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Clipped Wings Why you should think twice before pounding that Jagerbomb >> pg. 4
thegazette Showing up on time since 1906
Tuesday, September 24, 2013
today high 18 low 4
tomorrow high 18 low 5
canada’s only Daily Student Newspaper • founded 1906
Volume 107, issue 12
Campaign to clean up student image Students volunteer for post-hoco cleanup Megan Devlin News Editor The University Students’ Council has launched the Good Neighbour Campaign, which kicks off this Sunday with a post-homecoming neighbourhood cleanup. The event starts at 1 p.m. the Sunday after Homecoming, and asks students to volunteer a couple hours of their time to show their commitment to London residents by cleaning up after themselves. Gloves, garbage bags and other tools are to provided by the USC. Amir Eftekarpour, vice-president external with the USC, explained the Good Neighbour Campaign was conceived in order to re-imagine students’ relationship with the London community. “Way too often, students are thought of as loud, drunk, annoying residents who live here for a couple years then get out,” Eftekarpour said. “This campaign is meant to reflect what students really do […] we contribute hugely to the culture, the economy, the communities, we graduate and have the potential to come back and really contribute to London.” The short-term goal of the campaign, Eftekarpour said, is to foster a sense of community among students and their long-term neighbours. However, in the long run, Eftekarpour hoped initiatives from the Good Neighbour Campaign would change the way students are
perceived by Londoners. “The community cleanup was based off of McMaster’s post O-Week cleanup. It shows commitment to the city, and commitment to keeping the place clean and safe,” Eftekarpour said. The homecoming cleanup is just the start of the Good Neighbour Campaign; Efekarpour hopes it will continue with events such as community dinners for the less fortunate, or having Western students volunteer at soup kitchens in the community. He also said he was investigating mess-prevention measures for Homecoming, such as asking city waste management for 40 garbage cans to be placed on Richmond Row on Saturday. Eftekarpour explained this event was meant to prove students could actively engage with the city of London, and hoped such active engagement may serve to bring about the end of initiatives like Project LEARN. “Project LEARN stems from a perception in the city that students are drunk, loud and noisy. The whole point of re-imagining that is to make things like Project LEARN unnecessary,” Eftekarpour said. “We’re going to kill them with kindness.” Eftekarpour hoped that by having students do their part for the community, London could do its part and get rid of things like Project LEARN. He explained the USC was
Kelly Samuel GAZETTE
HOWDY NEIGHBOUR! The University Students’ Council is organizing a post-homecoming cleanup effort as part of their “Good Neighbour Campaign,” designed to improve relations between students and the city. The campaign is part of the USC’s plan to kill Project LEARN with kindness, according to VP external Amir Eftekarpour.
conducting research looking into how other student-heavy cities handled things like noise bylaws. In Kingston, for example, the Queen’s student council handles noise bylaw complaints. Ending Project LEARN was one of the platform points Eftekarpour carried when he campaigned last year with Pat Whelan and Sam Krishnapillai.
Eftekarpour questioned the police policy, asking why $300,000 is spent on Project LEARN every year, and less is spent on initiatives that help students, such as preventing break-ins in student areas. “We’re having a meeting next week with the police to propose a police protection project for students in their neighbourhoods,” Eftekarpour said.
He explained all of these measures were to re-imagine how students integrate with London, hoping police projects that were mutually beneficial could replace Project LEARN. Representatives from the London Police Service and city council were not available to comment on this story.
USC to debate about debating rules Iain Boekhoff News Editor University Students’ Council debates may soon have a new time limit, if a proposal is passed at tomorrow’s council meeting. The second motion on the agenda calls for the ratification of new standing orders of council — and in those new standing orders is a section that would limit debate on any motion to one hour. Council could vote to extend a debate, but “only one extension shall be permitted on any question, amendment, or item of business,” according to the proposed rule. Andrew Shaw, legislative assistant for the USC, in a
report regarding the agenda for Wednesday’s meeting, said the time limits are designed to “ensure that discussions at council are focused and pointed — as opposed to circular and never-ending.” Last year’s budget debate clocked in at two hours, and the recent restructuring of the USC was approved only after several hours of heated debate. In the report, Shaw said that after many years of observing council, it is necessary to put time limits on discussions to prevent ineffective decisions coming from long debates. The goal, he says, is to engender debate and protect the democratic process and the hope for placing time limits on debate will allow council to
12 a.m. is the diving line between strong, clear decision making and a ‘let’s get out of here’ mentality.” Andrew Shaw
legislative assistant for the USC
become more focused. Furthermore, the policy states that there should be a 12 a.m. cutoff for all meetings, so that decision-making isn’t affected by tired councilors. Last year, council meetings regularly went past 12 a.m., including two which went past 4 a.m. Meetings cut short at midnight would be resumed at a later date, according to the new rules. “History suggests that 12 a.m. is the dividing line between strong, clear decision-making and a ‘let’s just get out of here’ mentality, so it makes sense to end meetings prior to this point to engender the strongest, clearest discussion possible on an issue, which will in turn only benefit the students that c ouncil
represents,” Shaw said. Pat Whelan, president of the USC, said he hopes council takes the proposed changes seriously and debates the merits of the time limits. “We’ve had some mixed responses and that’s why I hope this is a really serious debate on Wednesday night about how to balance an effective decision-making body with the proper deliberative process.” Tomorrow’s council meeting, the first of the school year, will be held at 7 p.m. in council chambers on the third floor of the University Community Centre.