News DSU Caught in the Middle as Kwantien Student Union Seeks to Embarrass CFS Kwantlen aims to make details of 2006 DSU scandal public at CFS meeting By JJ McCullough, Editor-in-Chief A motion for an upcoming meeting of the Canadian Federation of Students that strongly criticized the troubled past of the Douglas College Students’ Union was unanimously denounced by a DSU board meeting last week. The controversial motion is part of a larger package scheduled to be put forth by the student union of Kwantlen University College, whose board is dominated by individuals critical of the CFS. Both Kwantlen and Douglas are members of the Canadian Federation of Students, a national umbrella group that many student unions across the country belong to. Once a year, the organization holds a national general meeting during which any member union can propose motions for other members to vote on. The 12" motion of the Kwantlen Students’ Association’s package is entitled “Douglas Students’ Union” and consists of an elaborate, 38- clause statement providing a lengthy chronology of the controversial and complex events that consumed the DSU’s operations from May of 2005 to January of 2006. During that period of time the DSU had its funding suspended by the administration of Douglas College after the union failed to provide financial audits to the College Board, as required by law. The suspension of funds threw the DSU into virtual bankruptcy and significant political turmoil, and it was in this context that the Canadian Federation of Students intervened. Much of the Kwantlen motion deals with this period of CFS involvement, and is particularly critical of a $200,000 loan the CFS’ BC component gave to the DSU over the course of late 2005. The loan is slammed for having been authorized in a secretive manner, with the CFS being accused of “propping up the Douglas Students’ Union when it was grossly mismanaged.” The motion also criticizes the DSU’s current court-appointed receiver- manager, Marne Jensen, as being an unfit appointment, and portrays her nomination— which was secured through CFS involvement in a court case between the DSU and Douglas College—as a CFS-backed attempt to install a partisan loyalist and prevent oversight. 4 Titus Gregory, the architect of the controversial motion The Kwantlen motion was largely written by Titus Gregory, a crusading anti-CFS blogger and activist who is currently employed by the Kwantlen student association as a “policy analyst.” A prominent figure in BC student politics, Gregory is well known for obtaining and publicizing embarrassing or damaging documents that offer revealing insights into the often secretive bureaucracies of student unions. Last spring Gregory spent over $300 of his own money to personally obtain all public court documents relating to the case of the DSU v. Douglas College; documents which were clearly used to provide many of the facts cited in his motion. On October 3 the Douglas Students’ Union held a board meeting attended by Laura Anderson, the Kwantlen Students’ Association’s external relations officer, to discuss the contentious “Motion 12”. Despite Anderson’s efforts to justify the motion as a way to demand CFS accountability, the DSU board eventually voted unanimously to denounce the motion, in a rare move that even united both anti and pro- CFS board members. Chief among the complaints were accusations that the motion was needlessly embarrassing to the current DSU, and continued to foster a negative public image of the union. No one associated with the scandal of the previous year is currently on the DSU board, all of whom were elected promising to “clean up” the problems of the past. “This is going backwards instead of forwards,” said Ally MacGrotty, the current DSU external relations officer. Others argued the actionable items of the Kwantlen motion—which call for the censuring of the entire CFS national executive as punishment for their involvement in the loan controversy — were too harsh. At this point the DSU’s opposition is largely symbolic. Speaking to the Other Press, Laura Anderson said the highly critical nature of the motion makes it very unlikely to be approved at the CFS general meeting in November, but suggested Kwantlen’s efforts were largely symbolic as well. “This is half about history and half about financial accountability,” she said. “It’s important to maintain that there’s a history and it’s shady and the CFS had something to do with it.” CFS officials have traditionally argued the DSU scandal was largely triggered by the administrators of Douglas College who overstepped their authorities in cutting off funds to the DSU, with the CFS then intervening to help alleviate the situation in a time of crisis. Titus Gregory has in turn accused the CFS of trying to “re-write the history” of the DSU scandal in order to misrepresent the nature of CFS involvement. Even if the Kwantlen motion fails, Gregory’s lengthy chronology will presumably remain achieved in CFS meeting minutes as a defeated motion, which Anderson suggested is in itself a small victory. The Kwantlen Student Association was rocked by its own financial scandal last year, which critics have also attempted to link to the CFS. In the aftermath, a strongly anti-CFS board was elected to power, and a referendum on leaving the CFS altogether will be voted on by students in 2008.