# The Garage Majal of Curling Rinks

An episode of [Rose City Politics](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1247337855), 27 Jan 2024, 49 min.

Audio: https://dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/api.spreaker.com/download/episode/58475328/the_garage_majal_of_curling_rinks.mp3

Jon, Frazier and Doug talk about a new transit budget proposal and a cap on student visas. Rose City Politics is brought to you with the kind support of LiUNA Local 625: Building Better Communities. Support the show on Patreon.com/RoseCityPolitics. Read our stuff in Biz X Magazine or online at BizXMagazine.com or RoseCityPolitics.ca.

## Transcript

[0:24] Hey, everyone, Welcome to Rose City Politics. It is January the twenty
[0:29] seventh. A regular panel includes Doug sar Tory, Fraser Fathers, and myself,
[0:34] John Lidkey. Support us at patroon dot com, slash Rose City Politics,
[0:38] pick up a biz x magazine, follow us on social try to find
[0:42] us in real life somewhere, and Rose City politicstable to broadcast live on tape
[0:45] thanks to the kind support of Luna six two five building Better Communities. We've
[0:49] got no Don Maryfield Junior today. We've got no Kristin Ciappas today. We
[0:54] do have a Fraser Father's here today. Fraser and Kristin haven't been on the
[0:57] show together. It's missed serious right, Like we can only afford one actor
[1:04] has to play both roles. Well, glad to be here with both of
[1:08] you today. What a lovely gray afternoon we have here in the city of
[1:12] Windsor, but lions fever across the city. They're playing football, big football
[1:18] games. Yeah, it's a real big ones sports. You were at the
[1:19] last one. How was that the last one? Yes, that's like if
[1:23] they won. When was the last time you were at a game and they
[1:26] won earlier this year? Okay, so we've we've created a through line that
[1:30] you might be San Francisco right now on a jet plane. Fraser is now
[1:38] the RCP Sports Correspondence. We've needed one for a while and we've depleted the
[1:44] budget. Flight costs is a little high. The Renson has the GM has
[1:52] been replaced with just girl and I was going to make a tweet about it,
[1:55] and then I was like, but is like, is that specifically a
[1:57] Lions refer There was no logo, there was not beyond that. So I
[2:00] realized, rather than a tweet, I'll just talk about it on Rosy Politics.
[2:04] Okay. I love big city sports, Like when it's Championship Fever.
[2:08] It's so fun because everybody reverts to like six years old in a good way.
[2:14] You remember being like six and the most exciting thing was Halloween. You
[2:19] get to decorate your teacher's door or whatever, like the streamers in the hallway.
[2:23] And that's what the girl on the rents end is. Yep, it's
[2:25] just a giant. Like I love the Lions on the midday marketing guy.
[2:30] Gotta live big that day, yea when you hit like post to sign the
[2:37] eggs. There's so many things about professional sports that are unfortunate as it intersects
[2:42] politics and and as it intersects municipal finances and state finances, et cetera,
[2:46] et cetera. But it's also this fun thing that makes grown people into children
[2:52] and the I say more of that, Yeah, I mean, it's just
[2:55] it's it's great. And uh, that's about as far as we're going to
[2:59] take it that subject and shift hard focus into you know, the politics that
[3:02] you come to no and love here on ros city politics interesting coming out of
[3:09] wards two and nine's a story here with Fabio Costante and Kieren McKenzie both pitching
[3:15] a transit service enhancement plan, and this is coming on the heels of what
[3:21] is expected to be a looming transit windsor strike, which we will discuss just
[3:25] after this. But the two councilors want to add six or more routes,
[3:30] primarily in South Windsor, at about three hundred and thirty thousand dollars to improve
[3:36] transit service and maintain the current levee at or below inflation. This would be
[3:40] funded through the budget Stabilization Reserve with a zero point with a zero point zero
[3:45] two percent increase to the operating budget, which would bring that total tax levee
[3:49] increase to three point nine to five percent. Now, this is a scaled
[3:53] down version of the enhanced improvements which were already approved by the Transitport last year.
[3:57] Stats show that transit usage is at hot level, much higher than pre
[4:00] COVID and transit windsors are of course, as we know, facing a fair
[4:04] increase this year with service levels which you could argue are decreasing because right now
[4:10] people are missing buses so they're not seeing the same level of service being delivered.
[4:15] Now, what the counselors are saying is proposed in the budget currently doesn't
[4:18] meet the challenges of what the transit system and its users are facing. And
[4:23] these enhancements that were approved last year with the Transit Board would have seen upwards
[4:28] of eighteen thousand hours to the system. This proposal is a third of that,
[4:31] so only six thousand hours. But it wouldn't require any new buses to
[4:35] be purchased because they would just be redirecting resources. Now, this would be
[4:40] enhancing the Dougal six, the Walker Will eight, the South Windsor seven,
[4:44] a new route, the three to Zho five and the parent fourteen and potentially
[4:47] even the five one eight X and as we know right now, Windsor covers
[4:51] half of our transit Windsor budget, with the rest coming from fares and senior
[4:57] government funding. This is a fun one, I think primarily just because it
[5:01] is it's politically savvy. I don't know how the mayor is going to go
[5:06] with it. I mean, obviously it's his budget this year. He opted
[5:10] not to have anything like this involved in it. But we have the two
[5:15] counselors really playing the mayor. I don't want to say in a rock in
[5:18] a hard place, but here's a proposal that comes in at exactly what the
[5:23] mayor likes to say. It's, you know, holding the line on taxes.
[5:27] We're below the level of inflation, but it would see these increases.
[5:30] And so to me, the way that I see this is, does Dilkins
[5:32] want to go giving a win to these two counselors or can these two counselors
[5:38] go muster enough votes get four of their colleagues to go along with it.
