Bethune College Council General Meeting #15

February 26, 2014

6:15 pm to 7:54 pm

Bethune College, Room 224

Chaired by thePresident, Anil Mohabir

*The President called the meeting to order at 6:15 pm.

  1. Roll Call

Voting Member Attendance:

Anil Mohabir, John Amanatides, Paul Delaney, Mazen Hamadeh, Kayla Lascasas Jiries Karborani, Aryan Heidari, Kashif Khan, Navreet Gill, Julia Dumitrescu, Mohsen Youseff.

Non-Voting Member Attendance:

Naim Ibrahim Benoit, Christopher Lam, Michelle Shoukralla.

Guests:

Nastassia Paikoff.

  1. Relay for Life
  • Relay for Life is an event created to fundraise money for the Canadian Cancer Society; the event is scheduled on Saturday, March 22, 2014 to Sunday, March 23, 2014 at the Tait McKenzie Center.
  • All participants are split into several teams and each team member must raise at least $100.
  • The event includes ceremonies, performances, games and competitions.
  • Council members decided to promote the event through social media and encourage Bethune Students to participate.
  1. First Year Representatives’ Reports
  • The First Year Representatives from Bethune, Vanier, Glendon, McLaughlin and New Colleges held a meeting on Tuesday, February 25, 2014.
  • The students decided to create a joint social gathering across the York University Colleges; more information about the event will be received soon.
  1. Social Committee’s Update
  • Over 100 tickets for Bethune Formal have already been sold.
  • The macaroons order will be finalized once the final ticket sale count is received.
  • IC Studios were booked once again for the photography services.
  • The Vice-President Social will hold a meeting on Saturday, March 1, 2014 with the event planner and photographers to finalize the details.
  • Council members were also reminded to fill out the sent out doodle poll to ensure that everyone will be available to complete the tasks assigned to them.

Menu changes:

a)All meat choices will be halal.

b)Eggplant parmesan or stuffed pepper with vegetable medley will be the two vegetarian options.

c) All the potatoes will be sweet potatoes

d)Only brown or whole wheat bread will be served.

  1. Promotions and Marketing Committee’s Update
  • Promotions and Marketing Committee meeting were consistently held over the last few weeks.
  • The clothing line will include sweat pants, yoga pants, T-shirts, shirts, sweaters and shorts.
  • Samples for the clothing line should be received soon for promotional video; the advertising will be similar to Axe commercials.
  • Please e-mail for BCC jacket orders.
  • The digital media assistant is currently working on the Bethune Formal’s promotional trailer.
  • WordPress training will be held on Wednesday, March 4, 2014 by the Digital Media Assistant, Jenni Wu.
  1. SOS Representative’s Update
  • SOS is now recruiting Peer Mentors, Peer Advisors, Pass Leaders and Student Ambassadors.
  • SOS videos will be made to advertise available programs and events; SOS Talks video project has already been started and the videos will be most likely uploaded on the BCC YouTube channel.
  1. Executive Vice-President’s Report
  • JACS and JCR have been cleaned and disinfected.
  • The new microwave stand with added microwave covers and instructions has been purchased and placed in JACS.
  • BCC has now a cleaning schedule. Council members can also follow the “to do list” which was posted in the BCC office.
  • JACS and JCR Facebook group was created to improve communication between the monitors.
  • The Executive Vice-President is also working on creating contracts and performance evaluation forms for each position on council that could be used at the honorarium meetings and by the future Executive Vice Presidents.
  • The Game of Thrones premiere will be held in JCR on Sunday, April 6, 2014.
  1. Finance Report

Vice-President Finance’s response to the issues brought up by the Vice President Executive:

a)Failure to oversee creation of the ticket sale procedures, internal controls, reconciliations of finances and deposits of cash.

  • The Vice-President Finance was not made aware by the BCC that the performance of duties has been found subpar;
  • The one-on-one meeting with the President was not scheduled after the reduction of his honorarium as promised.
  • The spreadsheet has been prepared before the ticket sales and the VP-Finance regularly checked up on the progress with the Master’s Office.

b)Present the BCC Budget at the start of each semester with the money spent and allocated; present monthly financial statements to council.

  • The updates have not been presented for the winter semester 2014 but the President does have an access to the Quick Books.

c)Lost cheques requisition forms and inability to process cheque requisition forms in timely manner.

