Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Cam Woolley: Toronto Mike'd #833

Episode Date: April 12, 2021

Mike chats with CP24's Cam Woolley about his decades with the OPP, his first retirement, working at CP24, why he's retiring (again!) and what's next for him. This is Cam's exit interview.

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Your outsourced IT department. Contact Barb. She's Barb at cdntechnologies.com. Ridley Funeral Home, pillars of the community since 1921. And Mike Majeski, or as I call him, Mimico Mike. He's the real estate agent who's ripping up the Mimico real estate scene. Learn more at realestatelove.ca. I'm Mike from torontomike.com and joining me in the backyard on a rainy Monday, it's Cam Woolley. Welcome, Cam. Thanks a lot, Mike. It's kind of neat back here. You're used to, you know, Bell Media media big productions uh how is this for doing it yourself you're comfortable back here this is awesome i'm used to live stuff so it uh we don't even get an umbrella out there so it's uh you got like two umbrellas this is really cool well yeah this is

my camping tarp like this is so so this the stuff over this is my camping tarp and then this i actually uh had to get a new umbrella for your appearance because my old umbrella was basically broken. So I was like, I checked the forecast and I said, I need an umbrella now because I got Cam Woolley in the backyard tomorrow morning. But dude, what a pleasure it is to meet you. Yeah, thanks. This is a lovely umbrella.

It's kind of nice to be back here too in Etobicoke. I grew up in Etobicoke and it's so nice back here with all the trees and the nice old homes. It just has a great feel. And you didn't have too far to go to get here because you were live on location at Cloverdale Mall. Yeah, another vaccination site opening up. City's doing a really good job with those. They're well planned. The firefighter in charge of the one going on today, actually, we've known each other oh, many decades since we were teenagers. And he had extra spots inside so people wouldn't have to

wait in the rain. There's a bit of confusion, though, because of these hot spots. And that's the problem. The mass vac spots aren't for the hot spots, even though they might be in a hot spot. So let me get this right. This is for 50 plus, right? Is it 50 plus? You're right. 50 plus if you're in a hotspot or otherwise age 60. But now the weirdness is there are some hotspots that are so hot. It's 18 plus, but these sites aren't geared for that. They're the pop-ups where nobody knows where they're going.

There should be like a Twitter account where you just basically follow the Twitter account and it lets you know where the hot spot is today. Like, where did it pop up? Yeah, that seems to be a bit of an issue. There seems to be some concern that they'll get overwhelmed because we do know that some of the ones that have been at places of worship or community locations, there's been massive lineups. So I think they're afraid about that sort of thing.

But it is confusing. We had dozens of people show up hoping that they could just get in line and that these are appointment only. Now, Cam, you're not quite 50 years old yet, but did you get your jab? Yeah. Well, I'm old enough to retire, so that gives you a hint. I did. And it was kind of neat.

I felt like a camper, a brand-new camper, a summer camp, with all the counselors welcoming you. They had staff about literally every three or four meters going this way, this way. And there were some people that were pretty hesitant, and they calmed them down. And it was overall quite pleasurable. Even the telephone part of the customer service was good, which you don't usually expect with a government involved. Well, okay, that's good news. That's good news. Now, there's so many things I want to discuss with you, but right off the top, the big news of the hour,

I should play a sound effect, but Cam, you're leaving us, like you're leaving us. Yeah, it's time to retire for me. I did 30 years OPP and 13 years as a reporter in CP24. And time to maybe just relax for a bit. We've been looking down in eastern Ontario. My wife's family's from there. And we started looking several years ago. Thought, well, we'll just get a feel for the real estate. We actually didn't see anything we really liked. And as you get older, you get pretty fussy.

So we did find the perfect spot. And that was that. When's your last day on CP24? liked and as you get older you get pretty fussy so we we did find the the perfect spot and that was that when's your last day on cb24 april 15th is my last day it's a thursday okay so okay so you sound like such a cop there april 15th so in like three days like this is okay yep i'm done in three days and that's that so this is like your exit interview. It could be. I don't think I get one at Bell. No, this is it. I don't think they do it for retirement. For the record.

Okay, so, and again, just to be clear here, you decided. Like, you made a personal choice that you're going to enjoy real retirement instead of this working every morning. Because you had early mornings, right? Like, so this is your choice to step away. This isn't part of some Bell Media. No, no, no. There's, no, no. They've been wonderful.

I told them about a year ago I was thinking about it, and I just promised to give lots of notice, which I did. And it was more of a case of finding the sort of ideal forever home. And it was so hard to find. My wife and I decided if we find it, that'll be the way to go. It's hard. One thing I would, some advice that I've followed for years is pick a job you like, but leave it while you still like it. I did that when I was a copper.

I retired at 30 years and I was happy when I left. But, you know, you see people that stay in some businesses too long and they get bitter. And I didn't want that to happen. I didn't want that to happen here too. I still like getting up at 2.30 in the morning and going to work. It's pretty cool to have multiple retirements. I think of, there's only one other person I can think of at CP24 who had such a luxury. And that's my dear friend, Ann Romer. Oh yeah, yeah.

Annie and I known each other since we were young teens. I love Ann. Okay. So she was on actually pretty recently. She kicked out the jams with me, I think Anne. Okay, so she was on Rack. She pretty recently, she kicked out the jams with me, I think within the last three weeks she was on the program. And I got lots of time for Anne, but she, of course, famously had her retirement at CP24.

Did you buy her a Keg gift card? Yeah, I was at one of her retirements. Okay, so did you ask her gently, like, Anne, can I have my gift card back, my Keg gift card? Did you tap her on the shoulder and say, this is not cool? No. You know what?

She's just been dining out on this because every night she can order the Keg on all these gift cards she got from all those retirements. Yeah, she's doing pretty well on that. There's quite a few. And Anne's got a good sense of humor about it but again she left on her own and then she came back

and she left on her own and she came back so Cam is there any chance you coming back is what I'm wondering are you like a boomerang cut from the Romer cloth you're going to be back in a few months no it's about a four hour drive so I don't think that's going to happen they did say hey do you want to do something in Ottawa

and I said I'm not looking for a transfer. Okay, and I hope you were warned by Carl. These are tough questions you're going to get drilled here. These are not softball questions. But any possibility of you entering politics? I'm looking you in the eye right now. I think that's in your blood that you're entering politics. You know, it's funny that that has come up,

and I did consider it quite actively at one point, and I was recently talking to a fellow, you may know, I won't give his full name, Doug. I know a Doug. You know my guess, which Doug? Another Etobicoke guy. Yeah, another Etobicoke guy, and we were talking about retirement and that, and I was

saying, you know, Premier, you must be making about $4 an hour, because he's working, that poor guy is working so hard. And that's one of the things. I'm at a stage in my life I'd like to take it easy. And when I see how hard those people are working, and all the politicians generally, I'm not favorable to any particular party, to be honest,

but a lot of them are working crazy hours right now. I don't know. I would have chalked you up as a PC guy. That's just my feeling. I don't see Cam Woolley running for the Green Party. I don't know. You know that chalked you up as a PC guy. That's just my feeling. I don't see Cam Woolley running for the Green Party. I don't know. You know that Mike Schreiner is a cool guy. I don't know if you had to talk to Mike.

