GUELPH POLITICAST #349 - What’s Next? Part 3: The Candidates

While the 13 members of the new city council will have the next four years to refine their ideas about the issues facing Guelph, it feels like we just forget the people who also ran for office just as soon as the results are called. In 2022, nearly 40 people felt like they had the right stuff to be one of Guelph’s civic leaders, so we’re dedicating this episode to the people that didn’t win.

There’s a lot of commentary about politics as blood sport, and we accept it as just part of the experience of running for office. Is that the way we should be thinking about politics?  Maybe there should be some formal debrief post-election as some candidates might be traumatized by the experience when exposed to the very modern gauntlet of hate and vitriol during an election campaign.

You’re going to hear about that on this week's podcast, and you will hear about how our election system has remained the same even though the demographics of our community has changed remarkably in the last 20 years. Insights will come from mayoral candidate Danny Drew, Ward 1 candidate Chidi Nwene and Ward 2 candidate Morgan Dandie. These three candidates are going to share their election experiences, and you might find them pretty valuable even though they didn’t win.

Our panel will discuss in detail the lessons they learned on the campaign trail, and how the actual experience was different from their best laid plans. We will also talk about the role that money plays in a campaigning, the value of volunteers and support teams, and the pieces of advice they wish they had gotten in the beginning. Finally, they will talk about next moves, what they would tell other people interested in running for office, and whether they might consider running for office again.

So let's talk to the people who ran, but didn't quite make it, on this week's Guelph Politicast!

You can follow Chidi Nwene on Twitter @chidex35, you can follow Danny on Instagram @for_a_socialist_guelph, and you follow Morgan on Instagram @morgan.dandie and check out the weekly Breezy Breakfast live on Thursday at 8 pm or on CFRU Mondays at 9 am.

The host for the Guelph Politicast is Podbean. Find more episodes of the Politicast here, or download them on your favourite podcast app at Apple, Stitcher, Google, TuneIn and Spotify .

Also, when you subscribe to the Guelph Politicast channel and you will also get an episode of Open Sources Guelph every Monday, and an episode of End Credits every Friday.