[5:42] It's an interesting one. It's actually eight colleagues. Eight colleagues excuse me,
[5:46] because it's a change of the strong mayor budget. Yes, if Mayor Dilkins
[5:50] is savvier than he is in trans again, He'll give it some serious consideration.
[5:55] I think this is a I think this is a really smart proposal.
[6:00] I'm not competent to judge whether this specific recommendation being made is the right one,
[6:04] but on the face of it, finding a way to make an improvement
[6:12] to the service that is desperately needed while keeping the big picture ideological goal of
[6:18] maintaining tax increases below the rate of inflation. The way this is constructed,
[6:26] it's less of a challenge to the mayor, you know, and I think
[6:30] we've seen that sort of thing a budget time in the past, throwing down
[6:33] the gauntlet. It's less of a challenge and it is more of a like.
[6:39] It takes the appearance of a very reasonable suggestion, and you have to
[6:43] ask yourself like why wouldn't you do this? And a reasonable person will ask
[6:47] themselves like, why wouldn't you do this? To me? This is either
[6:53] this passes and we have like some improvement to transit, some relief for some
[7:00] of the people who are suffering the most in our community based on like the
[7:04] municipal services themselves or Mayor Dilkins blind spot on transit is fully exposed because there
[7:12] is absolutely no reason that he could not have done this and me and met
[7:15] his own goals politically, Yeah, I agree with that. I think the
[7:20] smartness the savviness of the proposal of taking a piece of that transit master plan
[7:29] targeting it to South Windsor, you know, like like we have to think
[7:31] about like a lot of those routes service, for example, the high schools
[7:34] which are used for you know, South Windsor residents to get their kids to
[7:40] or from school. You know, yes, parking rides are a big thing,
[7:43] but you know what, a transit bus drives by a lot of a
[7:46] lot of the major high schools in the city and those are used you know,
[7:49] kids getting home from football practice or band practice or whatever after school sometimes
[7:54] as well. And so adding routes to those things as well as general north
[7:58] south connectivity, which is going to get you you know, students to Saint
[8:01] Clair College easier from you know, other parts of the city. Some of
[8:03] those you know, broader connections to the Devonshire Mall and other parts of South
[8:07] Windsor are all going to be improved by this. And so I think,
[8:11] like it's not just you know, the mayor. I think it's like,
[8:15] you know, I think you know, this is gonna improve transit in Ward
[8:18] one, Ward ten, Ward eight, you know Ward nine, you know
[8:22] you'd assume councilor Soissantes on board, you know, because it's his proposal.
[8:26] So, like you have the votes in theory there for just even geographically where
[8:31] the routes are going to be improved. You know, you have to get
[8:35] a couple extra votes to make a veto proof, you know, which will
[8:37] be you know some of the challenge there, but would be a dangerous veto.
[8:41] But like is that are you going to veto you know, a point
[8:43] too? Like again, like so it's a point two oh two percent increase
[8:48] to the levee, which works out to ninety thousand dollars, is what they're
[8:50] saying. So we're gonna raise taxes by ninety thousand dollars. We're gonna pull
[8:56] the other portion of this up to three hundred thousand dollars out of the reserve
[8:58] fund, which is being used for to fund several million dollars worth of operational
[9:03] expenses this year in the budget in order to keep the levy low. And
[9:07] so you know, this is like small change stuff where I think if the
[9:13] mayor is smart, he takes it, he runs with it, he wins
[9:16] with it, and then he just takes takes the bus to South Windsor and
[9:20] stands, you know, in front of any school in South Windsor and says,
[9:24] you know, transit improvements, you know here, and it's helping get
[9:26] north south you know, transit moving quicker and more efficiently in the city.
[9:31] And if he really wanted to take it, he comes back himself with a
[9:33] table drop at the budget meeting and says, you know what, six thousand
[9:37] hours isn't enough. Eight thousand hours is just go right in front of them.
[9:41] It doesn't affect anything whatsoever in terms of the actual dollars and cents of
[9:46] thing. But what's from the political angle so interesting you're looking at, you
[9:50] know, no surprise here, Fabio Kieran Francis. Still consider the names that
[9:56] we have conversations about where people are going for mayor next time around. With
[10:00] these two bringing this forward, they're obviously doing a big push right now for
[10:03] a student demographic with this traditionally much lower inclined to vote. However, if
[10:11] it's something that's so reasonable that won't affect you know, the dollars and cents
[10:16] of you know, South windsor residents. They're not going to be up in
[10:18] arms over something so small. I think there's the very real risk for mearor
[10:22] Dilkins here that you could go turning yourself into the big bad guy among the
[10:28] larger people who probably quite frankly, would never think about municipal politics because they
[10:33] got their heads in their books right now and they really wouldn't necessarily get out
[10:37] and involved if the transit system wasn't in that you know state of decay that
[10:41] we were talking about last week masically, you know the youth vote, right,
[10:46] but it's like the day that a ballot box is more appealing than a
[10:50] pair of hot knives is the day that we will when I need to get
[10:54] to work to make some money to be able to afford the hash for the
[10:56] hot knives. Like I just don't see it, but I think I think
[11:00] what's also interesting on this, and Doug touched on this a little bit is
[11:03] the incrementalism of this approach. And you refer that back to you know,
[11:05] past councils where you know, ideas emerged at budget, but they were very
[11:09] much like all are, like recognize the process is a little different with the
[11:13] strong mayor powers and the mayor presenting the budget. But like you know,
[11:16] we had table drops from counselors at pass budgets that like were relatively reasonable,
[11:22] but like you know, again like the process here I think is you know,
[11:28] it wasn't an all or nothing. It was like, oh, we
[11:30] really need this additional thing, so we have to spend this money versus like
[11:33] here's like, well we just want this piece of it. And I think
[11:35] what's interesting about that is, you know, it's looking at it incremental improvement
[11:41] versus like an all or nothing improvement. Like and I think, going back
[11:46] to what John was saying a little bit, I think if incremental improvements are
[11:50] off the table for such small dollar amounts, then I think it's it frames
[11:56] future budgets in a very interesting way because you now know nothing's going to move
[12:03] in that space. And I think for you know, organizations like ATWE and
[12:07] you know, other transit writers and advocates, you now know like for point
[12:11] zero two percent of a tax increase could get you six thousand hours of addigital
[12:16] transit service, you know, and that was unreasonable or unaffordable or not or
[12:24] you know, suddenly like it reframes like the transit debate going forward. I
[12:28] think in a way that really, like you know, we have to have
[12:33] an honest conversation about like you know, Mark McKenzie's proposal, it was just
[12:37] outsource transit. I think one of the one of the ways that governments lose
[12:45] their luster is by accumulating evidence of incompetence on different files that matter to people
[12:52] and it and I think that that is something that goes beyond the interest group
[13:00] if and that's why I think this is such a smart proposal too. It's
[13:05] one thing, like the interest groups involved are always going to be a course,
[13:09] you know, like the curlers would always want they would want us to
[13:11] build the garage Mahal of curling rinks, right, like they would want that.
