Last week, on the motions of non-confidence in Western President Amit Chakma and Board of Governors Chair Chirag Shah, we witnessed one of the most thoughtful, engaging and, yes, feisty university Senate debates in recent memory.
When I preach the value of a university setting to outsiders, what was allowed to happen within those few hours Friday is what I am trying convey. Outside of a handful of embarrassing audience members hell bent on drawing attention to themselves through catcalls and forced guffaws, it was a near-perfect moment in how we settle our differences.
Until we actually had to vote, that is.
As you know by now, Senate members voted down separate motions of non-confidence in Chakma and Shah at the specially called meeting. Senators voted 30-49 with five abstentions against a motion of non-confidence in the president, and 20-46 with 21 abstentions against a motion of non-confidence in Shah.
But neither of those numbers are what we heard in the moment.
Questions started flooding in Friday night as the official vote count on the Chakma motion, released after the meeting, failed to match up with what people heard earlier during the meeting.
There were 87 voting Senate members in attendance last week – making the announced vote count of 39-49-5 (93 members) impossible. Seems the acting Senate chair announced the wrong number and those incorrect numbers were, for some reason, not corrected in the moment.
Later, the official tally of 30-49-5 was released.
Now, even that tally has issues as it still leaves three missing votes. Two of those are the president and meeting chair, who did not vote. One is missing.
Maybe one Senator didn’t vote. Maybe they were overlooked. Maybe it was the most poorly timed snack break in Senate history. Who knows? Certainly not the Senate.
The Shah motion caused confusion as well. The audience heard the vote count announced as 24-46 with 21 abstentions. That was almost immediately clarified to 20-46 with 21 abstentions. Seems it matters to the human ear when you announce something as ’20 for’ instead of ‘20 in favour.’ At least they managed to find all 87 Senators that time, however.
Three individual head-counters were used to count both motions. So, we can be confident in these numbers. But, how did we fumble this one?
Part of the problem is the representative body clings to antiquated ways. The Senate votes by raising their hands. No joke. Each Senator picks up a white, cardboard name tag at the beginning of the meeting, holds it up to vote and then someone counts.
That works when you have a 12-person city council or Senate opinion is overwhelmingly swinging one way. But in close votes, it can get confusing. Witness Friday. Secretary of the Senate Irene Birrell had the hardest part of the day – counting every waving, fading, hidden, shrouded, antsy arm in the air.
Earlier in the meeting, Senators had a chance to fix this, but they turned down an opportunity for a roll-call vote. To me, a roll-call vote seemed appropriate as it would have guaranteed an accurate count, created much-needed accountability during a debate about accountability, and allowed us not to conduct the most important vote in a generation the same way grade-schoolers ask to go to the bathroom.
But Senators had their reasonings – one was they feared retribution because of their vote.
OK, if you’re too worried about retribution, that’s fine. But you need to rethink being a Senator. This isn’t a you-and-the-ballot-box moment like general elections. Senators are accountable to constituents, and, as such, shouldn’t hide when the tough vote comes.
Even though the numbers game didn’t impact the outcome, it did signal a need for a change.
There were votes where not only the results, but margins mattered. By fumbling the counting in the moment, the Senate unnecessarily confused an important process, fed conspiracy and, perhaps most frustratingly, added more fuel to the ‘can’t they do anything right around there’ mentality this controversy has grown outside The Gates.
Despite surviving the votes, Chakma and Shah need to do a lot of soul-searching. But perhaps the Senate could also take this opportunity to review and update its procedures. First up, let’s start voting like a major institution of higher learning instead of the Mayberry Town Council. If you don’t like a roll call, how about some of those classroom clickers or an electronic solution, maybe even an app? I don’t care. We just need to make sure we get it right – the first time, every time.
This isn’t the fault of any one person. It was a high-pressure, stress-filled moment for those running the show. But it was a failure of process. Because when the lights shined brightest, the debate was marvelous, but the process was an embarrassment.
By a show of hands, who agrees with me?