# Night Day Darkness Eclipse

An episode of [Rose City Politics](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1247337855), 3 Feb 2024, 1 h 13 min.

Audio: https://dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/api.spreaker.com/download/episode/58556913/night_day_darkness_eclipse.mp3

Full house on the show with Jon, Don, Frazier, Kristen and Doug talking about the city budget, the latest in the housing debate and the upcoming eclipse. Rose City Politics is brought to you with the kind support of LiUNA Local 625: Building Better Communities. Support the show at Patreon.com/RoseCityPolitics. Read our stuff in BizX Magazine and online at BizXMagazine.com.

## Transcript

[0:24] Hey, everyone, welcome to Ros City Politics. It is February third.
[0:27] We've got a full panel today, Doug sar Tory, Don Merryfield, Junior
[0:32] Fraser Fathers, Kristen Siapis, and myself John Lidkey. Because we are all
[0:37] here, it means that none of us are at our jobs and taking care
[0:40] of the things that we have to be doing. So head to patroon dot
[0:43] com slash ROAs City Politics and give us your money or someone else's money.
[0:46] It'll help make these full panels possible moving ahead in the future. We're also
[0:51] in Physics magazine and you should read that in Ros City Politics in broadcast live
[0:55] on tape thanks to the kind support of Luna six two five building Better Communities.
[1:00] This is like a this is a shit show of an episode because it's
[1:03] a shit show of a city. This week set the bar hig John's I
[1:07] mean we just started. Yeah, Well, it's like I just want to
[1:11] explain, like why it might seem like we're all over the place with this
[1:15] one because there's no real cohesive Dude, never explain act like we planned it
[1:19] well. Okay, well here done, put it back thirty seconds Okay,
[1:22] I did, this is okay? And we're back that it was fun.
[1:25] It was a fun, great cut. Okay, Well, I guess we're
[1:26] gonna start things off with the twenty twenty four budget. We know that Windsor
[1:32] has finalized it now without any vetos from Mayor Dilkins, coming in at three
[1:37] point nine to one percent property tax increase, a one point nine billion dollar
[1:42] ten year capital budget, with five hundred and sixty nine million for roads this
[1:46] year, four hundred and seventy one million for sewers, and one hundred and
[1:49] eighty three million for parks and recreation, two point oh seven billion spent on
[1:53] capital investments. There's a three point two percent increase to the Windsor Police Service
[1:57] that's up over one hundred million now at one hundred and two LAS six.
[2:00] Windsor EMS receives fourteen per point six percent more up to fifteen million, and
[2:07] the Windsor Essex Community Housing Corp Gets a thirteen point five percent increase to seventeen
[2:12] point seven million dollars. Also, the Jackson Park Banshell Study was approved,
[2:17] albeit at one hundred and twenty thousand, not three hundred thousand. Were you
[2:22] already laughing at that one done? Or was that just a clear yeah.
[2:24] That and the fact that we're giving one hundred and two million extra to the
[2:29] police service and only seventeen million to housing kind of just sets the tone for
[2:34] the windsor extra. That's the total budget. Oh that's their total, all
[2:37] right. I thought one hundred two sound I don't know, don like three
[2:39] point two percent increases, like that's that's what passes for a restraint on the
[2:44] police by jet around one hundred. I was just I was just comparing it
[2:46] to housing, and I thought, well, yeah, that's an increase for
[2:50] housing though, right. So yeah, so now it's like seventeen point six.
[2:53] I'm glad I've just thrown the show right off the rails. I thought
[2:58] we were pretending like it was. All I did was clear my throat and
[3:01] apparently at all what the hell and I am as did. There were also
[3:05] some amendments at the budget which were approved, including not to extend parking meter
[3:09] enforcement by three hours to nine pm. We lost out and potentially about six
[3:15] hundred thousand dollars a year in potential revenue there. We killed the free COVID
[3:19] parking program, which I found out about like last week or the week before
[3:23] them. Right now, there's a free COVID parking program. It was a
[3:27] great scam done and now it's over. But maybe yeah, look, so
[3:30] that's disappointing. They extended the free drop in summer program at Mitchell Park.
[3:36] User fees have gone up at Lakeview Marina by six percent over the next ten
[3:39] years. Fifty million on infrastructure for lows on Parkway in County Road forty two
[3:43] not unexpected, thirty eight point five million to provincial and division improvements, thirty
[3:49] five point seven million for the transit windsor fleet replacement, and twenty five point
[3:53] three million to civic esplanade improvements. And that includes seventeen million to improve the
[3:59] festival plat as. We're going to green it put some shade features in,
[4:02] not the full canopy, which would have brought it to like sixty seven million,
[4:06] not the second option for half the canopy. So I think that we're
[4:10] gonna be buying some umbrellas for people and when it gets sunny, will hand
[4:13] them out and hopefully we're praying for clouds. There's also twenty four million dollars
[4:17] heading to eighty Knox Herman Recreation Complexes re imagining you know, Mayre Dilkins has
[4:24] been describing this throughout the media over the past week as a very restrained budget.
[4:30] He said, you know, there's there's no uh, there's there's no
[4:33] window dressings I suppose on it, or I forget the exact words that he
[4:36] was using. It's not there's nothing really dressed up about it. It's as
[4:41] low as it could go. What are our hot takes on it? Doug?
[4:43] You want to start? No, no, no, I've been We've
[4:46] got some people on the show who haven't been on for a few weeks.
[4:47] Don what's your take on the bike? Well, first of all, I'm
[4:49] upset. It's gonna cost me six percent more to park my yacht down at
[4:53] Lake Grey Marino, So it's pretty upsetting. Uh yeah, I mean I
[4:57] guess. And you compare it to those surrounding communities. Uh, they're looking
[5:00] at much higher increases than this. Uh, it's not so much the increase,
[5:04] it's like always its priorities. And that's where I kind of question windsors
[5:11] common sense, like the Bandshell, Okay, I'm gonna piss off a lot
[5:13] of people and Miles is gonna get burned down. But the band shell,
[5:15] to me, is the biggest waste of money on the planet. We're spending
[5:17] one hundred and twenty thousand as opposed to three hundred thousand to tell us that
[5:21] it's gonna cost eight million dollars to fix something that no one's ever gonna use.
[5:26] So hey, hey, hey, hey, don is talking about your
[5:31] throat too? No? No, go ahead, Yeah. I think the
[5:33] Bandgell is stupid, so not your hell phone? Yeah yeah yeah, So
[5:43] the not stupid I think is great. And why why Well, I mean
[5:48] it's it's an amanity in Jackson Park, but we have the one right downtown.
[5:51] Yeah, it's not in Jackson Park. It doesn't have that historic it's
[5:56] two miles away. Yeah, it's it's miles away, not in the same
[6:00] location at all. Now we don't have a space the arts community has very
[6:04] clearly, there isn't a space that we can use that is that size and
[6:09] has that that. I mean, the historical element, the cultural element,
[6:12] the significance still the black community. That's all very important. I look at
[6:15] it from my perspective as well additionally as as somebody who produces and creates arts
[6:20] events in the city and knowing what arts organizations are looking for. That's a
[6:25] space that is very valuable. It could be very well used throughout the year.
[6:29] Doesn't the school board own the property around it? School board owns the
[6:31] adjacent property. Yeah, said that they would be open to talks and level.
[6:35] So what are the estimates, like forget this bullshit three hundred thousand dollars
[6:39] or whatever it is, What are the actual estimates to fix that? Because
[6:42] they don't know that's what it's for. But it's pretty much your repair,
[6:46] isn't it. I don't know about that, Like, I don't know what
[6:47] I look at the space that I wouldn't it be better to build another banchill
[6:51] in a park somewhere in Jackson Park? I mean there would be definitely an
[6:56] additional expense to that that would be higher than one hundred and twenty thousand dollars.
[7:00] Well, one hundred and twenty thousand is just to find out how many
[7:02] millions are gonna to fix it. It probably would be cheaper to just build
[7:05] a brand new Well that's all I'm saying. Well, let me if you
[7:09] don't mind, Eric Kristin, I want to ask you about this. So
[7:13] the there's a big investment in the esplanade, right, that's that's going to
[7:18] be a major venue. Do you like from your perspective, from the per
[7:24] you know, from the perspective of someone in the arts community, do you
[7:27] think that is that what's most needed a big venue or or you know,
[7:31] our smaller, more distributed venues a better deal for the arts community. To
[7:36] me, I think with the size of organizations we have in the community and
[7:40] the space that they're looking at at creating work for creating you know, presentations
[7:45] of musical presentations, theatrical presentations, whatever kind of live performance, we need
[7:48] something that is smaller. We need something that would be like this, this
[7:51] size is ideal, this size of audience, this space, you know,
[7:56] the size of the stage space. Certainly, like when you look at the
[7:59] Riverfront Festival Plaza, it's so far out of reach for any kind of small
[8:01] local group that it's it's pointless. Like to consider that any small arts organization
[8:07] is going to use that space and activate a space like the festival Plaza is
[8:11] laughable. Like it's a totally different vibe. It's like sure, big movies
[8:16] and with and all of that stuff. And they did a phenomenal job and
[8:18] I absolutely loved it. And like some of the music festivals that come in
[8:22] sure short short like those are huge, but some of the smaller arts organizations
[8:26] that we need in order to build the arts industry and Windsor we need scaffolding
[8:30] for that, We need the in between pieces that just don't exist, and
[8:33] so a venue of this size is valuable in that respect. I also think
[8:37] that its location is really specifically interesting because of where Bright Lights is situated.
