Salute the Veterans event to be held on campus, but donation details remain vague
Melissa Sundardas
Staff Writer
The funds raised for an upcoming on-campus event may not be going towards the cause it is advertising.
The event, “Salute the Veterans,” is a party being held at the Underground November 10 and is being advertised as a Remembrance Day event. Flyers promoting this event to students have been put up all over campus and clearly state that advanced ticket proceeds will go to unemployed veterans.
However, no unemployed veteran organizations are listed on the flyers.
Don-David Kouassi, a second-year York student and employee at the Underground, is part of promotional group D-Boys International. D-Boys is hosting Salute the Veterans, he says; it was his idea to throw this party.
“We looked at the date and thought it was a good date and looked at the theme,” says Kouassi. “Though it was a good theme, we decided to do it for a cause, not just for the sake of doing it. We wanted a way that the university students can contribute to the veterans more, rather than just wearing a poppy or something.”
But when asked how the advance ticket sale funds were going to be given to unemployed veterans, Kouassi said he had a friend named “Ruth” who knew a male—whose name he did not know—who would be taking care of the process.
“I’m not too sure about how she’s going to do it,” he says. “She said that she has connections to someone that was running in the elections at York and that she would talk to him and he would be our bridge to go help the veterans’ home. We’re going to cut him the cheque and he’s going to give it to the veterans’ home on behalf of us.”
After Excalibur asked for more details about which veterans’ homes exactly would be receiving the advanced ticket profits, Kouassi changed his story and spoke about a separate event downtown November 12 that he “didn’t have many details about,” but that he was going to be present to donate the raised money.
Upon asking for Ruth’s contact information to get further details about the downtown event and the unnamed male who would be responsible for delivering the funds, Excalibur was provided with two phone numbers that were out of service, followed by the number for Pizza Pizza, before being put on hold for five minutes and ultimately hung up on.
Kouassi would later clarify the reasons for the shifting plans, citing it on financial decisions. “If we break even [after the event], then there’s nothing to give. We haven’t sold enough advance tickets,” he says.
When asked why D-Boys had not changed the info in their flyers, on their posters, and on their Facebook page to reflect the possibility that the money may not ultimately be donated, Kouassi said that it would be “kind of tricky if we take it off our Facebook right now,” emphasizing that he did not want students to think the event was “just a big scam type of thing”.
Vietnam War veteran and York student, Lewis Chaitov, says he was told by people selling tickets in the Student Centre that the money would be going to “the school”, which would be responsible for distributing the funds.
“I said, ‘I see down here it says the money’s going to veterans, are you giving it to them directly?’” he recalls. “They said ‘No. We’re going to go through the school and give the money to the school.’ I couldn’t get a clear answer.”
He feels information about which organization will be receiving the money should have been made clear on the flyer.
“They’re very vague and I’m disappointed in that. I think it’s B.S. As a veteran, it insults me.”
Yussuf Yanni, who is also part of the D-Boys International promotion group and in charge of Salute the Veterans, changed his story multiple times about how advance ticket sales from the event would be given to unemployed war veterans like advertised.
Yanni first said the York Federation of Students (YFS) was helping to send the collected money to the veterans and that it was a long process.
But when reached, YFS president Vanessa Hunt confirmed this was not true.
“It’s not true and it’s kind of frustrating that people would put the name out there,” she says. “It’s completely false. I’m kind of taken aback in this situation because we haven’t been approached at all about this.”
When approached yet again, Yanni then stated that a total of seven unemployed war veterans went to the Underground and signed a document with Underground management, which stated that they will receive a cheque of $200 each from the event’s ticket sales once the event ends.
However, when asked about the Underground’s involvement with Salute the Veterans, York University Student Centre (YUSC) executive director Scott Jarvis sent the following statement to Excalibur:
“The Salute the Veterans event is a club rental. It is not an Underground sponsored event. The management is in no way involved in the collection or delivery of said funds and has not been communicating with anyone pertaining to the same. The donation is the sole responsibility of the event promoters.”
After asking Yanni again to clarify which organization the money would be donated to, he said the money would be going to “the Legion,” though he could not specify which Legion branch
it would be going to.
“It depends how much we make the night of the event,” he says. “One organization is the Legion—the one that sells poppies […] we don’t know which one because there are some people who are helping us to go through to them.”
He says for the moment, no documents have been signed.
“Right now we’re trying to make enough money. For example, if we didn’t make enough money, what would be the point to tell people that we’re going to give a donation?” he says. “So we’re trying to have a certain amount of money that we make and we can promise for sure that for this event we’re going to donate this money.”
Yanni couldn’t directly explain why he and his partner had previously said other people and organizations were involved in donating the advanced ticket sale funds to unemployed veterans.
Kouassi’s friend Ruth Johnson, another employee at the Underground, contacted Excalibur before publication and confirmed that Kouassi and Yanni had secured at least $500 that will be donated to The Royal Canadian Legion’s North York Branch 66, and that the amount will only grow from that point.
Johnson says the proceeds will go to the Branch’s poppy fund, which aids veterans of all ages that are in the hospital or require other forms of long-term care. In addition to the initial donation, a donation box will be present during the club event.
In the meantime, numerous posters and flyers around campus continue to firmly advertise that funds will go to unemployed veterans, while other posters say that the proceeds will go to the Royal Canadian Legion.
With files from Mike Sholars, Stefanie Kennedy, and Yuni Kim
