Student representatives are in for a long haul at tonight’s Associated Student Government Senate meeting as a litany of new bills and amendments will be introduced and debated.
Senators will consider seven new pieces of legislation, as well as an amendment to ASG’s constitution presented last week by Executive Vice President Jay Schumacher.
The amendment would change the way student-group senators are chosen by integrating members of the Student Activities Finance Board, the ASG president and the ASG Rules Chair into the process.
Under the current system, members of the Executive Committee review senator applications from members of both A- and B-status student groups. But the Executive Committee interacts exclusively with B- and T-status groups, while the SAFB deals mostly with A-status groups in its day-to-day operations.
“I would like to make sure that people who interact with student groups have a role in the process,” said Schumacher, a Communication sophomore.
Two other constitutional amendments will likely be introduced today: the ad-hoc Reform Committee’s bill to restructure Senate representation and Elder Sen. Ben Parr’s bill to abolish ASG’s executive committees and replace them with non-Senate “executive departments.”
Rules Committee Chairman Gabe Matlin, a fifth-year McCormick senior, will also introduce an amendment to ASG’s bylaws, which govern how the group operates. The amendment would clarify that the bylaws cannot be overturned without an additional amendment.
Off-campus Sen. Howard W. Buffett will likely introduce his “Uniform Spending Bill,” which would require the Senate to approve every ASG expenditure over $50. The bill would also force the Executive Board to produce a weekly audit trail report detailing specific line item expenditures.
“I believe in an effort for ASG to try and win back the trust of students, it must fully support transparency as well as financial accountability,” said Buffett, a Communication junior. “And I know that those are just buzzwords being thrown around, but those are the objectives of the bill.”
Bills supporting extra ATMs on campus, environmentally conscious investments by the university and polling of students to determine next year’s shuttle services will also be introduced.
“Other than spring funding, there hasn’t really been a whole lot for Senate to do in a given week,” said Speaker of the Senate Dan Broadwell. “So I’m glad to see there’s more for Senate to do this week, more than there had been in Fall and Winter quarters.”
— Jordan Weissmann