[8:41] It becomes sort of a year round venue. You know, all the things
[8:45] that they were talking about doing with the Riverfront Festival Plaza for all of the
[8:48] reasons why that was such a great space to invest into for large events,
[8:52] This is also a great space to invest in for smaller events and has the
[8:56] added benefit of creating connections with the Black community and with our history and then
[9:01] with local arts organizations as well. So I think there's a couple things here.
[9:05] First of all, First I don't and I think in the Global Mail
[9:09] did a story on this as well this week right Oliver Moore was down here.
[9:13] He did a story about the Bandshell as part of his coverage of Windsor,
[9:16] and it's really being framed. I think the framing of the conversation around
[9:20] the Bandshell I think was summed up very well by counselor ri Destino at the
[9:24] very end of that, do we want a performance venue or do we want
[9:28] a monument or some sort of acknowledgment of the history and legacy of that site
[9:33] in Jackson Park, Because those are two different things, right, A statue
[9:37] and some sort of like monument to the history of the Jackson Star Banchell,
[9:41] which the current banchelle is not the original banshell, you know, is one
[9:46] thing. And then I think that there's a much bigger conversation around is the
[9:50] performance venue needed there? The Esplanade project has a mid sized performance venue in
[9:56] the project that got funded this year. There is going to be a bandshell
[10:00] in the Esplanade, So the question, assuming it moves forward as funded all
[10:03] of those things, so there's I think a conversation around, you know,
[10:11] I agree with Kristen that smaller venues are needed across the city should about to
[10:16] throw something there. But I also think I also think the question is there
[10:20] is if this is going to cost ten million dollars, would you rather see
[10:24] ten million dollars divided by you know, put into the Arts and Heritage fund
[10:30] or have another facility? Because this is how the city operates because you have
[10:33] the we're going to invest, you're going to invest in? Which one is
[10:37] there's no funding at all? Your children? This is this is how the
[10:41] city is operated in the arts space for a long time, is that they
[10:46] fund the capital feeder every year. And that's the justification why they don't,
[10:50] you know, when the miscible benchmarking comes out, while it doesn't count this
[10:54] capital funding that we spend money on. So the trap is there, and
[10:58] so we have to be careful. Are you stepping in to that trap by
[11:01] doing by saying we want to say this as a performance facility versus like there's
[11:05] the whole history conversation. I recognize that could look like something very different or
[11:09] it could be a stage, But I think, like there are conversations,
[11:11] there's a much bigger picture that's political than that. You know, we have
[11:16] to figure show up one week a month. I don't think it. I
[11:22] think it is both. I want to go back to some of these like
[11:24] is it one or the other? I think that that it is both.
[11:26] It can be both, like can too, But I don't think you have
[11:30] to say, like, oh, well, what do you guys want to
[11:31] do you want a museum or do you want a performance space, Like the
[11:33] performance space is the museum. The museum is the performance space because we're activating
[11:37] that space because we're you know, maybe there's a plaque or something or like
[11:41] whatever, I don't know, but but because it honors the legacy by carrying
[11:45] it forward in the same way that like is is how am I going to
[11:48] say this? You know, is a street car and a glass garage a
[11:52] monument to transit or is it an investment in transit? I think it's you
[11:58] know, it's it's it's both, Like it's if we're gonna call it,
[12:01] you know what it is. I think that that we have the opportunity to
[12:05] both. I also think that, yes, this city absolutely does the trade
[12:09] off of like like if we invest ten million dollars in the Jackson Park banshell,
[12:13] you know, do we really need a performance space at the Civic Aspet.
[12:16] Yes, the answer is yes, we need both of those things because
[12:18] those are two different spaces. Those are two different spaces to activate and target
[12:24] audiences and uses of the space. Like it's like if we have bright lights
[12:28] in Jackson Park, would we need bright lights? We have neighborhoods and bias
[12:33] and different communities all over this city and we can activate those spaces in different
[12:39] ways, using different things. It doesn't mean that, but look at what
[12:41] he right lights. That's exactly what Frasiers framing is like. You can either
[12:46] have bright lights of tracks and park or we can have a conversation moving it
[12:48] to downtown. But we can't do both. Yeah, in the context of
[12:52] those budget, which is where we started, and the leanness of this budget
[12:56] and the history of lean budgets going back, and we've all sort of commented
[13:00] about that graph which shows sort of the gap the savings and what taxes could
[13:03] have been versus what they are because of you know, fifteen now plus years
[13:07] of hold the line. You know, I think that's the danger of this
[13:11] co of like this conversation is that you're in, this conversation is being injected
[13:16] into a resource scarce environment, and the moment that an investment gets made,
[13:20] there is no long term plan for how that space gets utilized. So it'd
[13:24] be like, yes, we will build a venue, but then it's solely
[13:28] on the arts community to activate that venue, and it's solely out of their
[13:31] own pocket that that venue has to be done because we just invested in this
[13:35] venue for you and that's the trap, and that's the thing I would be
[13:39] cautious about if we're thinking about, you know, moving forward in the Banchell.
[13:43] And I support the Banchell, but I think like until there's a broader
[13:46] shift in how the arts community and the arts funding is looked at in the
[13:50] city, a windsor there's a there's a danger here where you're gonna get a
[13:54] banshell and it's gonna be great, but then there's gonna be no funding to
[13:58] maintain it. There's gonna be no behind me to put performances at it,
[14:01] there's gonna be no funding for arts groups to actually be you know, build
[14:03] up their community because we just spent all this money on the bench. Well
[14:07] that's not true, because I mean you look at you look at arts culture
[14:09] heritage funding, the grant the grant funding that goes out every year that goes
[14:13] to artists in the community who are creating things that would go on performance here.
[14:18] And you look at some of the things that have been invested in,
[14:20] like bright lights because of its its proximity to Bright Lights, that the expansion
[14:24] of our entertainment lights would be great. Well, I mean, and there
[14:26] already is entertainers, and there are you know, there are things that happen
[14:30] during bright lights. This would I think dovetail really nicely in a way that
[14:33] if we are considering are we is there a trade off, are we you
[14:37] know, giving up something? I think this this combines nicely with things that
[14:41] are already happening, so we don't have to give anything up in that respect.
[14:43] I think it's such a small piece though, like the fact that we're
[14:46] talking about the Banshell in the context of like the larger but there's so many
[14:50] issues that I think that we we look at where we're not. We have
[14:54] historically not invested in the things that we need to invest in in this city,
[14:58] and every year it's like leaner and leaner and leaner, And at what
[15:03] point do we as residents go, what are we getting for this? Like
[15:07] you just keep cutting back and cutting back and cutting back. And I respect
[15:09] the need to keep taxes low in the consideration of inflation and everything, but
[15:13] I'm just I'm so second of looking at the things that we could have had
[15:16] that we don't have, and this is just one example of that. So
[15:20] I think it's really interesting. And then I'm glad that we focused on the
[15:24] Bandshell not not only because I think this is a conversation. Yeah, I
[15:31] think this is a conversation that doesn't happen often enough. And that kind of
[15:35] led me to the thinking of how hold the line impoverishes debate in general,
[15:41] because that's the kill switch for every discussion. To your point, Fraser is,
[15:48] well, you know, we can't actually even talk about this two thirds
[15:52] of the spectrum of debate because hold the line, and that's never going to
[15:56] happen. But until like, and as much as I think there's criticism of
[16:00] hold the line, right, there's criticism of this policy, there's criticism out
[16:06] there of the duration of it. I don't see an actual debate forming,
[16:12] and what like, what I think it takes for there to be a real
[16:17] debate in public about this is somebody with more standing than anybody around this table
[16:22] has to raise this issue and own it. A politician, a media personality
[16:27] who doesn't do a podcast like you know, and that voice doesn't exist.
[16:33] And so I think what happens is the tacit agreement on this policy that we
[16:40] are always, always, always going to forever till the end of time be
[16:44] shrinking the budget of this community in real terms means that like we like,
[16:48] what's the point of even talking about what the arts community wants? Yeah,
[16:51] so even like looking at the amendments, right, and the number of amendments
[16:53] that were made, like a number of them were cuts that weren't listed in
[16:56] that story, right, Like there's a little trimming here and there, and
[17:00] one of the you know, and like counselor Castante was like one of the
[17:03] persons looking to find money because he had the bus proposal that wasn't passed,
[17:07] and so he came up with a list of amendments. So they are only
[17:11] hiring one full time, you know, customer service coordinator at three one one
[17:14] instead of two. You know, they're doing a whole A bunch of those
[17:17] cuts came through, you know, through what you could call progressive counselors trying
[17:22] to find a solution. So I agree with you. It's captured the whole
[17:26] debate to a point where even a progressive counselor is going through the motions of
[17:32] what can I cut in order to fund whatever I want so or perceived need,
[17:38] and those perceived needs still aren't getting funded. So the transit expansion didn't
[17:41] get funded for the seth windsor buses, but cuts still got made, so
[17:47] they're only hiring one additional So the actual three point ninety one is below what
[17:52] we were talking about last week, which was three point nine three. Right,
[17:55] we'll take those cuts you got of. That's a great idea, But
[18:00] forget about the service enhancement and even that debate, and I think we touched
[18:03] on this when we discussed it, but even that debate around the service enhancement
[18:08] to transit was impoverished because the only acceptable way to enter that debate on the
[18:15] side of pro transit was to say, we're not going to raise taxes.
