Second Meeting to Decide Next Step for CUTV

Membership, Structure and GA to Be Discussed

NewsCorey Pool — Published November 18, 2012

The meeting has been called for Monday at 6:30 p.m., but the location has yet to be confirmed.

The first meeting took place Thursday evening in the basement of Concordia’s School of Community and Public Affairs building. It was labelled an “info-session on moving forward.”

At its peak, the meeting consisted of approximately 40 people and included a mix of Concordia students and community members affiliated with CUTV.

The meeting came in response to the growing concern over several issues that have plagued the station over the past few months.

Since mid-October, CUTV has seen the resignation of several members of its Board of Directors, the resignation of its station manager, the freezing of the student-funded fee levy accounts by the university, concern over the station’s finances including community donations and assets and reported issues involving several interpersonal conflicts amongst staff and members.

The meeting on Thursday was tense as attendees tried to tiptoe around personal conflicts and keep the conversation focused on informing the community about the complicated situation at CUTV.

The end goal of Monday’s meeting will be to announce a formal general assembly in order to elect a proper Board of Directors and a set of bylaws that will hopefully get the station back on its feet.

However, there are still several obstacles in the way of seeing this through.

One of the main points of discussion, and what ultimately needs to be decided at tomorrow’s meeting before anything can move forward, involves defining what constitutes a voting member of CUTV.

Due to a lack of official bylaws and a Board of Directors that is legally illegitimate, there is no clear definition of a CUTV member, and no official body or bylaw to state how a member is to be defined.

CUTV is a student-funded fee levy group, receiving $0.34 per credit from each undergraduate student at Concordia.

It is also a community organization that receives donations from, and is staffed by, community members.

Several ideas put forward at the meeting suggested that community members who make financial donations or contribute more than four hours of work to the station can be voting members at the GA.

There was repeated discussion on whether or not all undergraduate students at Concordia would be voting members at a GA, due to the fact that they all automatically pay into the corporation. A decision was never reached on this point.

CUTV’s former program director and current Executive Director Laith Marouf suggested in the meeting that voting student members are only those who have contributed four hours of work, and that community members go through a process wherein they pay a fee, are presumably trained and complete the required participation.

Marouf suggested that this is how most campus media fee levy groups are organized, naming both CKUT, McGill University’s radio station, and The Link as examples.

According to bylaws that govern CKUT, all students registered at McGill are members of the station, not including continuing education students, summer students, McDonald College students, medical interns, residents or non-resident graduate students. Each member of CKUT has one vote at all meetings.

According to The Link ’s bylaws, all undergraduate students at Concordia are members of the publication and subject to the $0.19 per credit fee levy. The bylaws state that all members have the right to vote and run for the Board of Directors during the annual general assembly, special general assembly or in a referendum.

The bylaws for the Concordia Student Broadcasting Corporation, the umbrella organization that governs CJLO, Concordia’s radio station, and used to govern CUTV, states that “the fee levied upon students by Concordia University to finance in part the activities of the corporation is not a membership fee.”

CUTV was a part of the CSBC prior to June 1, when a transition agreement was set in place making CUTV its own corporation. Though that transition process is technically still taking place, the CSBC bylaws no longer apply to CUTV.

The meeting on Monday night is open, and all interested parties are encouraged to join.

Update: In the original version of this article it was reported that the student fee-levy of $0.34 per credit from each undergraduate student at Concordia makes up more than half of CUTV’s budget. The Link cannot verify this information and therefore regrets the error.