Episodes

Investment in our actual land: farm, urban and park - that take years, and cost a lot - but benefit generations with greater resilience to extreme weather, greater security of our food and shelter and health plus effective defence against tariffs and other international market risks... Smart investments - that fall outside our current financial systems. How to fix that and diversify Canada's Financial systems to better reflect our full economy, better serve us through this poly-crisis and set ...

5.6 Popping (market) Bubbles The market correction I foresee and welcome, how to ensure your investment portfolio is ready to ride it out, and what we need to build in Canada in order to have the diversified financial systems that we need to make it through this poly-crisis, and flourish. With a tribute to the value of corner stores and garbage collection! Money is never still - how it moves through our lives has a lot to do with policies and law. Which could be substantively updated in this Fall's Federal Budget. What to hope for - and how to amplify those hopes, adding your shoulder to the wheels of change!

5.5 Farm Gate - why tax $ should go into farming A Canadian raised abroad takes an apparent short-cut to flying here to work, and ends up trapped in a Slaughterhouse compound with no easy way out. Diving into the weeds of why we are losing farmland (!) and farmers (!!) and people able to learn to farm (!!!) - and what further measures are needed to reverse that trend. This one gets political, but also historical, and creative. With a meditation on the secret to prompting productive conversati...

Exploring the cost of what can't get financed, or is hobbled by the cost of accepting a grant or loan, now. Canada is way behind our peers when it comes to financing the small, local, regional or mission-driven. And it is costing us! Exploring the shadowing cost of what we're not doing because we're making it unreasonably hard to do - even though we long to see it done. And solutions worth getting behind that are ripe for promotion right now.

The impact of food storage infrastructure on food prices, food values, and food security. Front line stories of shotgun defense of a potato patch and a bed of lettuce harvested by headlamp then given away, given the context of planting to keep, gardening made easier, and the insidious impact of international corporations owning our food storage infrastructure. With a call to action around the Federal Government's funding of Food Hubs - which needs to be less urban, more field-friendly.

How did we get to where Canadians need to be Millionaires in order to be okay? Or so it seems, and not without reason! Frontline stories of the nightmare of financial insecurity that woke me up and drove me to my career in finance, through a humbling pre-CFP a-little-information-can-be-too-little-help error in my own personal financial planning, and my revelation about how many people actually contributed to my Grandparents making it through the Dirty 30s without losing the homestead. Put into context with the Dominion Lands Act, and the Post WWII to 1973 Federal development of our Economic systems. Calls to action around planning with professionals now, and calling for us to finish the Federal Finance system-building we cut off in 1973.

Food grows on trees. And food is necessary = valuable to us = money. Food production that is resilient, requires minimal care once established, and produces generously over generations is a staple of sustainable economies - but not of Canada's economy. How did we get here? How can we manage now better knowing this? What does Good look like and how might we help make that change happen here? Three stories: -how my neighbour the wild unmanaged bush made me question my savvy as a gardener, -where money trees remain, and why they are survivors of pre-colonial times rather than pillars of our economy, -why farming is a unprofitable industry in Canada Their context, some tips for managing this mess today, and thoughts on how to push towards a more fruitful tomorrow.

A new weekly season launches on Tuesday July 28 exploring two themes for people who care & live somewhere: Food & Money. Now that I have my own Advice-Only Firm I am free to tell you what I see as a Certified Financial Planner helping people get right what it should be easy to get right (only it ain't). I dream of fixing our system so my profession goes from essential to optional - starting with these reality checks, context mapping and solution-casting queries.

July 28 a new weekly season starts exploring two themes: Food & Money. What does Food have to do with being a Good Ancestor? So much!

Keynote speaker at the third annual https://northwestclimategathering.ca/, author, activist and architect.

The John St. Extension Community Park and Gardens started guerrilla twenty years ago, one of the successful neighbourhood initiatives that informed Thunder Bay getting pro-active in supporting community gardening. This Spring Scott Pound is leading an initiative to add a community garden to the space, and grow food to be served at the Abbey's free meal program. Building community through gardening, creating welcoming spaces and daring to engage through kind conversations with strangers and neigh...

A conversation with Provincial Green Party Leader Mike Schreiner held on April 23 touches on care and community, expensive current provincial legislature discouraging renewable energy production, the need & opportunity to build local food systems - and more. Held at Rose N Crantz Coffeeshop in Thunder Bay This picture of Mr. Schreiner was taken at the Earth Day Party thrown by Thunder Bay's Northwest Climate Gathering the night before at the turn-an-old-shirt-into-a-tote-bag table with vol...

Why I'm in love with 17% - that's all it takes to tip Impactful Climate Action in our community from outlier to mainstream. And why I hope to see Native Plant Gardening get trendy here this growing season. With a new song - and lots of nerdy facts to back me up.

The Season Finale features development lawyer Richard Wong with his thoughts after talking about engaging successfully with Corporations, and financing the big changes you want to see - at the Northwest Climate Gathering in Thunder Bay last month. Th...

Ken is the worker bee behind Just Bike TBay, the Memorial Link and Thunder Bay’s E.V. shows. And he was right at the heart of the Northwest Climate Gathering. We talk about the power of positivity and persistence, we celebrate being nerds and buildin...

A season wrap before the season’s done - and a teaser for the episodes to come. With many songs, and an insider’s tour of the Northwest Climate Gathering 2023: Hope & Action. Good company as COP28 unfolds. Referencing: https://www.katharinehayh...

A rebroadcast of an episode first shared May 17, 2022. What it would take to achieve food security in Thunder Bay, and what blows Brendan’s mind in every teaspoon of soil. Brendan Grant is leading discussion of this topic at https://www.nwclimategath...

Talking gardening, city wilderness, the satisfaction of a well-stocked garage & peace with Lucie Lavoie. Lucie is a founding member of both Superior Seed Producers and EcoSuperior, where she was a program coordinator for over twenty years. She an...

Keira Essex is is an environmental studies student at Lakehead University, an activist, and a novice photographer of mixed settler-Anishinaabe heritage. She is one of the people pulling together the Northwest Climate Gathering this month. Original mu...

Kevin Brooks teaches and researches Social Justice as a Program Advisor at Lakehead University. He is one of the people shaping and leading the Northwest Climate Gathering November 25 & 26. Our conversation circled back to housing more than once,...

A visit and new song with award-winning singer-songwriter and humanitarian Shy-Anne Hovorka, from her home near Nipigon. A fitting kick-off to season four. Lyrics, links and more at www.SomethingDifferentThisWayComes.ca

Dave Spies is the Thunder Bay Chapter Lead of Protect Our Winters Canada and  a third year law student at Lakehead University’s Bora Laskin Faculty of Law. His research focus is on the intersection of environmental law, Indigenous rights, public land...

From gathering a harvest, to gathering momentum and attention. Considering how fear hunts us, and hope needs to be reached for. Proposing the power of community.  Hoping for utopia and savouring joy.

Songs composed and recorded for this podcast by Heather McLeod - plus one co-composed and co-performed with Shy-Anne Hovorka.