Carleton University Students’ Association (CUSA) council voted on merging the corporation and association and banning slates from future elections during a five-hour virtual meeting on Oct. 25.
October’s meeting was highly anticipated following the release of the democratic reform advisory committee’s report. The recommendations in the report included merging the corporation and the association, changes to the number of executives and their working hours, the future of slates in CUSA elections and term limits for executive members.
The bulk of the meeting focused on reviewing the committee’s recommendations. Council voted to suspend the typical rules and meeting procedures to hold a discussion about each of the suggestions.
Following each discussion, council undertook an indicative vote on the options and the results were recorded to be shared with CUSA’s legal counsel, McKenzie Lake Lawyers LLC, following the meeting. Indicative voting gives councillors the opportunity to share which options they prefer and they can vote on as many of the options they agree with.
The council meeting was conducted over Zoom, but due to technical difficulties, there was no live stream on Facebook. The meeting was uploaded to YouTube on Oct. 27.
Turmoil in council
Council discussed a motion to limit debate times on the democratic reforms to five minutes each, but it was not passed.
“I think that [democratic reform] is arguably one of the most important things that we’ll be discussing this year,” science councillor Greg Dance said.
Before council began discussion on the democratic reform recommendations, Dance expressed concern that the reform committee and the proposed recommendations were being used to cover up a larger issue.
Throughout October, interim president and vice-president (internal) Ahmad Hashimi held private one-on-one meetings with each of the councillors to discuss CUSA’s governance structure.
Dance said they discussed liabilities that CUSA is currently navigating with lawyers and during the private meetings certain information from CUSA’s correspondance with their lawyers regarding the alleged “liabilities” was redacted.
Dance asked the executives if the redactions were there and what they were about.
“I just don’t want to see the democratic reform committee used as the solution to these liabilities without directly addressing them,” Dance said.
Hashimi said he could not answer Dance’s question because of confidentiality, as advised by CUSA’s lawyer.
“I’m sorry, but I cannot tell you that,” Hashimi said. “It’s my responsibility to keep the reputation of CUSA, as the acting president and as vice-president internal.”
Dance continued to express his concerns about moving forward with voting and proposed a motion to postpone the vote until councillors were fully informed on the situation by the executives and legal counsel.
“Transparency and democratic reform are what we were elected on and I think we’ve got the democratic reform and we just have a little bit more transparency to go before I can be satisfied,” Dance said. “And if it’s really that bad, then maybe we need to be having the discussion about the benefits of CUSA to the students.”
Public affairs councillor Gray Simms agreed with Dance and said that he would prefer moving forward with discussion but postponing the vote.
He also suggested that a lawyer from CUSA’s legal team be present for a meeting with the councillors, either in-camera or publicly. Vice-president (finance) Venassa Baptiste told council that the cost of having a lawyer present would be $500 per hour.
After an hour of debate, Dance’s motion to postpone indefinitely did not pass.
Science councillor Conall McCutcheon suggested the council move in-camera to review what they discussed during the one-on-one-meetings and to listen to student-at-large and member of the democratic reform committee Simon Harris speak, since Harris mentioned in the chat that he would only comment in-camera.
Council voted and passed the motion to move in-camera with 14 councillors voting in favour and four in opposition.
New CUSA structure and composition
Following the in-camera session, council voted in favour of merging the corporation and association. As suggested by the democratic reform advisory committee, merging would also spark the creation of a student-composed board of directors and reduce the vice-presidents’ and trustees’ financial responsibilities.
The option to merge received 19 votes and only one councillor voted to remain with the current situation.
Council then discussed the amount of hours CUSA executives should be expected to work each week.
Currently, executives are expected to work a 25-hour work week, but the alternative options proposed to council included full-time executives, full-time president with part-time vice-presidents or fewer executive positions.
Baptiste shared that she supports sticking with the current situation. Based on her own experience, Baptiste said with proper time management, the 25-hour work week is manageable.
Sami Islam, Rideau River Residence Association (RRRA) president, asked what it would mean for international students if any of the positions changed to full-time hours. To work in Canada with a student visa, international students are required to be enrolled as full-time students, which means taking a minimum of 1.5 credits each semester.
Hashimi said the committee considered that barrier and said international students would still be able to work a 35-hour work week while also meeting the 1.5 credit requirement.