[18:18] God damn it, we aren't raising taxes. Like we know that everything we
[18:23] say after it will be inadmissible in this community if we say that we want
[18:27] to raise taxes more than the existing budget does, and I think it's a
[18:32] real shame. Like I think it's a real shame because in a city with
[18:36] a population that has exploded since the last time we raised taxes over the rate
[18:41] of inflation, how long, and we've added lots and lots of housing stocks,
[18:45] it's the last time we raise taxes over the rate of inflation. Like
[18:51] this can't go on for much longer without serious, serious problems. And maybe
[18:53] some people would argue, we're already seeing serious problems. Are they still using
[18:59] that as the base case? Some I assume Friezer would actually know. So
[19:02] hold the line on taxes a little bit stupid about it, and I agreed
[19:04] with it on some level. But what was stupid about it is the expansion
[19:07] of the property base, which is property taxes, that was always factored in
[19:11] and then negated. Yep, it was always a zero some game. You
[19:15] get add a thousand properties that are adding a million dollars to the tax base,
[19:18] they would knock that million dollars down. So the whole the case we're
[19:22] using now, is that three point nine percent on top of the expanded property
[19:27] tax base or is it still off the base number? It's still it's still
[19:32] the like we still measure the tax increase based on the spending overall. Right,
[19:37] So the city's revenue take is the tax increase. So if the city
[19:42] chooses to to economize and not use the resources that would come from additional housing,
[19:49] Yeah, that's right. So about two percent or more, about eight
[19:53] million dollars plus came out of reserves as well, so like into operations.
[19:59] So in other words, the actual like levy of what's being funded this year
[20:03] is like a five point whatever, But they pulled two million dollars out of
[20:06] reserve or eight million dollars at a reserve about two percent in order to cover
[20:11] a bunch of operational things at a bunch of stabilization. So like in theory
[20:15] we're getting like a five percent worth of spending, there was almost six percent
[20:18] worth of spending. But some of that is not actually funded fully. It's
[20:22] just been funded one time, and like some guy's job is up, or
[20:26] some project will end next year because it's just at a budget stabilization and will
[20:33] either need to be incorporated into the tax rate next year or all stuff.
[20:37] We should get more serious about corporate naming rates or just any game rights.
[20:42] I mean, we could like sell off naming for parks, actually recommend that.
[20:47] Why don't we just sell it, Like there's Realtor parks, a Realtor
[20:49] park many many years ago, realtors paid for that park. I would like
[20:52] my money back, But Realtor's paid to redo the park. It is turned
[20:56] into a dumpo there, and it's still called Realtor park, which it shouldn't
[21:00] be. Which would like automatically five years it's killed. It should Don Merryfield
[21:04] Junior Memorial Park, John Merrifield of My Life. We can probably get a
[21:12] lot of money for like naming City Hall. It could be the compre Pizza
[21:15] City Hall and featuring windsor because they never are, my friend w Arcade has
[21:23] got to step up to the plate at some point. But you know,
[21:26] this has got me thinking of a revenue idea for Rose City politics. We
[21:30] could just sell naming rights to Don a weekly basis Frank Tomorrow, right,
[21:37] he could be Don Franco's Meryfield, Frank's Brewery Maryfield. It's like on Canada
[21:44] Land when they start off and they're like, this episode is brought to you
[21:45] by Josh and Phil and Jessica, Jimmy. Jimmy's an asshole. Jimmy's sitting
[21:53] in with Rosy politics. If I can just make one more point on this
[21:57] stupid ben So, Look, I don't know what this study entails because it's
[22:03] always chaos. But if they're just trying to figure out how much it's gonna
[22:07] cost to renovate and make that a usable space, the fact that they went
[22:11] from three hundred thousand to one hundred and twenty thousand. I am no civil
[22:15] engineer, but I am in the real estate industry. I'm pretty sure basically
[22:19] a concrete contractor could go down there and tell you about fifty minutes for five
[22:23] hundred bucks once you gotta do to make this space that banshell use, it's
[22:26] gonna be a four page consultants report instead of a thirty place well consultant's report.
[22:30] It's terrible. Yeah, but it could be a dude who walks down
[22:34] there goes, yeah, that's gonna be you gotta rip all that down here
[22:37] telling me we don't have one outdoor city of windsor employee. You could walk
[22:41] over there and just be like, eh, eight million. What about these
[22:42] building inspectors we apparently have? Isn't are they qualified to inspect properties? But
[22:48] it goes with a construction, that's true. Yeah, they have to drive
[22:52] vi all those houses and not go in. Okay, let's keep this conversation
[22:55] going. We're gonna shift gears a little bit. But you know, everything
[22:57] is connected in this epod and this directly relates to budgets of today and budgets
[23:06] passed many many passed. Actually, let's set a scene right now, it's
[23:10] the year, the year nineteen ninety four, Disney's Aladdin had either just come
[23:18] out or was coming out reasonably soon. That's where today's story begins, because
[23:25] our City of Windsor engineer is explaining that acting City of Windsor engineer is explaining
[23:32] that twenty percent of our roads today are beyond repair and need to be replaced.
[23:37] And the reason that this is all coming up is because a resident on
[23:40] Jarvis Avenues lived there his whole life, Chris Jacobson, has been expressing a
[23:44] lot of problems with it, lots of flooding whenever it really rains. The
[23:48] sewer itself is clay tiles, hasn't been replaced since like the seventies, and
[23:53] the city says, yeah, we've got nothing that we're going to be doing
[23:56] on this road. The reason why I wanted to set the scene with the
[24:00] early nineties is because that was when the funding model for roads changed and the
[24:06] Feds and the province really got out of it. The city had to take
[24:08] it all on. And our engineer explains, look, the reason why twenty
[24:12] percent one of the five of our roads in this city are beyond repair need
[24:18] replacement is because that occurred thirty years ago when I was five. Are we
[24:26] literally still blaming Mike Harris for the misery and our province is that it's a
[24:33] good one two punch. It's this is this is just such a mind boggling
[24:37] one to be able to just go pointing to, you know, governments of
[24:41] thirty years ago to justify I guess not making the meaningful improvements. And you
[24:45] know, the whole hold the line thing really comes into play because one in
[24:48] five of our roads are deficient. So I know nobody has the answer to
[24:53] this question, but I'll ask it rhetorically. In that thirty plus years,
[24:57] how many reports do you think we're paid for and generated to figure out the
[25:02] state of our road infrastructure over the last thirty years and how much money was
[25:06] spent on that and how many roads could that have prepared? Jarvis Road if
[25:12] you've ever been like, Jarvis Road is one of these kind of weird little
[25:15] roads they don't even notice is there just because of its location. It would
[25:18] be better off being a still being a gravel farm road than what it is
[25:22] right now, just halfway there. But I was looking at a photograph that
[25:27] from the Windsor Star and it's like the manhole, not of the sewer.