[13:16] But it's when it's when you appear like incompetent on the file in general,
[13:24] that goes to perceptions of competence overall. And you see this happening right
[13:30] to different governments at different times. And like it's one thing to say transit
[13:35] is not a priority. And I think, you know, we have a
[13:37] good service. We care about our service, We care about our writers.
[13:41] Look, we cared about their health during the pandemic. Look, we're buying
[13:43] new buses with federal support. We care about transit, and you can and
[13:48] and there's a lot of that in Windsor politics is sort of being able to
[13:54] to put out like sort of blanket comforting message so that the people who don't
[14:01] actually need the thing are like, well, what are they complaining about?
[14:05] And and and so I think that this like to your point, like,
[14:11] I think it does reframe it and it makes it an issue like does Drew
[14:15] Dilkins have the capacity to manage a transit system? Becomes the question, right,
[14:20] and if you can't, like, given there's a strike on the horizon,
[14:24] yeah, exactly exactly, And isn't that interesting? And how how is
[14:28] that going to play out? Whoa like who? Hopefully there isn't a strike,
[14:31] Hopefully they come to an amicable agreement and you know there is no disruption.
[14:35] But I think what I've been really thinking about in that space is,
[14:39] you know, there's politically there's a big risk here if this strike lasts more
[14:45] than a few days, because like, okay, people will get by for
[14:48] day one, day two, day three of this strike if assuming it happens,
[14:52] pretty you know, they'll figure it out. Right, But like transit,
[14:54] like provides a lot of transport to people who then do a lot of
[14:58] sort of those again not only frontline stuff, but like students who go to
[15:03] school when their parents are at work, for example, like mom works as
[15:05] a nurse, dad works in the auto plant, has to be there before
[15:09] Timmy needs to be dropped out at school, and so you know, and
[15:13] they're already probably missing some of the buses because they're full. And I've seen
[15:16] social media story saying that you know, but like you know, you get
[15:20] have parking traffic chaos around high schools in the parking rides because you know,
[15:26] hundreds of students who normally take a bus to get to school aren't able to
[15:31] and suddenly it starts rippling out and showing impacts in ways that you know,
[15:35] the average south windsor person or the average east windsor person doesn't normally see because
[15:39] they don't take transit, right, they're being impacted by the lack of transit.
[15:43] The transit disappears and suddenly like there's hundreds of more cars on the road.
[15:48] You know, there's like all of those sort of things that, Yeah,
[15:52] it's it's interesting because you know, when you make the case that a
[15:54] politician is a self interested jackass, even if if you make that case very
[16:00] compellingly, I think that the vast majority of Windsor rights the Windsor culture is
[16:06] that that is met with a like acknowledgment and a shrug because this is this
[16:11] is what every politician is like, and I think that it's some reason for
[16:15] the population to feel that way and Windsor. But when you break through and
[16:22] actually impact people's lives in not the gradual Hey, this street that I work
[16:27] on is like shittier every year for the past ten years. Not like that,
[16:32] but like hit him in the face with, hey, your kid can't
[16:33] get the school, figure it out? Shit, face like that becomes that
[16:37] becomes like a real problem, right. I mean, people are having a
[16:40] hard enough time right now with their grocery bills, and now you're going to
[16:42] tell them it's going to be an extra forty five to fifty dollars because you
[16:45] got to or you got to take a cab at least one way, so
[16:48] it's going to be two hour walk or an hour walk for you to get
[16:51] there, and then it's going to be extra money. I mean, this
[16:52] is where people get really angry really fast. And we know that they are
[16:59] meeting right now now all the sides. There's the city and there's transit,
[17:03] there's the union as well as the federal mediator, and they're having their last
[17:07] ditch conversations today. We expect there will be an update provided Monday. I
[17:11] believe nine am is what we're expecting to hear. But as you guys said,
[17:17] I mean a couple of days, it's still going to be hell if
[17:19] it's only a couple days of strike for the people who rely on it,
[17:22] And then as you were saying, for the people who will inevitably be impacted
[17:26] by it, I mean, just think about crazy. A grocery store is
[17:30] going to be with just so many cabs just out front because people aren't like
[17:33] it's just the whole situation is just wild. It's one of those I guess
[17:37] we'll wait and see, but I don't know better if it goes longer or
[17:41] shorter for long term outlooks for the transit service, I don't know. I
[17:48] think a long term transit strike might change things, like it might bring change
[17:53] to the city, It might might change attitudes, it might break people out
[17:57] of their old ways of thinking. But in twenty twenty four, do we
[18:03] still think that like, hey, like a little chaos will produce a good
[18:06] outcome, is like a smart rationale for anything, because I don't, Yeah,
[18:11] I think I think it will change the narrative around so again, depending
[18:15] on the context and assuming all parties are well behaved during that strike and things
[18:19] like that. I think assuming there is, you know, a strike,
[18:22] something in the one to two week range, like, I think that has
[18:26] the potential to change some of the narrative around transit and like, Okay,
[18:30] there's no one actually able to make it to the grocery store to stock the
[18:33] shelves, or you know, for some small business owners who you know,
[18:37] their staff takes a bus or their staff you know, or you're the student
[18:41] coming home from your part time job and you get off at the pizza place
[18:45] at eleven pm and now you have to walk you know, forty minutes home
[18:48] instead of whatever. Like, there are impacts that will be felt that will
