The Associated Student Government’s ad-hoc Reform Committee is finalizing a constitutional amendment that would cut the number of ASG senators by 40 percent.
The legislation, which the committee is likely to approve on Wednesday, would eliminate individual dorm and residential college senators. Instead, a limited number of representatives would be elected by the Residence Hall Association and Residential College Board. There would also be a decrease in student group senators.
There are currently 82 ASG senators — more than half represent residence halls and residential colleges. Under the amendment, RHA would directly elect 10 senators and RCB would elect five. The number of student-group senators would drop to 15, cutting Senate membership to 49.
The amendment comes after lengthy discussion and is intended to make the Senate more efficient and representative of the student body.
“We believe the Senate disproportionately reflects a younger viewpoint,” said Communication senior Matt Hall, who heads the reform committee.
At most 10 senators are upperclassmen, he said. The majority are freshmen picked in an election during the first week of Fall Quarter. The committee hopes more upperclassmen will be chosen if RHA or RCB are given the power to elect senators.
However, RHA President Emlyn Torres said even if the amendment passes, freshmen and sophomores would likely continue to be elected.
“Typically we do get mostly freshmen interested and running,” the Communication sophomore said. “I don’t suspect that that would probably change.”
Torres said downsizing the Senate might attract more upperclassmen by giving individual representatives a greater voice.
Shrinking the Senate will make it more efficient, Hall said.
“Eighty-two people trying to make a decision can turn into a circus,” Hall said. “I know — I ran the circus.”
Freshmen unable to serve in the senate can be members of the executive committees, which are open to non-senators, Hall said.
Allowing RHA and RCB to elect their own senators hopefully will forge the missing link between those organizations and ASG, Hall said. The three groups currently function independently from one another and have experienced conflicts when making recommendations to the administration.
“We are foreign entities,” Hall said.
But ASG Rules Chair Gabe Matlin said the plan is ill-considered.
“I don’t think that RHA or RCB are capable of appointing senators in a fair manner or possibly of appointing them at all,” he said.
He elaborated that both organizations are “disorganized” and “not very well run,” as well as largely freshmen.
Senators have expressed mixed feelings about the amendment.
Bobb-McCulloch Senator Dena Oaklander said she worried that the bill would push freshmen like herself out of ASG, but will probably still vote for it.
“I think that ASG does need a change,” she said.
She recalled her own election, when a few students at her dorm’s Munchies picked their senators.
“Maybe we’re lucky that we got a lot of people who were really enthusiastic,” she said, “but it might not be the best way to do it.”
Reach Jordan Weissmann at [email protected].