[25:32] Great where the water goes down is recessed like four and a half five feet
[25:36] into the property yard, and there's like a raise in front of it because
[25:41] the roots of the trees have raised it all up, which is also collapsing
[25:44] the sewer. But it's just this hilarious situation where the water is obviously pooling
[25:48] at the base of the berm that's been built. It can't get over it
[25:52] until it rises so much that it can then access the sewer. But again,
[25:59] hold the I am I right, yeah, So I find this really
[26:03] interesting, and I want to I want to tie the hold the line policy
[26:07] to the to that Martin era and and Harris era, although I think ninety
[26:14] four is was was Hair still in office from ninety four is just getting elected
[26:18] Okay, okay, right, common sense revelation, But that that that that
[26:22] whole era of politics was like a fiscal reset for this country and this province
[26:27] right where severe cuts were made and and and I think you you know,
[26:34] you you talk to people who are dependent on or advocate for social services in
[26:40] this country, and they point to that era as a time when you know,
[26:44] we we really lost our connection to the you know O d SP rates
[26:51] and and Ontario Works rates and so forth, that the housing that all that
[26:56] stuff. Right, So so there was a a there was a fiscal reset,
[27:00] but what that really resulted and is sort of the permanent, permanent impoverishment
[27:04] of elements of our society based on you know, resources no longer going there,
[27:11] right And and isn't that kind of isn't that kind of what Hold the
[27:15] Line is doing to Windsor. I mean, if you live and I know
[27:18] we talk about this all the time, and I see the comments on our
[27:22] on our iTunes, you know, people call us cry babies who hate South
[27:26] Windsor. But the truth is that yes we do, and we're cry babies
[27:32] who hate South Windsor and we're we're a bad MSNBC clone don would enjoy,
[27:40] but madam, you know I don't. So I'm sensitive to the fact that
[27:44] some of our some of my neighbors in South Windsor think that we're a bunch
[27:48] of sucks who hate them. At the same time, if you know,
[27:52] if you are a person who doesn't need any of the city services, and
[27:56] you think your kids will never need any of the city services, then like
[28:02] hold the Line and the narrative and the and the rhetoric around the hold the
[28:07] line is a total justification for you to pursue your self interest and like the
[28:11] core of the city could be a smoking ruin for all. It's going to
[28:15] affect your life if you if you live in uh, you know, Southwood
[28:18] Lakes and and don't ever come south or north of Tekomsi Road, like that
[28:23] doesn't matter, Yeah, because that's always that's a big part of the transit
[28:26] debate all the time. Right, we have to spend you know, real
[28:29] it's like, well, you probably spend fifty one hundred million dollars to get
[28:30] our transit system up and running. But if you live in Southwood Lakes,
[28:34] sure you live, you know, on the far east side of the city
[28:37] or South windsor farther road south Winds, you don't use it well. And
[28:41] then that impacted I wanted to bring this in because that impacted Costante and Mackenzie's
[28:47] proposal one transit like it was heavily weighted towards improving service in South windsor right,
[28:52] and probably for like, you know, not a small amount, because
[28:56] you have to justify that to the people who live there well and unfort the
[29:00] thing like you said, we're still treating Windsor like Mike Harrison, Paul Martin
[29:03] treated, you know, the country back then. Is that is still Unfortunately,
[29:07] that is still I think the mentality of the mayor and probably a lot
[29:11] of counselors and their supporters in the suburbs is they haven't fully acknowledged. And
[29:17] I can tell you this from a real estate standpoint for sure, is like
[29:19] people who live in South Windsor havn't acknowledged the housing problem. But the reality
[29:26] is the last four or five years, it's turning up in their neighborhood and
[29:29] they're just not looking at it like there's a lot of seuth Not a lot,
[29:32] but there's a number of South Windsor homes that have been bought and turned
[29:36] into sixteen students living in a four bedroom, two story which would have been
[29:40] in a quiet residential neighborhood. And maybe they don't know yet or they don't
[29:42] care. I think that the people in the suburbs are still looking at these
[29:47] as downtown problems, and I think the mayor on the whole housing thing,
[29:49] if we're going to get into that later, prove that they haven't even acknowledged
[29:55] that it's actually affecting them, beginning to affect them now, and it's only
[29:59] going to get work if we don't, if they don't, I think of
[30:03] this, I think you can make the argument that those those early impacts are
[30:07] are driving like even more intense sort of an India attitudes towards for because they'll
[30:12] just think it's going to get worse. That's why they don't want four plexes
[30:15] and south windsor right then you know, the poor people are going to live
[30:18] with us. I see Frasier. It's like a bit yeah, well so
[30:22] so yeah. The road challenges is again it goes back decades and it goes
[30:26] back to choices being made right and Don likes to talk about other priorities,
[30:30] like we've you could have invested in roads and not done the aquatic center for
[30:33] millionaire esplanades. You know, could have borrowed, we could have borrowed.
[30:38] You know, there are a lot of options that haven't been taken. And
[30:41] I think I think like and I think let's be fair here. This is
[30:45] not just a winsor issue. You know, on my other podcast, I've
[30:48] talked to the mayor Chatham, Kent. They have like a one point two
[30:51] billion dollar infrastructure deficit in Chatham, Kent with a fat fraction of Essex County's
[30:56] positivis not talk about your other girlfriend in front of us with you, but
[30:59] like but like this is like but it's all like bridges and culverts on rural
[31:03] roads from like the amalgamation of twenty one towns and like these are all things
[31:07] that like every municipality has this problem. And so the question is really again
[31:12] and I think like what we're sort of dancing around is like there's a tipping
[31:17] point on quality of life, and like the question is when do these tipping
[31:21] points get hit for certain parts of the community. And you know, this
[31:26] is where you see you know break down as social trust, in social cohesion
[31:32] and all those other conversations that you have like well, if they can't fix
[31:34] my road after fifty years, why would you trust them to raise your taxes?
[31:37] Right? And so like it all feeds into like that negative cycle,
[31:41] and so I think, like there's there's challenges there where like I there isn't
[31:48] art a strong argument make like just get back to basics as a municipality and
[31:52] like, you know, fix the damn road was like Gretchen Whitmer, you
[31:57] know, now the governor of Michigan like campaign things like we're just gonna fix
[32:01] the roads, and like she got elected. Like I think that there's you
[32:05] know, I think Pierre Polyev is gonna run on a common sense fiscal agenda
[32:09] federally in the next election, modeled off of Mike Harris's Common Sense Revolution Like
[32:15] these are this is where sort of society is today, and I think like
[32:21] there's a pathway there where like, yeah, you could see some shrinkage in
[32:24] government unfortunately or fortunately depending on your point of view, but it's gonna free
[32:29] up dollars to you know, we're gonna just pave the roads to hell with
[32:32] whatever else is going on. And you know, Banchells be damned. Yeah,
[32:37] well, I think I don't mean to jump on anybody, but that
[32:39] was gonna be My point is I think it's not only a municipal issue.
[32:43] This is going on all over the country on many different basic infrastructure things in
[32:46] the country, our health systems and chaos and housing and everything else. It's
[32:52] have we reached that point as just citizens of a country that we're looking at
[32:57] all of our levels of government and trying to figure, Okay, what do
[33:00] we actually want government to do. Like it's almost like there's gonna be a
[33:04] giant reset of Okay, stop all this extra bs that you're spending money.
[33:09] We just want our roads fixed. We just want you know, defense spending
[33:14] increased. We just want our healthcare spending increase. All the other stuff that
[33:16] you know, the shiny bright election stuff that they throw a few million here,
[33:20] a few million there around that really is priorities and that has to end
[33:23] because I think we've proven as a country we can't afford it. We just
[33:30] can't afford it. Well, no, I disagree, we can't afford it,
[33:32] right. The problem is our expectations are misaligned. Right, So again
[33:36] going back to hold the line locally, what if taxes had gone up one
[33:38] percent a year through that whole period, they could have just on expanded property
[33:43] base, Well they could have, I agree, right, but you could
[33:45] have generated one percent more revenue and that would have been four million dollars a
[33:49] year and over ten years, that's forty million dollars that you could be plowing
[33:52] into insert priority here. And like, the problem is our expectations are misaligned,
[33:58] right. I think it's really important to like to point that out because
[34:02] what does it cost to have a city that isn't like being run into the
[34:08] ground or doesn't feel like it's being run into the ground. And like,
[34:13] you know, if your tax bill is, I don't know, five grand
[34:15] a year today, what would it cost in order for that the quality of
[34:21] life to be somewhere more acceptable? It's not like it would cost ten thousand.
[34:24] And I think that that's where the rhetoric. That's where the rhetoric is,
[34:29] like it might cost fifty five hundred, right, fifty five hundred a
[34:31] year instead of five thousand, Like that might be where where we're at.
[34:36] And so like, are we prioritizing saving the typical household five hundred bucks over
[34:42] having a decent city to live in? And I think that's a question of
[34:45] balance. Like I don't agree at all that we can't afford it, and
[34:47] it would have to be proved to me that we can't afford it. I
[34:51] think the problem when we look at situations like this, Yes, it's only
[34:54] five hundred bucks. Could everybody around this table ford five hundred bucks? Problem?
[34:58] It's no big deal. But we're just forty dollars a month done?
[35:01] No, I get it. If you own a house, you can afford
[35:04] forty I spend forty bucks on stupid shit all the time. But you're and
[35:08] we are looking at it in the context of just municipal taxes. The problem
[35:14] you're going to run into is people are going to go our property taxes have
[35:17] gone up, gas prices with carbon taxes have gone up, food is gone
[35:21] like it's not you can't look at it as it's just five hundred bucks a
[35:24] month because you know what, there's another three thousand a year I have to
[35:28] pay extra expenses because of government spending on top of that. That isn't municipal
[35:31] or to piggy off that it's just an extra five dollars a year, that's
[35:37] a that's not reality. No, I know. But the point being is
[35:42] once you do start to parse that argument down to just that base level,
[35:45] rather than having a conversation just about we need to just fund the things that
[35:49] we need to fund, and you start to parse it down, it becomes
[35:52] really easy to start to kill that argument by going, well, look at
[35:55] the slippery slope of everything else that could just be funded in just a small
[35:59] little piece beyond Now, Well, it's a whole paradigm shift that's sort of
[36:01] needed, and I think people are willing to spend the money if they're getting
[36:05] what they need, like if if it does cost five hundred bucks more for
[36:09] household for example. But everybody's roads are set and we're you know, we're
[36:14] good. Everybody's back up to date. The problem is the gap between where
[36:17] we are and where we need to be. It is too it is too
[36:21] expensive. Even if we increase you know, taxes ten percent this year,
[36:25] we still couldn't quite get there. And I think that's the trade off that
[36:30] we go, Okay, well, if we're not going to get there anyway,
[36:31] let's just keep taxes low because people are going to gripe and complain about
[36:36] it, and let's just keep the taxpayers as happy as we can. I
[36:38] think Toronto's testing that theory, right, maybe it'll bee Chow's budget came out
[36:43] at nine point six percent, you know, as Toronto. That's like like
[36:45] they've had a hold the line for just about as long. You know,
[36:50] there wasn't zero, but they've been like staying under inflation for almost as long.