[18:52] have a legacy, I would assume to the ballot box in twenty six potentially,
[18:57] But I think it has to be sort of that sweet spot because at
[19:02] some point then someone will get called in transigent and or someone or one of
[19:06] the parties will something will happen in the strike process that will then turn the
[19:11] public against one side or the other. And so there's like a sweet spot
[19:15] where I think like a transit strike could, in theory, despite causing chaos,
[19:19] change the narrative of transit and windsor I think like it's one of those
[19:23] things, like you're trying to thread a needle and like if you miss,
[19:29] like it's just as likely that you know, there's a conversation about outsourcing the
[19:33] tunnel bus and it moves forward in a realistic way, you know, to
[19:37] going forward rather than you know, rather than actually getting you know, changing
[19:42] the narrative around transit. Yeah, and I'm not saying it couldn't have good
[19:45] outcomes. It very very likely could it Like possibly could. It does rely
[19:52] on a certain amount of skill being displayed by the folks, you know,
[19:57] around the negotiating table and people on strike. But I don't think that's beyond
[20:03] the capability of organized labor in this town, especially after perhaps learning the lessons
[20:08] of a few past experiences. Maybe there will be maybe there would be a
[20:14] little bit different approach, but you know, again, I just I am
[20:19] never going to be on team fucking flip the table. Anymore. I don't
[20:23] want to do it. I think flipping the table is going to produce worse
[20:26] outcomes generally than better. I mean, the last strikes that we had that
[20:32] were of import here social media didn't exist, just baby steps in two thousand
[20:38] and six. Yeah, just wild to think about that. And you know,
[20:41] since then, we've had yellow vests, convoy anti vacs, it's all
[20:48] evolved into further protest movements and like everything just keeps escalating. There's no incentives
[20:55] to take off ramps, especially with divided your social media ecosystem. I'm more
[21:00] inclined to be on a team Doug on this one that the chaos will probably
[21:04] take hold sooner than later, but there's gonna be positive. It's a good
[21:08] point that we haven't we have not had like a big labor conflict in windsor
[21:14] in the social media era like that that paralyzed the city or did something like
[21:18] that. Is a good point. Yeah, I think this is where,
[21:22] you know, I think if Transit does go on strike here, you know,
[21:26] I think there will be a lot of control on the labor side.
[21:29] You know, labor's in a position of strength, probably for the first time
[21:30] in a long time at the municipal level, you know, inflation just get
[21:34] keeping wages up. I know there's a whole bunch of technicalities around the actual
[21:38] issue about the cross border federal employees in ten days, six days and things
[21:42] like that, but I think, you know, I think like we're in
[21:47] a place where the community can feel, you know, sympathy for labor in
[21:52] this space. You know, we have all seen what's going on downtown.
[21:56] We all know, you know, we've all heard, you know, the
[21:59] challenges that transit drivers have faced. You know, when individuals with mental health
[22:03] crisis get on the bus to stay warm on a cold day and they're just
[22:07] riding the bus but streaming in the back. Like, those are significant challenges
[22:11] that these drivers have to put up with. And I think, yeah,
[22:15] okay, you should probably have a pay raise that matches inflation, just like
[22:18] you know, the auto workers got, and just like the you know,
[22:22] the salt miners got, and et cetera, et cetera. And so I
[22:23] think that there is a position of strength and labor right now that like,
[22:27] you know, they have to be mindful of that public opinion. But I
[22:30] think like which I think is a moderating force a little bit, And I
[22:33] think when we looked at some of the other strikes that have occurred, like
[22:37] in the US around you know, the auto workers this past year, like
[22:40] they weren't throwing bricks through you know, people's windows and stuff like that.
[22:44] I think, I think, like if this process, you know, hopefully
[22:47] doesn't come to that, but I think like there is a place there where
[22:51] the community would probably side with labor in the in that near term. I
[22:53] think so too. I think the generals like geist in North America is as
[22:57] pro labor as it's been this century for sure, and probably even longer.
[23:03] I think that there's a lot of interest in a time of uncertainty and a
[23:08] time of insecurity. I think there's a lot of interest in tools that can
[23:12] help you have a little bit of security and a little bit of protection.
[23:17] And and I think that the you know, the strength of being a part
[23:19] of a labor union probably appeals to people a bit more today than it did
[23:25] back then. I think that one question I would have though, since we're
[23:27] kind of since we're now just opening vaguely about labor and windsor but what would
[23:33] be interesting. I think in recent years we have seen a lot of detente
[23:40] between the the powers that be municipally and organized labor. The relationship, the
[23:49] relationship between labor and the municipality and business that helped to land the battery plant.
[23:59] I don't think the know. I think that when you look at the
[24:00] messaging and the communication around that, and you've got these guys are sitting in
[24:04] the same room singing from the same songbook you you have, I think you
[24:12] can see that there is collaboration happening that didn't happen before in some circles.
[24:19] Labor is not a monolith in some circles. Uh And and I you know,
[24:25] there is that, although I think I think it's probably the blooms off
[24:29] the roads with the PC government, but there there there definitely was an attempt
[24:34] to split labor by conservatives across the country and and uh like by the PC
[24:40] specifically, And and you know, I look at all that and I just
[24:44] think that there's all those threads that could potentially impact this situation as well.
