Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:00 Good morning, Fort McMurray, wood, Buffalo, and the rest of the world. You've tuned into the Mac city morning show. I am your host Elliot Pierre, and we're going to start the show off on the same note. We always start the show off with a moment of gratitude. I know you could be doing a million other things with your time. So the fact that you're spending with us truly does mean the world to me. So thank you on that note, Tanner.
Speaker 1 00:00:20 Oh, she caught me, loves near listen to the next city morning show.
Speaker 0 00:00:29 All right. And we're back. Okay. We got a fun one today. We have a counselor on the show who is actually running for council again. So I'm excited to have him talking about his new campaign and, uh, everything else he's got on his mind. So as everybody knows at home, I don't introduce my guests. I let them do that themselves. So on that note, sir, can you please tell everybody at home who you are and what you're about?
Speaker 3 00:00:50 It's certainly a pleasure to be here, Elena. My name is Jeff pedal. I've been a counselor for four years and Ms. Pality and, um, obviously I'm running for re-election. Um, I've been in a municipality around 12 years. Both of my boys moved up here from Newfoundland. I'm like a lot of people, uh, uh, Newfoundland or that came for opportunity and, and for a, a better chance at life. I think that a lot of people, uh, come here with the same goal or vision in mind. Um, there's amazing opportunities in Fort McMurray and as a really close knit community with, you know, with some amazing opportunities.
Speaker 0 00:01:25 That's exactly it. So 12 years, that's a long time and that you've been here now. It's not bad at all.
Speaker 3 00:01:31 Yeah, no, it's absolutely a for me, you know, I've been through, uh, the ups and downs. I've been through the fires. Floods is the recession. My house was the first one to flood. Uh, like everybody in the municipality I've went through my mental health struggles, like everybody. And, uh, it's how the, you know, the ups and downs of forming Murray. But I certainly do believe in this municipality moving forward in, uh, putting us to a different level for a, I guess.
Speaker 0 00:01:56 Yeah. So I'm just going to ask the, put the elephant out out there. You've had a hard four years in council. Anybody in politics has had a hard, hard, rough go, especially in Fort McMurray with everything that went down. Why would you sign up to do it again?
Speaker 3 00:02:11 Well, I have to be honest and tell you that I was contemplating running or not running. And I had literally hundreds of people reach out to me and say, no, you have to, you've been a good voice for us. And you know, you've been a big supporter for what we're doing and in multi cultural events. Um, it's, you know, I'm very proud to say now that you know, my best friends are from Alberta, Lebanon, um, Somalia, uh, all over the world. So, you know, I'm very blessed to have that opportunity. And, uh, so I like being, you know, um, a voice of the community and voice for some people that don't get hurt or have issues. Right. And to me, it's, you know, it was a really simple concept of how do we make things happen. So to me, it's not about who's right or who's wrong is how do we get to the end goal and see efficiency? You see a big business open or Sue Messer, I guess, red tape.
Speaker 0 00:02:59 Right, right. Okay. So you're going forward again then,
Speaker 3 00:03:03 Um, I'm looking for you don't do this job for your own self. You do it for the people that have the municipality to certainly have everybody's voice heard.
Speaker 0 00:03:14 Great. So you said you moved here 12 years ago from Newfoundland. What part of Newfoundland are you from?
Speaker 3 00:03:19 Uh, my mother's from Cornerbrook. My father is from Trinity base on color, in the middle, and it was a born, I was raised in conception bay, south of Newfoundland. It was originally from a Labrador.
Speaker 0 00:03:30 Okay. Wow. So when you moved here, did you spend your whole life in the east coast and then come here? Were you in different spots before?
Speaker 3 00:03:37 No. I'm from Newfoundland straight to Fort McMurray.
Speaker 0 00:03:41 Wow. And so what was the opportunity in regards to work that you, you came out together?
