In these waning days of 2023, we know what you all need: Another end of the year list! It was another busy year in the news business here in Guelph, a lot of meetings, and issues, and debates, and announcements, and groundbreakings… How do you make sense of it all? With a Top 10 list! So let’s look at the year in Guelph from great progress to big protests, and all the issues that we mulled over, and will likely mull over some more in 2024.

10) Pigs Fly!

Two projects decades in the making finally got their start in 2023, and there’s no going back now! In the spring, ground was broken on the new main library, one of the anchors of Baker District Redevelopment, and in the fall all eyes looked to the south end where the ground was finally broken on the new Community Centre. Both buildings are expected to be completed by 2026, which still seems like a long way off but nothing compared to the nearly 20 years it’s taken to get things this far.

9) LGBT-Off

For many people, 2023 will be the year that anti-LGBT and transphobic hysteria seen in the United States the last few years came home. In September, hundreds of people gathered in front of Market Square to protest “radical gender ideology” but the hundreds of counter-protesters had another word for it, “hate”. The next protest in October had a significantly smaller impact even though it took place on a Saturday, but it could be argued that the damage had been done long before either of these protests. In June, a former grad student walked into a gender studies class at the University of Waterloo and stabbed three people. He’s awaiting trial, but the attack forced campuses in the area, including the University of Guelph, to up their security.

8) Gryphon Impossible

Life up atop the hill on Gordon Street seems to be going on as normally as the University of Guelph has continued to collect accolades, but there was a lot going on beneath the surface. Numerous faculty members expressed concern about the announcement that the admin was hitting pause on adding new students to 16 programs in humanities and sciences, and they were also concerned about the U of G potentially working with a for-profit company that recruits international students and considered it a further erosion to academic standards since the Ontario post-secondary institutions can charge those students more for tuition. There was also another data breach that affected students and news about heavy competition for even the most modest student accommodations as the U of G’s sole attempt to address the issue was to commandeer the Days Inn. Not a great way to head into the university’s 60th birthday in 2024.

7) Raiders of the Lost Park

After about 20 years of discussion, direction and board hearings, there was finally some forward momentum about the old Kortright Waterfowl Park in the south end. The area has a long and complicated history, but people in Guelph have long memories, so there was a lot of interest this fall when it was announced that the Grand River Conservation Authority was developing a plan of action for the land. For the most part, the property will be preserved, but there are still a lot of unanswered questions about what the future of the park will look like, or who might be responsible for finally working that out. Stay tuned because answers should be coming early in the new year.

6) So Longfield…

In the spring, Guelph MP Lloyd Longfield announced that this present term of Parliament will be his last. Although an election is still technically about two years away. the race to succeed Longfield has already begin. Janice Folk-Dawson was acclaimed as the NDP candidate at an EDA meeting in the fall, and Ward 6 Councillor Dominique O’Rourke has announced her intention to be the next Liberal MP for Guelph. In the meantime, federal politics in Guelph were made even more complicated with the revelation of the completed redistricting maps for Ontario, and Guelph, for the first time, will now be split between two ridings.

5) Smokey and the Campus

In the spring it was announced that the Co-operators building downtown was being sold to Conestoga College to create a new downtown Guelph campus for the growing college. As many as 5,000 new students could be learning in the City’s core in the next few years, and this is in addition to the Conestoga campus on Speedvale Avenue West, which will remain open once the new downtown campus starts receiving students. It’s a good news story, but an incomplete one. Conestoga president John Tibbits had no real answers about the housing needs of those 5,000 new students, and we’re starting to see the pressures on increased enrolment on Guelph Transit on Speedvale.

4) Police Files

It was a busy year for the Guelph Police Service as they set a record for the number of calls for service received, which includes, for the first time, four different homicide investigations. Disturbing incidents like these, or the September discovery of human remains in Royal City Park, are sending a message that Guelph isn’t has safe as it once was, or maybe just that we’re seeing the arrival of big-city crime that accompanies our rapid state of growth. It added another layer to the annual debate about the police budget this year, and while the service pulled back on some planned capital projects there was still a big ask for more staff. A KPMG report said our police service is still understaffed despite efforts to compensate, and while the new funding was approved, a lot of people will be waiting to see if it makes a difference.

3) The Mike Riders

At the start of the year, some Ontario Liberals had a great idea: Why get a new leader when we can just get the leader of another party? A full court press was launched to get Guelph MPP and Green Party of Ontario leader Mike Schreiner to think about switching to the red team, and Schreiner took the time to mull about the possibility. He eventually declined, and earlier this month the Liberals selected Mississauga Mayor Bonnie Crombie to lead them. As for Schreiner, he ended the year by getting a buddy at Queen’s Park, doubling the size of the Green caucus after Aislinn Clancy’s huge upset in the Kitchener Centre by-election.

2) Power Sour

In June, the Ontario government announced that they were expanding the so-called Strong Mayor Powers to all of Ontario’s biggest municipalities, including Guelph. In the midst of it’s own update of the Procedural Bylaw, the announcement forced a mad scramble on the part of City staff to adapt, and it was not the first, or last, time in 2023 that Queen’s Park changed the game mid play. From the Greenbelt to changing Guelph’s Official Plan to no follow-up on their promise to make municipalities whole, this year was an excruciating reminder that cities are creatures of the Province. Worst of all, there was no real progress on the number one issue of the year…

1) Homelessness

A disturbing statistic was revealed at a special council meeting about housing this past fall, the number of homeless encampments in Guelph has doubled in the last year, and many of them are pretty easy to see. Although the fight against homelessness and affordability was front of mind for the last 12 months, it’s hard to see whether there’s been any progress. About 100 new units of social housing were completed, or are in progress of being completed, but 90 Carden Street, long a refuge for some of Guelph’s most vulnerable, was sold and its tenants evicted. There were two whole meetings about housing at city council, but all it did was affirm that Guelph doesn’t have the resources to really tackle the problem, so here we are, more or less where we started from when the year began. Full circle, as it were.