[24:48] I don't know. So one thing I would question is is was there a
[24:52] daytont here locally and that there was a dayton certainly between municipal leaders and private
[24:57] sector labor, right, but not there was tempt to outsource janitors. They
[25:02] outsourced obviously in the big strike garbage question, but now they've brought them back
[25:06] in. They've had to rehire some of the you know, garbage collection to
[25:08] do some of the work. From my understanding, last term, because they
[25:11] weren't able to get the contract to work out, you know, they tried
[25:14] to, they outsourced, you know, janitorial, couldn't find a company actually
[25:17] do it at that rate. And then because it's easy to be pro labor
[25:19] if you're not the one paying the bill and so so I think like there's
[25:23] some of that there. I think, and I think and also for sure
[25:26] and admittedly I also think labor politics is complicated, you know, like Unifoor
[25:30] has broken away from you know, national labor councils in a lot of cases,
[25:34] there's some challenges you know, within the labor movement certainly, and you
[25:40] know that's where you see you know, the Ford government has been successful with
[25:44] private sector construction, trades labor, but you know they're right still challenged with
[25:48] many public service used. Right Well, I think I think that governments have
[25:52] delivered, like you think about Windsor has delivered so much. If you're in
[25:56] a if you are working the construction trades, like you got to be voting
[26:00] as straight whoever got me here ticket every time because it's it's heaven right,
[26:07] And so I think that I think also that local government has demonstrated time and
[26:12] time again in recent years that it can deliver jobs. You know, it
[26:15] can deliver big public sector projects that are going to employ a lot of people.
[26:22] And that's got to be appealing to ride the wave as long as you
[26:26] can. Okay, well, let's keep this show going. Onto the next
[26:30] subject here. Temporary cap on international students the country. Canada is limiting the
[26:37] number of international students that will accept into the country for two years starting this
[26:41] year. The cap will be based on the population of each province and territory,
[26:45] meaning that some will see larger drops than others. Ontario could expect to
[26:48] see a fifty percent decrease in the issuing of permits now. The Immigration Minister
[26:55] says the decision for this was to address the challenges and opportunities of the post
[26:59] PANDEAM recoveries, such as labor market needs, demographic trends, and social integration.
[27:06] Although I think that we could probably all point to the one big elephant
[27:10] in the room that's not being mentioned right there. And you know, housing,
[27:12] which is the one conversation that we seemingly keep having over and over again.
[27:18] We don't know much more details about this other than what has just been
[27:22] announced there, other than to say the Feds seemingly are you know, making
[27:27] moves on the housing file in this case, how immigration, specifically international student
[27:34] permits is related to it. We also saw provincially, I think we can
[27:40] start tying this together. Ontario is going to require international students the colleges that
[27:45] bring them in to have a housing guarantee for them moving forward. So that's
[27:49] a big change as well. Sort of seems like everyone actually, did you
[27:53] know, get the wake up call that came about six eight months ago,
[28:00] said hey, this whole housing thing is a problem. And I'll never forget
[28:03] when Stats Canada came out after we started having those conversations and went, whoops,
[28:07] we counted wrong. There's another million people here. Forgot about that.
[28:11] That was bad. Hey, it happens. But you know, I be
[28:17] heartened that they're not being completely intractable in a policy. This is a tough
[28:22] one for them. I mean, the province says they want more immigration,
[28:26] they want to have the ability to choose which working classes they bring in.
[28:30] The FEDS are working hand and in love with the provinces because we know we
[28:33] need this because we're entering that point where, you know, the the boomers
[28:37] continually leave the workforce, they need to be replaced. And we're, you
[28:44] know, at a point though where we don't have enough houses, but we
[28:47] need to be bringing people in fodder for the opposition to just be able to
[28:49] point and say, you screwed up this file. How do you still signal
[28:56] to your constituency like, oh, we're not an anti immigrant, we just
[29:00] have to go close the door on immigration sort of a little bit for a
[29:03] little while here in this case being through international student permits. It's a tough
[29:07] one to be able to thread all of the different needles here. I'm glad
[29:11] I'm not this government. But speaks to the point of like this was a
[29:15] government where it's Don says this all the time. It was really easy to
[29:18] be a Trudeau liberal when everything in the world was going fine. Increasingly,
[29:22] it's very difficult to be one when things are falling apart. Don, that
[29:27] was for you, Yeah, like I think, you know, I think
[29:33] one of the big caveats to this the announcement this week was obviously this is
[29:37] for undergraduate students. Yeah, so master's degrees PhDs are not really included in
[29:41] this, and neither are students coming in on like for high school or other
[29:45] sort of like you know, you're an exchange student going you know, coming
[29:48] to Canada type of saying, and someone's going back to your country type of
[29:52] saying, like you know, on that sort of program like so those so
[29:56] it's not just it's not all international students, Like I think that's important and
[30:00] I think it's important to recognize that from an international student perspective, university and
[30:06] colleges are disproportionately have more international students of those postgraduate and you know master's PhD
[30:11] levels versus colleges tend to have more of the undergraduate students. And so I
[30:18] think, you know, when we're going to watch this, you know,
[30:21] a fifty percent reduction in Ontario, what we're likely to see is sort of
[30:25] a pool cube broken on the floor. And now there's sort of going to
[30:27] be a fight amongst post secondary institutions around how does that number then get allocated
[30:33] whatever's left, Because I don't know how it's allocated. I assume Previously it
[30:37] was just about who could whoever, however many you could recruit and get visas
[30:41] for you could admit. But if you now have this hard ceiling, is
[30:44] it like a first one to recruit the students gets the students sort of race,
[30:48] or is it like this school will get this many students, this school
[30:52] will get this many students, this school will get this many students. I
[30:55] don't think that's been made clear yet, and I think that's where there's a
[30:57] lot of uncertainty around how this is going to impact post secondary institution budgets going
[31:03] forward and whether or not you know, we're commodifying our internationals. Well they
[31:08] were commodified a long time, I know, but it's it's just it's so
[31:11] apparent. As it continually, it's going to be a challenge and I think
[31:15] it's going to be conflict. There's going to be conflict for resources. Institutions
[31:19] did it to themselves. Governments were so reluctant to take this step, Like
[31:25] the federal government took so long to take this step. They didn't want to
[31:27] do this and they wanted this program to work. And to be fair,
[31:32] you know, the Ontario government hasn't raised the core funding to post secondary institutions
[31:36] in like almost a decade now or something like that, and the Win government
[31:38] froze tuition on domestic students and that's never been lifted. So you have you
[31:44] know, people who have grown up and been born and raised in Windsor,
[31:45] Ontario who are Canadian citizens. You know, their tuition hasn't gone up since
[31:48] two thousand and eight or eighteen, sorry, twenty eighteen. You know.
