego the usual boring lawmaking of politics for something more deadly. We'll talk about some prime examples. REVIEW: The Order (2025). You may have heard about David Koresh or Timothy McVeigh, but what about Bob Matthews? In the 1980s, he started a terrorist group of White Supremacists who had a specific mission in mind: Bring the racist dystopia novel The Turner Diaries to life! The story of Matthews, and the FBI-led effort to stop him, are now dramatised in The Order featuring two British guys - Jude Law and Nicholas Hoult - in a deadly face-off that still has political resonance, but how does the movie itself resonate? End Credits is on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca Wednesday at 3 pm.

These are busy days at Politico HQ. There's a federal election on right now, and Guelph has become so big that it's spread over two ridings with so far a dozen candidates vying to be the next Members of Parliament. If one candidate in particular is successful then that means there will be a vacancy on Guelph city council. What happens then? In the rare event that the City of Guelph has to fill a vacant council seat in the middle of a council term, for whatever the reason, the City Council Vacancy Policy goes into effect. It sets out the options for what the mayor and council should do if the there's an empty seat at the council table, or what a council should do if they suddenly find themselves without a mayor. This week's episode of the podcast is dedicated to a reading of the City Council Vacancy Policy. Consider it an educational experience, and what can be more essential as we battle misinformation and look to resolve long-running blind spots in our civic awareness because while we love to complain about government many of us don't really know how it works. With this entry of the pod, we will start to aim to change that.   So let's dig into policy (for a change) on this week's Guelph Politicast! You can read the City Council Vacancy Policy here, and you can check out the list of other City of Guelph policies here. Remember: If you're interested in hearing interviews with the candidates running in Guelph and Wellington-Halton Hills North (which includes parts of Guelph), tune in on Thursdays on CFRU 93.3 fm or cfru.ca, or download OSG on Monday on this feed. 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, 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.

This week on Open Sources Guelph we begin the difficult juggling act of covering two federal ridings at the same time! This week, we'll start by heading not to Guelph, but the new riding of Wellington-Halton Hills North, which includes South Guelph, where we will hear from two of the candidates hoping that a new riding means new opportunities for any candidate not named "Chong". This Thursday, April, at 5 pm, Scotty Hertz and Adam A. Donaldson will discuss: Stuck in the Centre With You. Tired of partisan politics? Wishing people could come together and build consensus more? Then you might be interested in what Ian Smith has to say. The Erin-based businessman is one of several people across Canada running for the new Centrist Party of Canada in the hope that people want more than in-fighting and three-word slogans, and this week he will lean on his experience in housing management to talk about why the missing middle in politics might be the Centrists. A Man of Acton. The last time Andrew Bascombe ran for federal office he was a new transplant to Acton. That was 2019, and six years later he's ready to do what might seem like the impossible on two fronts: Win one for the NDP and beat the long-standing incumbent Michael Chong. Bascombe will join us this week to talk about why this time it's different for both him and Chong, why the NDP have proved their ready to lead, and why no voter should sleep on an Orange Wave at the end of this month. Open Sources is live on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca at 5 pm on Thursday.

This week on End Credits, we're hitting the high notes! We know that this show is not necessarily high brow, but this week we're going to the opera with the new Atom Egoyan film Seven Veils. Along with that, we're going to look at the film's star, who's enjoyed a successful and varied career, and talk about all the times she's made an impression.  This Wednesday, April 2, at 3 pm, Adam A. Donaldson and Candice Lepage will discuss: Mandy! This week's movie stars Amanda Seyfried, who is an actress that's been around for nearly 20 years now after her first big screen appearance as one of the titular Mean Girls. Since then she's done drama, she's done action, she's done scary, and she even got an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress, but before digging into her new role in Seven Veils, we're going to talk the best of Amanda Seyfried. Seven Veils (2025). In Atom Egoyan's latest movie, a theatre director is called back to the opera company where she go her start at the request of her former mentor and lover, it was his final wish that she stage a revival of the opera Salome. Egoyan revisits some of his old themes about unhappy families and sexual power, but it's also done through a #MeToo lens and against the background of Egoyan's own production of Salome at the Canadian Opera Company. So there's a lot going on, and we will try and sort it all out! End Credits is on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca Wednesday at 3 pm.

