6 THE VOICE, THURSDAY, OCTOBER 11, 2012

EDITOR OMAR SHARIFF

Langara elections are still too vague

ob descriptions should accom- pe job openings — it’s how we

keep people accountable when they get hired for a position.

Listings for jobs let us know what new employees are supposed to be doing and it makes their progress, or lack thereof, measureable.

But when we have fuzzy, or worse, no job descriptions, how can we know if they’re doing what they’re supposed to do?

The short answer — we can’t.

And during the Langara College elections, we haven’t seen any clarity in those job descriptions at all. A few weeks ago, while brows- ing my email inbox, I noticed the Langara Students’ Union was holding nomina- tions for the board of gover- nors and educa- tion council. There was nothing in the messages to describe what their responsibili- ties were.

A fancy title with a student government sticker — it must be an important job!

I scrolled down the brick wall of text just below, hopeful some of the information there would enlighten me. I was wrong.

In a nutshell, here’s what it said: want to be nominated? Pay your tuition.

Fair enough, but it would be nice to know what kind of jobs your tuition’s supporting. The Langara website doesn’t do much better, providing a hazy, general outline of what their responsibilities are.

The board of governors site will make you dizzy from the legalese, while the education council descrip- tion doesn’t fare much better:

“Education Council is responsible for policies concerning student evaluation, withdrawal, academic standing, appeals, grading, awards for excellence and curriculum content.”

It’s so general it’s equivalent to saying the education council is responsible for education. In the case of the LSU we don’t even know what they do, so they’ll be staying for a long time — whether or not they get the job done.

OPINION

STEVEN CHUA

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BRANDON KOSTINUK cartoon

Y/ 40

"WHY Does LAN GAR HAVE SULCH BAD CELL

/

No due process evident in thin streets proposal

ncouver cannot afford to lose good, progressive ideas like the ‘thin streets’ proposal to bad political practice.

Such ideas must be legislated in ways that generate credibility, support and trust, rather than increase skepticism.

After a rushed vote by city council, the zoning amendments pertaining to the ‘thin streets’ proposal were approved last Wednesday.

Legally, any proposed changes to zoning may only become policy after meaningful consultation with communities.

Although Marpole has historically been a “not-in-my-backyard” neighbourhood (I’m remembering the Canada Line construction), residents have justifiably expressed their anger at having these pro- posed changes forced on them with no consultation.

While I applaud projects that directly address Vancouver’s housing issues, anything that is

tabled, voted and rushed through a government body in three days piques my interest.

When the project is valued at $2 billion, and the proposed changes are taken into effect immedi- ately, I become wary of the motivation behind the development.

More interest- ae A ing still, the :

Mayor’s Task OPIN ION Force on Afford- ANNIE ELLISON able Housing is

co-chaired by

Olga Ilich, former

BC Liberal MLA and millionaire development diva.

What do she and the rest of the developers on the task force stand to gain? And what exactly are her insights on affordable housing?

Greater Vancouver Homebuilders’ Association CEO Peter Simpson made the prediction that only a

“shrill minority who don’t want change” would oppose the project.

And shrill they were.

It’s difficult to feel bad for someone who owns a corner lot on the westside, but homeowners like David Griggs were not given that meaningful consultation.

Since Wednesday’s outcry from residents, the city has backed off on the immediate effect of the zoning amendments, and those missing neighbourhood discussions will now take place.

Why the rush, councillors?

I suspect council tried to approve this valuable proposal before too many screechy homeowners waved their million-dollar mortgages and said no.

Well, they’re waving them now.

Lack of regard for residents has made the proposal more controver- sial that it already is.

I hope that this lack of transpar- ency does not jeopardize the future of such an innovative solution for Vancouver’s density dilemma.

Faregates at SkyTrain stations not needed

noticed the new gates plaguing

every SkyTrain and Canada Line station.

Since you now have to filter past them single file after leaving a crowded bus, the gates seem to be more of a nuisance than anything else.

TransLink’s justification for these new faregates is that they will eliminate fare evaders and allow TransLink to collect the money they would otherwise lose.

But in reality, the amount of fare evaders has decreased.

There were 3,100 fewer tickets for fare evasion issued last month in comparison to September of last year. And the kicker is that 76,000 more people were checked for valid fare in that same span of time.

I pretty sure everyone has

One could argue that because TransLink is cracking down on fare evaders, the number of people riding the train system for free has drastically reduced.

And that’s totally fine.

But if it’s been proven that having a stronger enforcement presence on transit is the solu- tion to the problem of people cheating the system, why do we need these gates?

This new gate system is estimated to cost $171-mil- lion to implement. Sure, TransLink

OPINION

OMAR SHARIFF

won't be fronting the entire cost by itself; the provincial and federal governments have pledged to contribute a total of around $70-mil- lion to the project.

But just last month, TransLink announced its three-year plan to cut costs by reducing services during off-peak hours and on less busy routes.

Surely they can’t possibly just cut $100 million worth of services — this extra money needs to be coming from multiple sources.

The only other way I can think of to boost revenue for a transit company is by increasing the cost of using its services.

And it’s not fair to increase the cost of using transit while decreas- ing services to fix a problem that is already being resolved.

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EDITORIAL STAFF THIS ISSUE:

MANAGING EDITOR/ PAGE 6 Omar Shariff

PAGE EDITORS

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PAGE 2 Ashley Viens

PAGE 3

Cara McKenna

PAGE 4

Sascha Porteous

PAGE 5 Stacy Thomas

PAGE 7 Alex Skerdzhev

PAGE 8

Ross Armour

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