[31:53] So there's there's like provincial policy choices, federal policy choices, there's local policy
[31:59] choices that have all created this messy perfect storm. Yeah, no question,
[32:04] And I think, like taking a thousand foot view, you know, I
[32:09] thought initially that you could see that there were warning signs here for a long
[32:15] time coming. And I took the view that the government probably anticipated a bit
[32:22] of a mess, that they knew it would be a little messy, but
[32:23] that the outcome, a Canada that has a bigger share of North American population,
[32:30] a Canada that can that that can fulfill all of its economic ambitions,
[32:36] is worth a little bit a mess, you know. But I don't think
[32:40] that. I think that there's two things that I see here. One,
[32:45] I think this government has constantly fails to be bold enough, and this is
[32:51] like half a moonshot, which just from which government you're talking about, the
[32:54] federal government, Like, this is half a moonshot, right, We're going
[32:58] to radically increase popular and everything else will work itself out. You had to
[33:02] do the other half. You had to do the other part of how do
[33:06] we prepare the grounds that this this thing works? That's you know, and
[33:09] we don't know actually how much planning happened. It could be the things just
[33:14] took a turn. Maybe they didn't expect sure, like it's so, you
[33:19] know, I don't know that. It just strikes me that there is some
[33:22] consistency here that this is not the only time when I thought, wow,
[33:25] a more bold turn might have made this this not so successful policy into something
[33:30] good. The other side, the other thing that I see though, is
[33:35] that like you guys all get service, you buy French fries, you buy
[33:40] shoes, the the change in the demographic of the people that you encounter as
[33:49] minimum wage workers in this town tells a big story. And I think too,
[33:54] we're starting to hear stories. You know. I have no verification on
[33:58] this, but there was a Reddit post made a couple of weeks ago about
[34:00] somebody alleging that an employer was basically scamming them for like stealing labor from them,
[34:07] scamming them, telling them they had to do training for free. They
[34:10] didn't do the training good enough, you have to come back tomorrow and do
[34:14] the training again, which is stocking shelves and doing pricing and whatever, and
[34:19] then you'll get a job. And I don't know how true that is,
[34:22] but I think it's symptomatic, and I think there are things like that happening
[34:25] out there. What we have here, the point that I'm making is we
[34:30] have a bonanza for minimum wage employers across this country, a bonanza, and
[34:35] you can tell that it's hugely beneficial to them to have workers who are eager
[34:38] to work, possibly desperate to work, workers who have no local connections,
[34:44] have no one to turn to, have no recourse, and probably don't know
[34:47] the law very well. It's a bonanza. And I wonder how much those
[34:52] voices were a force for like let's keep this role and let's increase those hours.
[35:00] It's like, this is awesome. Well, I think that was part
[35:01] of the solving the labor crisis, right, like so even like in the
[35:05] post COVID, you know, it was a twenty twenty one, twenty twenty
[35:08] two when like you know, there's all that disruption and supply change and people
[35:12] weren't willing to work anymore and all that sort of stuff like that. On
[35:15] the government did remove some of the labor hour restrictions on international students, right
[35:19] the federal government, and so like, yes, and to be fair,
[35:23] I always think that those students should be able to work, you know,
[35:25] like if I as a Canadian could work a full time job and go to
[35:29] post, like if I wanted to do that, they should be able to
[35:31] do that as well. It's not fair that they could come in and like
[35:34] pay four times the rate that I'm paying for university and not be able to
[35:37] work and pay for themselves, you know, earn earn a living and pay
[35:42] to support themselves. So you know, let's be honest, like an expand
[35:46] the conversation. You know, we've had a lot of conversations about migrant workers
[35:51] and the ag sector on the on the podcast, and like you know,
[35:53] there are lots of stories and they are continually stories through the Migrant Worker Network
[35:58] about exploitation in those spaces where you know, the word slavery has been thrown
[36:02] around in some cases on some of those cases, and I'm not saying that's
[36:06] broad justification or broad occurrence, but like, there are certainly bad actors that
[36:09] have been accused of things in those spaces. And so I think what we've
[36:14] seen over the last ten to fifteen years is, you know, the low
[36:19] wage job sector in Canada has largely been importing talents in order to fill it.
[36:24] That's fair. And like whether that's on a farm or at a fast
[36:29] food restaurant, right, and whether that's because you know, there just aren't
[36:31] enough Canadian young people want those jobs, or those jobs aren't good enough for
[36:36] Canadian young people, or whoever would want that, I don't know. You
[36:39] know, there's certainly an argument that if you're paying twenty five dollars an hour,
[36:43] someone might be able to be willing to work at Tim Horton's, you
[36:45] know, and do what has to be done at Tim Horton's type of thing
[36:47] for twenty five dollars an hour instead of whatever minimum wages. Yeah, I
[36:52] think that's totally fair. And so there's a lot, there's a lot here.