No, but Ralph Ben-Murgy worked on his campaign, and Ben-Murgy is a friend and a client of mine, so I feel like I'm very closely connected to Mike. I've had a chance to talk to Mike a number of times. When you hear Green Party, I thought he would be an environmentalist and being the head guy, I thought he'd put the mental in environmental. But actually Mike is knowledgeable in almost any

topic. He's a really interesting guy. I think he's a great party leader and I think had he been a PC or liberal, he'd probably maybe be premier someday. Okay, well shout out to the Green Party. And also Mike, I have a client, Dr. Diane Sachs, who is now running for the Green Party, actually.

So maybe it's only a matter of time before I get all these Green Party people in the backyard. They won't let me in. I got too many big block engine cars. That'll do it. You're right. You got to be like me. I bike everywhere.

Okay, they want me. They say, come on over here, bike Mike. Okay, so Cam, lots of questions, but I have some statements, not statements, comments from people when I said Cam Woolley was dropping by. Mike Lynch, for example, he writes, Cam Woolley, four question marks. He goes, awesome. Please ask him how much he enjoyed Dance Party Friday.

Well, I'm a horrible dancer. And sometimes there's a thing where we can listen to the station. It's called an IFB or internal full box, so you don't hear your own voice if it works right. Great. I have a button like that. I'm afraid to press it. I never know exactly what will happen.

Well, I didn't always hear the music. I had people trying to sign me up for dance lessons, but I think it worked out well. What I quite enjoyed is I'd hear the music and people in the street did, and I'd be at some live location. I'd start dancing, and I'd try and rope people on the street into dancing with me. And it was just fun watching the reactions, some running the other way, some people would dance.

And we had police officers, soldiers, firefighters, and just regular citizens dance, others that would take off at high speed. So good question, Mike Lynch. Only Mike's going to ask questions on this show. No, I'm lying, because Rick says, I'm looking forward to Cam Woolley. Who isn't? Everybody's looking forward to Cam. I bet he's... Okay, I'm going

to read this verbatim. Remember, this is from Rick, and you can reply as you wish. I bet he's not a fan of Julian Fantino. Cam was great as a media officer, but the commissioner didn't think so again i'm just reading this from rick i don't but what what do you say about that comment cam well it it uh all a lot of these comments have some truth when julian fantino first came to the opp as commissioner uh we'll just say we had a difference of opinion at first

uh then we had a meeting one morning. I wanted to talk to him. There was some things came up, and the 20-minute meeting ended up going for about two hours. Whoa. And we, after that, got along quite well. What I can say about Julian, and didn't agree with everything he did,

we still talk, by the way, super hardworking guy. He got us our black and white cars back, got rid of the funny hats. He was quite a traffic man. He pulled over dozens of dangerous drivers in the unmarked vehicle. He actually, what I liked about him is because of his hard work ethic, he kind of cleaned things out at headquarters. And sometimes you need an outsider to come in and do some of that work. And frankly, overall, it was actually pretty positive. Okay, good. So good question, Rick. I wasn't sure what question will get me in what trouble,

but that was a good one there. Okay. By the way, have you ever pulled over, and we're going to get to your policing career, but have you ever pulled over a cyclist for cycling erratically? No, no. Well, I was an OPP officer. So, well, actually, I guess I should qualify that by saying I did pull over a few cyclists. There are very few in the 401 because it's against the law. Yeah, you're not allowed on the 401. I would get the odd one. And typically, they were just lost or had other issues.

And we would typically just give them a ride to safety. And it was always OK. OK, good. When I was 17, not far from here, actually, I somehow accidentally turned onto, I think it was on the Queensway or something. I accidentally found, I said, oh my God, I'm on the Gardiner. Like I was cycling away.

This is many moons ago. I'm a little older than 17 now, but I still remember like, and at the point I realized I'm on the Gardiner, I had to like literally throw my bike my bike over, like, a fence and climb a fence. I was so scared to be cycling on the Gardiner. So it happens. You get turned around sometimes.

Well, I bicycled through Europe when I was 16, had a great time. The infrastructure there for bicycling is just wonderful. Maybe you shouldn't be with the Green Party. Maybe not. But what happened one day is a bunch of students from Europe came, flew into Pearson, got their bicycles off the plane and started cycling, and they ended up on the 409, and they were petrified.

But I could understand it. Being in Europe, okay, you get in your bike and you go places. So they followed whatever map they were given, and we were able to luckily get them. There was enough cruisers we could load up the bicycles okay, you get in your bike and you go places. So they followed whatever map they were given. And we were able to luckily get them, there was enough cruisers we could load up the bicycles and take them to safety. And they didn't actually speak much English. They were German.

So we had to explain, this is verboten. Autobahn. Autobahn. Brian, shout out to Brian, Brian G. He says, love Cam. His life is real talk. So there's a lot of real talk on this show. So if you ever need to share something you've never shared before,

this is the place to do it, Cam. He goes, the perfect guest on his career in future retirement. So love from Brian to you, Cam. There's no question there. He just wants to let you know he loves you. The Cleaning Guy, he says, I hear Cam Wooley is retiring. He has been very qualified on his

beat considering his background in law enforcement. He has his own style. He will be greatly missed! Two exclamation marks. That's very nice. You don't always get the two. No. That's good. Charles Brandt. Love to Charles Brandt. He says, Cam is great and I will miss seeing him on CP24 in the morning.

Will Cam sleep in more when he retires? Oh, I think that's pretty easy, because we have to get up about 2.30 in the morning now. What I usually do, you get up about then, have a quick breakfast, go over the, we have camera guys on patrol throughout the night, so I check in with them. There are some emails from them, then I get up in the truck and then I start phoning duty inspectors and the police services and others. They don't always tweet everything as you might figure out. And I basically call a bunch of my sources and then we drive around and we have a look.

This morning, for example, I was at a truck rollover. We didn't know what was going on with it. And the best thing to do is on the way to work i'm going to go check it out and we we did that uh some days we move around a lot and then of course we got police scanners going in the truck so you're always listening to something uh is there something more pressing about to happen or you hear it starting to develop and then we coordinate with our assignment people what else have we got? Should we go? Should we just drop this now?

Cause there's that thing. Sometimes you, you might drop a fairly good story and end up with nothing. Right. So we have to decide if it's worth it. Do we have the helicopter up? Can they go check it? Do we have another camera guy?

You've got an exciting job, but you sure you want to retire? I don't know. It's a lot like policing. It's very, basically the same thing. So, okay.

Okay. That's great. Cause we're going to get into that segue in like uno momento. But I guess I'm wondering when you're on the scene, let's say there's a terrible truck turnover or something at like 3.30 in the morning and you're there or whatever. Are there any other local media people who might also be on that same beat? Like would you get to know the – so you're the CP24 guy. Are there others? I don't know, 680 News or would you, you get to know the, uh, like you, you, so you're the CP24 guy. Are there others, I don't know, 680 news or wherever where you'll, you'll get to know these people.

Oh yeah. So do you want to, do you want to shout them out? Yeah. Carl from 680 and, uh, actually all the networks, it's kind of funny. They compete at, uh, the corporate level, but most of the reporters, uh, get along quite well. And, uh, and within reason. Nobody's going to share a scoop, but routine stuff.