Speaker 3 00:03:44 I was a consultant and I guess, into the housing and construction market. So I came up here and, uh, it was amazing opportunity what wood, Buffalo housing, and that's where I started. And, um, and you know, I loved my time there and you know, some of my good friends are still there. So I created some great relationships here and then made some good, positive impacts than I, uh, turned my business over to more of a consulting business. And, um, just helping people with policies, procedures, efficiencies, project management, et cetera.
Speaker 0 00:04:12 Okay. Cornerbrook hands down. I spent a lot of time in the east coast. Cornerbrook, in my opinion is one of the most beautiful spots in Canada. It's gorgeous, man,
Speaker 3 00:04:21 This time of year when it gets to the fall, the them for the folic home, but they're just a color in the Hummer valley. Absolutely beautiful enough. And, uh, you know, it was all started because of the logging mill and, uh, you know, people move there, same thing back then for, for our jobs and opportunity, no different Fort McMurray. So it was all about the logging of the mill at the time. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:04:40 Yeah, no, it's, it's a gorgeous, gorgeous spot to be in the fall in particular, for sure. So that being said, it's so beautiful back there where you came from, where you grew up, you've moved for me, Marie. You've been here for a long time now. What, what keeps you here in this community? You'll obviously have options.
Speaker 3 00:04:55 No, you know, I, I believe in forming Murray, I think that, you know, we do a lot of things, right. But I think we can do a lot of things better. Uh, we have the most amazing trail systems. Um, the Birchwood trails and around, um, the river is absolutely amazing. And I always take people down the river kayaking and paddle boarding and, uh, just to get people out on the water to see them. Um, so I, I love the opportunities that are here. I think there's better opportunities in Fort McMurray than anywhere else in Canada. And you know, some of the most amazing people, you know, I'm very proud to say, you know, most of my best friends are from Fort McMurray and from all over the world that live here now.
Speaker 0 00:05:32 Yeah. That's amazing. So yeah, it is definitely home for you. You're not going anywhere anytime soon. Absolutely not. How old are your boys?
Speaker 3 00:05:39 Uh, 26 and
Speaker 0 00:05:40 23 also. They're not boys anymore. They're men. They're still boy,
Speaker 4 00:05:45 If you're a man, you know that you, you don't ever really become a man. You just convince other people, your manly,
Speaker 3 00:05:52 You got to always carry on and tell people that, you know, going into witness protection programs that I don't find where I live and move back home. They've all moved back home. And, uh, but you know, I love my boys and I love my, uh, family. And, uh, so to me is, you know, they have great opportunities up here. And, uh, so, you know, they're, they're, they're doing well in their, uh, their, uh, Justin, they see the opportunity.
Speaker 0 00:06:14 So they both have, uh, stayed in Fort McMurray. Yeah.
Speaker 3 00:06:16 They both live in Fort Macquarie and they both stay here and one was in Edmonton and he moved up, uh, I guess in the past six months and now his full-time onsite and he's a red seal, journeyman electrician. And, uh, you know, he's, he loves it. He's loving life.
Speaker 0 00:06:31 That's awesome, man. That's great. So in regards to, uh, your campaign, like I've, I've never been on council, I've never ran for council. I don't know much about it, to be honest with you. And, uh, you're the first one who's been on here talking about council and re-election, what's something that people at home may not know about actually being a counselor and sitting on that, that group of individuals.
Speaker 3 00:06:54 Certainly a lot of people have the mind set. It's a meeting every second Tuesday. And, um, you know, a lot of days I'll take 10 or 15 calls a day from individuals, businesses. Um, and it's a lot of, uh, getting ready in preparedness. And it's about listening to the people in municipalities and, uh, and making sure you have their best efforts going forward. Also, there's a lot of, um, social events, um, and making sure you are meeting the right people and make sure you're, um, I guess representing council in a positive way. So to me, it's supporting all the nonprofits and agencies that would offer events. So to me, you know, some weeks you can put in 30 hours a week, some weeks you would insert me 60 hours a week. So it's not a, what I call a part-time gig. Like a lot of people
Speaker 0 00:07:40 That's right. Yeah, no, I, prior to COVID with all the different events, I went around him. I obviously, I went to a few of them and it blew my mind how often you and other counselors were there. I'm like, man, I only come to like one of these every week or two, every time I show up somebody here and more often than not, like I was getting paid to go, um, to do some form of work at these. And I was like, man, these guys are busy.