These are some heady political times. We've already made it through one election this year, and we're now in the midst of another. As we're going to air, the consumer carbon tax is gone, the major parties are duelling to see who can be the most moderate, and it appears that things like environmental stewardship and compassion are just not affordable. Maybe it's time to re-calibrate. Let's talk about the last few weeks at city council for a moment. This week's Committee of the Whole meeting tackled the new Private Tree Bylaw and the potential use of the Drill Hall as an art and cultural centre, which the staff report made it clear that these are things we can't fully afford now. And last week, the Public Space Use Bylaw was amended so there's definitely message emanating from inside the halls of city hall: We're now in a time of austerity. It's a dirty word that activists don't like hearing, especially if they're on the progressive side. Not wanting to get lost in the mishegoss of the federal election happening right now, we're going to re-calibrate and focus on city hall stuff, and regular council observer and a semi-regular council delegate Morgan Dandie is going to help us with that. She's often been a fly in the ointment at city council on all kinds of issues, so how is she feeling about the current political moment as a council observer? Morgan Dandie will answer that and other questions as she talks about the state of city council, the state of Mayor Guthrie's perceived relationship with the other members of council, and how “Gotcha moments” are in the eye of the beholder. She will also talk about whether or not she thinks her delegations have an impact, being open to learning new things, her own successful efforts to improve herself as a speaker and a politician, and what keeps her hopeful as an activist.  So let's get into some Guelph Politi-Chat on this week's Guelph Politicast! You can follow Morgan Dandie on Instagram. You can see what she said at Committee of the Whole yesterday and get other information about what's coming up at city council meetings on the City of Guelph's website. And a programming note: If you're interested in hearing interviews with the candidates running in Guelph and Wellington-Halton Hills North (which includes parts of Guelph), tune in on Thursdays on CFRU 93.3 fm or cfru.ca, or download OSG on Monday on this feed.  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, 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.

This week on Open Sources Guelph, we are so back! Back on the campaign trail that is!! Yes, there's now a full-blown federal election across Canada and to kick things off on this show, we're going to talk about the opening moves by party leaders, the opening faux pas by a provincial leader, and how this election is going to look very different for all the voters in the Royal City no matter what riding they're in (?). This Thursday, March 27, at 5 pm, Scotty Hertz and Adam A. Donaldson will discuss: April Election Showers. Wrapping up his first couple of weeks as Prime Minister, Mark Carney decided that he's done everything he needed to do get the party election ready and visited the Governor General to start one. The date is April 28, and the first five days of the campaign have already been action-packed; from questions about conflicts of interest and potential election interference, plus the efficacy of Canada's third-tier political parties. What should we make of Campaign 2025: Week #1? Ms. Smith Goes to Florida. As we're going to air, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith is going to the Sunshine State. Again. Florida is ground zero for the MAGA movement, and Smith has been spending a lot of time there, but it's her recent appearance on a Breitbart podcast that not only has people calling her out for siding so blatantly with Donald Trump, but wounding the Conservative Party's first few days on the campaign trail in the process. So is Smith helping or hindering the Team Canada effort? Now Twice the Guelph. It may surprise you to learn that depending on where you live in Guelph, you may not actually be in the federal riding of Guelph. Yes, the City of Guelph is now spread between the ridings of Guelph and Wellington-Halton Hills North, so that means you may have an entirely different set of candidates to vote for than your friends and neighbours. To wrap up, we're going to talk about the two Guelph ridings, their candidates, and the political considerations for the voters there. Open Sources is live on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca at 5 pm on Thursday.