And with us, because we're on every half hour anyway, there's a lot of sort of cooperation. We try not to get in each other's way. We try and set up our cameras so we don't ruin someone's shot or our audio. We try and sort of keep enough distance so that we're not, hey, CP24, when somebody else is trying to go hey you're listening to 680 knows so there's a general uh sort of camaraderie and then uh you know some some of us that we have developed uh further friendships where we'll uh we have tend to have different contacts so uh you know i'll show you mine so let me ask you this so let's call it a rolodex i'm sure it's digital but it's more exciting when you call it a rolodex so you're you're done thursday

yeah who gets the rolodex it it's gonna get deleted uh so so carl can't be like hey buddy got some contacts for me uh hey do you like beer you know it's like if i was thinking bob mckenzie okay yeah we all love bob mckenzie but that rololodex, which is really, that's a big Rolodex he's got. Like, I always thought, like, does he give it to his son, right? Because his son works for Sportsnet. Like, is that, you know what I mean? Like, who gets that Rolodex? Bob says, I'm done.

People are asking about it, but it's going to get deleted. There's a lot of them that are, whether it's a personal relationship. Some of these people I've worked with or have known them decades. So let's take Doug for an example. Like if I said to you right now, put Doug on speakerphone, could you, I mean, he might be busy doing something or whatever, but if he sees your number across his phone, he takes your call? Yeah.

Let's do it. I got questions. No, no, no, no. I'm not going to do that. It turns out Toronto Mike ends up with Cam Woolley's, his Rolodex when it's all said and done. That's the... If this is Cam, hang up now.

Oh, yeah. No, that's great. Okay, so I want to just shout out Carl real quick. You mentioned him there. So at 680 News, Carl Hansky, he's been there a long time, does great work, and he works similar hours to you. Yeah, Carl and I are up he works similar hours to you. Yeah, Carl and I are up early.

We have our 3.30 in the morning talks sometimes, like, hey, what are you doing? Because sometimes it'll sort of save him starting to drive halfway to Burlington when this boss, I just saw a cam in a truck, turn around and come back, and vice versa. So there is some cooperation, or, or hey what do you know about this and while i talk i talk to the sergeant on the scene and carl's maybe talk to a detective back at the station and then we compare notes and and see and then sometimes we each get a little piece

of the puzzle and when and then we're sometimes able to put it well actually not just sometimes we frequently put it the whole thing together. He's going to miss you. Yeah, yeah, I'll miss Carl. He's a super guy. And see, I knew Carl since I was a police officer. A lot of these media folks, I already had a relationship with. Because you were the media. What's that title that you have when you're the media liaison?

That could be it. Now, what had happened is the OPP didn't really have it for decades, and it was just whoever was there. And because I was on the unit and investigated the fatals and the truck crashes since the 80s, I was talking to them anyway, and then it was only my last couple of years when they said, oh, we should have a guy. You want to do it?

You're kind of doing it anyway. It wasn't even on my job description. But you were a natural, which explains everything. So, okay, so just before we get to that, because that's actually the next stop on our journey here, but just to put a bow on the Carl Hanski thing. Carl's the reason you're sitting here today. Is that fair to say? Yeah. Because you never heard of me. Would you cancel? I used to call myself the guest you get when the good guest cancels. No, but Carl and Michelle Butterly this summer are going to pay a visit to the Backyard Studio.

They could bring their dog and everything. Oh, yeah. Beautiful dog. So shout out to Carl. But yeah, thanks to Carl for letting you know about this whole thing that's happening here. Carl's a good, he's an FOTM who hasn't yet made his debut for a variety of reasons, but we're going to get that settled this summer. So shout out. So you're a cop.

Did you always want to be a police officer? Like what caused you to go into the force? Actually, I didn't really know what to do. I went to Upper Canada College, and it's not usual for a UCC boy to end up a cop. They're more often like a stockbroker or a lawyer. My dad was a corporate lawyer and kind of hoped I'd go that way. Yeah, stuff like that. And what happened is I did go to university, but it just wasn't much fun.

I knew one thing I did figure out is I didn't want to have a desk job. And while going to university, I had a summer job at an Ontario place in the OPP police tent. And this is like in the late 70s. And I met these young men and women, and they were really interesting. And I'm a total car guy, and they're doing car guy stuff on the highway and I'm thinking oh that might be neat and at the time all the baby boomers were hitting the job market at once and they were getting five ten thousand applications for a few hundred spots and I was also interested in a car in the car

business itself so I applied to Northwestern University in the States. They had a car business program and I applied to the OPP. They were both really hard to get into and I thought, well, I'm going to let fate choose this and whoever calls me first, I'll see. Because they were both kind of long shots to get

into and I lucked out and got the OPP one. And because I'm from Toronto, in the OPP, a lot of people didn't want to work in Toronto because of the sort of pace of life and the cost of living. And they were, hey, this idiot will work here. So I don't know. We'll take him anyway. So I was able to, because I grew up in Toronto and I liked the pace of things. So that's what I did. And it was really a wonderful career. And you kind of touched on this earlier, but you just were naturally good with the media? Like this was just a natural born communications gift that you had?

I guess. In that I was at these crashes, the media would show up and some truck roll over and they go, hey, officer, what happened? And the OPP policy at the time was well yeah you can tell the media whatever you want just uh uh don't uh say anything bad uh basically the typical stuff don't don't drop any f-bombs and don't name any young offenders and do they say like just use the word allegedly a lot isn't that the secret just every time you say something just say allegedly and it gets you off the hook.

Lawyers like that word. This is a great moment to bring in a question from Linda. Linda says, can you ask him if all police officers receive media training? If a reporter shows up on scene, can any police officers speak to a reporter or are there only

a few who can speak to a reporter? Great question. Tell us how it was and how it is now. speak to a reporter or are there only a few who can speak to a reporter great question yeah that's that tells how it was and how it is now well they they are becoming most police services want a supervisor or a designated person there they are afraid of mixed messaging and that sort of thing so they don't generally want the constable that's actually typically trying to uh deal with whatever is going on also to be distracted. So they generally will refer it to a supervisor. Most of the police services do have,

well, all of them have some form of media training, but it's not mandatory. Most of the officers are just given the basic instruction. I used to give that instruction, and a lot of it is just, look, the media can, wherever is a public place, they can bring their cameras, they can ask people things. But generally they want somebody that's qualified to speak. Now, do you remember Jesse and Gene?

Oh, of course. I was on their show. We got into all kinds of trouble on that show. And I thought I got away with it. One time on their show, I said there was a particular town that we didn't like to do ride in because we couldn't tell if they were drunk or inbred. And I figured at the time, Q107 played this headbanger music. Of course, yeah.

There's no way headquarters could stand it. So they won't know. And a police officer met me just a few years ago and go, oh, you're the guy. What do you mean? I met the commissioner years ago and he played this tape of you saying that and said, now don't you guys do it. Don't any of you guys ever do this. Only Cam can get away with it.