[36:52] Like we're gonna watch that test play out and she can deliver a higher
[36:55] quality of life and fix certain things over the next two years, like suddenly
[37:00] there's an argument to be made because then there's a model to do it.
[37:04] I just think it takes longer than two years to see that kind of thing
[37:06] turn around. And so that's why we recycle with with the terms that we
[37:10] have that over the four years that you're in office, you can't actually get
[37:14] done what you need to get done in order to prove your point to people.
[37:16] Kristen supports dictatorship. Sometimes I've been advocating for yers that I should just
[37:30] be the king and everybody should do and I'm just going to do the branding
[37:34] on your crowns. So something else that Chow did is try to secure more
[37:42] dollars from the Feds. And like I'm I'm sympathetical. Yeah, And I'm
[37:47] sympathetic to municipal governments, even even though we get tired of hearing city councilors
[37:54] and windsors say this or that issue is a provincial issue and whatnot. I'm
[38:00] sympathetic to that argument because property tax is a regressive tax by comparison to income
[38:05] taxes, where people with the highest incomes pay the biggest share. Property tax
[38:09] doesn't work like that to your point on and municipal government maybe is the place
[38:15] where we should be looking for the penny pinchingst approach because we are hitting people.
[38:20] We are hitting people who have less ability to pay more. But that
[38:24] would require partners at senior government to stop being addicted to those low tax rates
[38:31] and actually increase income taxes. And I'm looking at the OECDS comparison of the
[38:40] total tax wedge for the average worker across different countries in twenty twenty two.
[38:45] Where do you think Canada is in terms of like the total take among the
[38:51] rich countries of the world. Do you think we're in the top half or
[38:52] the bottom half just for income taxes that's correct, well, the tax on
[38:59] workers, so that would inc boot all taxes not paid by companies, so
[39:01] like sales taxes, business taxes, blah blah blah. Not probably midpack.
[39:06] I think somewhere we're in the bottom third. We're below, well below average.
[39:10] OECD average is thirty point thirty four point six and Canada's thirty one point
[39:15] nine. My point is we have a completely distorted conversation in this country.
[39:21] We act like every other country in the world doesn't exist, and that the
[39:25] level of taxation is absolutely the maximum that we could possibly take from people and
[39:30] have a decent quality of life and be able to reward entrepreneurship and risk taking
[39:35] and all that. And it's horseshit, like we're talking about tiny differences.
[39:38] You know, you look at I don't know, pick a country that is
[39:40] a progressive superstar Norway thirty five percent right, one percent oil money. Let's
[39:49] pick Denmark. Okay, Denmark even lower, thirty five point five percent,
[39:52] so they're zero point nine percent higher, right, less than one percent higher?
[39:58] Take on wages, right, and think about the difference. Isn't isn't
[40:01] isn't that the place where they send you like a baby box with all the
[40:05] diapers and formula and stuff that you need. And by good point, but
[40:08] they steal it from Finland. By to Frasier's point, you know, countries
[40:12] that have higher social cohesion and higher social trust are probably more willing to to
[40:17] have higher top end tax rates because you feel like your money is going to
[40:22] be I think that was the point, and I agree that. Look,
[40:25] I sit here and say I don't want to pay tax all the time.
[40:28] I don't want to pay more money. And the only reason, and this
[40:30] is the conversation people don't have with me, The only reason I don't want
[40:35] to pay more municipal taxes or income tax right is because my feeling is the
[40:39] return on that tax is nothing gets better, so stop taking my money.
[40:45] And it's exactly my attitude. And if like you were bringing up Toronto,
[40:47] which is a great point, if you're gonna anyone who pays attention outside of
[40:53] Windsor knows what goes on in Toronto all the time. They're paying hundreds of
[40:55] millions of dollars to build subways, blah blah blah blah blah. If you're
[41:00] gonna come to Windsor and say Windsor residents say look, we got to raise
[41:02] your property taxes ten percent because you know we need roads, and then you
[41:07] use as an example, look at Toronto. They're raising their property taxes nine
[41:10] and a half percent, but they're also getting exponentially much more provincial investment for
[41:16] their transit problems. Then we will ever get down or even pro rated.
[41:22] So it kind of goes back to my original point is we have to decide
[41:28] what we want government to do for us. And the problem is what you
[41:30] brought up is Toronto always gets a lot more money because that's where the votes
[41:35] are. Let's not kid ourselves. They're buying votes in Toronto, in Ottawa
[41:37] and Montreal and all these other places. Maybe we just need a million more
[41:40] winsor rights time. But no, that's the point. I lived in Toronto.
[41:44] You know. It's funny. When I lived in Toronto the nineties,
[41:45] and I had house in the nineties in Toronto which I sold, I could
[41:49] be a billionaire right now. When I moved from Toronto to hear my houses
[41:54] were pretty much the same. If you look at square photers might have been
[41:57] a little smaller in Toronto, my taxes were I'm trying to do this on
[42:00] a percentage basis, probably about forty percent less in Toronto than they were here.
[42:07] And the only reason Toronto has survived is because the amount of money that
[42:10] the province pumps into that wrong, I disagree with that transfer tax. Yeah,
[42:16] but that's new. I'm talking they had that, They've had that for
[42:19] over a decade. Well that's new to me. I'm old Christie, listen.
[42:24] I just you can't say that that Toronto gets all kinds of pre when
[42:30] we have opportunities to get provincial and federal money and we offer them and they
[42:32] have these great programs and we go, hey, you could get thirty forty
[42:37] million dollars for your housing and prestucture problem. All we need you to do
[42:39] is abide by these rules. What no sing I am factor when I am
[42:45] factory again the windsor's a moron factor. You can't say like, oh,
[42:50] well, I mean Toronto gets everything. Toronto plays the game. Toronto gets
[42:52] what they need because they go for it. Do we go for it?
[42:55] No, we get offered in and we go You know what, No,
[42:58] thanks, I actually I prefer not doing anything a garage all money like we
[43:02] could have had money for transit. We said, you know what, we
[43:05] would rather have solar panels on bus shelters. Fantastic, Thank you so much.
[43:09] You know what I love sitting upside in the cold for forty five minutes
[43:13] while my bus doesn't come. You know what I love. I can't go
[43:15] out tonight because I gotta go pick up my kid at eleven o'clock from her
[43:17] job. Because she can't even take the bus home because the bus goes right
[43:21] past her. You gotta be kidding me. You talk about quality of life,
[43:23] you talk about getting investment from provincial and federal money. We don't even
[43:27] take it when it gets offered to us. The funny thing is we agree.
[43:30] I don't know why she's yelling at thank you for say all that.
[43:40] I wasn't saying that we couldn't get it. I'm just saying we don't.
[43:45] We definitely don't. I definitely don't. I think that is our next topic.
[43:49] Actually so beautiful providing a segue turned down your speakers, folks, I'm
[43:54] going on the other show, less violent. Well, let's just really quickly
[44:01] touch upon the transit windsor topic before we go on broadly to the housing accelerator
[44:07] one, which he just gave us a of our next let's do both.
[44:14] Yeah, So we are rapidly approaching a transit strike here twelve oh one Monday
[44:17] morning, and hilariously, transit windsor in the city are asking people to find
[44:24] alternate arrangements. Which it was hilarious, it wasn't so absurd. There's a
[44:30] great quote here from a transit user. It is my favorite quote. Media
[44:35] con said, in the event that they're not running, I will bike,
[44:37] I will walk, I will hitchhike, I'll fly if I had wings.
[44:43] I really enjoyed that, no kidding. So probably the problem is then the
[44:46] mayor season. See, we don't even need a transit options, but look
[44:52] at the experience of our transit users. They've gotten so used to finding other
[44:54] methods of transportation that there's no hesitation to find a list of other ways I
[45:00] can get somewhere. This is what transit is so unreliable. Maybe maybe transit
[45:05] winds or in the city are just conspiring to bring back the law started hitchhiking.