[36:58] I think that the cap is a positive move, but I also think
[37:02] it's important to note that it's a cap on new admissions. They're you know,
[37:07] and probably for good reasons and no small reason that when you make a
[37:12] commitment, you should honor it. Nobody's being sent home, no so,
[37:16] and I support that, But it also means that the impact of placing a
[37:21] cap is perhaps smaller than people think because there's already a full boat of students
[37:25] attending these institutions. It'll only be new students. Like, so it's going
[37:29] to take four or five years for mental shift, right, for some of
[37:32] these things to play out, Yeah, which is probably helpful to the institutions.
[37:37] Gives them a little bit of time to plan and prepare and you know,
[37:40] potentially close that satellite campus wherever you've got it and whatever they got to
[37:45] do. So that's that's positive, But it also means that it's not it's
[37:50] not going to have the impact that the numbers might indicate. Again, like
[37:54] again and I don't know the numbers on this, but like the question mark
[37:58] would be what portion of international students stay in Canada after they complete that two
[38:02] year You know, we've certainly heard a lot of them are then trying to
[38:06] find work stay in Canada, et cetera. But there is a portion that
[38:07] goes back, you know, every May, every you know, after the
[38:10] semester is done, and they take the skills they learned in North America,
[38:15] go back to their home country and work there, and you know, have
[38:17] prosperous lives in their home country as well. So I think there will I
[38:22] think there will be some impact actually just starting next school year in that if
[38:27] you're only bringing in and we're gonna I'm gonna make up some numbers. But
[38:30] if we're going from six thousand to three thousands, you know, it's just
[38:32] like arbitrary numbers, you know, and some proportion of the old six thousand
[38:39] has graduated out, moved out of the community, found a job in Toronto,
[38:44] whatever it is, there will be some relief to the housing rental market.
[38:50] Well, no questions and lesser numbers, less competition. So I think
[38:52] I think, like the question will be just how dramatic it is, and
[38:55] the question is you know of that again macro number, how much you know,
[39:00] Let's say our local institution is get a smaller share because of like the
[39:05] international student pool compared to say Toronto or something like that. That could be
[39:08] a far more dramatic drop. And then I think then I think you have
[39:13] some really you know man, going back to the chaos, flipping the table
[39:15] chaos, like you could see the housing market, in the rental market really
[39:19] transform in the next nine months. I'm not looking forward to student visas and
[39:23] at London as a rallying cry, what do we want to the last one?
[39:30] Yeah, okay, this is our recurring segment. We do this every
[39:31] now and then. For those listeners who do pay attention. It's called movers
[39:35] and shakers, where we decide to take a spotlight and shine on one person
[39:37] in the community. It's not a ready at the boardot. I'd be finn
[39:45] to present it like that. See how far we could get in. It
[39:47] was about but twelve words and you were like, wait, shut this down.
[39:52] No there is but you know, movers and shakers. The CEO of
[39:55] Invest Windsor Essex is on the move. Stephen mackenzie, who led the Ecdev
[40:01] Agency and helped attract billions in investments, will be serving as a Special Advisor
[40:07] on Innovation and Partnerships where at the University of Windsor starting February the nineteenth.
[40:13] Now Mayor Delkins, who is the chair of the Invest Windsor Essex Board said
[40:16] that McKenzie moving over to this new role was part of discussions that took place
[40:22] over the last few months. Those talks included the invest Windsor Essex Board,
[40:28] Robert Gordon from the University of Windsor as well. And we know that mackenzie
[40:34] is going to be remaining on the Invest Windsor Essex payroll. His current contract,
[40:38] which should have expired in August, is being extended until the end of
[40:42] this year. How the university position will be funded or extended afterwards is still
[40:47] to be determined. There's going to be a new interim CEO appointed before February
[40:52] nineteenth, then they're going to do a whole search for a full time CEO.
[40:58] This is one of those interesting stories. I mean, listen, we're
[41:00] not diving into the ins and outs of this piece specifically, but this one,
[41:06] I think, you know, it sort of relates to the theatrics of
[41:08] politics in the city and the angle that I wanted to go with when I
[41:14] brought this piece to the table. Here today was looking at the quotations that
[41:17] were included in the piece. So Stephen McKenzie did not provide a quote.
[41:22] He provided a written statement to the Windsor Star and he declined to comment.
[41:30] Now who did speak to the Windsor Star. Mayor Dilkins is quoted representing Invest
[41:35] Windsor Essex as the chair, presumably as well as Mayor Dilkins, because you
[41:39] know, sort of all in one. The University of Windsor president Robert Gordon
[41:43] is quoted in it as well, and then Essex County's Warden and Leamington's Mayor
[41:47] Hilda MacDonald was also quoted, and she also sits on the board of directors
[41:52] of Invest Windsor Essex. It's so interesting when we get these stories, not
[42:00] all the time in the city, but when they're about one person, obstensibly
[42:06] and that person is just like, nope, no comment, don't come to
[42:08] me about this one. And then enter stage right. You have an authoritative
[42:13] voice who says, let me explain to you exactly what's going on here.
[42:15] Here's all the moving parts that you might not be aware of. And it's
[42:20] like, but we're the media. We're trying to figure out those moving parts.
[42:22] No, no, no, no, no, just take a listen.
[42:24] It's just these stories are so interesting to me. Yeah, it's not
[42:29] a very dignified position to be in. To be talked about in the media
[42:32] and not speak It's unfortunate. Man. What I think about in as you
[42:40] were talking about this story, because I don't really want to talk about this
[42:45] in detail either because I don't know what's going on here. It's weird.
