TalkErie.com - The Joel Natalie Show - Erie Pennsylvania Daily Podcast

We began our Friday show with an update on the 2020 Census in Erie by Aaron Loncki of the office of Mayor Joe Schember. Then we had profile of Jonathan Burdick, Union City High School history teacher, Erie Reader contributor and author of the Rust & Dirt blog and social media platform. His extensive knowledge of Erie history and the unusual characters that made their marks contributed to a fas...

We generally try to have an education focus on Thursdays, and on our program we caught up with General McLane School District Superintendent Rick Scaletta to find out how well their hybrid learning model is going for the hundreds of students in the south-central Erie County district. Then, in recognition of Constitution Day, we spoke with Erie educator and military veteran Brian Lasher about his n...

We began the week with a recap of how the restart of high school sports, especially football, went at our Erie County school districts. GoErie.com/Erie Times-News sports reporter Tom Reisenweber shared his experiences covering the weekend games and the ongoing controversy over spectator limits at school events.

On our Friday feature, we highlighted the greatest teams and players in Erie County scholastic sports history, with the region's foremost school sports historian, the Honorable Daniel Brabender. Judge Brabender has had an extensive sports career himself, and in the last twenty years has written multiple books chronicling the standouts in local sports history. This trip down memory lane was thoroug...

After weeks of delay, the high school football season finally began on Friday, Sept. 11th. We shared a preview of the season, along with the challenges that the pandemic has brought to our coaches and student-athletes, in our conversation with Paul Adamczak and Ben DiStefano. They compose the award-winning sports broadcast team for our sister station 106.3 WCTL.

On our Wednesday health focus, we welcomed back local epidemiologist Dr. Howard Nadworny to our program. Dr. Nadworny has been the proponent of the Biobot sewage testing program that Erie has participated in over the course of the coronavirus pandemic. He makes the case to Joel about the need for more and broader testing of Erie County residents to facilitate the slowing of the virus.

Our conversation after the holiday was with Brenda Sandberg, the Executive Director for the Erie Port Authority. The interview surrounded the importance of the Port of Erie to the region's economic future, about how COVID-19 has affected their year, as well as current projects across the Port's footprint and what is being planned in the coming months and years.

Erie ex-pat and prolific non-fiction author Dr. Craig von Buseck was our Friday guest leading into the Labor Day weekend. Dr. Von Buseck is known for his book about another Erie native Harry T. Burleigh, titled Nobody Knows : The Forgotten Story of One of the Most Influential Figures in American Music .  Our conversation covered his book from 2019, I Am Cyrus: Harry S. Truman and the Rebirth...

As we like to do on Thursdays, we focused on education, and specifically private, or non-public, education.  We spoke with Daniel Brooker, Head of School at Erie First Christian Academy; and Chris Paul, principal/administrator at Luther Memorial Academy.  Both schools have been back in-person since August 24, so we chatted about how they’re doing after the first full week of this very un...

Tuesday we caught up with two County Council-approved appointees to the Board of Trustees for the new Community College.  First, we talked to Justin Gallagher. He is a former board member for the Harborcreek School District, and also served on the board for Erie County Technical School. Then we talked with Cheryl Rush Dix, a engineer, Fulbright Researcher and professor from Erie. Both trustee...

On our Monday show, we welcomed to the microphone George Deutsch, Executive Director of the Erie County Historical Society.  We talked about the unique history of our hometown, including the Battle of Lake Erie and the 1918 Spanish Flu Pandemic. We also looked toward the future with an update on the newly re-envisioned Hagen History Center.

On August 28, 2003, Erie became the focus of national attention with FBI Major Case #203, also known as the Pizza Bomber Case. Friday, we recognized this macabre anniversary with the two authors of “Pizza Bomber: The Untold Story of America’s Most Shocking Bank Robbery.” Dr. Jerry Clark, lead FBI investigator on the case, and Ed Palattella, investigative reporter for the Erie Times News, joined us...

On our Wednesday health focus, we introduced our audience to Dr. David Bartlett, who is the new chairman of the AHN Cancer Institute. He will be bringing his years of experience to the new AHN Cancer Center at St. Vincent Hospital. Then we spoke with Dr. Howard Nadworny, an infectious disease specialist who has been helping the Erie County Health Department in their work fighting the spread of COV...