[45:09] It's funny you say that, because I think we just start our own
[45:12] transit system, like just drive around on demand. I have every belief,
[45:20] I have every faith in our transit system. I love the people. Why
[45:22] why why can better? That's hope for a better world. That's hope,
[45:29] not faith. I just think you're doing Princess Leia right now. Are not
[45:35] even for a god? Well? No, you know, it just it
[45:45] ties into the whole point of you know, lack of trust in the city
[45:49] and just the institutions, Like why would anyone want to see, you know,
[45:52] any type of tax increase when you're seeing your transit fees going up,
[45:57] you're seeing the service decreasing or being eliminated temporarily. Uh, It's just the
[46:04] whole situation is you know, just continuously demonstrating. I think people from South
[46:08] Windsor should have to pick everybody up downtown and drive them where we have to
[46:12] go during a transit trick. That's that's it is. This is why people
[46:16] say that we don't like Southwood manator. A transit Windsor user with a regular
[46:23] bus pass, you'll be provided with a copy of the white pages and you
[46:28] can place a call to any of the phone numbers and just you know,
[46:34] just put a call out, and uh, we're not going to cover the
[46:37] fief for the phone call. So when it was really cool, so my
[46:39] kids going to the University Windsor and he takes the bus because I don't get
[46:43] up early in the morning anymore. But when it was really cold there a
[46:46] couple of weeks ago, he had one class that ends really late and he
[46:50] has to date the bus home and inevitably I get that call about every other
[46:53] week, can you come and get me Dad? The bus didn't show up,
[46:57] and I see, like, what my guys must have been freezing out
[47:00] there. What happened to the other views is literally six people sitting in the
[47:04] shelter freezing their ass off, got together, chipped in money and called an
[47:07] uber to get home. That was the only way they were getting home and
[47:10] it's minus twenty outside. Then that that is every other week for a drinks
[47:15] rebrand those bus shelters, it's an uber pooling mustard point. I want to
[47:22] say, though, these are two separate issues, and I think it's important
[47:25] to separate them. That that the strike issues and the fair deal that they're
[47:30] they're bargaining for is is a completely different thing. But the impact that we're
[47:35] going to see on our users is going to degrade the faith in the in
[47:39] the transit system. So at the end of the day, if you're standing
[47:43] at a bus shelter and there's no bus coming, or if you have to
[47:45] find alternate means of transportation, it's still that's your experience. And I think
[47:51] they are no. I agree, like like, when's the last time we
[47:55] had a police strike? Right? My fun hit that we the things that
[48:00] we don't prioritize are under pressure, and one of the ways that that pressure
[48:05] gets released is labor on Even in the budget they call the transit funding a
[48:09] subsidy and housing funding a subsidy, whereas the police budget shows up as a
[48:13] police budget, right, right, And so even just in the framing of
[48:15] the budget. You go read the documents, it's like the under the ABC's
[48:21] the transit authorities is transit subsidy amount. This is the essential and these are
[48:25] bonus. And so it's like there's a cultural thing here, and like this
[48:30] is I've hit culture a couple of times. People off about, you know,
[48:34] culture a little bit, but I think like there is you know,
[48:37] and cultural culture change takes time. And so we talked about the potential transits,
[48:43] like the last time there's a potential transit strike and like, you know,
[48:46] and we had this conversation of do we hope for chaos or not right,
[48:51] and like but like either way, there's going to be something as of
[48:54] Monday morning. And you know, the part of the reason why they didn't
[49:00] add those extra buses is because it would have taken buses off of school routes
[49:04] supporting the school boards in the in the in the budget, and so those
[49:09] buses aren't running Monday, and so suddenly, you know, it's like it's
[49:14] gonna be reality of like you know, you're gonna get a taste of like
[49:16] the parking rides that are gonna be over jammed Monday morning. Whatever the hell
[49:22] there they're called I don't have kids, I don't bring the school but whatever,
[49:28] but like it is, keeping keep being asked to leave appropriate I'm asking
[49:35] for parents. We got weird radio anyway, so like so you know,
[49:45] I agree, like there hasn't been a big strike in the city in a
[49:49] while, at a municipal strike, and I think how that plays out over
[49:52] the next few weeks is going to be very telling because I think if the
[49:55] if the strike goes it certain ways, you can actually see this is a
[50:00] catalyst for investment in transit. If it goes other ways, it could be
[50:05] the thing that kills transit, winsor forever. I think the Mayor's looking at
[50:07] this. How long does a strike have to happen where I can go back
[50:12] to the public and saying, now I don't have to raise your texts because
[50:15] we saved so much money on transit by not having it. Now they have
[50:17] to hold those those dollars in deserve to pay after the strike. Do you
[50:22] think I only talked about it a little bit last time, But again,
[50:25] there's other municipalities that are now involved in this transit strike. If it does
[50:30] occur, do you think that there's any weight of those elected officials to put
[50:34] weight onto our elected officials to get this rut. I think they care less
[50:37] about transit than Mayor Bilkins does, to be honest, And I think the
[50:40] routes are so like it's an hourly route in sow it's an hourly route,
[50:44] Like it's not the Leming tins like three times a day or four times a
[50:47] day. You know, it's not at a cadence that like you're using that
[50:52] to get to and from public school or to the you know, or to
[50:54] your job easily. It's better than nothing depending on it. But I also
[51:00] think that it's been introduced so like recently that that anybody who's who's using it.
[51:07] But this is the problem, right because because if if you lose that
[51:14] even for a period of time, like I think, you really need people
[51:16] to feel like they can count on transit, and especially people in the regional
[51:20] system, they need to feel they can rely on the system. There is
[51:24] there's a person who works in this in this unit, a gentleman who works
[51:29] for hackforge who uses transit to commute from Leanington or from Kingsville. Sorry,
[51:35] and transit and cycling. This is a little weird, like that's a that's
[51:39] definitely an investment of time. But the point is that now his place of
[51:45] work is inaccessible, inaccessible if there's a transit strike. He doesn't own a
[51:49] car, But that's true for a ton of people that we don't. But
[51:52] it's always characterized as students. It's always characterized as like as though transit is
[51:58] for recreational use, or or it's for people who have parents or whoever that
[52:01] can get them from place to place. But transit is essential. It's the
[52:05] backbone of how we get around in this city. And until we invest in
[52:09] it, we're not going to be able to progress. You know, the
[52:13] issue that we're fighting over in this strike, that the issue that's come between
[52:16] the two parties that's holding us up seems to be this ten sick days thing.
[52:22] Like it's the fact that this is the wedge, this is the thing
[52:24] that's driving it is so ridiculous, Like we're not even talking about investing more
[52:29] money in transit, which we should be. What would we allow to be
[52:31] suspended for ten sick days in this town? Right? What do we allow
[52:36] to be disrupted for the amount of money that ten sick days for a transit
[52:40] driver represents? Not everything, but transit. I don't think that. I
[52:47] mean, to your point about chaos. I think that on the one hand,
[52:52] you hope for chaos so that it proves the point that we need to
[52:55] invest in transit. But on the other city Rose City chaos politics, I
[53:01] think it's I don't think we're gonna see that unless it goes on for a
[53:06] very long time. You look at when transit was canceled during COVID, and
[53:07] yes, COVID is like a very different thing, but there just wasn't There
[53:12] were certainly groups that were upset about it. There were certainly, you know,
[53:15] people who were speaking out against the fact that that transit was shut down,
[53:19] But it didn't move the needle. It doesn't it doesn't become a part
[53:23] of the conversation in the whole community, right, And I think that's I
[53:28] think that's the real problem is you do you get these sporadic stories. You
[53:31] know that the people who are impacted know that it's impactful, but there isn't
[53:37] a there's not a consistent drum beat to kind of draw like bring people to
[53:44] that conclusion when a service like this is disrupted, Like if you don't rely
[53:47] on transit, you're gonna get you know, an article in the CBC that
[53:52] you might read or you might not. You're gonna hear something on AM eight
[53:54] hundred, you might turn the radio off and that's it, and it's not
[53:59] you know, but there are some things in this time. If there was
[54:01] a garbage strike, well or public work strike, we know what happens,
[54:06] right. It's it's a gigantic issue for every single person. And I just
[54:10] don't think this is going to rise to that level no matter how long it
[54:14] goes. I don't know. I think that you're gonna see a lot of
[54:15] people who rely on like Uber now getting really mad because you're gonna see your
[54:21] fares going from like twenty dollars regularly to forty dollars because there's now just so
[54:23] many more people that are on the system. And now you're calling up your
[54:27] city councilors going, what the hell it's costing me sixty dollars a day to
[54:30] get to work? Like this is insane. I don't use the bus personally,
[54:35] but now I'm impacted because of that. But you know, to the
[54:37] question of whether or not a strike will yield, you know, better services
[54:40] or not, I look to the past. You know strikes that we have
[54:43] had in this city, the longer ones. Did they ever result in greater
[54:46] services? Or were they just you know, continual markers in our quest to
[54:52] keep cutting taxes. The garbage service got better after we Yeah, but I
[54:55] tracked it out. But now look at what we're going to We're going to
[54:59] be getting rid of it and alleys and everyone's putting it on their sidewalks to
[55:02] be shared with with bikes and scooters and yard waste. How is Paul Burrelly
[55:07] going to get downtown on his bicycle? Okay, there is one thing I
[55:13] just wanted to match before we quickly move on start to wrap things up with
[55:15] the global mail downtown Or In Windsor, there were some pretty funny tweets that
[55:20] were put out. One sort of related to transit and the riverfront. Oliver
[55:23] Moore took a picture of the Spirit of Windsor down at the river and he
[55:28] said, when there's done a pretty good job on this section of the river
[55:30] trail, though I'm not entirely sure the message that the Spirit of Windsor is
[55:32] a decommissioned locomotive that will never move again. No, that pretty much Wait
[55:38] till we get a decommissioned Street. Oh yeah, maybe they'll put up a
[55:45] model of a functioning emergency room, just a random hospital bed downtown. Remember
[55:54] when we had healthcare? Okay, well, last topic, real quick.