This week on End Credits, we get bad. Cue the Inner Circle music because we're heading back to the Halcyon days of the mid-90s to revisit a couple of bad boys. And then, in the here and now, we're going to talk about people behaving badly in the name of patriotic service with the new spy thriller Black Bag. God save the King and the movie-going audience!  This Wednesday, March 26, at 3 pm, Adam A. Donaldson and Peter Salmon will discuss: Bad Boys at 30! Could you have imagined that when Bad Boys came out three decade ago that we'd still be cranking out Bad Boys movies in the 2020s? Probably not. Bad Boys didn't look like a movie that would stand the test of time, another dumb buddy cop action movie, but it launched Will Smith to superstardom, Michael Bay to blank cheque status, and it became a franchise of surprising longevity. Today, we go back to the beginning. REVIEW: Black Bag (2025). What if Steven Soderbergh took Mr. and Mrs. Smith seriously, but not, like, too seriously...? That kind of seems like the pitch for Black Bag, a spy thriller about married spies played by Michael Fassbender and Cate Blanchett where a man must determine whether his beloved wife is traitor, or whether it's one of their frenemies in the agency. It's high stakes, but done with the same Soderbergh light touch as his Ocean's 11 movies, so do we black bag Black Bag, or should all of you open the bag and dive in! End Credits is on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca Wednesday at 3 pm.

In six days, the doors of Guelph's Consumption and Treatment site will close for the last time. Unless a Charter challenge in an Ontario court succeeds, the Ontario government's mandate to close a dozen different CTSes and replacement them with new Homelessness and Addiction Recovery Treatment, or HART, Hubs. Or at least that was the plan. Either way, what happens on April 1? It was kind of a surprise last summer when the Ontario government announced that they were closing several consumption and treatment sites. The justification? Safety. Any CTS within 200 metres of a school or daycare has to close down and in their place is a HART Hub, which will provide primary care, mental health services, shelter and transition beds, supportive housing and more. Looking at the numbers, the success of the Guelph CTS is clear; 41,000 visits, 1,000 referrals to primary care, 44 people per month referred to treatment, 311 drug poisonings reversed - only 12 requiring a follow trip to the hospital - and zero fatalities. While activists and advocates welcome the nearly $400 million in new funding, especially for the housing, but there's still a lot of concern about what's going to happen April 1. To learn more, we're joined this week by Guelph Community Health Centre executive director Melissa Kwiatkowski and Wellington Guelph Drug Strategy manager Jean Hopkins. They will discuss the anxieties and concerns about the pending closure of the CTS, the impact on the services Community Health can offer, and what exactly will change on April 1. They will also discuss what the Guelph HART Hub will offer, how it's not a replacement for safe consumption services, and how they're planning on filling the gaps between the two. Let's talk about these last days for the CTS on this week's Guelph Politicast! You can learn more about the CTS at the Community Health website and you can find the Wellington Guelph Drug Strategy website here. There will be another drug poisoning and overdose response skills training on Tuesday April 29 at 6:30 pm at Art Not Shame downtown, and you can find direct links to more information about the transition from the CTS to the HART Hub here. 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, 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.

This week on Open Sources Guelph, we've got Canadian Tire money to burn. Like Justin Trudeau! Who spent the first day of the first week of the rest of his life pretending he's a normal guy. As for his successor, he was going stuff this week, while south of the border there's this guy that keeps talking smack about Canada, and now he's rounding up people who are using their voices to be critical of foreign powers. This Thursday, March 20, at 5 pm, Scotty Hertz and Adam A. Donaldson will discuss: Arctic Blast. Nearly wrapping up his first week as the Prime Minister of Canada, Mark Carney did a whirlwind tour of France, the U.K. and Iqaluit where he announced a deal to buy a new radar system from the Australians to insure northern security. Meanwhile in Ottawa, the Conservatives are trying any and every strategy to get something on the new PM as his numbers keep going up and theirs keeps going down. So how is Carney doing after six days? 51st State of Play. Since U.S. President Donald Trump started talk about all this 51st state nonsense, there's been a persistent nagging question: How seriously are we supposed to take all this? While there are some serious implications from things like the tariffs and the trade disputes, what's the endgame here? Does Trump seriously want Canada to be a part of the United States, or is this just more of his patented trolling? Khalil's Speech. You may not know the name Mahmoud Khalil, but he was one of the organisers of the campus protest at Columbia University last year demonstrating against the War in Gaza. Now he's the canary in the coal mine. Despite his status as a legal immigrant, and his marriage to an American citizen with whom he's expecting a child, he was arrested by government agents and is presently being held in detention with the administration promising more to come. Has the American nightmare arrived? Open Sources is live on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca at 5 pm on Thursday.

