The Continuing Sie Gaitinies

independence from the Union. Further, the Red Book contained predictions that sales would reach almost $30,000 by the year by 2000, and Fidel produced copies of both CHSR and CHMA’s (other campus radio stations) budgets, showing sales of less then half that, in larger or comparable markets, in long established stations. How then, he charged, could CIMN ever expect to make that much in revenue? And if not, who was going to pay for the station? .

Lynda Jefferson McGowan of Major Market Broadcasting (a regional agency) has stated that $5000 a year was a realistic assessment of regional sales. Target Broadcasting's Richard Sienko stated that $14,000 a year was

The Red Book, the briefing and business plan created by CIMN to reas- sure UPEI Student Union of

the legal and fiscal sound- ness of the FM plan, had

become a weapon used to

shut the station down.

reasonable in national. That leaves on $11,000 in locally generated sales, underwriting, sponsorship, and special promotions. The Price Edward Island radio sales market is valued at $5 million per year.

Further, CIMN had a scheduled general meeting of UPEI Student Radio, and had tried repeatedly to explain rational for seperate incorporation to the Union, and its General Manager.

- With the time allotted for the meeting growing to a close, the motion went to a vote. Council decided to use secret ballot, the Student Council voted to stop all funding for CIMN, by a vote of 11 to 6, with one abstention. CIMN was considered a sub-org, meaning it was a.second tier society. Its now been downgraded to a "club," like the Music Society or the Chemistry Club. CIMN convened an emergency meeting back at the station, and went into overdrive, planning how to work around the Stu- dent Union.

It is fascinating to watch how quickly young, non-political students become political animals when some- thing they care deeply about is threat-

ened. On Monday the Student Union was holding an all-candidates forum for the ongoing elections. The programming executive of the station managed to get out CBC TV and radio and the Guardian newspaper to cover the meeting. The student paper stopped the presses late Sunday night and has put the shutdown on the cover of its Tuesday issue. About 60 students showed up at the forum and grilled Burns over the shutdown.

Please picture this. The reason- able, clean cut, just plain nice kids from who have put in all this work to help the University and the community, are fighting mad, sitting there, throwing out question after question. President Elect Burns, who is acclaimed because no one ran against him, is wearing a suit and tie, and is turning beet red and sweating. It’s the kids versus the suits, the op- pressed versus The Man. It’s the good guys versus the bad guys and it makes great TV. The CBC guys are grinning ear to ear and loving every minute.

One student asks "How many of you like listening to Micheal Bolton on the way to school and Starship on the way back?" [On Magic 93]. The answer is a resounding cheer! Right on! We need a radio station! Best of all, I had a sneaking suspicion that if UPEI Student Union's records were so shoddy, prob- ably they hadn't kept on top of their own corporate papers either. At 10:00 am on Monday, two hours before the forum, Melissa, CIMN volunteer Colin Cheverie, and I went down to the Attor- ney General's office and got a certified copy of the UPEI Student Union's constitution. A quick examination showed it hadn't been updated since 1985, and that the structure of the executive and the nominations and elections section which were in the ; registered document are not at all what the Union has been operating under this past year.

The station executive presents the

true constitution to the President Elect at

the forum. The camera captures the moments he looks at it and tosses it aside as irrelevant. "What about CIMN then?" someone in the audience shouts. Burns has no answer. Burns doesn't know what to do with the camera two feet from his face as he struggle to answer question after question. Finally, he gives up and walks out.

The station still has a license and owns its own equipment. Hopefully the CRTC will grant them an extension and they can go FM in the fall. Target Broadcasting is going to try and get brokered programming for the station, 2 hours per morning of religious broad- casting. The Student Union had fought this in the past, threatening to suspend funding, but they don't have much say anymore. The value of the Student Union contribution is $14,000, but the value of the religions programming could be as high as $27,000 per year.

While the obvious fear at this point is that the Union will change the locks on the station, and ignore the stations legitimate right to access to the

It is fascinating to watch how quickly young, non-political students become political animals when something they care deeply about is threat- ened.

offices and equipment of the Student Radio Inc, it appears that they are too busy trying to get their own house in order to do much more damage. Per- haps the executive was driven by a neo- con imparative to destoy what it couldn’t control, but their attempt to “manage” the situation has blown up in their faces, and was likened by one observer to trying to put out a fire with gasoline.

Other than that, it appears that CIMN has won on most fronts, and despite not having student funding until ahopefully successful referendum later next year, the station will continue to soldier on. The CRTC remains an important question, but by bringing the by-laws into compliance with the Prom- ise of Performance, the only issue between the station and the CRTC will be financial. The station executive hopes that it will be able to arrange the refer- endum so that the money collected from each student is paid directly from the University to Student Radio, and the Union will not have the temptation to withhold funds in the future.