In late August, the Students’ Administrative Council spent nearly $1,500 to transport 26 student demonstrators from Toronto to New York to protest the Republican National Convention, The Varsity has learned.
Six students were fully funded and the 20 remaining students were allocated $50 each and were required to pay the balance from their own pocket. The protestors then travelled by bus to New York City for the weekend of August 28.
The decision to fund the controversial trip was made at the July 16 SAC External Commission meeting, where the committee approved a motion to allocate subsidies totalling $1,480.
The proposition caused a stir from the start: forty members of the External committee debated the issue for over two hours during the meeting. And the result was a squeaker, with 18 votes in favour of the motion and 16 votes against.
Sam Rahimi, SAC’s Vice President External for 2004-2005, said in an interview that he believes the American election is an important issue and that the money was well spent. He voted in favour of the motion and attended the protest, which he says was relevant to U of T students.
“It showed solidarity to students in the US who don’t believe in George Bush and his policies,” said Rahimi. “The actions of Bush…are a direct threat to the whole world and that includes Canada. Students are future leaders. We must speak out against injustice wherever it may be found.”
On whether it was appropriate to use student fees to fund a trip with explicitly partisan goals, he said, “if Republicans asked for money, [to protest the Democratic convention] I would’ve voted for that too.”
Although the external commission’s mandate listed on SAC’s website is conducting “lobbying campaigns on issues that matter to you: tuition fees, public transit, world peace, and social justice,” some students believe the council spent money inappropriately.
Noel Semple, a law student, said that students work hard for their money and believes it was “not SAC’s business” to fund initiatives that do not directly affect U of T students and that they shouldn’t have used dollars collected from student fees to finance the trip.
“There are some things a [student] government shouldn’t do at all,” said Semple, “that aren’t government business… because it’s out of their jurisdiction.”
He suggested instead that SAC focus their efforts on local issues such as hiring a new president to replace the former president Robert Birgeneau. He points out that students have varying views and that it is “not appropriate to spend money on one particular opinion. They should spend [money] on other things better than this.” He says that if SAC was interested in sending people to New York, then it should have done so without dipping into student fees.
“Sam should stand out on the street and ask people for change from their pockets,” he said.
The trip was lightly advertised on SAC’s website and, as of September 12, 2004, it still stated “We are planning to provide transportation for students to go to New York City in August to protest the policies of President Bush at the Republican National Convention, and more information will be posted here as it becomes available.”
That the trip was poorly advertised upsets Semple, who thinks the organization of the trip was unfair, since it “was in the middle of the summer; most students didn’t know about it. The only way for a seat on the bus was if you knew someone.”
He says all students should have been able to benefit from a subsidized trip to New York.
“It would be interesting to know how many people had a pleasant weekend in New York without doing anything political.”
Rahimi countered that group attendance was taken and that “all of them did attend at least one of the protests, the one on August 29.”
Semple said the voting system for dispersion of SAC money is flawed, since the voters on the committee “are not democratically elected representatives.” Currently, any full-time undergraduate who is interested in voting on a particular issue in the external commission need solely show up at a meeting and will receive voting rights.
“If someone brings in a proposal for $1000 to paint their house and they bring enough people to vote for it, SAC can pass it,” Semple said.
“It’s our money, and we have no control what the commission does with the $850,000 they think they can play with.”
Rahimi confirmed that voting rights are open to all willing full time undergraduates, but said that while it may not please all of the students all of the time, the system works.
“In any representative democracy, not every decision makes everyone happy,” he said. “I believe the majority of U of T students would’ve supported the initiative.”
“That may be true,” said Semple, but these students should be donating their own money to the political cause through their own free will. “They shouldn’t take money from students with different views, or who just don’t care.”
The SAC external commission will continue to be involved with political issues outside the university. Numerous deserters from the US military are presently living in Canada; many of them had been students who enlisted in the army in order to pay their tuition. Under its War Resistors Campaign, SAC will lobby the Canadian government to allow these Americans soldiers to remain in Canada.
