The position Vice-President Student Life on the Students’ Administrative Council (SAC) will be replaced next year with an appointed position to be determined by SAC’s board of Directors, the council voted last week. The motion was the most contentious issue addressed at SAC’s Annual General Meeting, held last Friday in the Earth Sciences Building where about a hundred students came out to the marathon four-hour meeting.

The replacement of an elected Vice-President with an appointed one was part of a larger swath of changes that were being implemented in SAC’s new set of by-laws. The vote, reflecting the highly contentious and protracted debate that raged over the question, was close with 469 votes in favor, 410 opposed, and 49 abstentions. About one fourth of those voters came with a large number of proxy votes (votes cast on behalf of students not present). The proxy voters, many brandishing the maximum of 11 votes, considerably outnumbered many individual students who had only their own vote.

One of the main responsibilities of the old VP Student Life (the appointed position has been renamed to VP Campus Life) is to oversee the dispersal of SAC funds to campus organizations and clubs. In the 2003-2004 fiscal year, SAC disbursed approximately $150,000 to campus organizations.

A variety of people spoke against the proposed change including Sam Rahimi, SAC VP External.

“By-law changes are not a good way to address the sort of organizational problems that SAC has faced this year,” said Rahimi.

Dylan Rae, the current-and now final-VP Student Life, said, “Clubs deserve to have an elected person, who is responsible to the students. If this person is hired by SAC, they would feel responsible to their employer, not to students.”

Lisa Alridge, SAC VP Operations, was involved in drafting the by-law changes and spoke about the revisions.

“We want greater accountability for the clubs commission,” said Aldridge. “It doesn’t make sense to have this as an elected position; patronage is a major concern under the current system.”

Several of those who spoke at the meeting described themselves as outsiders, unaware of the details and precise nature of SAC’s internal problems. Brian Kolenda asked the chair, former SAC president Alex Kerner, to clarify whether or not there has been impropriety in the use of SAC funds. Kerner said that the details could only released if the session went in camera, a motion which failed to pass.

The other contentious change which passed at the meeting had to due with altering the allocation of positions on SAC’s Board of Governors. Under the current system, there are nearly fifty members on the Board; the new system would raise the population of students in a given constituency (i.e. College, Professional Faculty, etc.) needed to get additional Board seats.

Howard Tam, SAC VP University Affairs, said, “We think these changes are necessary, as the Board has become too large and unwieldy.”