Speaker 3 00:08:05 You certainly put a lot of time and you do what you do, you know, for the love of the municipality and of what you do. So I think that's a, you know, very important, I guess, for me moving forward. And it's about supporting a lot of our nonprofits and our groups and making sure your, uh, I guess at events, you're listening to the right people and you're hearing the needs of our community.
Speaker 0 00:08:25 Yeah. In regards to, uh, moving forward into the community, what do you think are some things that this community is missing or lacking or could improve upon moving forward?
Speaker 3 00:08:36 Do we have one day
Speaker 0 00:08:38 And listen, we got all the time in the world. You can be a repeating guest. You can come back once a week. If you'd like,
Speaker 3 00:08:43 I think the municipality do, we do a lot of things, right? I think a lot of people in our administration do the best they can with the tools that they have. But I think now we have to change up our toolbox, um, during COVID a lot of businesses that hit very hard, but in our municipality, we lost double the businesses compared to everywhere else in Alberta. So to me, that's a red flag. If people put their lives into this municipality lives into their business or use their house. So there's no other second plans to double the amount of businesses close here. To me, that's heartbreaking. So for me, moving forward and I don't have all the answers, but I know that I've done a lot of research and I would like to see development, grants, development, incentives, tax incentives, things to attract business here in 2019, just in our urban center, we had around 72,000 people.
Speaker 3 00:09:32 Now we're around 50,000 people. So, you know, people are still leaving in a municipality. So I think we have to do more to attract business and maintain business. Um, on the second part of that, uh, we used to have a lot of, uh, events in the municipality events, uh, events would Buffalo, a lot of things for events and for, um, people do have fun. Yeah. Now when you want to have fun, you go to Edmonton Calgary, bam, Jasper. It's not knocking them as palliative. So I think we have to do a better job. And one of the things I would like to put forward is emotion. And I would like to put some money on the table and it might be a half, a million dollars, might be a million dollars and getting mother counselors to support that at a private individual. If you're going to put off an event like rip fast and you're going to put everything intuitive heat, if there's rain this weekend, he's bankrupt, he's lost everything.
Speaker 3 00:10:22 Um, instead of having a mediocre band, he could bring an amazing band if he had $50,000 and that's a three or four day event. So I would like to see funding for I'll call it the religious community to, instead of bringing in a hard rock band, ran a Christian festival of, I guess, a group I would like to see more Buster festivals. I would like to see more comedy festivals, more folk festivals. I would like to see a farmer's market for three days. So it's putting the, I guess, policies in place that we can help those people. But we're going to see a massive return, um, in our region and people staying in a region of spending money in a region. Also, I think when you do it right, you attract other people from outside of our region and we'll fill up hotel rooms and we'll just make it a better place to be.
Speaker 3 00:11:09 We're putting a lot of money into the river and riverfront revitalization. Now I would emotion through many months ago to link up the Maytee center with hotel trails, moccasin flats, about a side of the towers, just 200,000 a lot for, um, I guess a monument there. And it goes right down down. Um, I think with this here, there should be an event space down there and, uh, and to have events, um, and you know, multicultural events, uh, you know, I'll, I'll give heads, you know, hats off to Krista balsamic and her team that when we had, um, um, the patio party and when we had, uh, the food expo and stuff, it was done absolutely amazing. A lot of time, a lot of personal commitment, but everything that we do here is by someone's personal dime and there's no skin in the game for municipality. And I honestly think as a municipality, we should have a little bit of skin in the game and to have an event every second or third weekend for families and, and funding for people. I think it'll keep people in our region to keep funding in a reason and also prevent people from leaving a region. Right. And since 2019, if we had 20,000 people leaving red flags have to go off and say, you know what? We've got to do business a little bit differently.
