Check yer six: Manna from heaven for Douglas students
david fleming-saraceno
If ‘heaven’ is the CFS, and ‘manna’ is $100,000
There is a large and fairly well-organised student movement in this province and across the country made up of thousands of student-run organisations. You may or may not be aware of this, but really, you should be. Not because you should join some kind of student revolution, but because these organisations exist because students like you pay them fees and you should know where your money is going.
Several weeks ago the Tri-City News had a story about Douglas College and the Douglas Students’ Union (DSU). Starting last May the college refused to remit fees to the Students’ Union because it hadn’t had a financial audit in three years and hadn’t presented these audited financial statements to its membership (Douglas students) as required by law in that same period. To make matters worse, the Students’ Union had sent a letter to the college each year saying that, in fact, it had done these things, everything was hunky dory, and please pass along something like $800,000 in student fees, thanks. Once the college learned of this little oversight they did what I think is pretty reasonable — they turned off the tap. To get the cash flowing again the Students’ Union was required to have their finances audited, present this information to its membership, and follow several other steps laid out by the college. To make the situation more fun for the DSU they were on the verge of having their registration as a society revoked, as in they would no longer exist. In a hurry an audit was done and the findings presented to the membership — but the findings were not good. Basically the auditor said, we can’t verify your financial records. In short, the folks running the DSU had really fucked up.
“Umm . . . david, I am not sure if you have noticed but this is The Peak and we are at SFU, so like, why are you telling me this?”
Good question, there are several reasons. The first is because students in this province enjoy the benefits of legislation that require colleges and universities to collect fees and remit fees to student organisations if these fees have been approved by students (say in a referendum) and the organisation complies with the legislation that governs them. Most of these student organisations rule and include a variety of activities. They range from The Peak and its haughty band of ne’er-do-wells and CJSF, to the Canadian Federation of Students (CFS) and student unions across the province. The situation at the DSU sucks because it doesn’t just potentially screw over Douglas College students, it could screw us all. Since they first took power, the B.C. Liberals have been debating the right of students to have fees collected for their organisation and to decide this for themselves democratically. Something like the gross mismanagement at the DSU is exactly what they may be looking for to come down on us all, even if there are only a few bad apples in the barrel.
The second reason is almost as much fun as the first because it involves your money. Having heard many rumours about this situation and inspired by the article in the Tri-City News, I tracked down a Douglas College student to find out what the hell was going on. Apparently, by this fall, the DSU’s bank accounts were coming close to empty and some members of the DSU’s board who were trying to get the organisation’s finances in order were getting worried. Then one day it happened: manna from heaven, or rather a certified cheque in the amount of $100,000 and, according to the Douglas student I spoke with, the money came from the CFS.
Now this got me thinking about a number of questions. Why on earth was the CFS giving its members money, your money (full-time students pay $7.22 per semester to the CFS), to an organisation that has demonstrated such poor financial management? Who authorised this expenditure? And where did the money come from, the provincial office here in B.C., or the national in Ottawa? So I asked. I asked these questions of several elected leaders of the CFS and by deadline I had not received a reply. If they get back to me, I’ll let you know. My biggest question remains, will we get this money back?
Here’s the deal: organisations like The Peak, the SFSS, and others are keeping their finances in order and students can hold them to it by paying attention. What we as students, who want healthy active campus communities, need to do is not let this happen in our house. And it probably wouldn’t hurt to ask some questions about that $100,000 to make sure we don’t have another student organisation going down the toilet.