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T uesday January 31, 1989
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BY PAUL H O R W ITZ_______ The McGill Students’ Society is on the verge of becoming a found ing member of a new student or ganization, the Fédération des étudiant(e)s du Québec (FEQ). Representatives from the student organizations of McGill Univer sity, Université de Sherbrooke, Laval University, and Université de Montréal have been meeting since December to discuss setting
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up a studentorganization in Québec which would enable universities to respond in a co-ordinated manner to common areas of concern. The organization began the process of incorporating itself in a meeting on January 14. On January 24, the Students’ Society Council agreed to support the foundation of FEQ, and, with the other schools, to contribute $1 0 0 0 towards operating costs of the association for the next three
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months. On Sunday, SSMU Presi dent Nancy Côté and External Affairs CoordinatorJohn Fox went to a meeting held at Laval Univer sity, where the group’s constitu tion, organizational and voting structure were discussed. “It went very, very well”, said Fox. “It’s coming along very quickly.” The group’sconstitution was discussed clause by clause. DiscussingFEQ’svoting structure, Fox said, “The smaller schools
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o v e r d u e BY C O LIN SCOTT The new security measures that have been implemented in the McLennan-Redpath library for the Winter semester have proved to be inadequate. Since the library budget was cut last year, the secu rity for the complex has suffered heavily. There have been many complaints of problems arising from the lack of security and the future does not hold much hope for improvement The budget for security was re duced by $50,000 from last year’s $201,000. Reportedly, the money is now being used to provide more reserve services and to help im prove service to students. Dr. Eric Ormsby, Director of Libraries for McGill, says that service is being improved “in response to the needs of the students.” However, this has left a large gap in the security network of the library. “The guards have not been re duced [in number] at all. They are just being used differently. At present, it seems to be working, and I haven’t had any complaints,” said Ormsby. Dr. Ormsby feels that having guards on patrol is the best way to reduce security prob lems in the library. One guard patrols the entire library complex from 9h00 to 17h00 on weekdays and another is added from 17h00 until closing and on weekends. In addition, a guard checks identifi cation after 17h00 on weekdays and on the weekends. The guards are supposed to pre vent students from such activities as eating, smoking and vandalism, as well as performing regular se-
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pg.3 U.S. Inauguration.............. Engineers engineer change Pg*5 A Bohemian existence..........Pg.8 Talk Radio...............................pg.9 Rugby probation reviewed.P&*12 Sports P it................................pg.14
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must have a say about what goes on.” He added, “ The structure has to be such that it avoids the prob lems of RAEU [Regroupement des Associations EtudiantesUniversitaires]”, a defunct student organi zation which linked votes to the amount of money contributed to the organization. According to Fox and Côté, FEQ’s primary objectives are to provide an organization which will coordinate the reactions ofQuébec universities to common problems. Côté added that she' hopes the organization will also “produce visionary research into the future of education in Québec.” A head quarters for the technical opera tions of the association is planned, and will most likely be located in Montréal. Some concerns have been ex pressed over whether the Québec student movement w ill be split between FEQ and L ’association nationale des étudiants et étudian tes du Québec (ANEEQ). Côté responded to these concerns that some of ANEEQ’s actions in the
recent student strike had been “unbecoming of a student organi zation. We want to be a credible body.” She also said that she thought ANEEQ was too CEGEPoriented to be of real value to McGill and other Québec univer sities. The founding congress of the organization had originally been intended for mid-March, but Fox said that the date for the congress has been moved up to February 11. The group is expecting the tabling of policy papers on loans and bur saries and university funding by MinisterofEducation Claude Ryan in the near future. “We want to be able to respond to them with a brief at the public hearings”, he said. Though McGill is supporting the foundation of FEQ, it will not offi cially be a member of the associa tion until the incorporation proc ess is completed and the founding congress is held. At that point, if it wants to become a full member, it must hold a campus-wide referen dum.
Losses predicted for ASUS Winter Week BY SHANNON ALDINGER curity tasks. But with only one guard patrolling the entire library, this is not being done adequately. “All the guards in the world can’t control that”, says Ormsby. Then there was the recent incident in volving a peeping tom who set up shop in one of the women’s wash rooms on the third floor of the library. A guard tried to apprehend him, but was unsuccessful. While Dr. Ormsby feels that the present security is adequate, many others do not. Maria Battaglia, SSMU VP University Affairs, has been working on several possible solutions to the security situation, but as yet has not met with any response. The biggest problem comes from the fact that the secu rity is under contract to Barnes Security, and would be difficult to change until the agreement expires in June. The mostplausible alternative is onethat calls for Hospitality McGill to supplement the present security. “Hospitality is willing to provide us with security. They would be
good because they’ve had the experience”, says Battaglia. ‘The problem is that it can’t be started right away.” Hospitality McGill presently provides security to the McCord Museum. Dr. Ormsby has been consider ing the whole situation, but it does not look like anything will be done before June. “If we use students we would use them in addition to regular security. I don’t have the money to hire any more now,” commented Ormsby. He is con tent with the present setup, and does not see any real need for changes. As for the peeping tom incident, all he had to say was, “Oh, did that really happen?” Controversy over library safety continues; if nothing is done until June, library security w ill be se verely compromised. Considering the present disinterest in the situ ation on the part of the library administration, it is likely that nothing will change and students will have to take their chances in the library until next year.
The Arts and Science Under graduate Society (ASUS) will present its final budget figures for Nuclear Winter Week at tomor row’s meeting. Although ASUS executives will not comment on the monetary results of the week until after the meeting, speculated figures predict a loss of approxi mately $10 000. “We never expected it (Nuclear Winter Week) to break even. We had our hopes up, but didn’t expect it,” says Jeremy Boal, ASUS Presi dent. Boal explains that while ASUSsponsored events are ‘expected to break even in most cases’, excep tions can be made. “If it (the Program Committee) feels it won’t be able to break even, it asks council (for permission) to hold a special event. Council often saysyes; we usually feel it’sworth it One example is guest speakers: with guest speakers, it’s almost impossible to break even,” says Boal.
“Speakers cost about $5 000 American and it’s just accepted that guest speakers will not break even. We can’t charge students $20.00 a ticket which is about what it would cost to fully finance the speaker,” says Jennifer Fraser, ASUS VP Internal and one of two Winter Week coordinators. “We [ASUS] passed a motion back in November for about $7 000 American to finance the two speakers. The other events (of Nuclear Winter Week) were budg eted to break even,” she continues. Fraser made a point of explain ing that other student societies are allocated money (between $5 000 and $10 000 was her estimated figure) to spend on speakers with out any expectation of breaking even. ASUS receives an annual budget of approximately $100 000 (ap proximately $10 from each Arts and Science undergraduate stu dent.) “We’ve already received the money from the students, now continued on page 5