Speaker 0 00:12:21 There you go. Love it. All right. Uh, Tanner has giving me a signal saying, Hey, I want to do my part of the show. We have a segment called the Mac CD minute it's Tanner segment. He's going to ask you some questions. Best of luck to you. Tanner hit him with the max 80 minute.
Speaker 4 00:12:34 Alrighty. Question number one for you today. What is the oddest place you've enjoyed a rum you hadn't had before?
Speaker 3 00:12:42 An honest place,
Speaker 4 00:12:44 The oddest place?
Speaker 3 00:12:49 Um, I would still have to go back to, uh, uh, Jamaica. Jamaica has four amazing distilleries there now, and they used to have 140. And, uh, so I've been introduced to Roman people's private collections in their home. So I had a great friend who introduced an amazing room in his home that I never saw before I rear rear bottle that I absolutely loved. So, you know, I still love, uh, I guess Jamaica and Jamaica rum. So I think, uh, it was at a gentleman's house in a bottle I've never seen before, and I'm going to get a kidney Candy's go around and see that. And I'm certainly excited. I love the history
Speaker 4 00:13:27 Question. Number two. What has been your most memorable moment you've had from your last term on council?
Speaker 3 00:13:35 Um, great question. Um, you know, a lot of people are very uncomfortable with it and it was defeated, but I think bringing up the issue of, uh, Pfeifle fly in, fly out and just to have people talk about it was to me the success and not to hide it under the carpet. And, uh, just to show people that our region that, you know, we care. And I think there shouldn't be a camp within a 35 pound radius. Uh, I know the camps are very important for turnaround and other things, but it's not a safety issue. So I just, I honestly think bringing that to light and have a conversation, but I think that was a success because a lot of people didn't want to talk about it.
Speaker 4 00:14:18 Question number three, having been involved in the food industry for over four years. What is the most interesting dish you learned about that you didn't know before?
Speaker 3 00:14:31 Uh, I would definitely say a ox Taylor Curry goat, and, uh, I made a 20 pound pot yesterday of oxtail and yeah, and I do everything outside under the trees and open flames. And, uh, so I'm definitely a cook by heritage and a chef by heart. And, uh, so I think, uh, coming from Newfoundland or our taste buds are a little bit different and the variety is not there. So I think, uh, cooking and tasting oxtail to me is one of the most amazing dishes in the world.
Speaker 4 00:15:00 Question number four. What do you think was your biggest personal challenge you had in your last term on council?
Speaker 3 00:15:11 I think the biggest personal challenge is, uh, is working with other individuals and, um, and, uh, everybody wouldn't call it, you know, pride and their differences aside. So I think the biggest challenges is, um, looking at other people's point of view from their shoes and moving forward and keeping the respect and, uh, and, um, integrity in place. So I think, you know, it's, it's a good learning lesson going forward and you're not always right to me, is working with people in a professional manner is truly important.
Speaker 4 00:15:45 And your final question, what do you think is the most underrated asset Fort McMurray has that people should pay more attention to
Speaker 3 00:15:53 A thousand percent the river system? Uh, you can go up to a different places on the river and there's benches, picnic tables, far pits. So absolutely amazing river system this time of year. Almost every time I go up, you can see black bears. Uh, I take a lot of people down in kayaks. We have like 12 or 15 kayaks and for multicultural just to show them the river and you can go right by the side of the bank and you can touch Tara sands was there. So just seeing that and seeing all the beavers on the river and the wildlife to me, is it just truly historical in an absolutely beautiful and seeing bald Eagles. And so I think, you know, our river system is truly under utilized
Speaker 4 00:16:33 And those have been your five questions.
Speaker 0 00:16:35 The river system is nuts in regards to like, I have a kayak as well. I have the divorce model is what it's called. It's a two man kayak, and that's what they sold it as. And you know what, the first, uh, first season I had it, they weren't wrong. It's, it's a tough one to like get in sync with, but, uh, it's amazing that you can live anywhere in Fort McMurray may be Timberly Addison beacon hill. And you put that kayak on the top of your boat or your top of your car. And you're down at the Snyder in less than 10 minutes. And you can just go.