That's amazing. That's amazing. I bring it up because I heard from Gene this morning. Oh, yeah. They were great fun. We went, they went, somebody told them, a trucker told them women show them their breasts when they're driving. So they decided they were going to go in a

truck and see if it was true. Yeah. We heard about it. So we followed in the police car to make sure they didn't cause a crash. So they ended up getting kind of a police escort and we ended up back in the studio. That's amazing.

And I remember the boss is going, what are you guys doing? Well, we're just keeping things safe, boss. Yeah. But that, that, that's a good example of something back then you could do that, but you couldn't do that today. Like this, this environment you couldn't even Yeah, it might doing well. We're just keeping things safe, boss. Yeah, but that's a good example of something. Back then, you could do that, but you couldn't do that today. Like, this environment, you couldn't even, like... Yeah, it might not fly.

You couldn't appear like you were supporting the flashing, the public flashing of truckers. Well, we weren't supporting them. We were more concerned if these guys, if somebody started doing silly driving beside them and ended up crashing in the truck. So we just hung back and just made sure that things were moving. So, so Geneville, actually, so I work closely

with Peter Gross. Did you ever, you ever, I guess. Yeah, I crossed paths with Peter a few times when he was, he was still at City when I started, I think he was, he left shortly thereafter. Yeah, he came back. He did. So he left, he quit in like a, a coke induced rage,

like literally, because he had an 80s. There was a few guys that were... What are those names? I need those names. You can guess. Some of them will tell you about it here. Look, I produced Gallagher and Gross Save the World. I've heard these stories. Are you kidding me? Honestly, John Gallagher and Peter Gross, it's unbelievable.

But Peter Gross, he actually had an episode last summer where he had a stroke. But it was one of these strokes, like so he doesn't seem to have any ill effects after the fact, but, because I guess they I don't know the term anymore, but there are some strokes that you can, they come and they they don't kill you or anything or even they, so I would say it's the good

stroke, I hope that doesn't get me in trouble with the heart and stroke people, because there's probably no good stroke, but Peter Gross had one of these, and then Jean Valaitis from Jesse and Jean just had the same type of stroke episode in vancouver so i just want to say because i know gene will be listening uh get better soon buddy he's a good fotm you're now an fotm by the way friend of toronto mike but gene's a good fotm and i hope you get better soon friend and uh he he wanted to piggyback on Linda's question there, which I thought was awesome. And Gene wrote, I agree with Linda. Can cops on the scene not do the usual?

At approximately 12.03 p.m., a male suspect was observed. He says, speak English. He says that's a boring cop speak, and he thinks that the communication from cops should be more human. Oh, I agree. And what's interesting is the OPP media relations course, that's what they tell you. One of the first things, there was a motor vehicle southbound in 400 in lane one caused braking to apply.

They're saying, no, speak in common language. I remember my boss used to say, speak so that grandma from the old country knows what you're talking about. Oh, yes. And I try to get, if there's a little bit of a joke to it, depending on if it's appropriate, I'll throw that in or an analogy or something like that. Cam, you were the OPP officer of the year in 2005. Yes. Did that come with like a plaque or a trophy?

Like what do you get when you're OPP officer? Because that sounds like a great accomplishment. that was a it was a huge surprise to me i honestly thought the boss was punking me he was pretty my boss at the time the chief superintendent guy named bill grudzinski was later one of the bosses of go transit uh for his uh retirement uh after job he just retired from that uh i thought chief was having me on, as they were generally investigative-type guys that were winning that award, and I got it for more or less public awareness around road safety.

So it was a great honour and a lot of fun. Yeah, you get a little trophy, and I have that at home in a place of honour. That means it's in the bathroom. Is that what you're telling me? Where is this? Do you have a trophy case? We have an honorable closet.

No, you get a lot of this stuff. It is funny that we often used to joke about all these plaques you put in a carton in the basement. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, I think I have some public speaking trophies from the early 80s. Well, yeah, there's a lot. Most of the guys have what they call a me wall. Right.

And you put all these things and you get all these uh okay but that's all okay so that's awesome first of all that's like your opp officer of the year for 2005 uh but it's not long after right that you retire from the yeah about three years it was 2008 september 2008 i took 11 hours off and then uh switched to cp24 and okay so uh and you're telling i guess this is what you alluded to earlier because i asked you because i was thinking oh cam's retiring he's going to be running as a as an mpp for uh doug in the pc part this is what i envisioned i should say i allegedly i think i know nothing this is all me guessing in uh it would have been a good guess if it wasn't for covid it looks like it i'd have

to but you're smart to work i think i think you're i think you're. I think you're a genius here because what you've done is you're going to parachute in post-COVID. Okay. This is the best timing possible. Listen, Cam, I know it's up here. You are going to enjoy some time with your family and you're going to enjoy some time working on the cars out in this mysterious location that's hours and hours away. But I think then the next election will be post COVID. Well, most of us will have been vaccinated and hopefully things have a more sense

of normalcy. You could go to a Jays game at the dome. Things will feel a more like Toronto and you won't be in Toronto, but you'll be running somewhere outside of Toronto in Ontario for the, I think that's the time. Like that's the time. None of that COVID stink will be stuck on you. Yeah.

Well, you're a genius cam yeah well we'll see i don't it sounds like a lot of work and that's one thing i've learned as a reporter because that did have some appeal and now when i see the hours you got to put in i'm kind of wondering yeah but covid time it's exceptional times uh it's not going to be that tough post covid uh anyway i'm not again this is all my speculation but I only bring that up to say that it sounds like in 2007, you almost did run as a PC party candidate in the 2007 provincial election. Like you were that close, right? Yeah. Now what would happen? It's kind of interesting.

Had I been a Toronto cop, I probably would have because the Toronto copper, you can kind of leave any time. And if you decide you want to leave, you can take your pension and go. On the province, though, after 10 years, it's locked in. And if you leave five seconds early, there's a giant penalty. And there was massive penalties. I would have been about a year. It was about a year difference. And at the time, it was nah.

And I did enjoy my career in the OPP. So I didn't know. Sure. Well, you did 30 years? Yeah, yeah. Wow. Well, that's, it was funny as people say, well, you know, when did you decide? Well, I decided on my second day.

I was at the OPP Academy and some old guy who was twice my age, about 40, explained, I just wanted the job. I didn't actually ever think about anything else. And when you're 21, you don't think that, uh, down the road, cause each year is a big deal. And as you get older, they speed up as you know. But, uh, this guy said, oh, you could have a second career. You could leave at 51 years old. And I remember thinking, Hey, that'd be cool.

I'd love to have another career. I didn't really guess on this one. I thought it would be something else with cars and i actually did have another business for about 20 years in the open i got oh i got questions about that so put a pin on that one that's coming up for sure i got lots of questions about that one but uh how did uh bell media and cp20 but how did they seduce you like did they just make you an offer you couldn't refuse what happened there no it uh i did enjoy working with the media people and i do enjoy

going to these scenes and uh when the word came out that i was going to retire i i did get some calls from some media folks that said hey would would you uh consider working with us and it was bell and some other companies and uh i knew the sort of senior people at both right and frankly that the uh boss at Bell at the time was a fellow named Paul Rogers, who was just a prince of a guy. And a great musician, right? I feel like he was.

