Welcome to the Guelph Politico Tip Sheet, a thrice-a-week newsletter meant to “tip” you off about some of the important stuff going on in the Royal City. It arrives directly in your inbox on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays.
REMINDER: Election Day is Monday September 20. The polls in Guelph will be open from 9:30 am to 9:30 pm, and you can learn all you need to know about how to vote here (assuming you haven’t already).
If you need help trying to decide how to vote, you can watch (or re-watch) three of the local debates with the Guelph Federal candidates here.
You can also listen to the Open Sources Guelph and Politicast interviews with the following candidates:
And from Wellington-Halton Hills
Finally, we will be going live-to-air on Election Night on CFRU 93.3 fm and cfru.ca. We’ll have local and national results and analysis as well as a few surprise guests, each one more surprising than the last!!!
The Guelph-Wellington Task Force for Poverty Elimination has released fact sheets for Guelph candidates and Wellington-Halton Hills candidates.
The People’s Party candidate in Perth-Wellington apologized for an unhinged voice mail received by a Stratford resident from one of his volunteers. The call alleged that a vote for incumbent Conservative candidate Wayne Barker is a vote to, and I quote, “kill our children with a graphene oxide injection.”
Meanwhile in Guelph, People’s Party signs were specifically targeted for vandalism.
Waterloo Region Public Health announced that a 10-year-old child with underlying health issues passed away this week due to COVID-19. The case is not linked to any school or daycare outbreak.
The Guelph Police Services Board heard that the Downtown Resource Officer program has been a success, and it’s likely here to stay. There’s also a lot of support for keeping the body worn camera program too.
Were you at the Western Hotel on September 6,8 or 11, or Trappers on September 4 or 7? You should probably know that they have both announced potential COVID exposure for patrons.
The County of Wellington is looking for a new spot for temporary supportive housing with their lease at Loyola House set to expire next month. The County’s social services administrator says they’ve got “several irons in the fire.”
If you weren’t concerned about the local COVID-19 case count before, maybe now is the time to start. In just two days since the last newsletter, the number of active cases is up by nearly 50 to 166 total cases, including the 41 added on Friday. Also, more than three out of every four of the new cases on Friday were in Guelph alone. The 7-day moving rate of confirmed cases is now up to 42.6 per 100,000 while the test positivity rate is now up to almost 4 per cent.
The vaccination rate continues a slow but deliberate increase with half-a-per cent more of eligible residents getting a shot this week. We now see 86 per cent of people fully vaccinated in the region with 81 per cent with two shots, while in Guelph 91.6 per cent have had one shot and 86.4 per cent have had both.
If you’re looking for an indication of where the fourth wave is going, there’s not much to divine from the provincial numbers. While we note that the number of active cases has fallen slightly in the last few days from over 6,200 to now barely 6,130, the new daily case count was 864 on Thursday and 795 on Friday after dipping under 600 for two days earlier this week. It’s worth noting that 73 per cent of the new cases on Friday were in people with one vaccine, no vaccine, or whose vaccine status is unknown.
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If you were at select industry and press screenings at the Toronto International Film Festival this week you might have been exposed to COVID-19.
For unknown reasons, the three available COVID-19 vaccines in Canada have strange new names. (Not to mention full Health Canada approval.)
According to the University of Guelph, 94 per cent of undergrads are fully vaccinated for COVID-19 while 5 per cent are partially vaccinate and 1 per cent have been granted an exemption. Staff and faculty, meanwhile, are 97 per cent fully vaccinated with 2 per cent partially vaccinated.
Western University has introduced mandatory training for undergrads about sexual violence and consent as a large crowd of students staged a walkout on Friday to protest the alleged assault of as many as 30 people during the first week of school.
The Guelph Storm have new owners.
Special Meeting of City Council – September 22, 6 pm.
In a special Wednesday meeting, council will consider the draft Official Plan Amendment for Clair-Maltby. You can see the Politico preview here.
Regular Meeting of City Council – September 27, 6:30 pm.
Council will ratify decisions made at Committee of the Whole and will select the five members of the City Council Remuneration and Support Advisory Committee. You can see the Politico preview here, and you have until Friday September 24 at 10 am to register with the clerks office as a delegate or to send a correspondence.
Committee of the Whole Meeting – October 4, 2021.
The agenda for this meeting will be posted on the City of Guelph’s website on Thursday September 23.
Planning Meeting of City Council – September 13, 6:30 pm.
The agenda for this meeting will be posted on the City of Guelph’s website on Thursday September 30.
For more information on Guelph City Council meetings, from agendas to live-tweets to recaps, you can visit that page on Guelph Politico here.
This weekend at the Mustang Drive-In, check out an unusual double bill with the new Clint Eastwood movie Cry Macho, and the new horror movie Malignant.
The Bookshelf Cinema is also back in business with the drama Best Seller, and the documentary The Hidden Life of Trees.
This year’s hybrid indoor/outdoor Guelph Jazz Festival runs until Sunday September 19.
This year’s first virtual Doors Open Guelph Tour, which features Stoneleigh at 225 Waterloo Ave, is available today!
The Fall into Autumn Market is happening right now at Heritage Hall on Essex Street until 3 pm!
The Ghost Walk of Guelph will be hosting another tour tonight!
Tuesday Food Trucks in Exhibition Park is back for September every Tuesday from 4:30 to 8 pm.
The Planning Advisory Committee will meet over Webex on Tuesday September 21 at 6:30 pm.
The Waste Resource Innovation Centre Public Liaison Committee will meet virtually on Thursday September 23 at 6:30 pm.
The Water Conservation and Efficiency Public Advisory will get together online on Tuesday September 28 at 7 pm.
Remember, Halloween is right around the corner:
And finally, feel free to reach out to me by email at adamadonaldson [at] gmail [dot] com, or find me on Facebook, Twitter, and, of course, GuelphPolitico.ca!