Speaker 3 00:17:04 Absolutely. We always, uh, I have amazing neighbors in the I'll drop them off. They'll drop us off. So we go to the second boat launch, come on down. Yeah. It was just truly memorable. And, and, you know, people don't, you don't need to be good at it. You don't need experience is not to be, so it was just an amazing day on the, on the river front, and certainly forget about the rest of your life and the rest of issues. Everybody has issues in their life, but it's just a great relaxing day on the way.
Speaker 0 00:17:30 Yeah. Even doing a float. There's so many people like being born and raised here. I just remember as a kid teenager, more often than not, but like just doing the float, just getting like in a dinghy or a tube, tying some soda, pop to the side and just floating down, it takes a few hours and you just get to see what Fort McMurray has to offer. That's not just the city, it's, it's a beautiful system for sure.
Speaker 3 00:17:51 Absolutely. And you know, one of the things that I really want to do is I want to marina down on the river, um, cold lake has a beautiful marina. And, um, at the end of the year they just hook them onto the tow back on the shore. Right. So, you know, I want to see a marina and we have hundreds and hundreds of jet boats here. So we'd be able to park them down there to have food trucks around. Yeah. It'd be absolutely beautiful. Where are you thinking about that? Well, to me, you can put one in by the snow or across from Canadian. Tart is an old right there. There's lots of different places. You can put a marina and a, that people can put their boats and they pay monthly sort of boats there. I do think it could be a private individual or private company that runs it for profit.
Speaker 3 00:18:34 And, um, I think that would be an amazing feature. And there's one of the things I have in my, a campaign is I want to see, uh, I'm reading down the Snyder and I think it's a great opportunity for a local business to make money, but, you know, develop more of our downtown. One of the other things that's truly important in downtown for me is, um, an art center. Um, I strongly believe, and I know there's works that they're looking at a movie theater, but our people come here and they come here for work and oil sands mainly. Right. But if they got a way for husband's son or daughter, who's an artist, um, are in that field, the, the opportunities are very limited, cannot cut with the rise program. So to me, by having a incubator here for art center art center, I think would help revitalize our downtown with our district.
Speaker 3 00:19:22 And so to me, the funding for that is very important. We're not talking a lot of money and, uh, but you know, if it's two or $3 million to get a building and get them situated, uh, you know, Amy ramp is an amazing artist here. I'm sure you saw her work. Uh, we have a lot of indigenous, a lot of multicultural artists from all over the world. So when people come here, if they're going to bring something back from Fort MacMurray, bring back something from a local artist and from companies purchase stuff for Christmas gifts, that's purchased something from a local artist. Yeah. So I think, you know, um, that vision to me is very important as well.
Speaker 0 00:19:54 There you go. Sweet. Well, that's been our 20 minutes, so thank you very much for coming. Um, truly do mean this, say it to everybody. And I, hopefully you take me up on the offer, come back and again, and again, the seat is always open to you. And I know we have so much more than we could definitely talk about me. It'd be council or your rum room, or just, you got a shower. That's exactly. It it's been a pleasure. Thanks man. So before you go, though, everybody gets a, a shameless plug or a shout out. So this is your time to shine. So whatever you want to talk about, the mics on you,
Speaker 3 00:20:23 I think we have an amazing municipality is a great place to live, but I think we have to, you know, um, and, and no fault to nobody's, but I think we have to change what we're doing. I think we have to do a better job of mowing your lawn, trimming our grass, trying to win beautification awards, doing more for families and getting people to stay in our region. And I think we have to do more to make it attractive for businesses to come here. Um, I think that we're very blessed to have oil sends out our backyard and because 95% of our revenue comes from them, I think we stopped being creative. So I think we have to be creative, get businesses to come here. He don't help businesses sustain and do more for families.
Speaker 0 00:21:04 There you go. Awesome. Well, everybody at home for memory wood, Buffalo in the rest of the world, that's been another episode of the Mac city morning show. Thank you. Once again, for tuning in it truly does mean the world to me. Um, on that note, hopefully you're having a great day and we'll see you tomorrow. Peace.