This week on End Credits, we're going out to the farm. Everyone yearns at some point for a more simple life on the land, and it looks like one of them is Tom Green... so he made a film about it. On this episode we're reviewing This is The Tom Green Documentary, and we will also take the unusual step of critiquing the critics and the rare times they've got it wrong. This Wednesday, March 19, at 3 pm, Adam A. Donaldson and Tim Phillips will discuss: Wrong Turns. The subject of this week's film is Tom Green, who once made Freddy Got Fingered, which was declared by one critic as "quite simply the worst movie ever released by a major studio in Hollywood history". Hyperbolic? Probably, which reminds us that sometimes critics are wrong, or at the very least over-the-top in their negative assessment of a movie, so to begin this week, we will talk about some critical misses. REVIEW: This is The Tom Green Documentary (2025). At the turn of the century a simple man made a splash on Ottawa cable access TV with his out-there sense of comedy. Tom Green took his eponymous show to Hollywood and then they started putting him movies. The world was his oyster, but then he got cancer and his career never fully recovered. In his new documentary about himself, Green looks at his wild ride and his latest turn as a proud farmer in Eastern Ontario, but is the life of Tom worth celebrating on film? End Credits is on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca Wednesday at 3 pm.

Maybe you don't remember, or want to remember, but it was this time five years ago that the world closed down as COVID-19 became so virulent that it required us to be sequestered for months or else keep six feet apart while wearing a mask or other PPE. Many of us have memory-holed those events, some have re-written it as an overreaction or, even worse than that, a conspiracy, but perhaps the time has come to face our trauma about the pandemic. Here are some of the headlines from the March 20, 2020 edition of the Guelph Politico Tip Sheet newsletter: “All City of Guelph facilities are now closed to the public including City Hall", “The two remaining city council meetings for March have been cancelled”, and “The Guelph General Hospital, as well as other area hospitals, have initiated more stringent measures on who can visit the hospital and when”. There was a lot going on, and no one knew how it was all going to shake out in the end. It may not seem like it, but on this fifth anniversary of the pandemic, COVID-19 is still around. Even once diligent maskers don't mask anymore, even when they're sick, fewer people are getting their booster shots, and when you talk to people about their pandemic memories it's about how we took it too seriously and spent too much in response. Is that how you remember it? What should we be thinking about following our COVID experience now half-a-decade later? The perfect guest to answer these and similar questions is Dr. Nicola Mercer, who is the Medical Officer of Health for Wellington, Dufferin, and Guelph. She's going to talk about the warning signs she saw in advance, what she and Public Health got right about the pandemic response, and what she thinks they might have done better in hindsight. We will also talk about the lessons learned, the current state of COVID-19, and how our experiences might inform the response to the next pandemic. So let's rewind to 2020 on this week's Guelph Politicast! You can learn more about Wellington-Dufferin-Guelph Public Health at their website, where you can find links to information about immunizations, health alerts, data dashboards, and agendas for the Board of Health meetings. You can also follow them on social media @WDGPublicHealth on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Instagram. 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, 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.