[56:00] The FEDS obviously rejected our request for forty million to seventy million in housing funds
[56:05] from the Housing Accelerator Fund because we didn't want to loosen our bylaws to allow
[56:09] for four plexus throughout the entire city only wards to Costante three Augustino and nine's
[56:15] McKenzie voted against the resubmission reaffirmation of the Housing Accelerator Fund. Two camps are
[56:22] now playing out here. One is that the evil federal government refused it.
[56:24] The other is that the City of Windsor didn't jump high enough to meet the
[56:29] requirements. They're both right, although the framing is not really I think even
[56:35] the way you've described the intro to this, the Feds turned The Feds didn't
[56:37] turn it down. The Feds said you have to do X, Y and
[56:40] Z, and we told them to go f themselves. And then we said
[56:44] all the Feds are being mean and not giving. Well, we did turn
[56:45] it down because they submitted we submitted the wrong paper. But I think,
[56:49] I think when you phrase it in the media and from the Mayor's office.
[56:52] That's how they're framing it. It has to be framed at Windsor didn't get
[56:55] the money because we didn't want to play by the rules. Windsors shipped the
[56:59] bed on its housing accelerated fund. Honestly, that's what it is. I
[57:02] mean, that's all it is. And that was sorry, go ahead,
[57:06] No, that's like, that's it. I don't want to go into like
[57:07] the you know, what's made up of it and stuff. We've talked about
[57:10] all of that enough. I guess it's just the politics of this now just
[57:14] here we are. It's it's the constant situation that's always at play. The
[57:17] Mayor's office and his allies and whoever is going to get you know, looped
[57:21] in from the media to help launder that messaging across are just going to put
[57:25] out there that it's the Feds and it's Eric and they hate Windsor and if
[57:30] only they would have been willing to listen to how reasonable we were, they
[57:32] are reasonable. I'm of two minds about this. I think that this issue
[57:39] and the way that Mayor Dilkins has handled it, and he's been like at
[57:44] first I thought Mayor Dilkins is playing defense here. He's being defensive, and
[57:49] I think you can make that case that that there is a lot of noise
[57:52] happening because he's, you know, he's worried about the perception on this.
[58:00] But there's also been a like a long standing pattern of Drew Dilkins creating distance
[58:07] between him and the Liberal government and uh contrasting himself with Erica's Marrichick. It
[58:14] seems to be something that Mayor Dilkins really likes to do. So I just
[58:17] want to throw this out there as an element. Do you think that Mayor
[58:22] Dilkins is preparing a federal run in Windsor West for the Conservative Party of Canada.
[58:27] Do you think that it's in Windsor West or do you think that it's
[58:29] going to be in Windsor t to Coomsis. Honestly, I would I think
[58:34] it would be a big mistake for Diltiins to run into com see and there's
[58:37] already nominations happening. Oh they're going to get Kathy Brawley again. Hell yeah,
[58:43] at least at least that's according to a certain Twitter at Canada. Well,
[58:50] see, I don't know, because I was of the belief that if
[58:51] he was going to run, it would be Windsor d Cumcy. So because
[58:53] of this housing Accelerator fund, of his defense that was taking saying, look,
[58:57] we're not going to allow for these types of units in South Windsor,
[59:00] We're not going to allow them in Walkerville, We're not going to allow them.
[59:02] So that area. City Windsor's Housing accelerated proposal is very close to the
[59:07] federal Conservative Housing proposal, which is around transit and major arteries and transit hubs
[59:14] and nodes, all the language that you've heard. You know, if you
[59:16] go look at the map, it's all along major you know, arteries and
[59:20] think that's where they allowed four places by right, that's where they were willing
[59:22] to do that, but not in existing neighborhoods. So now we don't know,
[59:27] there is no formal federal consertive housing proposal that would say like, you
[59:31] know, this is the setbacks and these are the kind of rules like I
[59:35] assume that CMHC has right now that they're operating under. So I think that
[59:39] there's a pathway there for the mayor to run should he choose to. Particularly,
[59:45] you know, again, there's always the perennial rumor is Brian Massey also
[59:49] going to be you know, is Brian Massei ready to retire and like move
[59:51] on and things like that. I don't know. I haven't heard anything on
[59:53] that front. I can't see them ringing against each other. But you know,
[59:58] if if they are running, or if he is running and Brian Massey
[1:00:01] isn't, you have to figure he is a shoe in for that seat.
[1:00:07] In a it is probably going to be a landslide Conservative victory and probably if
[1:00:12] you're run for the Conservatives, now's the time to do it. Ass tracked
[1:00:15] to some sort of parliamentary secretary or cabinet position. So the thing is that
[1:00:19] to the extent that you think this is true, then then we're talking about
[1:00:25] sacrificing the equivalent of a ten percent tax cut. You're throwing Windsor under the
[1:00:30] bus, the equivalent of a ten percent tax cut to the residence of the
[1:00:35] city of Windsor in order to make some score some points against the Trudeau government.
[1:00:39] And to the extent that you think that's true, you know, I
[1:00:43] would tend to think that that's that's pretty bad. Yeah, well that's what
[1:00:46] I said, Like, he's literally willing to sacrifice Windsor for his own political
[1:00:52] career if you believe that argument. I don't. I never went down that
[1:00:55] path. My thought process from real estate agent guy is people in South Windsor
[1:01:01] are afraid they're going to get renters who are historically lower income than them living
[1:01:07] in their neighborhoods and they don't want it. Well, sure, but you
[1:01:09] know what, how many cities across the country have signed on to that four
[1:01:15] plex requirement. So so I think, like you know, in Kizmrichik makes
[1:01:21] this argument that it's about what community leaders chose to do in those cities,
[1:01:25] which is lead instead of fearmonger. And and you know, I recognize that
[1:01:30] both Kazmirchik and Dilkins maybe are jockeying and thinking of their own political self interest,
[1:01:39] and they may even each have their eye on the other's position at this
[1:01:44] moment, right, So you've got to take all that into account. But
[1:01:46] I find I find Kazmirchik's argument pretty compelling. Well, it is because it's
[1:01:52] common sense and that Look, I've been in real stage for Windsor for twenty
[1:01:55] Jesus twenty four years now. I'm going to tell you right now, if
[1:01:59] this proposal went through and was passed, and four plex is gonna be built
[1:02:02] in any community. No one is buying a six hundred thousand dollars house in
[1:02:07] South Windsor tearing it down getting a grease serviced for a fourplex, And the
[1:02:12] math would never work unless they're crazy like a fox, crazy like a fuck,
[1:02:15] but from a strict in that real estate investment numbers game, that would
[1:02:22] never work. The only they're still just gonna build four plex's downtown on lots
[1:02:27] wherehouses are burnt down. Anywhere there's an infill lot, you get a ninety
[1:02:30] foot while you said out forty five feet, you sell that. South Windsor
[1:02:32] Riverside South what they just don't have that kind of you're not. They were
[1:02:38] never gonna get built there even if this was passed. So either the mayor
[1:02:44] once again has proved that the city Windsor has no concept of real estate at
[1:02:49] all after that fiasco with the library, they're just doubling down on stupid,
[1:02:52] which I one hundred percent think is the case, or b yeah, maybe
[1:02:55] it is, just the political angle is taken, which opens up a whole
[1:02:59] others. So I think what happened Thursday and Friday was interesting where the Housing
[1:03:04] Minister came out and said, well, Windsors only hit thirty percent of its
[1:03:07] current housing Parker with like three hundred approvals last year, and then the mayor
[1:03:10] comes out immediately on the next day with eleven hundred number based on the internal
[1:03:15] permitting data. Now I think there's like again, like he's trying I don't
[1:03:21] know, like if you're trying to end the story right, And I think
[1:03:24] like he also dropped the budget release on Friday afternoon at four pm so that
[1:03:29] there'd be a new story for Saturday that the budget's been approved and things like
[1:03:32] that, and that we would talk about it for you know, I'm sure
[1:03:35] he was thinking about this group we talked about, sure, you know.