  • No cheque requisition forms that were directly given to the VP Finance have been lost; cheques left by students in the Executive Office and not directly given to the VP Finance are often lost.

d)Frosh has not been closed.

  • The Orientation week 2013 has not yet been closed because other colleges still have not submitted their payments for the hosted events and supplies.

e)Moneris machine has not been returned.

  • The supplier has been contacted in December 2013 and the VP Finance was told that BCC will not be charged for the further rental of the unit.

f)Failure to complete the interim audit by the end of January 2014.

  • Accepting cash for the orientation leader payments did not translate into failing the audit. A few extra steps were taken to ensure internal controls and no issues regarding orientation leader payments were brought up.
  • Quick Books and other financial documents were up to date and the audit was completed on January 30, 2014 without any complications.

g)Failure to attend BCC meetings as scheduled and spends at least 5 hours in the office per week.

  • In 2013, the VP Finance attended 13/15 meetings. The VP Finance notified Administrative Assistant whenever he was not able to attend the meeting.
  • According to the office hours’ updates sent out by the Former Vice-President Executive, the required amount of office hours has been completed in 2013. However, the completed amount of hours in 2014 is declining since the Vice-President Finance no longer considers the BCC office a safe space.

List of concerns brought up by the Vice President Finance:

  • Lack of communication between the council members;Rumors about the performance and status of the interim audit.
  • Facebook picture posted by one of the council members which questioned performance of the Vice-President Finance.
  • Lack of constructive criticism; no follow up on the performance after the honorarium meeting. First form of feedback shouldn’t have been a dismissal letter.
  • Non BCC members should not be permitted in the Executive Office and should not be allowed to use the BCC Executive computers.

List of concerns brought up by the other council members:

  • No response has been received after several sent e-mails and calls.
  • The BCC mail box still contains cheque requisitions and refund requests from Orientation Week 2013.
  • Lack of communication between the Vice-President Finance and other executive council members. Checking e-mail should be a duty of a council member.
  • The Bell bill hasn’t been paid for more than three times.
  • Orientation Week payments still haven’t been withdrawn from the BCC PayPal account.
  • Weekly meetings with Suzanne Park have been missed.
  • No response has been given to the multiple requests to send out a finance update.
  • SOS will hold a Conflict Resolution workshop for the future council members.
  1. President’s Report
  • One of the former Bethune College Alumni proposed to hold a Bethune Graduate meeting. The President suggested “capturing” and engaging thestudents right after their graduation.
  • Alumni can be involved in the Orientation or Frost weeks to help out. Several alumni have reached out and were interested in the Bethune Community involvement.
  • Students must e-mail the President () as soon as possible for the BCC sweater requests.
  1. Constitutional Changes
  • No constitutional changes can be made as it is too late in the semester to hold a public meeting regarding the changes in BCC constitution.
  • Next year’s council should discuss constitutional changes in the fall semester so by the winter semester, council can dedicate more time to advertising and gaining support from the community members.
  1. Other Business
  • Vice-President Social suggested that council members should receive training from SOS early on in the summer to improve the levels of discipline and organization.
  • BCC members are welcomed to attend the SOS training which will be held from May 2, 2014 to May 4, 2014.
  • CRO, Alex Bryan, will send out the nomination packages over the Listserv.
  • Council members must ensure that the CRO has been properly trained, the nomination packages don’t contain errors and that the voters list includes all members of the Bethune College Community.
  • All CROs were trained by the ERO hired by the SCLD and must be familiar with York University policies by now.
  • The voting list has been already prepared and will be submitted to the Master’s Office before the nomination period to ensure that each community member is on the list before the voting starts.
  • Laptop voting is now banned; council members suggested setting up a few voting stations around Bethune College, Steacie Library, Life Science and Lassonde buildings; paper voting is not allowed; all voting must now be done electronically.

*Aryan Heidari motioned to allow people to be interviewed together; seconded by the President, Anil Mohabir.

Vote: 11 for; 0 against; 0 abstained; motion passed.

  • Emergency Finance Meeting must be held as soon as possible.
  • Council members must send out their monthly reports to the Vice President Executive, Kayla Lascasas, before Friday, February 28, 2014.
  1. Next Meeting
  • The next meeting will be held on Monday, March 3, 2014 at 6:00 pm in JCR.
  1. Adjournment

*The President called the meeting to adjournment at 7:54 pm.