[42:47] But what I think about is just how much I would hate to have a
[42:52] job, how much I would hate to have, like, you know,
[42:55] to just be somebody's pawn and minion, and like, oh, well,
[43:00] we've decided you don't do that anymore now you're over here. Cut these fishheads
[43:04] Like I Man, I'm glad I don't have a job. It's the fish
[43:08] trading between the two organizations sphere. That's the way we've seen in the city,
[43:14] you know, where someone's been removed from one department and put to another
[43:16] one way off from the outskirts of the city towards the county because they don't
[43:20] want to ever be seen from or heard from again. I mean, this
[43:23] would be like taking the City of Windsor engineer and doing a swap with Lassalle
[43:28] or something for one of their employees. Like right, the fact that you've
[43:30] got both the university and the City or invest Windsor Essex doing this exchange.
[43:36] And again I don't know Stephen McKenzie. By all accounts, he's good in
[43:38] his job. They've pulled in a lot of money, They're been well represented.
[43:43] I've got nothing negative to say about him, nor about Robert Gordon.
[43:45] Never met the guy. Seems to be doing a pretty good job as a
[43:49] as a steward over at the University of Windsor. But god, just you
[43:52] know, as you said, it looks like upon on a chessboard and each
[43:55] side's just going like, Okay, I got ten bucks, I want the
[43:58] piece now for Bony to be named later you give viavi McKenzie. So I
[44:02] think I think you know, again, I don't know all the machinations behind
[44:07] the scenes here and things like that, but I do think. You know,
[44:09] a cohesive economic ecosystem has movement within, you know, major institutions and
[44:15] the economic development network in a particular community. And you look at Kitchener Waterloo
[44:21] for example, you know they had a regional economic ecosystem and then each of
[44:24] the because Kitchener and Waterloo are two separate cities, so they have city based
[44:28] offices, and then they have your University of Waterloo and Conestoga College, which
[44:31] are major drivers there and they have like coordinated, like shared positions within those
[44:37] ecosystems. And so this may just be you know, Steve McKenzie moving over
[44:43] to the university to again and I don't know what the exact role was.
[44:45] It was like partnership, is it in innovation and partnerships, Like the university
[44:50] is a part of the battery plant process. They have to build an R
[44:52] and D facility that's going to be like two hundred million dollars or something like
[44:55] that with you know, someone like two engineers. Like that's exactly the kind
[45:02] of stuff that I would expect Stephen McKenzie to excel at getting that together because
[45:07] in my experience, universities and colleges are hard to move stuff through rapidly.
[45:13] They're not businesses. They are these you know, dual types of governance,
[45:17] dual sort of institutions where you have multiple layers of bureaucracy and you know,
[45:22] you have committees upon the committees and you know everyone. You know, there's
[45:27] all sorts of challenges in that. And so I do think, like,
[45:30] you know, it makes sense for a senior level economic development person to go
[45:35] to a university and go into a role as it sounds like they're and I
[45:37] think there's absolutely work for him to do there to like land that thing.
[45:42] And to be honest, you know, we were just talking about international students
[45:45] and if that's actually going to hurt the institution's budget, then having an economic
[45:50] development head who former economic development who has a rolodex of all these companies who
[45:53] would want to partner on research and development and grants that could help fund the
[45:58] university activities is probably a really good time and a really good get to get
[46:02] that person. Yeah, I don't I don't disagree with any of that,
[46:06] Like it's it all sounds reasonable to me, and I think that the university
[46:12] is getting something they need and I accept that, and I think that's okay.
[46:19] It's interesting to me that invest wins or Essex doesn't need it, but
[46:23] that you know, I accept what you're saying, and I think that you're
[46:29] right that the conments and movement between institutions and institutional relationships like this is not
[46:35] an unusual thing, except that it's the top guy. I agree, like
[46:39] I think, and so maybe and again because we don't have a comment from
[46:43] Steph McKenzie, like maybe it was his choice. Well, but but we
[46:45] don't write it's the top guy and he didn't have anything to say about it.
[46:50] That's weird. And we have a quote from Mayor Dilkins to the Star
[46:53] saying the message should not be Steve is being moved from Invest winds Or Essex
[46:59] or some hint of anything. End quote. Well, I mean there is
[47:04] some hint of anything. The guy wouldn't comment and and he is being moved
[47:08] from Invest Windsor at six he's being moved to the universities. But maybe because
[47:13] he just doesn't like to talk to the media. That makes sense, right,
[47:15] No, No, that doesn't make sense. See to me, Like
[47:17] if there if there, if there's going to be an announcement of a formal
[47:21] partnership between Invest Windsor Essex and the University of Windsor, and they're opening up
[47:24] some kind of new hub or innovation center or whatever that's going to be,
[47:29] and he's the one there to bridge the gap to get to that point.
[47:31] Everything makes perfect sense, Like I get this, all this story makes sense.
[47:35] We don't need to do this segment at all. But if it's just
[47:38] we're trying to straddle the two organizations here with the one guy and he's going
[47:44] to be half in, half out at both places, because that allows him
[47:46] to maintain one unified rolodex. Again, it's just we're left in a it's
[47:51] the constant windsor position. We should never be left speculating. It should just
[47:55] be fully explained because the speculation not nine times out of ten, is far
[48:01] worse than anything else that it actually is. As our friends who have gone
[48:05] on to council routinely let us know how actually boring most of this gun is.
[48:08] The people who need to know. The people, the people who have
[48:13] the capacity to make these decisions for you are the people who need to know.
[48:19] They have all the details they need, Go go enjoy adventure Bank.
[48:22] The people who need to know need to know. Well, that's all you
[48:30] guys need to know. We're gonna end it there. That's the end of
[48:32] the show. We're gonna wrap it up, put a bow on it and
[48:35] put it under the tree and wait for next year. Folks, Rose City
[48:37] Politics. It is January twenty seventh. Regular panel today included Doug sar Torre
[48:42] Fraser, Fathers, myself, John Lidkey, head to Patreon dot com,
[48:45] slash Rose City Politics, pick up a viz X, track us down in
[48:47] public and always remember ROAs. City politics is able to broadcast live on tape
[48:52] thanks to the kind support of Luna six two five. Building better communities is bas

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