[1:03:39] So I think so it's like, why are you continuing the story unless you're
[1:03:45] trying to shore up something else? And like I think like that internal number,
[1:03:51] and like the argument that was made in the in the in the winsor
[1:03:53] started a decent story breaking down the data gaps, and they beat me to
[1:03:58] it. Dare really, I know, but they how do he know those
[1:04:04] people who get paid to do that get paid? I know, But like
[1:04:11] the challenge is like three hundred to eleven hundred's a big gap, right,
[1:04:14] and so there's there is this difference here, and like the perception of like
[1:04:18] is the city doing enough on housing is still an important perception that the mayor
[1:04:23] has to manage. And so it's not just enough to like, oh,
[1:04:28] we did our best the evil threads, but like we also set record number
[1:04:30] permits last year permitraining well, and like we've talked about that, and you
[1:04:34] dig into the methodology of how CMHC tracks those things and what numbers are being
[1:04:39] put forward by the city versus what numbers are being tracked by the provincial government
[1:04:43] through their dashboard, which I would point out the City of Hamilton just got
[1:04:45] awarded twelve million dollars for hitting their targets this year through through the provincial government.
[1:04:50] So we had thirty eight percent, Hamilton got ninety seven percent. They
[1:04:54] got twelve million dollars based I don't think the problem. And the city's going
[1:04:58] to try and advocate to the province to use better numbers. They're not going
[1:05:00] to change their methodology if they're already handing out cash based on the old methodology.
[1:05:04] But as mare Delkins pointed out in debate, you know he's on the
[1:05:09] housing policy. Does that matter? Apparently not like so much in windsor it's
[1:05:15] just all vibes. Yeah, as long as you can just keep people from
[1:05:18] looking behind the actual curtain, don't look at the land behind the curtain,
[1:05:21] bull and the springs. And there's enough blame to go around, because,
[1:05:24] let's face so, we're in this housing situation because the FEDS are completely screwed
[1:05:28] the pooch on their immigration policy by not factoring in housing for bringing in five
[1:05:31] hundred thousand people every year. So there's enough blame to go around. The
[1:05:34] FEDS are trying to cover up their mistakes, and we're just doubling down on
[1:05:39] stupid because that's our method. It depends on whether you consider that a mistake,
[1:05:43] the mistake being that, like we need to provide better support when we
[1:05:46] do bring in that number of people. Yeah, you can bring in ten
[1:05:50] million immigrants and going out, but if there's nowhere to put them, you
[1:05:53] have no plan for housing them, then you're not looking at the full thing.
[1:05:56] You're just looking at one side of it. Okay, Yeah, it's
[1:06:00] ended where she starts yelling at me again. She's terrifying you, like you
[1:06:05] go on the rants and like it's like you are yelling at all of us,
[1:06:11] but what we are all like just nodding in a groom, but no
[1:06:13] one can see that because you know so it's an audio baser power. Yeah.
[1:06:17] I literally agreed. Wow, So there's just one four year consideration that
[1:06:25] I wanted to bring up. I just I started hearing about this story out
[1:06:29] of the Toronto District school Board and like all stupidity rolling down about this one
[1:06:33] too. So it followed that it followed from Toronto here to uh Windsor,
[1:06:41] Essex, with Public and Catholic school boards dimissing dismissing students at one pm on
[1:06:45] AGELD, the day of an expected solar eclipse. Now that eclipse is supposed
[1:06:50] to be impacting the region between two pm three fifteen pm. Both boards have
[1:06:57] also announced that bus transportation is canceled for the afternoon on those days, so
[1:07:01] you can get the kids to school on the bus. School then ends your
[1:07:05] shit at a luck to get them home. So is the idea here that
[1:07:09] there can't be any liability if nobody is on the property during the eclipse.
[1:07:14] Yes? So at first when I heard this, I went, oh,
[1:07:15] cool, they're letting the kids out early because there's an eclipse, they're to
[1:07:18] be able to spend the day experiencing the wonder and magicty of science and the
[1:07:24] universe. And of course no, it's the stupidest goddamn thing that it possibly
[1:07:28] could be. In windsor what's being said out loud is that we're concerned they're
[1:07:33] going to look up and see the eclipse and they can go blind. There's
[1:07:35] a quote from the Catholic Board that says looking at the intense light from the
[1:07:40] Sun during a solar eclipse, even for just a few seconds, can cause
[1:07:43] permanent damage to the retina, the part of the eye directly responsible for vision.
[1:07:46] Exposing your eyes to the sun without proper eye protection during a solar eclipse
[1:07:50] can cause retinal burns or retinopathy. But of course, I mean, we
[1:07:55] all saw Donald Trump do it. He just stared out. So that's a
[1:07:58] red picture in my head right now. So I just cancel recess. Like
[1:08:01] I'm trying to understand the timing, because it happens at the end of the
[1:08:04] school day. There's all the dismissals happen. But it's been considered, right,
[1:08:13] it comes from TDSB, it comes from other school boards, and so
[1:08:15] now our school board is like, oh, should we do that? So
[1:08:17] the one other thing before you get fully into this, because you're you're fully
[1:08:21] engaged as an error, we're talking about just the looking at it point of
[1:08:27] view of the liability I presume is you know they're on site. They're walking
[1:08:30] out of school on our property. Look up, Johnny goes blind, but
[1:08:34] the sun's not on the property every day, and bind yourself. The second
[1:08:41] one that they actually mentioned in Toronto was it's going to be pitch black when
[1:08:45] these kids get to school because of the clips. What if they go to
[1:08:48] cross the street and a car just boom hits one of them. Are we
[1:08:54] at fault because we put them out during the middle of the night day darkness?
[1:09:00] Can they just say we're using es to get a day off like shot.
[1:09:03] Well, they actually tried to move the PA day up so that there
[1:09:09] wasn't any of time. Contractual union issues wouldn't allow for that to occur,
[1:09:15] so they had to get the half day. So of the various options there
[1:09:18] was we can we can swap this is my understanding of it. That's not
[1:09:20] like I was in the room, but I think they could swap the PA
[1:09:25] day. So there's a p a day at the end of April. They
[1:09:27] were just going to switch it to April eighth, which is a Monday.
[1:09:29] They were gonna they were gonna swap the days, or they could just call
[1:09:31] it like eclipse day, like a fog day or a snow day, like
[1:09:35] it's a clips day. I want to stay home, Like fine, it's
[1:09:39] a weather event. Are you kind of the thing that we did where you
[1:09:45] take a piece of paper and stare up at the side. Why not use
[1:09:49] it as a learning experience in an education system that let the parents decide send
[1:09:56] a note home with the kids. If your child is too stupid they look
[1:10:00] at the sun, keep them all. Maybe your kids not supposed to not
[1:10:04] be blind the rest of his life. He's that dumb. It could be
[1:10:06] a learning experience. I think, I want to say, the last time
[1:10:10] there was an eclipse when I was in grade school. We did have we
[1:10:14] theyded cameras everything, but that that eclipse happened at like twelve thirty. I
[1:10:18] think it's the timing of when this spans that they actually couldn't even turn it
[1:10:23] into an educational experience. The funny thing to me is like teachers have to
[1:10:27] stay at school for the full day because they've only done like a half day
[1:10:30] thing, and the fact that they've canceled transportation. It's like, of all
[1:10:34] of the options, just stranding kids at the middle of the day, What
[1:10:39] happened, What happens if they happen? What happens if they need Like for
[1:10:44] the number of people who are just going to be able to keep their kids
[1:10:45] home from school that day. Now we have this hodgepodge mess of like some
[1:10:49] kids in school, some kids, you know that the teachers had to stay
[1:10:53] too. What if they have kids? Exactly? What if the teachers look
[1:10:58] at the sun? Yeah, that's exactly. Don't look at the sun.
[1:11:02] I guess that's all I can do for the rest in their hands. So
[1:11:05] missus Smith, come here and come look at the window. Kids. This
[1:11:13] is why I don't want to pay more taxes, because these are the morons
[1:11:15] who are spending my money taxes. Yeah again, I thought that this was
[1:11:21] going to be a really good story, that kids were going to be able
[1:11:25] to experience science. And of course no, the moron don't want any of
[1:11:30] that stupidest thing that could have been. So for your consideration, go outside,
[1:11:34] look up at the sun. Don't don't sugg. Don't don't do that.
[1:11:44] I don't know. Just let us know. Maybe it's fun is just
[1:11:46] let your pets look, John take a look and let us know what happens.
[1:11:50] Isn't like this is like that Louis c ca skid where he says,
[1:11:54] you know, we're dealing with peanut allergies, a new thing. If we
[1:11:57] all do this for a year of just go away, we'll never have to
[1:11:59] do the game. That can't be the note that we end this show on.
[1:12:03] If your kid can die by touching a peanut, maybe you're supposed to
[1:12:06] die. That's just the way. February third, I like to reiterate that
[1:12:14] was a Louisy case that is not taking the opportunity to say something horrible.
[1:12:23] Don't blame me. I tried to do the outro kill this show off.
[1:12:26] Don please please quickly. Roastity Politics was February third, full panel Doug Star
[1:12:31] Tory, Don Merrifield, Junior Fraser, father is Kristen siappis myself, John
[1:12:34] Lidkey. I don't know. After that hour. Head to patreon dot com
[1:12:39] slash Roasty Politics if you want. I'm not going to do a hard cell
[1:12:42] on it. Pick up a bris x Rosy Politics also broadcast live on tape.
[1:12:45] Things the kind support of Lena six two five, Building better communities.
[1:12:49] We'll find out if there's a transit strike next week. Go look at that sun

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