The Ubyssey is endorsing Nathan Shack for the role of AMS VP finance.
Editor's Note: The new Editorial Board is a pilot project launched for this year's elections. From now on, that term refers to the group of journalists who write their views as a collective in the newspaper's name, linking us with centuries of newspaper tradition.
Our pilot Editorial Board consisted of Features Editor Elena Massing, Politics Columnist Maya Tommasi and AMS Columnist Quyen Schroeder, who served as the board's chair. Over the past few weeks, they contacted every candidate, held interviews, attended debates and studied platforms before deliberating among themselves who The Ubyssey will endorse. Their deliberations were private and isolated from the rest of the newsroom, including from me, the Opinion Editor, until drafts had been filed. Like all of our journalists, they practised according to the Canadian Association of Journalists' Ethics Guidelines.
— Spencer Izen, Deputy Managing Editor and Opinion Editor
Shack, as the current AVP finance, has demonstrated knowledge of the portfolio. He aims to conduct focus-group surveys on AMS businesses, then revamp them based on that feedback. These surveys will likely be the baseline of what Shack calls a “comprehensive business review,” which will be used to formulate a long-term plan — he thinks this is necessary for long-term financial stability at the business level.
Shack works under current VP finance Gagan Parmar, whose thinking he aligns with. He wants to continue Parmar's approach to investment, claiming he “did a very good job” with their portfolio. Shack has also shown more willingness than his opponents to maintain a balanced investment portfolio, while his opponents took a more conservative stance, citing a likely negative economic downturn.
Shack’s campaign isn’t just a wish list: there are plans. He hopes to increase the mental health coverage to $1,500 per year. Acknowledging the need to pay for this coverage, Shack would slightly increase the Health and Dental Plan fee — a decision backed by an AMS-run poll.
All candidates seemed keen on training, though their priorities were different. Having formerly served as the UBC Film Society’s treasurer — in addition to working with club treasurers during his time in the finance office — Shack claims to have seen a lot of treasurer turnover. He hopes to support them by improving training, like providing a multisession training course during summer. For him, this would be more in-depth and effective than the one-day session and video walk-throughs that currently happen. Fellow candidate Iman Dhaliwal agreed with the need to improve treasurer training, but he focused on the idea that there should be more transparent communication between the AMS and club treasurers, making sure “treasurers have a very simple understanding of what we want as the AMS.”
That said, there were not many more concrete ideas on treasurer training from Dhaliwal. His priorities seemed to be focused on businesses and advertising them — Dhaliwal advocated for a youth-oriented approach to marketing, flexing his ability to “Gen Z post” — credentials gained during his time in some of the largest clubs at the University of Toronto before transferring.
Outside his focus on marketing, Dhaliwal also discussed his experience volunteering with the Vancouver Police Department and advocating for affordability as a member of the British Columbia Youth Parliament. Finance-wise, he worked with the Student Managed Fund and Management & Economics Students Association while studying at the University of Toronto. While his experience is valuable, Shack has already worked in the AMS’s finance office and has a better understanding of the main issues it’s currently facing.
Dhaliwal also took on a needlessly confrontational tone during the debate, which left us questioning his ability to work with other executives.
Audrey Xue is easily the weakest candidate in the field. She has a vision of radical cost-cutting for the AMS, and while concern for the deficit is important, her proposals risk not only failing to improve the union’s fiscal situation, but also significantly worsening student quality of life. Her plan to address failing AMS businesses relies heavily on automation — advocating to potentially replace restaurants and food service staff with machines. She was not particularly clear about a lot of her proposals, but given her willingness to cut AMS student jobs, we are concerned that a Xue term could lead to reduced positions to sustain students through their education.
Furthermore, Xue was particularly opposed to fees. She proposed having AMS health care fees being “opt out by default” which she later admitted was “not feasible”. Nevertheless, she maintained that other opt-out fees should not be assessed by default, a policy which would sap funding from clubs, AMS resource groups and media organizations like CiTR. She also proposed combining fees in the name of “transparency.” Not only would this make the AMS fee structure more obscure by hiding the purpose of each fee, but officially consolidating these fees requires a referendum — so she wouldn’t achieve this goal until late in her term.
You shouldn’t vote for Xue: her harmful proposals outnumber and outweigh her meaningful ones. We don’t think she’d lead our union in the right direction. Dhaliwal is a reasonable vote given his reasonably solid platform and finance experience; however, we’ll be voting for Shack. Perhaps Shack’s experience in the AMS Finance office gives him an unfair advantage. But the role of VP Finance is principally operational. You need someone experienced and someone capable of collaboration. Shack is financially competent, familiar with the AMS and willing to keep the AMS on a steady course, so he earns our endorsement for this race.
Editorials are opinion essays, and while they represent the views of the Editorial Board, they may not speak for every person at our newspaper. They are subject, however, to the same standard of fact-checking as anything else in our report.
