The KSA says they are here to provide two things to the students: advocacy and services. This means it is up to the elected staff to work with us and take our concerns to the university administration, the Canadian Federation of Students and to external policy makers. It also means they are there to make sure we get some pretty sweet stuff. As a students get ready for another election, we at the Runner have compiled a list of what our current elected officials have done for us to help our readers make informed decisions in the upcoming election.
By Melissa Fraser [Culture Editor]
•Created the Beer and Girly Drinks committee, which had nothing to report throughout
the year.
•Organized SEXPO 2009 featuring Daniel Packard.
•Cancelled Langley’s
Sexpo event.
•Adopted Tap-In’s proposal to ban the sale of bottled water in KSA space.
•Spent $5000 on reusable water bottles designed by KSA
members.
•Organized Cram Jam 2009 with Danny Fernandes and Destineak. The Runner reported that the event was budgeted $25,000 and it was estimated that roughly 600 people attended the event. “Arguably one of the greatest Cram Jam events the KSA has held, thanks entirely to the amazing team of staff, officials, and volunteers who spent their summer working on this event.” – Vanessa Knight, director of events and student life.
•Held a fee referendum and passed all ten proposed fees.
Student Union Building Fund
START Volunteer Fund
Social Justice Fund
REBOOT Fund
Radio Free Kwantlen Fund
Peer Counselling Program Fund
Intramurals Fund
Club and Events Fee
Battle IMPARK Fund
Advocacy Service Fund
“The issue of KSA fees has been debated now since 2007, so finally being able to move forward on a set of questions and see them pass was gratifying.” – Steve Lee, director of finance.
•Phased in new fees to avoid a large initial increase.
•Axed Social Justice Fund, which was approved in the student referendum.
•Is fighting to get the KSA out of the Canadian Federation of Students, despite the students voting to stay with the CFS during the September referendum.
Organized a Casino Night at the •Richmond Campus
•Cancelled Casino Night at the Richmond Campus.
•Replaced chairperson after the Casino Night at the Richmond Campus was cancelled.
•Brought beer to the Surrey Campus.
•Lowered the price of beer on the Surrey Campus.
•Organized licensed events on the Richmond Campus.
•Organized Smoke Out 2009 – Held by SHIP and the Kwantlen Wellness Centre.
•Underground 2009 – “Our First Club Night Featuring DJ Flipout, was a definite success, and I’m proud to say came in under budget.” – Vanessa Knight, director of events and student life. Took the CFS to court to ensure that Kwantlen students had a vote in the society. Won the case.
•Held UPass forum for all students.
•Encouraged diversity and cultural awareness through events such as Taste of Asia and Diwali Festival.
•Provided you with free condoms, tampons and jumper cables. Also offered discounted movie tickets and Playland passes.
•Lobbied to have a toilet put in the Farrier building.
•Passed society bylaws to avoid internal extortion.
•Fighting the previous KSA government, who between 2005-2006 conducted illegal activity under the banner of the student society
At that same meeting I resigned in protest as the Disabilities liaison out of frustration of the lack of social justice resources for the KSA. In the end when even one of the Liaisons vote to axe their own funding, something smell defiantly wrong with his picture. I say the KSA does not care about social justice, all the KSA gives on this is excuses. I say actions are louder than words..
Sorry for the many comments but the site will only allow me to do small posts for some reason
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The liaisons are now the ONLY elected officials without an office space. The Liaisons might now get a bit more to attend meetings of council but even then in the 2009 budget the KSA tried to pull another fast one on social justice by trying to axe all the office hours for liaisons and just give them money to attend meetings. A budget which was drafted by Mr Steve Lee, that is until the liaisons had to speak up and say hey that isn't right. During the meeting that the social justice fund got axed even my opponent for Director of Academic Affairs, the current •Queer Liaison , Matthew DiMera , who had a vote by proxy, in the end voted to axe the fund as well.
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The reason very little funds were used in 2009 is because Liaisons which are charged with representing social justice issues at Kwantlen only got 5 hours to work a week and little or no support or training from the KSA itself on what the direction of these positions should work towards. And now the KSA thinks they can buy off social justice by providing laptops to the Liaisons to replace their office that once again got axed. BTW I mentioned this move over 5 months ago before it happened.
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However KSA council had decided that it was more important to put the funds into the Student union building fund which is currently being used to pay for the mortgage on the current KSA space and we had plans for a student union building since 2004 but nothing ever came of them. The excuse the KSA council gave for axing the implementation? That it was not as popular or important as the other programs that saw fees voted for.
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I beg to differ. The social justice center has been on the books for a few years now but it has always been shut down when the KSA needed space for more "important" priorities such as hiring more staff or wanting more storage space. Steve is right about the social justice fee fund being phased in later but the plans where to have part of it phased in with the current set programs.
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A few points in addition to what has been already been said above…
— The beer and girly drinks committee actually did have informal meetings and it is my understanding they worked on making recommendations to the commercial services manager and cafe manager about what beer and light liqour is served in the cafe. Now that we have liquour, the committee doesn't really need to exist and at one point I suggested we disolve the committee but people thought the title looked neat on the agenda. Unless Council moves a motion to do otherwise in April 2010, the committee will cease to exist on March 31, 2010.
— Langley's Sexpo event wasn't cancelled – it is my understand that there were space booking issues with Kwantlen that saw no space allocated for the event. The issue was not discovered until the day of the event.
— The Social Justice fund was not axed. As you state in the article, the fees are being phased in, and this fee was not implemented with the first set of increases. In this year's budget, no money was taken away from what was already budgeted for liaisons and the budget approved using all leftover money that the liaisons and the KSA did not spend on Social Justice on Social Justice initiatives. $15,000 was unspent in 2009 and has been added to this year's social justice budget. The Social Justice Fund has over $20,000 in it; and $5,000 has been allocated towards a positive space initiative – the most ever in the history of the KSA. In addition to their honorarium, liaisons are also receiving money for attending Council meetings. It is true that we are looking for space for the Social Justice Centre, as with our new START Volunteer Program and Reboot Computer Service Program, the old space was temporarily taken over to allow these two new programs to begin working for students. We are talking with Kwantlen about accessing student space in the C-Building on Surrey Campus (also known as Surrey Main), and I hope we can put the Social Justice Centre there or perhaps move Health & Dental there with the old Health & Dental space becoming the Social Justice Centre.
— We are not fighting to leave the CFS but we are fighting to make it more accountable. We continue to bring forward motions that purport to change the CFS by improving their bylaws. We took them to court over the issue of them not recognizing the KSA's duly elected student representative to their board of directors and we won. This win is precedent setting because it will help stop the CFS from not allowing people on their boards just because that individual has a differing point of view.
— We have not passed any bylaws but have developed changes to our regulations and procedures. The bylaws are the main set of rules that govern the society and they are approved by students attending general meetings. The bylaws state that the KSA can create regulations, policy and executive procedures to help guide the day to day affairs of the KSA and these are the rules that have been amended.
— We also employ many students at the cafe.
— We organized vaccination clinics on campus for H1N1.
— We have agreement in principle from Kwantlen for building a $15 million dollar student union building on the Surrey Campus, towards which Kwantlen should be able to give $5 million. The building will be planned with an eye towards allowing it to have future expansions built. It is expected to have this built and open within the next 2 – 3 years.
— We have agreement to help Kwantlen expand the student centers on the other three campuses, starting with Langley this fall. We are already discussing what improvements will be made in Langley and hope to make an announcement soon about that.
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