This week on Open Sources Guelph we order a side-helping of change and economic concern. The new prime minister and the new-old premier met this week to talk about their common enemy: the crazy person currently occupying the White House. For the other half of the show, we will look to more local concerns with one of the members of city council from the first (in numerical order) ward! This Thursday, March 13, at 5 pm, Scotty Hertz and Adam A. Donaldson will discuss: Carney in Charge. It wasn't exactly a horse race and in the end it seemed like a rocket ship, but Mark Carney is now set to be the next Prime Minister of Canada... but for how long? The once long odds for the Federal Liberals now look better with many polls showing a statistical tie between them and the Conservatives, and Carney already looks like a man of action even without yet being sworn into the role. Can Carney complete the greatest political comeback in Canadian history? Ford Tough? Two weeks after winning his snap election call, Doug Ford has thrown himself into the tariff fight with the Trump White House, which resulted in a 25 per cent surcharge on electricity exports to the United States that were then paused when Ford secured a meeting with the U.S. Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick. What comes from that meeting is still to be determined, but Ford's role as Captain Canada seems minted even as we're asking: Does Ford know what he's doing? Caton Expectations. Last week at Committee of the Whole, Guelph city council looked at an update to the Code of Conduct that will govern social media use, and there was a lot of confusion about what it was supposed to do. Also, there were some questions about the Accessibility Advisory Committee's desire for more autonomy and self-governance. We have the perfect person in mind for further discussion on these matters, and it's natural techspert, accessibility advocate and Ward 1 City Councillor Erin Caton! Open Sources is live on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca at 5 pm on Thursday.

This week on End Credits, we're still having February thoughts. Although it's March now, we're going to revisit Valentine's Day with the rom-com/horror mash-up Heart Eyes, and because we can't escape the ramifications of what's going on everyday in the White House, we will talk about how Canadian cinephiles can do their part in the trade wars.  This Wednesday, March 12, at 3 pm, Adam A. Donaldson and Candice Lepage will discuss: Trade War Movies. You may have heard that there's a trade war happening. Anger at the U.S. President has extended to all things American, including streaming sites like Netflix and Prime Video, which people are cancelling in frustration. So in that spirit, we will start this week with some trade war programming. We will talk about where you can find some great Canadian movies on some great Canadian streaming sites. REVIEW: Heart Eyes (2025). Two genres that play by their own well-established rules: rom-coms and slashers. Two great tastes that taste great together? That's the question at the heart of Heart Eyes, which essentially asks "What would happen if there's a Hallmark movie and suddenly there was a masked killer farting around?" The makers of Happy Death Day, Werewolves Within, and It's a Wonderful Knife answer that question, but whether or not that answer is satisfying for two well-known horror heads is a bigger question. End Credits is on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca Wednesday at 3 pm.

When we talk about the affordability crisis, you sometimes hear the term “legislated poverty”, meaning the state of social assistance rates like Ontario Works and ODSP that assure people can never get ahead because the amounts paid never cover all the real costs of daily life. That's why Mike Morrice decided to act when he was elected to the House of Commons in 2021, but like all great quests, it hasn't ended up the way he envisioned. Can one person make a difference? This is the question when you elect anyone, but without a party whip or a legislative agenda, an MP pretty much has to follow their own north star and Kitchener MP Morrice followed his star to a private member's bill called the Canada Disability Benefit Act. The goal was to offer low-barrier, additional assistance to people with disabilities to help get them out of legislated poverty, but as always happens, reality couldn't live up to aspirations. When finished, the act proposed that people with disabilities in Canada will receive *up to* $200 per month once they've been approved for the Disability Tax Credit and all the requisite forms have been filled. On top of that, there was even doubt for a while that disabled people would even start getting their $200 this summer because the Treasury Board hadn't approved the regulations until last week, which wouldn't have happened at all in the event of a snap election. So how does the man who sponsored the Canada Disability Benefit Act feel now that he's on the other side? Morrice will talk about that, why he fought so hard for the act, and why, even though it's watered down, it's still going to be a game changer for people with disabilities in Canada. He will also talk about the ins and outs working with the government to get the bill done, fighting for key provisions to make the bill better, and the marathon the last few weeks to get the regulations finished before any potential election.  So let's talk about how the proverbial sausage gets made on this week's Guelph Politicast! You can learn more about the Canada Disability Benefit Act on the Government of Canada's website. You can also check out Mike Morrice's ongoing advocacy on this and other issues at his 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, 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.

