Section 19 of BC's University Act lays out the composition of the Board of Governors (BoG) of BC's universities, including UBC. The composition of our Board was changed effective April 1, 2005, and Section 19 completely restructured, to allow for the creation of UBC-Okanagan and its representation on BoG, while keeping other universities' Boards unchanged. Students from UBC-V (i.e. you) are represented through two students elected under Section 19(2)(g). Bored yet (no pun intended)? It gets very nearly interesting.

Section 20, where the terms of office are set, was not updated. According to Section 20,

	(1)	A member of the board, other than the chancellor, president or a member elected under section 19(e), holds office for 3 years and after that until a successor is appointed or elected.
	(2)	Each member of the board elected under section 19(e) holds office for one year and after that until a successor is elected.

Since Section 19(e) no longer exists, the student Board reps at UBC, SFU, UVic and UNBC are currently serving three-year terms. In particular, our two current UBC-V reps have been in place since April 1, 2005, so their terms expire March 31, 2008.

Holy renumbering of subsections, Batman, looks like someone was asleep at the switch!

This is not some joke I made up. If it's funny, it's because the BC government made a fairly significant blunder. Or perhaps there's some irony in having this pointed out by a Fire Hydrant. The fact remains that we're holding an election for positions that're already full.

Getting me onto Board requires far more than my merely winning an election. It would require an extremely rapid (and quite possibly retroactive) change to the University Act, or the timely resignation of one or both of the current student reps. In either case, it may also require the approval of UBC's Senate, and/or a second election.

The point is that this election is largely meaningless. There's no reason why anything you elect would ever actually sit on Board. Except Tim, who's already there -- he can serve a second year whether or not he's "re-elected".

For added irony, former VP Admin of the AMS Lyle McMahon is not allowed to run (pending appeal), on the basis that he's a US citizen. Section 23 of the University Act requires BoG members to be Canadian citizens or permanent residents. I was forged at Terminal City Ironworks in Vancouver and have been pretty permanent, so I had no trouble. Yes, a Canadian Fire Hydrant can be on the ballot when an American student politician can't. These technicalities are great!