News Brief: KSA deletes and updates all regulations, holds secret ballot via email despite councillor concerns

The Kwantlen Student Association deleted its entire regulations and replaced them with a revised version during a council meeting on Oct. 9.

Some of the amendments included condensing the KSA’s mission, vision, and values statement. 

Council also changed the composition of the environmental sustainability committee and the social justice and equity committee, and changed the maximum number of committee meetings per semester to 12.

Other changes included changing the mileage reimbursement rate for personal automobile travel by staff or elected officials to $0.70 per kilometre, and correcting typos, incorrect references, punctuation, and grammatical errors.

The motion required two-thirds majority of votes from the council members to pass. Speaker of Council Amandeep Brar asked the student representatives to send their votes to her email to “maintain confidentiality.”

“Some members are not abstaining their vote and have [neither] mentioned a yes or no for these regulations,” she said.  

“Members do not have to vote, even if they are abstaining or otherwise,” KSA Advocacy Coordinator John O’Brian said, adding that he can set up a secret ballot.

Brar specifically asked for the motion to be submitted via email. After receiving all the votes, they will be sent to Executive Director Timothii Ragavan to verify, she said. 

O’Brian said there are only specific circumstances where a secret ballot is required, but otherwise, the votes are always by a show of hands or in the meeting’s chat. 

“Emailing the speaker does not meet the definition of a secret ballot under Robert’s Rules and so would not actually be allowed,” he said, adding the practice does not align with the KSA’s bylaws.

Brar then said she won’t count votes until they are sent to her email.

“There are 15 directors in [the] meeting, 6 people have written ‘NAY’ in [the] chat, so clearly, [a] 2/3rds [majority is] not met and the motion cannot pass,” Cloverdale Campus Representative Jobanpreet Singh wrote in the chat. 

Brar said the motion passed, based solely on the votes sent to her email.

“You would expect for a motion like this, considering it’s pretty significant to our operations … that we would have a bit of a question session,” Policy and Political Affairs Coordinator Diamond Obera said. 

While the motion was proposed during the governance committee’s report, it wasn’t recommended by it, O’Brian wrote in the chat. 

In his report, Vice-President Student Life Ishant Goyal said the council has been busy with upcoming events. He added the KSA has been working on distributing fruit baskets to students — about 75 of which have been handed out. Goyal also said the KSA gave club executives tea sets as a gesture of appreciation for Thanksgiving. 

The student association is planning its Golden Glow Gala for Diwali on Oct. 19 at Surrey’s Grand Empire Banquet Hall from 7:00 pm to 1:00 am. There is also an on-campus Diwali event scheduled for Oct. 15 from 4:00 to 6:00 pm. The council will be hosting a trip to Maan Farms on Oct. 26.

Ragavan mentioned he has been working with the chief returning officer to finalize a date for the election, which is tentatively slated for January. 

Councillors voted to remove Yuvraj Bains from all standing and ad-hoc committees and appoint Gurdit Singh, Harkamal Singh, Anmol Bansal, and Shawinderdeep Singh to the internal, governance, finance and operations, and Grassroots redevelopment committees respectively. 

Rohit Uppal was appointed to the university affairs, governance, and external affairs committees. Bhoomika Seera was removed from the external affairs, governance, and Grassroots redevelopment committees, and Goyal was added to the environmental and sustainability committee.

The KSA also held an executive committee meeting on Oct. 1, where Diamond Obera and Clubs and Outreach Coordinator Vanshika Jain proposed four club policies for the executives to review. 

“There’s unfortunately been some gaps in terms of how things should be carried out and the operation of those clubs,” Obera said, adding the policies are proposed to ensure clubs run smoothly in the future. 

The first policy proposed was for club events planning and aims to ensure that clubs adhere to the KSA’s and Kwantlen Polytechnic University’s event planning rules regarding booking spaces. The policy would allow clubs to host impactful events while maintaining inclusivity and accountability, Obera said. 

The second is the club finance policy, which outlines guidelines for club financial management, funding approvals, reimbursement, procedures, and reporting requirements to enhance financial autonomy. 

The third, a club email policy, aims to enhance and streamline communication for event approvals. Clubs will get their own KSA email accounts to help provide transparency in the approval process, Obera said. The policy outlines club procedures, eligibility, criteria, and benefits associated with the KSA domain email addresses for club executives.

The fourth is the KSA club membership and leadership policy, which outlines the election process for clubs, in addition to establishing guidelines for club membership, leadership, leadership elections, and the requirements for maintaining active status. 

Goyal said the executive committee has some questions and modifications and will “most likely” approve the policies at a future meeting. 

In his report, Goyal said the KSA distributed self-care baskets for women for Navaratri, a Hindu festival, to celebrate “women for the power they show and represent.”

The KSA also held an executive committee meeting on Oct. 8, where it approved $1,460 for the KPU Cricket Club to give away 50 tickets for the Canada Super 60 tournament, which runs from Oct. 8 to 13. The club received discounted prices from the league.

The executives also approved $300 for the Kwantlen Sikh Students’ Association to host a panel discussion about the 1984 Sikh genocide on Nov. 5 at the Surrey campus Spruce Atrium. 

The next KSA council meeting is scheduled for Oct. 23 at noon, with the next executive committee meeting slated for Oct. 14 at noon. Interested students can email info@kusa.ca to join the meeting.