A new candidate who entered the mayoral race this week hopes to shake things up, and he’s making a pretty big noise as he’s filing his papers. University of Waterloo professor Jason Blokhuis is the sixth candidate to declare for the mayor’s race in Guelph this election cycle, and he’s making a play to position himself as a middle path between incumbent Karen Farbridge and her immediate challenger Cam Guthrie. Continue reading “New Candidate Aims to Shake Up Mayor’s Race”
George Orwell’s 1945 political satire Animal Farm was about a group of animals who take over their farm from the drunk and inept Mr. Jones and enjoy success until the pigs that led the revolution become corrupt and human-like. Orwell was commenting on the Russian Revolution, but Animal Farm may be somewhat prescient in terms of the way the municipal election is shaking out in some quarters. You see, the animals are making a play to take over. Continue reading “This Municipal Election Year is an Animal Farm”
It turns out Baker Street is just the beginning. Adding to the recent talk about re-orienting the north end of Downtown Guelph, is the news below that city staff has released a draft of the new Downtown Streetscape Manual and Built Form Standards, which will come before the Planning, Building, Engineering and Environment Committee a week from Monday on April 7. Continue reading “City to Present Streetscape Manual for Downtown Facelift”
It’s always a conundrum, does our government do enough to engage its citizens and encourage them to get involved with policy and city matters? Continue reading “City Wants Your Help to Make Government More Open”
I guess the Tri-Cities (sorry, I meant Canada’s Innovation Supercluster consortium) has gotten a taste for GO trains and likes it. Either that, or Premier Kathleen Wynne is looking to secure votes in this area for “Schrödinger’s Election” (since the provincial election is both happening and not happening). But then again, maybe it’s a case of both, a win-win if you will. Regardless, full-day GO Train service will be coming to the Kitchener-Guelph corridor in 2016, and the funding (what ever it is) will be covered with the full extent of the service extension in the upcoming provincial budget. Continue reading “GO Transit Set for All-Day Service”
In a surprise move, the Guelph Mercury has announced that they will be closing their printing presses later this week and moving the printing operations of the nearly 150-year-old paper to Hamilton. The paper itself will stay in production and continue to be published six days a week, but that physical copy will be made in Hamilton, not the Royal City. Continue reading “The Presses Stop at the Guelph Mercury”
Not to be insensitive, but $10 goes to the first person who asks Olivia Chow about running for Mayor of Toronto. The erstwhile potential mayoral candidate, potential Lieutenant-Governor, and current MP for Trinity-Spadina, is currently on a book tour for her memoir, Olivia: My Canadian Journey and she will bring that tour into Guelph this Thursday. Continue reading “Olivia Chow Brings Book Tour to Guelph”
The Guelph Civic League is hosting a redux of Mayor Karen Farbridge’s State of the City address later this week, and it will be followed by a Q&A with the Chief Magistrate of the Royal City with citizens invited and encouraged to ask questions of the Mayor. Continue reading “GCL Invites You to Question the Mayor”
If we can step out of our own municipal race for a second, which already has four people on the ballot for mayor, we can look slightly westward to Waterloo, which, as of yesterday, has one candidate for mayor, and it’s someone you may already know. If you’ve ever watched the news on CTV’s Kitchener station, then you probably at some point got the weather from Dave MacDonald, and now the former weatherman is making his bid to be Mayor of Waterloo. Continue reading “MacDonald to Go From Weatherman to Waterloo Mayor”
If you were listening to “The Gang of Four” yesterday on CFRU, then you know it was the last appearance (for a while?) for “The Philosopher” Phil Allt. Allt has been a staple of the Gang since “Beyond the Ballot Box” began two and a half years ago, but he’s decided to give up political punditry for a shot at being a politician once again by announcing his intention to run for city council in Ward 3. In the already busy election year so far, Allt’s is just one of several knew names who have thrown themselves into the hat. Continue reading “A Farewell to Allt”
Guelph Politico 