ASFA No Longer Required to Publish Tentative Budget: Council

ASFA By-Elections Dated

NewsVince Morello — Published September 25, 2017

“I felt it was super unnecessary to disseminate the information throughout the entire community. I feel like most people aren’t interested in it,” ASFA’s interim Vice President of Finance, Francesco Valente said.

However, Valante added that he’d like to encourage those who’d like to see the mock budget to go to the ASFA office and request to do so.

During ASFA’s annual general meeting last May, former Concordia Student Union Sustainability Coordinator, Lana Elinor Galbraith, proposed a motion to have Valente produce a mock budget without spending money on frosh, and an analysis of frosh’s budget in order to make recommendations for the future. The purpose of the mock budget would be to show how ASFA’s money could be used to give member associations more money for their own projects.

Galbraith said that since students aren’t willing to give ASFA a fee-levy increase, cuts should be made to frosh spending in order to satisfy other parts of ASFA’s budget.

“There are [member associations] who should get more money, their CEO’s, and polling clerks should get more money,” Galbraith said soon after the general meeting.

The mock budget and analysis of the expenses were to be published on ASFA’s website and newsletter. The motion passed almost unanimously and a deadline for the mock budget and analysis was set for Aug. 31.

As the deadline came and passed without any results, Valente decided it would be for the best if the mock budget was not publicized as to not confuse any students into thinking that it was the actual budget.

Valente said that he had not been thinking about the deadline, but even if he had, he would have needed to present it to council before publishing it online.

“Legally it’s not valid,” Galbraith said about the amended motion after the council meeting. “Council cannot amend what an [annual general meeting] has done. An AGM is a higher decision body than just a council meeting.”

Valente had said that he had not told Galbraith about his amendment but would be willing to show her the frosh budget analysis, and the mock budget.

The Link was able to see the mock budget in time of publication.

Valente did go through his recommendations for frosh and said that there should be a cap on spending. Frosh currently has a cap of about $150 per student attending.

Call for Elections

At the same meeting, ASFA’s by-election dates were set for Nov. 20-23. All of ASFA’s executive team is currently working on an interim basis because their general elections last March were invalidated. The election was invalidated as they had extended their polling time, which contradicts their by-laws.

The current interim executive team is expected to run for their positions again.

A question about a fee-levy increase has become a tradition for ASFA during their elections, and this year’s by-elections are likely to bring up the question again, but Valente said it’s something that the executive team hasn’t discussed yet.

“I would love to do a fee-levy [question] again, but I myself am a bit of annoyed with constantly having this question brought up, so you can just try and wait a year,” he said.