Not that Paul Rogers. And I really trusted his sort of view on it. Because at the time, CP24 was a nothing. There was almost no ratings. It was a city had owned it, and they had used it as a little local cable station. Because it used to be,

it used to be that Breakfast Television, which airs on City TV, that's a Rogers station, by the way, that that was simulcast on CP24 until,

obviously, until the, I guess, Bell, whatever, they had, CRTC said you can't own both, basically.

Well, yeah. What happened is Bell bought basically the old Chum properties. Right. And then there are rules about how many you can own. You can't own a whole market. Right, because they already own CTV. Yeah, yeah.

They said you can't have CTV and City TV. That's right. You've got to choose one. And CP24 was part of the bargain. And then Bell could have just sold it, closed it, run it just the way they were. Citi kind of ran it as an afterthought. It wasn't really staffed. It was just sort of leftover news stuff

and they played reruns of old news. And Lorne Honickman had a show. I got to shout out my buddy Lorne. Oh yeah, Lorne. I remember Lorne. I was on his show a few times. I'm producing his new show. He's got a new...

Yeah, he's a wonderful man. Yeah, he is. I remember as a reporter, I remember we went to law school and then Lauren and I crossed paths a number of times over the years. But what happened was Bell decided that they would invest in this thing and actually make it a news channel, a legit news channel. And a lot of people didn't think it was going to work.

And sort of a backstory here, back to Ann Romer. Yeah, yes. Annie and I used to get, the boss would grab Annie and I and we'd go on the road with our boss to advertisers and try and convince them that CP24 was a legit deal. Right. And we'd play the little brother-sister act because we'd known each other since we were 12 or 13.

Right. Because at the time, the ratings were low, and we had people that really doubted it would even fly. I remember the first few press conferences, it was, you know, know who the bleep are you and they wouldn't let me ask questions and uh they it was if i was uh coming from some basement you know what it's as if you're uh correspondent for toronto miked i don't think it was that bad mike they didn't let me in because the camera guy had a fancy camera, but that was about it. But it was kind of odd at first, and it took a while to kind of... And remember, I'm not a trained journalist, and it's different to being a guest.

I've done lots of times, and it was pretty easy, I thought. And I thought being the host was the same thing, and I remember the first day going, ooh, what have I got myself into? I bet. I bet. Okay, so at what point, you know, speaking, we spoke earlier about all the cokeheads in the 80 thing. And I remember the first day going, Ooh, what have I got myself into? I bet. I bet. Okay. So at what point, you know, speaking, we'd spoke earlier about all the Coke heads in the eighties. Uh, at what point does Steve Anthony host that? Well, that was one of the ones I was alluding to that I wouldn't say. I love, I love Steve. I think he would tell you about, you know, he's addicted to now, uh, no more, no more Coke in his life, but he, uh, he, yes, there is Coke in his life, but it's Coke Zero.

Yep. He is addicted to Coke Zero. Is that an addiction? I don't believe that. Maybe. Yeah. Steve had some crazy stories. Oh my God.

Yeah. There's some, go in the back catalog of Toronto Mic'd and listen to the Steve Anthony stories. But okay. I guess at some point, CP24, credit to you, credit to Ann Romer, but it starts to become a legitimate force in the local media. And today, I mean, COVID, I don't go in as much as I used to, but I couldn't go into like a brunch place or a pizza

joint without seeing CP24 on the wall, like on the television in there. Like it seems to be the station of local restaurants and bars and et cetera. Like it's everywhere. Yeah, it is. Don't tell City TV it's everywhere because they have a trademark. Well, I know that's their trademark,

but it is kind of funny. It's often that we're at some scene or outside and even outside homes, maybe there was a shooting like on your street there. Oh, yeah, exactly. And then I can see us on, I look and we can look in the living room window, hey, we're on.

Right. Hey, that's us. Yeah, it's like, oh yeah, we're live. I can see us in the pizza. Well, it helps get guests too. They'll come out and go, hey, we just saw you. So you basically, you know, earlier you were being coy because you're a good communicator.

You're talking about how there is, you're talking to CP24 and some other mysterious, it's breakfast television. Okay, who else would, you were either going to go to CP24 or breakfast television. Yeah, that was, well, I'll tell you one of the things there is I had a lot of friends there and it's a lovely show and they're great people there. Kevin Frank just and I had known each other since he was like a little Buckeye Junior reporter. In the Barry.

Oh, yeah, yeah. We'd do stuff and I was, that was definitely a contender. But, you know, the late Ted Rogers, he was the only guy in the family that really loved the TV business, and the rest of the family were more sort of business-oriented. I was sort of worried about the business future, and frankly, the CTV felt kind of neat. On one hand, you go with an established, at the time, number one morning show with some friends, which had a heck of a lot of appeal. Or do you want to go with this brand new station?

You don't want to go into a place that's the king because they were the king before you. And all it can do is go down. I think you want to go to the place where you can actually take it to number one. Like Steve Anthony came over waving a press release in his hand because just before he retired in Prince Edward County, he's doing a lot of different things now. Yeah, I listen to him all the time.

He voices all these shows I like to watch. Yes, he's got his video. He gets his beak and everything. But he was very, very proud of the fact he was leaving CP24 with CP24 Breakfast being number one, like ahead of Breakfast Television. Like this was a massive accomplishment. You guys caught Breakfast Television and beat them in these key demos. Like this was something Steve was extremely proud of before he left.

Yeah, it's kind of neat. And I didn't know what a demo even was. I'm just some road cop there. My expertise was truck crashes. And then the boss at the time, when the CTV first took over, had a visionary guy named Bob McLaughlin. He was one of those guys, if you want to create something, you get Bob. You want to keep it running, you say goodbye, Bob.

Right, right. Bob was brilliant. He set it up to basically what it is now. But he brought the sales guys in to explain what all that is. And I'd say, well, what about that? Well, all these people are watching. Well, they don't count. They don't spend any money, you know?

Right, right. Yes. Now, Mike Grogodsky sent in a question, and just a moment ago when you mentioned, you know, traffic safety, I thought this is a good time to bring it up. Mike G says, can you ask Cam what one traffic safety issue, what's one traffic safety issue he would like to see become a rule slash law that is not currently enforced?

So is there something out there that would speak to Mike's query? Yeah, there's one that it's on the books, but it's rarely enforced, and that's the drivers that drive too slowly. And everybody would, a lot of people would complain about that because they're the ones that cause. Like going 80 on the 401. Yeah, then doing 99 in what the truckers call the hammer lane, and then everybody behind gets mad and starts doing stupid stuff.

It's as dangerous as speeding. Yeah, it really is. It's not more so, maybe. Yeah, and then you try and pull them over, and they're the idiots that'll stop in the passing lane and cause a big wreck. So I think that's a good one there. I'd like to see more enforcement of that.

Good idea. Matthew Carrick, by the way, he says, shout out to Cam Woolley for getting to retire twice. Twice is in all caps. And he also, and again, we've already shouted out Ann Romer, but that is pretty cool that you get to have a, like in COVID times, can they, like, can you even have your CP24 cake on Thursday?

No, no, no. Carl Hansky wanted to take me to breakfast. I go, Carl, there isn't even a restaurant open. We're not doing that.

