The University of Guelph Central Student Association has decided to reopen voting on the issue that was threatening the immediate future of the heavily subsidized Universal Bus Pass program.
Following a CSA meeting Monday night the board of directors passed a motion that will see an extension for the referendum question asking the school's 16,000 full-time students to vote on a new deal made with Guelph Transit.
Additional voting takes place from Wednesday to Friday.
The CSA made the announcement on Facebook late Monday night.
Ballots will be sent via email to eligible voters who have not yet voted. The question regards a new deal that would see a $50 incremental increase over the next five years to the subsidized pass, which currently costs students roughly $100 per semester.
The same question asked on ballots during the March 16-18 student elections failed to pass when not enough students cast ballots.
Even though 75 per cent of the 2,900 referendum votes those days were in favour of the new deal, roughly 4,000 votes were needed to make quorum and validate the vote.
That created a bit of a crisis as the current deal with Guelph Transit is set to expire at the end of April.
The CSA's own bylaws prevent the same referendum from being held for one year, but the CSA has extended voting, not created a second referendum.
All full-time undergraduate students at the U of G have been required to pay for the Universal Bus Pass since 1995. Graduate students came on board in 2000.
The referendum question is worded as follows: "Do you support the continuation of the Universal Bus Pass (UPass) and increasing the semester fee by $50 over 5 years (15 semesters), applicable to all full time and part time undergraduate students according to the proposed schedule?"
The increase would start with a $7 increase this summer semester.
U of G students currently pay roughly one third the cost of a regular adult bus pass.
