Breezy Breakfast Radio Hour

Episode 46: the Reformatory Lands

Have you ever wondered why there is so much activity - cars, bikes, pedestrians - on the south side of York Road near Elizabeth Street?  Guelph's Ontario Reformatory Lands is one of the most picturesque places to take a walk, hike, meditate, and soak up nature's beauty.  Along the way, you'll pass by Heritage trees, fieldstone walls, ponds, and the old reformatory buildings.

These lands are owned by the provincial government, and Guelph's own Yorklands Green Hub wanted to purchase a 70 acre parcel of this land.  Alas, this is no longer possible, as the provincial government has decided to sell the entire property in a one shot deal.  For this week's breakfast, recorded on May 27, 2021, our guests from the YGH focused on the Natural and Cultural Heritage designation of these lands.  In short, a higher designation will provide the OR lands with better protection:  some of the lands might even remain in the public realm.

Norah Chaloner will kick things off with some introductory remarks.  Susan Ratcliffe will describe the Cultural Heritage value of the OR lands and will give an introduction to the Natural and Cultural Heritage designation process.  David Alton will discuss the benefits of a Part V designation and how it fits with the Guelph Innovation District Secondary Plan.  Alex Smith will bring it all back home by investigating City Staff's recommendation of a Part IV designation, rather than the stronger Part V designation.

The OR designation decision will be made at the June 14th council meeting.  This lively presentation will inspire you to make a delegation!

 

This breakfast was co-moderated by Tanya Gevaert and James Gordon.

 

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Episode 45: Youth Takeover

Hi everyone, James Gordon here:

As part of the organizing team behind Breezy Breakfast, I’m thrilled that we continue to grow our list of participants each week. We now have 275 subscribers, and many more check us out every Monday morning at 9 am on CFRU or listen to our podcast. We are reaching out to a real diversity of interests and voices in our community. If there’s one area where we are under-represented, it’s in our youth. As the senior member of the Breezy Gang, I’m sensitive to that!

On Thursday, May 20th, we gave our gathering over to a vibrant group of young people. Our guest moderator is Indigo Kim, an activist and high school student here in Guelph. She’s assembled a team of her peers who will speak to their concerns, their experience with education during COVID, climate change, the need for gender-neutral bathrooms, and other issues that affect them.

 

This session was moderated by Indigo Kim!

 

 

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Episode 44: MP Lloyd Longfield

Member of Parliament Lloyd Longfield joined to field questions and discussion points from the Breezy audience on Thursday, May 13.

Tempers may have flared at times in this rapid-fire round of questioning that included discussion on housing, the BDS movement, climate action, and of course, the COVID-19 pandemic.

 

This session was co-moderated by James Gordon and Tanya Gevaert.

 

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Episode 43: Open Mic!

Every once in a while, we do these open mics to allow more space for all attendees to steer the discussion respectfully and collectively. Attendees set the tone, and the Breezy organizers lightly moderate to make sure everyone can engage on what matters to them.

 

This open mic brought up the long-term care crisis, upcoming agenda items at City Hall, and more.

 

This session was moderated by Dustin Brown.

 

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Episode 42: Honouring the National Day of Mourning

In honour of the National Day of Mourning on April 28th, this Thursday’s Breezy Breakfast mourned workers killed and injured on the job, and discussed how to prevent future loss.

 

We were joined by a suite of guests from the local labour movement:

 

Bonny Durtnall, a local labour historian who outlined some history of workplace dangers in the Guelph area; Wayne Samuelson of the Labour College of Canada, who offered a broad perspective on Health and Safety in Ontario; Barrie Fowlie of Guelph, current director of Workers United Canada Council and International Vice President of Workers United, who discussed his 40 years of efforts to improve workplace safety; and Sarah Neath, United Food and Commercial Workers Compensation Representative, who spoke on safety issues in grocery stores and food preparation facilities, especially as these are compounded by COVID-19.

 

Please listen in on this important Breezy Breakfast to remember those who have been lost on the job, and think about how we can prevent tragic loss of life going forward.

Episode 41: For Disability Justice

Disability activists have been working in Ontario and all across Canada for decades to improve their living conditions and social supports. The pandemic, of course, made things worse -- reliance on expensive delivery services increased, while people with disabilities were cruelly excluded from programs like the CERB. In Ontario, the provincial government even chose to deduct CERB dollars from ODSP recipients, so that they wouldn't see any gains in monthly income.

 

Disabled people in this province face abundant systemic barriers: poverty wages through Ontario Works and ODSP; a narrowed housing market due to inaccessible units; and an overall anti-disability stigmatization that creeps into all corners of public and private life. A better, more just, accessible world is possible. To make it happen would require a significant re-thinking of city planning, health care, governance, and community.

 

For this Breezy Breakfast, recorded on April 22, 2021, we hosted a panel of local disability activists: Erin Caton, Mike Greer, and Christina Faith Cameletti.

 

 

Erin Caton is a project manager, business owner and the chair and founder of the Environmental Sensitivities Coalition of Canada. She founded the ESCC to provide a collective voice in conversations about accessibility after realizing that people with Environmental Sensitivities are often left out of discussions.

 

Mike Greer is a disabled activist and Chair of the City of Guelph Accessibility Advisory Committee, as well as an ambassador with the Rick Hansen Foundation. Born with a condition called Osteogenesis Imperfecta, he learned to adapt and deal with many challenges over the course of his life. Mike has a strong interest in motivational speaking and accessibility advocacy, with a goal to help organizations better understand the benefits of hiring people with disabilities. He holds a degree in Information Technology and has worked for the past nine years as an IT sales professional.