This week on Open Sources Guelph, we're coming down from election fever, and maybe get ready to catch it once again...(?) Yes, the time has come for a new Liberal leader to be selected, which is its own drama, but nothing compared to the drama in the White House, which is exactly how its main occupant likes it (and the rest of us hate). For the interview this week, we've got a two-for-one special! This Thursday, March 6, at 5 pm, Scotty Hertz and Adam A. Donaldson will discuss: Garbage Disp-Oval. There's been no doubt that U.S. President Donald Trump is hostile to continued support for Ukraine in its war against Russia, but even by those standards what happened in the Oval Office last Friday was a disaster. A gathering in the U.K. on the weekend sought to buttress the rest of NATO in supporting Volodymyr Zelenskyy, but the bigger question is whether we can any longer be called the "Leader of the Free World". Carney of Won? At the end of this weekend, we will know who the new Liberal leader and Prime Minister of Canada will be. The safe money now is on Mark Carney, the former head of the Bank of Canada, and it certainly seems like the Conservative Party sees him as the prime minister in waiting, but what are Carney's chances really, and is Canada's favourite banker primed for an upset this Sunday? The Green Book. The Green Party of Ontario had one goal in last week's provincial election: Win more seats. That didn't work out, but party members and supporters can't say it was a total loss. For the first time in Open Sources history, we are hosting an entire party caucus from the Ontario legislature - Mike Schreiner and Aislinn Clancy - who will join us to talk about the election results, the lessons learned and what comes next. Open Sources is live on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca at 5 pm on Thursday.

This week on End Credits, we can't stop doing the monkey! Not the dance, but the movie of the same name that has been winning fans at cinemas all around the country these last couple of weeks. So yes, we're talking about The Monkey, and we're also going to be talking about the life and movies of another Hollywood icon!  This Wednesday, March 5, at 3 pm, Adam A. Donaldson and Peter Salmon will discuss: For Gene. While the circumstances of his passing still has many unanswered questions, there's no doubt that Gene Hackman is one of the greatest actors ever to grace the silver screen. From The French Connection to Unforgiven to The Royal Tenenbaums, Hackman's legacy has been secured, and that's not bad for the guy his classmates at the Pasadena Playhouse called "least likely to succeed". To start this week, we honour Gene. REVIEW: The Monkey (2025). The Monkey represents a horror trifecta: It's based on a story by Stephen King, produced by James Wan, and directed by Longlegs filmmaker Osgood Perkins. Perkins' success last year with Longlegs established himself as cinematic stylist and he brings all his skills to bear on this story about a cursed toy monkey that brings a swift and terrible death to the people around it. But The Monkey is actually a comedy too, which is not always an easy needle to thread, so has Perkins delivered the blood and gut(buster)s? End Credits is on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca Wednesday at 3 pm.

Although housing and homelessness has been THE issue for the last few years, it feels like they didn't make a dent in the recently completed provincial election. As the news obsessively tracks the tariff war and Doug Ford's response to Donald Trump's latest drama, the struggles of growing unaffordability and homelessness seems to have taken a back seat., So now that the election is over, does anyone in authority still care about these issues? Back in December, Premier Ford held a media event at Queen's Park. In the company of several mayors he announced the Ontario Restoring Safety to Parks and Public Spaces Act, a bill that expanded police powers in dealing with encampments and offered stiffer penalties for people who repeatedly break trespass laws and use illegal drugs in public. But just before the election call there was a turnaround, the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing said that maybe it wasn't needed after all. Not wanting to take chances, the Ontario Coalition for the Rights of Homeless People's tried to rally the political parties to all make the same campaign promise: A clear public commitments against criminalizing homelessness. Three of the four major parties signed up in common cause, but guess which one did not. With a new four-year majority for the Ford government secured there are now a lot of questions about what will happen next on the homelessness file. There many questions to ask, and this week we're asking  Diana Chan McNally, who is a community and crisis worker in Toronto and co-ordinator of the Ontario Coalition for the Rights of Homeless People. She will talk about her expectations before the election, how issues of poverty got overshadowed by tariffs, and her concerns about another attempt at criminalizing homelessness. She will also discuss what the action plan is now, and why the next fight with the provincial government will be through municipalities. So let's talk about where we go no on this week's Guelph Politicast! You can learn more about The Ontario Coalition for the Rights of Homeless People at their website. You can follow her on social media on Twitter and Blue Sky and you find links to her activism, op-eds and other work at Link Tree. At present there's no word on when the legislature will return or when and if the government will table the Ontario Restoring Safety to Parks and Public Spaces Act again. 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, 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.