It's a, no, it'll be a virtual thing. So far, all we've done is sort of have a telephone chat about it. When I was driving home one day, when I decided I'd let my coworkers know. Right. So when did you make the announcement? Was this recently that you just announced it?

Yeah, fairly recently. The boss knew for a while so they can do their planning. And then we kept it kind of quiet until fairly recently. We announced it to our people and then the next day on CP24. So I do want to talk about this other business you've been involved in that involves vehicles and media. And it's really cool. I got questions about that, but I'm want to talk about this other business you've been involved in that involves vehicles and media. And it's really cool. I got questions about that. But I'm going to just give you some gifts for retiring. Okay.

So I don't have any keg, no keg gift cards. Okay. And I don't have any. I still got some of those from the last time. I hope my wife will go Saturday. I envision your wallet. You know the George Costanza wallet where you can hardly close it? I envision you and Anne, when you get together,

you've got these big, fat wallets, and it's just stacked with keg gift cards. Yeah, they're all only $25, though. We have a lot of cheap friends. And that doesn't go very far, the keg. I've been to the keg. I think that's a fancy drink, isn't it? I think that's you've got to get a coffee and one slice of cake,

and you've got to share it with your girl. Oh, yeah, yeah. And even then, you've got to pony up some real cash. So here's some real gifts that you're taking home with you, Cam. And I got to say, we appreciate you in this city and we're going to miss you. Where do I start? How about with our good friends at Great Lakes Brewery? They're not far from here.

You know that. They're down the street from the Costco, as I like to say in Etobicoke here. And they brew fresh craft beer. And that is an eight-pack. Regular guests, I might give them a six-pack or whatever. When Cam Willie's here to retirement, eight fresh craft beers. You're taking

those home with you. Thank you, Great Lakes Beer. Yeah, that's neat. There's actually a hand sanitizer. I drink one of those every morning. I'm just kidding. Ridley, it's between. There's actually a hand sanitizer. I drink one of those every morning. I'm just kidding. Ridley, it's between the, no, yeah, okay, you got it. So Ridley Funeral Home, they're a wonderful family-run funeral home in the community here. They're always active in this community.

So they put COVID in this? No, no, no, no. That's right. It's a lead gen tool. That's funny. Yeah, that's funny. I'll laugh more at that, maybe away from their spot here, except to tell you that that is hand sanitizer from Ridley Funeral Home.

Oh, that's very nice. Actually, you know, this is great to have in my pocket because we get a lot of people come up and they're saying, hey, happy retirement and shaking hands before you can go, eh, but COVID. See, I remember. I said, I'm keeping 10 feet away from Mr. Woolley here. But hand sanitizer for Ridley. Thank you, Ridley Funeral Home.

There's actually a Toronto Mike sticker on that red box. That's courtesy of stickeru.com. If you want any stickers, decals for your cars, I envision some fancy decals. They go on my toolbox. Awesome. I'm going to buy a new toolbox. And then email me a picture of that. That would be amazing. Amazing. So Toronto Mike sticker. Thank you on my toolbox. Awesome. I'm going to buy a new toolbox. And then email me a picture of that.

That would be my retirement gift. Amazing, amazing. So Toronto Mike sticker, thank you, stickeru.com. That red box, there's a frozen meat lasagna in there, and you are going to tell me it's the best lasagna you can buy in a store.

So palmapasta.com. They're in Oakville and Mississauga. Wonderful supporters of the show and authentic, delicious Italian food. So thank you very much. That is nice. My wife and I love that. And it's great too, as we're starting to do a

lot of packing and there's times when, you know, there isn't really time for, to make a proper dinner. Right. That's what I'm thinking. So, I mean, I got a family of six here. Okay. That feeds everybody.

You don't have TV? Well, actually I got the big vasectomy in December 2020. I literally just took the test to make sure it worked. Thumbs up. Well done. The shop is closed. Okay. So I know you're happy four hours away from here where you're going to move and you're going to have a great retirement.

But anybody looking to locate to the cool Mimico, this is where the cool kids are going, you know, Mimico. It is. Mimico Mike can take care of cool kids are going, you know, Mimico. It is. Mimico Mike can take care of you. He's in the know in Mimico. Go to realestatelove.ca, reach out to Mike Majeski, or as I call him, Mimico Mike,

and let him know Toronto Mike sent you. There's a lot of Mikes in that sentence, but yeah, he's ripping up the Mimico real estate scene, and we really appreciate his support. So you got some retirement gifts. We'll see what CP24 does Thursday but they can't top the beer and the lasagna.

I don't know. It is Canadian media so I might get a pen set. I've heard this. I have guests over and give them these gifts and they tell me like, I mean Tom Wilson from Junkhouse, he said he's been doing CBC shows for years.

He's never got a lasagna. Like, he couldn't believe I gave him a lasagna. And, you know, I heard his wife said it was delicious and they loved it. And, yeah, I can top CBC. Forget it. That's usually pretty easy. Shout out to Matt Galloway, FOTM Matt Galloway. Okay, so let's talk about this side.

Was it like a side business? Because you're a cop and then you're in the media on CP24. But all the while, you tell me there's a business where you have vehicles for like movies and TV shows and ads. Yeah, there's a funny story about that. Many, many years ago. I'm dying to know about this. Remember the old Degrassi show, the original one? Do you want to know who my next guest is?

No. The actress who plays Caitlin on the original Degrassi Stacey Metician. Well she might remember how I got in this business Okay. She wheels in this episode wheels gets drunk and he crashes and he. This is called Schools

Out. This is actually post Degrassi High. It's a special TV where the F-bomb is dropped a couple of times. Listen, this is a big... I like that. For people my age, this is an absolutely... In fact, I've talked to my buddies, Stu and Cam, about doing, like, a three-hour

deep dive into this production. School's out. Please continue. This is key for my demo. Okay, so it's... Wheels, in this episode, Wheels gets drunk and crashes a car, and there's a horrible crash. Uh, that's the sort of backstory. Now, uh, now the Kam Wooley part.

There I am driving along in a marked OPP car on King Road. That's the one up in the 400, uh, that goes through King City. I'm driving along. Uh, this is back in the eighties. Uh, I was, uh, an active member in our police association union uh kind of knew everybody you know hey a happening young copper there so i see an opp car coming towards me and it was nice weather nice summer day i and uh we had the 460 air conditioning it means uh four windows open drive 60 mile an hour didn't have ac so i So I wave, I give the guys the wave.

They slouch down and look away. And that is uncool. So who is that? I look at the car number. The car numbers are decodable. And this car number was gibberish. It was too many digits. Didn't make sense.

There was no front plate on it. The cruiser was a bit of a beater. And the OPP do not drive beaters. If it gets a scratch on it, if you see it with a scratch, it's on the way to the body shop. This thing was a beater. The roof lights, back then we had big tractor lights and a center rotator, and there was a blue lens in one of them, and what the hell? So I do a U-bolt behind it, and this is weird.