We began our Friday COVID-19 coverage with a conversation with Senator Dan Laughlin, who tried to untangle the confusion over the Governor's ban of any "non-life sustaining" business in-person operations in Pennsylvania. Then Joel interviewed Cleve Wright, the head coach of Gannon University's Women's Basketball team, whose championship season was cut short by the NCAA's cancellation of collegiate...

On our Thursday program, we attempted to stay on top of the breaking news regarding the coronavirus pandemic, while learning the impact of the shutdown on different parts of the local economy. With us on was Amanda Duncan, Program Director of the Young Erie Professionals. Then PA Attorney General Josh Shapiro discussed with Joel Natalie how his office is investigating price gouging on essential it...

On the Wednesday program, the breaking news was that the first positive case of COVID-19 was reported in Erie County. As we covered breaking news, our focus on the Joel Natalie Show was to understand better the impact on the crisis on local Erie businesses. Our guests included James Grunke, the CEO of the Erie Regional Chamber and Growth Partnership, Sara Kim, owner of the boutique Lollies in the...

On the second day of our wall-to-wall coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on the Erie region, we kept up with the breaking news and those organizations who are trying to help. Joel was able to interview Erie Roman Catholic Bishop Lawrence Persico on his decision to shutdown public Masses indefinitely. Then from the United Way of Erie County, Mike Jaruszewicz explained the help that ca...

On the first day of the K-12 school shutdown because of the COVID-19 pandemic, we connected with Erica Erwin, spokesperson for Erie's Public Schools on the plans the school district made to feed their students. Then the superintendent of the General McLane School District, Rick Scaletta, called into the Joel Natalie Show to explain their contingency plans in light of the shutdown. Finally, Shani B...

On Friday, Erie Mayor Joe Schember returned to the Joel Natalie Show to give us an update from City Hall. In the midst of Joel's conversation with the Mayor, the breaking news came down that Gov. Wolf was shutting down all Pennsylvania Schools effective March 16th. The Mayor and Joel discussed the affect the pandemic would have on city operations, along with a discussion of the recommendation of t...

On the Thursday program we highlighted a unique program designed to expose school students to opportunities in manufacturing. It’s called ‘What’s So Cool About Manufacturing’ and fifteen middle schools in Erie and Crawford County, paired with manufacturer partners are competing this year.. Our guests from the Northwest Industrial Resource Center were Laurie Knoll & Bob Zaruta. Everyday we lear...

On the Wednesday show, we learned about the product called CBD and the new homegrown company that is planning on making a big splash in that burgeoning market. We traveled to Farmulated Premium CBD and talked to CEO Mark Troyer, VP of Finance Tricia Restifo, and the team about his vertically integrated approach to bring a natural product to market, from planting in the ground all the way to sellin...

On the Tuesday edition of the Joel Natalie Show, we learned about the upcoming Jefferson Civic Leadership Academy 2020 cohort.  Our guests from the Jefferson Educational Society were Director of Operations Angela Beaumont, and 2018 cohort member YahMoorah Shakoor-Hooker. We chatted about opportunities for Erie’s leaders and the touchstone project each cohort engages in to add value to the com...

Like many local media outlets, our big issue Monday was the ongoing breaking news over the coronavirus or COVID-19. We invited a family physician and entrepreneur who had pursued training in epidemic intelligence. Dr. Wei-Shin Lei from SleepPhones.com was our guest. To read Dr. Lei's articles on COVID-19, click here .

Our big issue on Friday was our continuing coverage of the Erie County Community College. We welcomed Attorney Ron DiNicola, one of the founders of Empower Erie, the non-profit group committed to creating a stand-alone community college for Erie County. Mr. DiNicola shared the story and  outcomes that Empower Erie envisions for bring this educational option to our community. We continue to ha...

On the Wednesday show,  we learned more about the ServErie Summer Project, a paradigm-changing focused intensive on a city neighborhood. ServErie’s Marcus Atkinson was our guest, and he explained the history of ServErie adopting a neighborhood, surveying its residents and responding to their needs, culminating in a three to five year plan of restoration and renewal of an area called "the donu...