It's four weeks of snow, promises, confusion, and apathy and after the longest shortest month of the calendar, we have finally come to this: Election Day! Now typically on Thursday there's a new episode of Open Sources Guelph, but because Election Day falls on Thursday, we're going to do it later, and we're going to do it live! Thursday February 27 at 8 pm, the Open Sources and CFRU News teams will go live to talk about the incoming results and immediate analysis as Ontarian choose their government for the next four years. Has Ford fumbled? Did Stiles slip? Will Crombie crush it? Will Schreiner turn his dynamic duo into the fantastic four? All questions will be answered including, why are we doing this again? For the Open Sources interviews with the Guelph candidates, click on the links below: Robert Coole, PC Party Carina Fraser, New Blue Mike Schreiner, Greens Cameron Spence, NDP Mustafa Zuberi, Liberals  Open Sources is live on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca at 5 pm on Thursday.

This week on End Credits, we're heading back into the wild! Things always get pretty wild when it comes to Oscar-season as one team of PR flacks tries to 86 the other, but things also get wild on an uninhabited island where even robots can enjoy a world without rules! On this show, we're reviewing The Wild Robot and we will talk about the Oscars! This Wednesday, February 26, at 3 pm, Adam A. Donaldson and Tim Phillips will discuss: Not An Oscars Ballot. The 97th annual Academy Awards will be given out this Sunday live from Hollywood. Who will win? We'll get to that. Emilia Pérez has the most nominations, but not many fans among cinephiles who would much rather see honours go to Brady Corbet and The Brutalist or Sean Baker and Anora. To start this pre-Oscars show, we will lay out the ones we think will win the show, and the one's that should win. REVIEW: The Wild Robot (2024). Speaking of the Oscars, the movie we're reviewing this week is nominated for one. The Wild Robot debuted at the Toronto International Film Festival last September, and then it had long legs in theatres even long after it was released on premium VOD. Why? That's what we wanted to find out so this week we check out The Wild Robot, which you can now stream on Prime Video, to see how this Oscar-nominated film hit a nerve and maybe if it will hit our nerves too. End Credits is on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca Wednesday at 3 pm.

It's been four weeks since Doug Ford asked the Lieutenant-Governor to dissolve the legislature and it really hasn't felt like anything has changed. Now, we will go to the polls on Thursday to decide who will form the provincial government for the next four years and despite all the issues, it feels like it's still going to be the people who've run it for the last seven years. So what have we missed this election? Early voting last weekend registered a six per cent voter turnout across Ontario. Not great. Accessibility activists have noted that this winter campaign generally, and the last week of wicked weather specifically, have thrown up big barriers to participation for anyone that's not able bodied, and wasn't that the point? It sure seems like it was and the impact has been pretty visibly felt: How many election events have you been to? Out of the campaign trail it's been rough going. The two likely successors to Doug Ford - Marit Stiles and Bonnie Crombie - have been straining to get attention. The Greens, led by Guelph MPP Mike Schreiner, have been pragmatic: They will not form a government, but they might be able to secure a few extra seats. And as for the big man himself he's been playing fast and loose with election rules, and going back and forth as candidate and premier. Now, there's 24 hours left till Election Day. What will happen? Scotty Hertz, co-host every week on Open Sources Guelph, appears today for a pre-game show. We will talk about what six per cent early voter turnout means, the ins and outs of winter campaigning, and why this didn't end up being a change election. We will also talk about the leaders' campaign, the various party strategies, and why Ford's been allowed to slide on all the domestic failures while failing in Washington on trade. Also what questions do we have going into our election night coverage? So let's get into this election that almost was on this week's Guelph Politicast! This Thursday, February 27, we will be going live to air for results and analysis starting at 8 pm on CFRU 93.3 fm or cfru.ca. For the interviews with the candidates running in the ridings of Guelph and Welligton-Halton Hills, you can check out previous episodes on this feed. To find where and how to vote this Thursday, go to elections.on.ca to find the polling location nearest you.  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, 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.

