Arts councillors hold town hall on student spaces levy

Prior to a vote that will determine if the student spaces levy will go to referendum, several members of Students’ Council held a town hall to discuss how their constituents feel on the matter.

Around 22 students attended a town hall organized by the Organization for Arts Students and Interdisciplinary Studies in the Humanities Fishbowl on February 1 at 12:00 p.m. The event was held a day before Students’ Council is scheduled to hold a special meeting which will decide if the student spaces levy will go to a referendum. If approved, the fee would cost students $18 in the 2019-20 academic year and double annually until it reaches $54 by 2021-22. It would be used for renovations and building maintenance around campus.

During the event, representatives from the Students’ Union were on hand to explain the details of the proposed levy. Several councillors took issue with various aspects of the levy, including the referendum question’s wording, as well as the question of ownership of the renovated spaces. However, some thought the levy should go to a referendum so that the undergraduate student population can decide to either approve or disapprove the fee themselves during the upcoming Students’ Union elections in March.

Prior to the town hall, a special meeting of Students’ Council was held on January 29 in order to discuss the proposed levy, but council was unable to reach a decision before running out of time, as council meetings are mandated to end at 9 p.m.

Emma Ripka, Students’ Union vice-president (operation and finance), was present at the town hall to answer questions about the proposed levy.

One concern Ripka responded to was who would own a space that would be renovated under the proposal. She responded that spaces renovated with the levy would still be owned by the university. She added that while the Students’Union doesn’t have the university’s written approval of the idea, she is working with Andrew Sharman, the university’s vice-president (facilities and operations), to get it.

Ripka added that a report on the Students’ Union’s consultations with faculty associations is currently being worked on and will be released some time after the town hall.

During the event, several councillors were asked how they felt about the upcoming vote. Arts councillor Rowan Ley said while some can think the levy is a bad idea, councillors should vote on Saturday based on whether they think the general student population should have a chance to vote on it in a referendum.

“The only situation which I would vote it down is if I disagreed with it as a referendum question, where it was so clearly an awful idea that was against the SU’s mission, or would create terrible outcomes, that students shouldn’t have a direct say on it,” Ley said.

While several others agreed with Ley’s sentiment, some thought the idea of the levy wasn’t worth considering. Alexa Byrd, a fifth-year arts student and a member of the Socialist Fightback club on campus, said it is “absurd” that students are potentially being asked to pay more than they already are in order to address maintenance on campus.

“It’s really important to keep in mind that by doing that, the university is offloading the problem onto the students,” Byrd said. “They’re not actually looking out for our best interest, they’re looking out for the profit motive of this university.”