In a nearly unanimous vote, Associated Student Government senators passed a constitutional amendment Wednesday night changing the ASG student group advising system.
Starting next fall, Student Activities Finance Board members will counsel A-status groups on programming issues as well as financial matters. The Executive Committee, which is now responsible for advising all student groups on programming, will work with B- and T- (Temporary) status groups.
“All this amendment does is to make what we do now official,” said McCormick junior Srikanth Reddy, ASG’s executive vice president. “This is something that student groups want.”
The change also will allow SAFB to recommend demotions or derecognitions of A-status groups to the Senate. Executive Committee members now oversee group status.
No senators voted against the joint amendment, which required a two-thirds majority vote to pass. Sixty-eight senators voted for the bill, five abstained and six were not present.
Panhellenic Association Senator Nicole Mash said she supports the amendment but abstained from voting because she had not had enough time to discuss the amendment’s intricacies with her constituents.
“The legislation, once it is implemented and if it’s implemented in the proper way, serves to benefit the Northwestern community as a whole,” said Mash, a Weinberg junior and former SAFB member.
Although Mash and a few others raised concerns about the bill, Women’s Coalition Senator Noreen Khalid said senators did not spend enough time discussing the change.
“I’m really pleased the bill passed, but I’m really annoyed with the lack of debate,” said Khalid, a Speech junior. “If we’re not willing to talk about the issues at all here, are we going to address them? We older senators set a bad example for how a bill is supposed to be debated and passed.”
In other business Wednesday, senators debated the ASG 2002-03 operating budget presented by Treasurer Edwin Chan.
The proposed budget of $87,627 is an $11,000 increase from last year.
Most of the increase would come from the $30,500 cost of funding the Chicago shuttle, re-introduced to campus last year. The budget also includes $22,000 for the new ASG lawyer, a $40,000 allocation last year.
“Everything is itemized well and it all makes sense, but when you look at the (total) amount, it’s a staggering amount,” said Neil Shah, the A&O Productions senator and a Weinberg senior.
The operating budget allows ASG to ask for additional money from SAFB without competing with student groups.
Although the budget will be debated and voted on next week, a few senators questioned some of the proposed allocations.
“I’m worried that (the ASG lawyer) is kind of a waste of money,” said Rachel Lopez, an off-campus senator and Weinberg junior. “It’s still something that needs to be put forth with other student groups’ requests.”
Also introduced at the meeting were three new bills calling for:
_Ѣ new forms of student identification that do not use social security numbers
_Ѣ an improved mentoring system in which upperclassmen would advise younger students with similar career objectives
_Ѣ a change in the color of the Rebecca Crown Center clock tower light to a more accurate shade of purple to recognize victories by NU sports teams.