ASUSU discusses control, budgets, but doesn’t take any action yet
Legislation that involved limiting one officer’s control over the entire body while strengthening their control in their respective regions, changing the name of the Academic Senate to Undergraduate Student Senate and allowing the Academic Senate to vote on their own budgets were all discussed at Tuesday’s ASUSU Executive Council.
According to the legislation written by Nick West, senator for the College of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences, concerning the amount of control officer’s have, most officers are elected to fulfill one specific area of ASUSU. Therefore, legislation about a specific area of student life should be sponsored by the person students elected to fulfill that office, he said.
“This legislation seeks to do one thing: ensure that the officers who are elected put the duties of their office first,” West said in the legislation policy paper. “It does not try to take away or limit the powers of officers; it only seeks to remind them where their loyalties truly lie: with those we elected them to represent their concerns in a specific area.”
According to the legislation, when a consensus could be reached in one body but not the other, Executive Council and the Academic Senate would hold a joined meeting in which each speaking member could voice their opinion and have the chance to vote on it, something Programming Vice President Jake Cook said he did not particularly agree with.
“We already have a bazillion meetings,” Cook said. “I feel like it is creating more work than is necessary.”
Another piece of legislation discussed by the body involved changing the name of the Academic Senate to the Undergraduate Student Senate because members of the senate, including West, feel the name doesn’t encompass what the Academic Senate does.
According to the legislation policy paper written by West, the name of the body should be changed because the senate does not only work with academic issues, but senators focus on every issue that affects their particular college.
“The Academic Senate is granted the power to deal with things that are not necessarily specific to academics,” West said in the legislation policy paper. “This power is often not realized because of confusion.”
The senate is not looking for more power, as they are content with what they already have, West said. The new name would better explain what the senate is already doing.
The council also discussed a piece of legislation that would have the officers shake hands at the end of every meeting, something West, the sponsor of the legislation, said he feels will help show unity and help officers demonstrate respect to each other. However, many members of the council felt shaking hands at the end of the meeting was something that shouldn’t have to be mandated and should be something the officers could choose to do or not.
“Leading by example shouldn’t require a mandate,” Cook said.
Several members of the council tried to move to permanently table the legislation, something West said was cowardly.
“You guys are a bunch of gutless cowards,” West said. “If you don’t want to stand up for something don’t just table it, vote it down. Don’t just table things because you don’t want to look bad in the paper.”
Cook said he felt the legislation just didn’t need to be done and said he felt it wrong to be called a coward.
The council also discussed legislation written by Brittany Woytko, science senator, that would allow all senators and vice presidents to vote on budget and structure issues. According to the legislation, the Executive Council is entirely responsible for structural and budget issues.
All of this legislation is currently in the works and has not been voted on.
-debrajoy.h@aggiemail.usu.edu