And the license plate, rear plate was on with one screw i call the plate and it comes back stolen and i go oh these guys are gonna rob a bank like why else would someone have a fake police car so i call for backup well there isn't any uh for about 20 there's nobody near me so these guys then go north up, I think it was Keel Street, Keeler Jane, I can't remember. And then down some back road, Dead End. And that's what bad guys do. They try and draw you away. And I'm getting nervous and I'm starting thinking about getting ready for the shootout

because there's two of them. And I basically take them down at gunpoint. And it's two guys delivering a movie car for Degrassi. And they worked for Parkview Ambulance, who was at the time based on Bellevue, blocks from here. Okay. And anyway, it all sort of shook out in the end, but they couldn't prove insurance. The plates were switched.

I impounded their car. So the next thing you know, all these movie types show up and go, ah, we need an OPP car. And I go, well, too bad. You can't have that one. And they said, what about yours? Can we rent you? And do you want to pay duty?

And I go, I don't know. I call my boss. And he says, what's this about? And they said, well, they want me for this show. And it's about impaired driving. And it's positive. And he says, yeah, OK, you can do it. So I met these people.

And I thought, oh, this is kind of interesting. And then the next day, I went to who owned the car and had a long talk with him. He ended up being a lifelong friend. He basically didn't have a dealer plate at the time. He did right after our talk. And he had just grabbed a plate that was laying around. So I thought, this is an interesting business. But at the time I had told him, I said, look, you straighten up and fly right.

We'll call this a warning as he had to towing expenses and he didn't get paid for the show and all that. And I said, but if I catch you again, I won't be so nice about two weeks later, same BS goes on, on the 401. I see this junkie cop car, uh, with switch plates. And I had that guy. He, uh, I'm not, it's no more, Mr. Nice guy, pull switch plates. And I had that guy, he, uh, I'm not, it's no more Mr. Nice guy, pull it over. It's a different company. And, uh, so I go to see their boss and give him, and he goes, Hey, do you know anything about police cars? I go, yeah, I was on our equipment committee and we'd just gone to the compressed work week. So I had all this extra time and I

liked working in cars. He said, how would you like a part-time gig? Could you make us a better police car? I go, yeah, yours is a piece of crap. So, uh, they, these guys, it was a company called Avon Hill Limousine and they were taking VIPs around and they said, well, your car guys, we want this car, that car. So they did a little bit of picture car stuff. I started working with them.

Uh, they went out and bought brand new Crown Vicks. I got them the light bars through the companies, you know, and they, uh, and I would wire wire them up i'd come in in my time off and build the police car and uh it took off from there and then the uh business went way better than they had expected and they were they had a huge fleet of limos yeah and uh they were looking for investors i didn't have much money i just bought a new house and uh but i had enough to buy some old cars,

police cars, some auction cars and fix them up. I ended up doing ambulances though because I didn't want to get into a public, into a conflict of interest. And I ended up with about 30 of them. So we ended up with literally hundreds of cars. And the business took off. And I ended up working with several of these companies

over the years. But I sold out actually when I went to 2-4. The thing is, I'm a car idiot. So I live out in the country. I have a big commercial shop at my house and that's what I'm going to have at my new house. And I, I build cars for fun,

like old Corvettes. And I like the barn finds. Oh, you'd love my buddy, Blaine Schmidt. He a great cup champion, Blaine Schmidt, by the way,

he's got this huge lot in Aaron. Yeah. And yeah, he restores like for Paul coffee and guys like this, he restores the role, he's got this huge lot in Aaron. Yeah. And yeah, he restores like for Paul Coffey and guys like this, uh, he restores the road, the muscle cars. That's what I, I play a lot with, uh, those I've done military vehicles since I was a teenager.

I've had armored cars, tanks. Uh, I have a, a world war II gun truck now with an anti-aircraft gun on it. I drive around in, uh, when the mood strikes me, we've done, uh, Corvettes from the 50s, old race cars, we hunt them. So let me ask, yeah, I can imagine. That's a reality show in itself, by the way,

Cam Woolley hunting for these. That's a reality show. And somebody would buy that and people would watch. Well, that's why I came to see you, Mike. I was thinking, that might be a podcast there. Oh, well, definitely there's a podcast there. But I firstly, I got to say that story, because it's started by that scene,

that scene in Schools Out. And again, this is like the TV movie, Post Degrassi High. And that scene where wheels crash. I mean, Lucy, for example, I know you don't know what I'm talking about. Mike, what are you talking about? But Lucy was heard in this,

this is kind of the climax of the Schools Out episode. Epic. that's the part in my French cam, but you're fucking Tessa Campanelli. Okay? That F-bomb was heard across from sea to sea as they say. That was the F-bomb heard across this country. And that's when

that's Caitlin, who's my guest on Wednesday. Caitlin Ryan. Really, her name is Stacy Metician, but I'm going to call her Caitlin. I don't care. When she finds out Joey, recent guest on Toronto Mike, Joey Jeremiah, Pat Mastriani, that he was cheating on her with Tessa

Campanelli. This is all key drama. You know this is important. That's kind of an amazing spark for your business. Are there any shows or music videos or anything you want to shout out where we see a vehicle in this production and it's from your company? We did about 100 films a year. So there's some music videos.

Philosopher King's Cry, actually. If you look at the handsome young paramedic driving the big Detroit ambulance, that's me in the opening scene. And it was souped up. For the car nuts, it was a big block Chevy. And they only had built a few of these for Detroit. Then they couldn't afford the fuel on them. And as they crashed them, they never replaced them.

So when I had it, it was still actually a new truck. They had blown it up. I went down to Detroit, bought it, and dragged it home and rebuilt it. And the funny part of it was doing the scenes on King Street there out near Dufferin and that. It was so fast I kept losing the police escorts. Wow.

I'd have to pull over and wait for them because this thing was really souped up. It was wild. Shout out to the old King and Dufferin McDonald's. I worked at the X for three years. Oh, I did a summer there too. Did you do a game booth? No, no.

I was with a ski company that was selling ski boots and skis and that inside the automotive building. Yeah, no good times, man. And that food, man, I don't know if they still have it, but they had the spaghetti at the food building. And I think it was like 50 cents or something. Oh, yeah. If you bring it up, bring it back. Mama's? I don't know if it was Mama's. Oh, yeah. That was, if you bring it up, bring it back. Mama's not, I don't know if it's Mama's.

It'll be, yeah, right. And of course, now when you talk about food building at the X, everybody just talks about the tiny Tom Donuts, but. Well, they've had some weird stuff that didn't work out so well. Almost every year there'd be a food poisoning. We would cover it as the media.

Oh, yeah. Where the. Well, they just deep fry everything, right? Yeah, the deep fried crap. Like the deep fried snicker bar or whatever. I don't see the allure of deep frying anything, to be quite honest. Okay, so here's a question that I was holding on to near the end because I'm going to challenge this guy.

So this guy's name is BigRed5050. He's on Twitter. And I was offended by this question. Forget you. This is me being offended. I'll read the question and tell you what I was thinking, and then you can answer it as you wish. But he says, I look forward to his thoughts.

That's your thoughts, Cam. I hope you have some thoughts here. I look forward to his thoughts on the corruption running rampant within the TPS and OPP and the lack of true accountability. Or is this just another fluff piece? So first of all, Big Red 50-50, whoever you are, there's no fluff pieces here, okay? I read your question.