Council debated if they should expect future executives to take time out of their degree for their position in CUSA, arguing that if they are working full-time hours, they would not be able to continue a full academic workload.
Jordan Collacutt, CUSA’s executive assistant, and Hashimi both advocated for full-time executives and explained the difficulty in scheduling and the heavy workload they currently face.
After debate, eight council members voted to maintain the current situation, six for full-time executives, 16 for full-time president and part-time vice-presidents, and two voted for fewer executives.
Future of slates and executive elections
The next item for discussion was the future of the slate system in CUSA elections. The proposed items were either maintain the current situation of no limit, replace slates with an elected president and hire vice-presidents or ban slates but continue to elect all executive positions.
Public affairs councillor Emily Sowa supported the last option to ban slates but continue electing all executives. Sowa said elections were the best way to ensure accountability, particularly since CUSA has had difficulty filling hired positions. She cited the fact that there were no applicants to fill the chief electoral officer (CEO) position this year, which postponed the presidential by-election, as an example of a lack of interest in hired positions.
Engineering and design councillor Cameron Davis agreed with Sowa and said that students have made it clear they are not happy with slates.
Simms spoke in favour of electing a president and hiring vice-presidents because it would restrict candidates from working together to form unofficial slates. He said simply banning slates and electing executives would not be as effective.
Hashimi agreed with Simms and said a vice-president’s role is to advocate for students, but they do not need to be elected into their role since they do not represent students in the same capacity that a councillor represents their constituents.
Three councillors voted for maintaining the current situation, 14 voted to ban slates, elect a president and hire executives, and 11 voted for banning slates and electing all executives.
The next item concerned the hiring and election structure for CUSA executives. Options included an internal election to hire vice-presidents, a “CUSA-council-approved” hiring committee and community-based hiring.
An internal election, according to the committee’s report, would put the vote to all incoming and outgoing councillors after giving them the opportunity to attend a candidates debate and meeting individually with the candidates before casting their ballot.
As described in the agenda, community-based hiring would host the candidates in a variety of town halls and debates with different student groups and the groups would then send their recommendations to a CUSA council committee to make the final recommendation to CUSA council.
At this point in the meeting, Collacutt spoke on behalf of vice-president (student issues) Valentina Vera Gonzalez who had to leave the call due to poor internet connection.
Collacutt said councillors might want to consider each role separately. She said it is crucial for the vice-president (finance) to have experience in business and accounting, while other positions would benefit from their community connections and community-based hiring would then have more merit.
“I encourage councillors to not limit themselves to just one way of hiring vice-presidents based on these three options,” Collacutt said. “But maybe consider all three in terms of their specific pros and cons.”
Baptiste said she was concerned that community-based hiring would bring up issues of conflicts of interest between candidates and the involved student groups. She said she would prefer vice-presidents elected by internal vote or through a hiring committee.
“We would have to do that with an unbiased, separate group that does not benefit from that candidate being empowered,” Baptiste said.
Fifteen councillors voted in support of an internal CUSA council vote, six in favour of the hiring committee, and eight for community-based hiring.
The final item on democratic reforms regarded term limits of CUSA executives.
Sowa did not believe a term limit should be required for CUSA executives.
“If the student body sees a positive reflection of what this individual is doing, I don’t see why this person should not be given the right to maintain a position in which they’re acting successfully in,” Sowa said.
Hashimi said term limits for executives are important to ensure executives do not abuse their position.
“It’s important to limit the executives’ time limits because they can get comfortable in the position and mislead this position and misuse it,” Hashimi said. “At the same time, it’s important to give other students opportunities to be in this position.”
Nine councillors voted for maintaining the current situation of no limit, four voted for a presidential limit, six voted for a one-year limit for all executives, and 11 voted for the “move up or move out” option, which would mean that vice-presidents may only run for a higher position within CUSA and presidents may not run for a second term.
With no presidential by-election scheduled during the October meeting, council said they could hold an emergency meeting in November before the next scheduled council meeting on Nov. 29.
Council is waiting on the hiring of the chief electoral officer, a process which the current executives have recused themselves of, before scheduling the by-election.
CORRECTION: A previous version of this article identified Greg Dance as a public affairs councillor. In fact, Dance is a science councillor. The Charlatan regrets the error. The article was last updated on Nov. 3.
Featured image from Screengrab.