 

Christina Faith Cameletti is a lawyer in Guelph with a general practice focusing on real estate law, wills and estates. Christina has had an episodic disability since childhood, and has volunteered and advocated for Disability Rights since she was 7 years old, for organizations like the Arthritis Society, Easter Seals Canada and the AODA Alliance. During law school, she interned at ARCH Disability Law Centre, a specialty legal clinic in Toronto that advocates for accessibility, disability rights and policy reform.

 

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Episode 40: 2050 is Too Late

The city has two climate change targets for 2050: Net Zero Carbon (for the entire community) and 100% Renewable Energy (for the corporation of the City of Guelph). Last September it released its first Sustainability Report on how we’re fighting climate change. Unfortunately, it showed that our greenhouse gas emissions went up between 2018 and 2019. Not a good start, to say the least.

 

This approach to targets leaves little or no accountability for current decision makers. And technically, nothing needs to be done until 2049. We could also just buy carbon offsets instead of cutting greenhouse pollution. All of this leaves the door wide open to prolonged fossil fuel use.

 

Will we be able to meet our climate change targets? At this Breezy Breakfast, recorded April 15, 2021, Evan Ferrari from eMERGE Guelph joined us to discuss.

 

 

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Episode 39: Highway 413 and the Greenbelt

On this Breezy Breakfast, we talked highways and greenways: the newly proposed Highway 413, and the timeless topic of the Greenbelt, which we're forced to keep bringing up due to the Province's persistence.

 

Here's a short timeline of our Provincial Government's relationship to the Greenbelt.

December 2018: the Ford government introduces Bill 66 – the proposed Restoring Ontario's Competitiveness Act. This bill included Schedule 10 which contained proposed amendments to the Planning Act. These amendments would have allowed development to occur in the Greenbelt. The Bill - without Schedule 10 - was approved on April 3, 2019.

December of 2020: the Ford government took away the power of conservation authorities to refuse developments that have received a ministerial zoning order. In addition, CAs cannot appeal these decisions via LPAT.

 

February 2021: Ontario announced plans to consider expanding the Greenbelt to include the Paris Galt Moraine and Urban River Valleys, including the ones connecting to the Paris Galt Moraine through the Speed and Eramosa Rivers.

 

The cynics among us might consider this newest proposal as a way to appease Ontarians who disapprove of the Ford government's environmental track record.

 

Indeed, the Ford government is set on building the GTA West highway, otherwise known as Highway 413. This highway would degrade parts of the Credit and Humber River watersheds that flow into Lake Ontario - the source of drinking water for millions of GTA residents. This 50-kilometre, six-billion-dollar highway would pave over two thousand acres of Ontario's most productive farmland. It is marketed as something that will address Ontarians' traffic woes; however, its estimated decreases in commuting time vary from 30 seconds to 30 minutes.

 

Last weekend, the plot thickened with reports about the various development companies that stand to benefit from the construction of Highway 413. Many of them have direct ties to various members of the Ford government.

 

Listen to this discussion to hear two sides of the development coin. Susan Swail, a registered professional planner specializing in sustainable land use planning policy, gave us the 411 on Highway 413. Mike Marcolongo, co-founder of Protect our Moraine and the Greenbelt West Coalition spoke on sustainable living in a province where it isn't always easy being green.

 

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Episode 38: Open Mic!

Every once in a while, we do these open mics to allow more space for all attendees to steer the discussion respectfully and collectively. Attendees set the tone, and the Breezy organizers lightly moderate to make sure everyone can engage on what matters to them.

This open mic brought up the library, Mayor Guthrie courting Amazon on Twitter to build a warehouse in Guelph, and more.

 

This session was co-moderated by James Gordon and Tanya Gevaert.

 

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Episode 37: Making Relationship with Water

Hi everyone, Dustin here:

 

Every March 22nd, many people around the world recognize the United Nations World Water Day as an opportunity to reflect on our relationship to water. I joined this year to reflect on the value water adds to my own personal and community life, including its important role in local and global ecology. This year I learned from Anishnaabe kwe who took part in a Water Walk through hundreds of kilometres of Saugeen Ojibway territory, making acquaintance with the waters that line the coasts and wind through the rivers.

 

My whole academic life has been shaped by water's influence in the world; it has been at the centre of much of my work for almost nine years now, and has brought me into awareness of a whole world of relationships. As Indigenous peoples continue to assert and embody, water is life. For humans and non-human species, plants and animals, geologic systems and climate stability, water plays a central role of reproduction, sustenance, cleansing, beauty, and inspiration.

 

On Thursday, March 25th, our special guests were three prominent water advocates: Mike Balkwill from Wellington Water Watchers; Lin Grist of the local chapter of the Council of Canadians; and Mike Sullivan of Get Concerned Stratford.

 

We had a broad discussion that touched on things like the moratorium on water bottling permits, the sale of Nestlé Waters Canada facilities, the struggle against MZOs that threaten water systems, the Blue Communities initiative, and Indigenous leadership on water protection. I hope listeners and supporters take this as an opportunity to reflect on what water does for us and how we can make a reciprocal relationship with it in our daily lives and advocacy.

 

This session was co-moderated by Dustin Brown and Tanya Gevaert.

 

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