The Student Union Society’s (SUS) Extraordinary General Meeting (EGM) did not meet quorum last Thursday, and has been adjourned to Thursday, Feb. 8. The quorum requirement will be dropped from first attempt attendance of 98 SUS members to 49 members.
A minimum number of members must be in attendance in order for the meeting to go forward. All students, upon paying fees to UFV, are members of SUS, and may attend and vote at the meeting.
The EGM was called in order to present SUS’s 2017/2018 budget plans for approval from students. Some bylaw changes were also to be presented and voted on, as well as changes to the election policy. The bylaw changes are required for SUS to be in compliance with the B.C. Societies Act, which came into effect last November.
The proposed budget will directly affect how students’ SUS fees will be used. Despite this, Gurvir Gill, president of the SUS, said that meeting quorum has always been a problem.
“There’s never really a good time to do it, because people are going to be in classes,” said Gill. “You could do it in an evening, but quorum would still be an issue.”
If the required attendance of 49 SUS members is not met again this Thursday, the three-week process of organizing the EGM will need to be started over. Gill believes that another meeting would likely not be until the end of March, or the beginning of April, when students are just starting to study for exams.
SUS vice-president internal, Jaleen MacKay said that despite the low membership turnout, this was the most advertised general meeting for SUS.
Gill said that the SUS is looking into getting academic accommodations with the university for the meetings, allowing students who would otherwise be in class to attend.
“This is important to students,” said Gill. “This is student money. So, if students have to spend maybe an hour or two out of class just to attend it, I think it would be valuable for the university to look into it.”
Image: The Cascade