Now Cam's on the hot seat, how he wants to answer the Big Red 50-50 query there. Well, there's recently been a number of charges laid around the tow trucks, and I think he's got a valid point there. There has been some people crossing the line. What I will tell Big Red is the police services aren't afraid to tackle that anymore. When I first joined the police, what would happen is either nothing would happen or they'd be given a glowing recommendation if they would resign and go somewhere else. And that kind of thing used to happen.

There was one case where the cop was actually a pimp, and the press found out, and that was sort of the end of that. So they are pretty aggressive with that sort of thing now. I was the actual president in our association in this part of the province for quite some time, and I was involved in representing some members that were subject to discipline. And the OPP went to some great lengths with undercover guys, hidden cameras. went to some great lengths with undercover guys, hidden cameras. I thought they were as hard or harder on bad cops than they were on criminals. And most coppers, when you get to know them,

they hate bad cops worse than most people because it ruins it for everybody, no matter what it is, whether it's corruption or some violence, gratuitous violence or something like that. Most coppers hate that stuff. So Big Red, put that in your pipe and smoke it. Well, he's, no, I can see why he'd raise it. I think it's a fair question. I'm more offended at the just another fluff piece here.

When have I ever pulled a question? No, it's not fluffy, but there's that kind of stuff. There's no, the big blue wall that they often talk about gets, I think, exaggerated. Right. Now, just before we say goodbye here, first, it stopped raining, so it only took an hour. Yeah, for what, five minutes?

Well, this is good because right after we say goodbye here, and I shut this down, from a very safe distance apart, we're going to take a photo at the the spot so every guest who comes by toronto mic uh gets the photo with me at the end so before you scoot off we get a photo together excellent good 10 feet apart of course because we're very careful here and we're outdoors etc etc etc uh but really this has been a great pleasure like that you took this time on your way from the cloverdale mall we've had not one but two episodes recently on toronto mics where we literally dive deep into the history of cloverdale mall okay i talked about it this morning as a little kid there was an eaton's

there and my mom used to take me there uh sure it was an eaton's because i think it was a morgan's and then bay by morgan simpsons? But I remember my mom bringing me there because Sherway didn't exist when I was a little kid. I grew up on originally Rathburn Road. Oh yeah. It was a dead end by the way at the Humber River when I was a little kid. But my mom would take me down there.

That was a mall. And it was an outdoor mall, right? Because I had, do you know Bill? Okay, so Bill Brio who grew up in that neighborhood, he was my most recent guest in a Cloverdale Mall episode. And he talked about, it was an outdoor mall, and he remembers this slide in the middle, like a concrete slide in the middle.

And then at some point, I don't know when, maybe in the 70s, at some point they build it to be an indoor mall like it is today. But the anchor of the original mall was what's called a Morgan's. I actually don't know much about the Morgans, although I have a daughter named Morgan, so shout out to Morgan. But Morgan's was bought by the Bay, and then it became the Bay, and then it became Zellers, and then a Target, and now it's a vaccination site.

Yeah, I was there for the opening of that Target. They were pretty snooty, so I think it's kind of funny. Although I did like the Starbucks part, and it's gone too. That's right. But there's one here at Evans and Kipling. I was able to find one, given the emergent situation. So, awesome that you came by here after Cloverdale. My last question, I guess,

because I'm curious, is when you're working on your cars, on your big, how many acres you got, and you're working on the cars, what kind of music is Cam Woollolly listening to on the boombox like ah usually 80s uh genesis stuff like that uh even some of the older older genesis that that sort of music oh so the peter gabriel genesis uh yeah yeah before before phil phil's phil's good yeah but he popified it like it's less um progressive more like uh yeah, I mean. I like the Mike Rutherford, the really old days,

some of the Foxtrot and some of the other stuff, but I have a pretty broad taste. So I have usually the, where I'm at the current, we don't have cable, so we're on the satellite. There's some satellite radio that's nice, that just no ads, just running along. Yeah, ads are terrible. But I will say uh

just i'm curious uh were you ever a fan of april wine no okay only because i was chatting he phoned me yesterday i i know a number i think i did see them at uh ontario place well it's hard to miss them i guess but uh for a while they were everywhere uh but uh miles goodwin called me yesterday anyways uh he's doing some stuff and we we're going to get him on Toronto, Mike. So a couple more bets. What about Gatto? I remember Gatto at an Ontario place too because OPP police that. So I was there when things went.

I guess I can say apeshit now on this show. Yeah, you can swear on this show. With the monkeys. I remember saving the monkeys' lives. The crowd went crazy. And because I'd worked there as a civilian in the marina, I knew where to get a boat. So I grabbed one of the little pontoon sort of garbage scowl boats

and got the monkeys onto that. You know you buried the lead here, Mr. Broadcaster, because that's a great story that you saved the monkeys. Oh, that kind of stuff all the time. Yeah, we watched them as kids, and they're actually pretty good musicians. Well, they had a big comeback in the 80s where much music just ran it like crazy.

So you got a bunch of 40-somethings who watched a lot of monkeys growing up because of the syndication. Oh, yeah, it was nuts. And there was groups like Teenage Head, and everybody went nuts and trashed the place. Oh, I remember quite a few bands. I remember listening to Genesis Live

because they were at the X. And they were so loud, we could hear the whole concert right next door. Wow. Amazing, dude. Amazing. So I'm thinking that's kind of like you're listening to like a Q107 or a Boom type mix.

I'm just trying to get your musical taste in there. But that's super cool. What about Max Webster? Yeah, I danced to Max Webster with my girlfriend in Bala, the key to Bala. I used to go to the concerts there, and it was a lot of fun, those hot summer nights. And our family had an island not that far from Bala,

and the Moonlight Boat Ride Home and all that kind of thing. Amazing, amazing. At some point, if you're ever back in the neighborhood, maybe when it's safe and you're meeting Carl for brunch, maybe you come back here and kick out the jams with me. Oh, yeah.

Yeah, that'd be great. You'd love it. And then I'll get you more Great Lakes beer and a palm of lasagna. Cam, thanks again, buddy. Your exit interview went very well. We're going to miss you. Hopefully you do pull a roamer and you un-retire again.

I think that would be great. And that brings us to the end of our 833rd show. You can follow me on Twitter. I'm at Trottle Mike. Cam, why are you not on Twitter? You would be a great follow and I can't find you there. I'm not on any social media because I'll get in a troll fight

in three minutes or less. So you're not going to find Cam on social media. If you want to know about Cam, you're going to have to listen to Toronto Mike because I'm going to see if he'll come on every week while he's retired and just do these hits with me and tell me how it's going. Our friends at Great Lakes Brewery, they're at Great Lakes

Beer. Love those guys. Palma Pasta is at Palma Pasta. Sticker U is at Sticker U. CDN Technologies, they're at CDN Technologies. Ridley Funeral Home, they're at Ridley FH. And Mimico Mike, he's not on Twitter either, but he is on Instagram. He's at Majeski Group Homes. He's at Majeski Group Homes. See you all Wednesday when my special guest is Stacy Metician, better known as Caitlin Ryan-Undergrassi. This podcast has been produced by TMDS and accelerated by Roam Phone. Roam Phone brings you the most reliable virtual phone service to run your business and protect your home number from unwanted calls.

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