Oct. 26 marked the one-year anniversary since Carleton alumnus Jim Watson was elected as mayor. To mark the anniversary, the Charlatan’s Jane Gerster spoke with Watson about the future of the U-Pass, the ongoing Carleton University Students’ Association (CUSA) conflict and the student noise issues in the South Keys-Greenboro community.
The Charlatan (TC): What kind of conversations are ongoing between the students assocations, OC Transpo and city council in terms of making the U-Pass revenue neutral?
Jim Watson (JW): We had a meeting with all the student leaders from the graduate students association, CUSA, and the [Student Federation of the University of Ottawa] a couple of weeks ago. There’s obviously a difference of opinion between what OC Transpo believes is revenue neutral and what the students associations believe, and they had some people put together their position paper.
We took the paper and our staff are now analyzing the points, point-by-point [to determine] whether in fact they have a correct analysis or if there are mistakes in it. My understanding is within the next couple of weeks, they’ll come forward with an analysis of that document and then we have to make a decision, obviously, sometime early in the new year for two reasons. First of all, that’s when we set our fare structure for the following year. Secondly, we have a commitment from the students to hold a referendum before March 31st on both campuses so that we can get a clear mandate from the students whether they want to proceed with the U-Pass for the next several years.
TC: If the price does go up, do you think students will be as interested in having a U-Pass?
JW: It’s hard to say. I think when I’m on campus at Carleton and I talk to students, they’re very happy with the U-Pass. It’s a significant savings and even with what OC Transpo is judging as revenue neutral it’s still a very deep discount. It wouldn’t be as deep a discount as the students are receiving now, but it’s still significantly cheaper. So the students are going to have to decide.
The fate of the U-Pass is in their hands because our council has indicated that we have financial pressures as well. We want to encourage student use of transit but we can’t afford to offer the deep discount that we have for the last two years so students are going to have to decide.
Obviously if I was advising students I’d say a U-Pass at a discount is a great deal. It encourages people to take transit, it saves you money in terms of taxi fares and buying the regular bus pass. Also, students have to realize every time the discount goes deeper, every other transit user has to subsidize that so we have to be fair for everyone who uses the system.
TC: With a possible price increase, would an opt-out option be a possibility or is that still completely off the table?
JW: I think the more opt-outs you have, the higher the price, so it’s in our collective best interest that there be as few opt-outs as possible.
We know [that] there are, for instance, people who live in rural Ottawa who would like to opt out but they also have access to park and ride services on the fringes of the community, which they can use.
TC: At the beginning of the summer you met with CUSA president Obed Okyere. Have you met with him since then or are there any plans to meet in the future?
JW: There’s a request in for another meeting with the student leaders. I think what usurped that was that we did have a meeting with a number of the student leaders on the U-Pass just a few weeks ago.
One of the things [Okyere] raised with me is increased O-Train services. The O-Train just celebrated its 10th anniversary and I took the train from Greenboro to campus to celebrate that milestone.
The O-Trains [are] a huge success. It started off as a pilot project that was intended to serve 4,000 people a day and now it’s close to 12,000 people a day. With that in mind and [the fact that] the single largest group of users of the O-Train are Carleton students and staff, we as a council approved the purchase of additional O-Trains as well as some passing tracks . . . so that we will have eight minute service. It’s going to increase service substantially and be in place before 2014.
TC: There have been some concerns raised from Carleton president Roseann Runte in regards to how democratic CUSA is right now, considering the ongoing council conflict, which has resulted in all the decisions being made by three trustees as opposed to the whole council. Will that in any way impact your business with CUSA?
JW: My hope is that this issue can be resolved sooner than later. I have enough to deal with with politics at city hall that I’m not going to delve into the politics of CUSA. As a former Rideau River Residence Association (RRRA) president myself . . . there seems to be a fairly long history of challenges and counter-challenges and elections overturned. I think my only advice as an alumnus, I suppose, and as someone who’s a politician now, is I hope all of the different factions and parties can get together.
I think it does hurt the student association’s ability to reflect a positive image of getting things done for their constituents when there seems to be never-ending legal battles over elections.
It’s in the collective interest of the university and of the students that all of these issues be resolved sooner than later because it does pre-occupy CUSA and the local campus media and so on. I think there are a lot of other important issues that could be dealt with.
TC: In regards to the ongoing student noise issues in South Keys-Greenboro, is this a council issue at all? Do you think this is a major issue?
JW: I don’t think it’s fair to prejudge [that] it’s just students that . . . create noise. There are noise complaints around the city made by people of all ages and all backgrounds so it’s not fair to just pinpoint it on one group.
It’s a matter of councillors in those areas working with all residents, whether they’re students or recent grads or adults, to make sure that everyone understands they have both rights and responsibilities in the neighbourhood. If I live next to someone who had loud music blaring out of their windows and intoxication on the front lawn, I wouldn’t be happy. But I’m not going to prejudge whether it was a student or not. It’s not acceptable behaviour by anyone . . . You have to understand you live in a community . . . it’s a matter of everyone acting in a mature and responsible fashion and recognizing that we have a collective responsibility to be respectful of one another.
TC: How would you recommend the councillor in South Keys-Greenboro, the by-law officers, the students and the residents who are unhappy with the situation address it?
JW: One of the things I did was I put together a little flyer on rights and responsibilities and some tips if you’re going to have a party . . . make sure that you notify your neighbour ahead of time, make sure the windows are closed, make sure you don’t have people walking onto other people’s property and those kinds of things.
The first call shouldn’t always be to the by-law people or the police. I think maybe if there’s been inappropriate behaviour and if you feel comfortable doing it, you should go knock on your neighbour’s door . . . I find [that] that kind of interpersonal communication is the best way to resolve it.
