The Arts and Science Union’s two remaining executives, Edward Wong and Sheila Hewlett, are facing the fallout from last spring’s contested election alone. Last week, interim provost Cheryl Misak froze ASSU’s funding and recommended a new election. In the wake of president Ryan Hayes’ resignation, the remaining execs are one vote short of quorum—according to their own constitution, they need at least one more member to make any decisions. This afternoon, ASSU will hold its regularly scheduled fall elections for four more executive members.
Wong and Hewlett have also inherited a tense working relationship between ASSU staff and some of last year’s execs.
ASSU has three full-time employees. Terry Buckland and Jane Seto Paul have worked there for 25 and 17 years respectively, according to the ASSU website. Ranjini Ghosh, former ASSU president (2002-04), was hired last fall.
The three have been working without a contract since their collective bargaining agreements expired last June. Staff have three pending grievances against ASSU, and negotiations can’t begin until they’re resolved.
None of the 2007-08 executives returned this year, though that could change with today’s exec elections. Ghosh said the changing of the guard hasn’t improved the working relationship: “I think it’s gotten worse, because in the summer the split [between the executives] didn’t exist as much. The staff didn’t have a say in how to run the office.”
Neither Wong nor the three staff members could comment on the pending grievances. If they can’t be resolved, both sides will split the cost of an arbitrator, which can run to to $3,000 or $4,000 per day. Morrison said the two sides will try to settle the grievances outside of arbitration.
Executive assistant Terry Buckland saw his role significantly scaled back last year. Buckland had traditionally attended exec meetings and taken minutes. Beginning last fall, he was no longer invited. The execs began taking minutes in turn and passing them among each other to fill in the blanks.
Buckland used to put together the budget for the execs’ approval. This year, he said, ASSU is working on it themselves: “I don’t have access to this year’s budget.”
Buckland is also president of the Association of Part-Time Students and has sat on different U of T committees in the past. Until last year, he said, he could easily take time off to attend various meetings. He no longer has that flexibility. “I am required to give one week’s notice,” he said. “And it’s very frustrating because sometimes you don’t get a week’s notice.”
Staff also voiced complaints of secrecy, condescending treatment, and disregard for their input. The office was re-arranged over Labour Day, said Ghosh, even though she told Hayes the new configuration only allows one photocopier to be plugged in at a time without blowing out all the sockets in the office. “If you come in the afternoon to the ASSU office, there’s at least 10 to 15 students waiting to photocopy tests.”
Seto Paul said staff wasn’t given the information they needed to run the day-to-day operations of the office. “It’s not been a very happy work environment,” she said. “It was a divided executive for most of the year. Staff wasn’t a part of a lot of things any more, we didn’t know what was going on.”