This week on Open Sources Guelph, we go mega! On this super-sized edition of the show, the last one before Election Day and the episode that opens three days of advanced polling, we will profile the three candidates we haven't covered yet. From the long-time campaigner running for the governing party, to an upstart trying to rebuild a Liberal stronghold, and a new face for a new party! This Thursday, February 20, at 5 pm, Scotty Hertz and Adam A. Donaldson will discuss: Be Coole. You may not know Robert Coole, but he's been doing politics in Guelph for a long-time as a reliable and seasoned campaigner for local Conservatives, but now, he's in the spotlight as the PC Party candidate in this provincial election. Coole will join us to talk about why Guelph needs a voice in the next PC government, and why he's taking the spotlight after years of playing in politics behind the scenes. Mustafa: The Liberal Candidate. There are a lot of young people running for the Ontario Liberals, and Mustafa Zuberi is one of them. Pretty well established in local politics thanks to his years running the Young Liberals at the University of Guelph, Zuberi now aims to be the next MPP from this riding and part of a Bonnie Crombie government. He will tell us why the Liberals are ready to run Ontario again. If the Blue Fits... Just when it looked like there would be no emerging party candidates running in Guelph this election, we get the arrival of Carina Fraser. The author and single mother is running for New Blue, which, as the name implies, is an alternative to the PCs aiming to collect the ones turned off by Doug Ford and not willing to bank on one of the other major parties. Fraser will tells us why you shouldn't sleep on the New Blue. Open Sources is live on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca at 5 pm on Thursday.

According to the latest polls, the governing PCs might be in minority government territory, and the spoiler might be a revitalized Liberal Party. In Wellington-Halton Hills it will be a big climb because while this seat is open, the Liberals finished fourth in a close race for second in 2022. Is there the possibility that without Ted Arnott on the ballot that voters might be willing to take a closer look at the man from Acton? When he was last elected in 2022, Arnott won more votes than the NDP, Greens, Liberals, and New Blue combined. Incumbency has its advantages, but so does longevity. How many people in Wellington-Halton Hills were voting for Arnott out of sheer habit? For 34 years at the Ontario legislature, Ted Arnott was always there. In fact, for some people living in Halton Hills and some parts of Wellington, Ted Arnott is the only MPP they've ever known Alex Hilson is one of those people. It's interesting to note that two of the people running to replace Arnott are Halton Hills councillors. Hilson represents Ward 1 in Acton, and has been running a pretty solid social media campaign during this election. He's a people person, as his background working with youth and the Acton BIA might imply, but will the people be willing to take a chance on him as part of a new Liberal dynasty? Hilson join us to answer that question and more. He will talk about his background, why youth matters right now in Halton Hills politics, and how his experience as a city councillor informed his desire to run for provincial office. We will also talk about the Liberal comeback under Bonnie Crombie, and what the Liberals need to do in order to earn the trust of the electorate again. Plus what issues is Hilson personally concerned about? So let's talk about a Liberal comeback on this episode of the Wellington-Halton Hills Politicast! You can learn more about Alex Hilson and his campaign at this website. For the interviews with the candidates running in the riding of Guelph this provincial election, you can check out Open Sources Guelph. Election Days is this Thursday, February 27, and we will be going live to air with the CFRU News Team that night with election results and analysis starting at 8 pm on CFRU 93.3 fm or cfru.ca. 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, 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.