Minutes from April 9, 2008

 ASOC SENATE

Meeting Minutes

April 9, 2008

By Thomas Stringer

Passed: Pending

 

Meeting Chair:  Ryan Bowen                                                                                                                                                                                Meeting Guests:  Spencer Jemelka, Bena Li, Laura Knuttenen, Julian Mitchell

Senators Present:  Tilak Gupta, First Year Senator ; Xochiltl Ramos, First Year Senator; Andrew DeBlock, Sophomore Senator ; Patrick McCredie, Junior Senator ; Mike Myers, Junior Senator; Dominique Kirkwood, Senior Senator; Don Johnson, Ken Smutny, Senior Senator; Santiago Mendez, Campus Wide Senator; Rob Calderon, Campus Wide Senator; Rozell Hodges, Campus Wide Senator;Nonda Hanneman, Sophomore Senator; Ken Smutny, Senior Senator; Monikah Baltimore, Campus Wide Senator

 

Ex Officio: Kenna Cottrill, Advisor; Paolo Cosulich-Schwartz, GA Co-Chair; Noel Hollowell, GA Co-Chair
 

 

 

I. Meeting called to order at 6:07 P.M.

II. Passage of Previous Meeting’s Minutes
 

The minutes were passed by general consent. 

 

III. Old Business

A.     Senator Approval

Ryan reminded the Senate of the need to approve Jimmy as the new Senior Senator, and ask if anyone had questions concerning the appointment process.  Rob asked if Jimmy had submitted an application; Ryan replied that, in following the appointment processes of the bylaws, an application was not required.  Kenna stated her wish for the record to show that, where Senate protocol is concerned, the Constitution overrules the Senate bylaws.  Ryan clarified that he followed the bylaws to more expediently deal with the issue of a new Senator before the semester’s end. 

 

Jimmy was approved as a senator 10-0-1, with Konstantin abstaining. 

 

B.     1:1 meetings progress

Ryan informed that he still needed to have a one on one meeting with Santiago, Nonda, Paolo, and Noel. 

 

C.    Midterm Report

Ryan told the Senate that he appreciated the honesty of the Senate’s self-assessments, as they showed potential for improvement, and asked Patrick to turn his in. 

 

D.    Capital Improvement Request From SAC

 

Kenna reported that the SAC’s uncontroversial request asked for only a fax machine, which they were in need of due to the advanced age and debilitated state of the current fax machine, bestowing upon it the endorsement of both herself and Gabriela.  Xochiltl raised the point that they should check whether CIRs were first presented to the GA or Senate.  The total amount of the request was $326.23.  Kenna said that Ryan needed to present the request at the GA the next day to open it for student questioning. 

 

IV. New Business

 

A.     GA Updates

Paolo asked all of the senators to be present at tomorrow’s GA, as the Registrar would be present, the resolution process amendment would be examined, and the CIR from SAC would be dealt with.  Noel reported that the final GA would take place on the 29^th of April with special musical guests The Board Of Trustees.  Patrick and Nonda stated that they would be unable to attend. 

 

Ryan asked Noel about the status of the faded paw prints; Noel replied that no one had responded to her missives as of yet.  Ryan read the constitutional amendment to decrease the required amount of GA meetings per semester to five.  Jimmy pointed out that the wording “vote on resolution occurring two meetings from being presented” was odd, and recommended “within two GA meetings of being presented as a substitute”. 

 

The Senate approved the GA amendment by general consent. 

 

Ryan then read the replacement Senator constitutional amendment, which would follow the text of the bylaws on the subject to avoid any discrepancies.  Patrick suggested changing simple majority approval to a 2/3 majority to approve the new Senator.  Andrew agreed, and the measure was adopted. 

 

The Senate approved the amendment 11-1-0, with Rob opposing. 

 

Kenna advised the Senate to draft a “for” and “against” statement for each amendment.  Ryan and Rob volunteered to write the “for” and “against” statements, respectively, for the replacement senator amendment, while Rob and Mike filled the “pro” and ‘con” roles for the GA amendment. 

 

B.     Finance and Public Relations Committee

 

a.     Funding Requests

Club/Org	Event/Program	Funding Amount	Vote
Occidental Review	Occidental Review	$1063.46	Mike moved, Monikah seconded, and the motion was passed by general consent.
Alpha Lambda Phi Alpha	Alpha Male	$99.05	Mike moved, Patrick seconded, and the motion was passed 11-0-1 with Xochiltl abstaining
Phi Kappa Psi	Rock, Paper, Scissors	$797.10	Mike moved, Rob seconded, and the motion passed 10-0-2 with Mike and Andrew abstaining.
Jimmy noted that the year previous, the charitable event lost money due to T-shirt costs.  Andrew replied that these T-shirts helped shore up off-campus support.
MEChA/ALAS	Music For The Soul	$572.29	Mike moved, Tilak seconded, and the motion was passed by general consent.
BSA	4th Annual Bingo Night	$162.38	Mike moved, Rob seconded, and the motion was passed 11-0-1 with Rozell abstaining.
ResLife	Learning On The Ocean	$25.00	Mike moved, Nonda emphatically seconded, and the motion was passed by general consent.
Students Taking On Poverty	First Meeting	$15.00	Mike moved, and the motion was passed by general consent
Rangeview ResLife	Ping Pong Table	$281.70	Mike moved, and the motion was passed 10-1-1 with Rob opposing and Konstantin abstaining.
Jimmy asked why Senate would be funding this item.  Mike clarified that Senate had set aside $3000 for RAs and had not provided stipulations under which the funds could or could not be used.  Thus this request fell under the purview of Senate.

 

C.    The Budget

 

Dramatis Personae

 

Anne Wilson: La Encina

Geoff Cromwell: Bengal Bus

Brett Safford: Programming Board

Abe Cohen: Honor Board, Club Sports

Yennaedo Balloo: Occidental Weekly

Justin Young: TOA

Emme Halken: Occidental Weekly

Sam Slesinger: Occidental Weekly

Amanda Tonkovich: Club Sports

Gabriela Niculescu: ASOC Finance

Victor Sowers: Programming Board

Erika Johnson: SAC

 

Kenna explained that, in a modification of typical budgetary procedure, Student Services were all gathered together to discuss The Budget this year.  She remarked that roughly $2000 had been left unallocated, and asked Justin Young to speak first.  Justin explained that TOA had an overall increase of less than $2000 thanks to increases in print and copy costs and decreases in food and telephone costs. 

Kenna explained to the group that student media such as Oxy Weekly and KOXY received a percentage of student fees that tended to increase with inflation.  Emme Halken validated this as a good process, as it guaranteed funds for student media. 

 

Anna Wilson reported that La Encina had increased the telephone and postage budget, but added that the largest change had occurred in the printing budget due to the amount of ad flyers sent to parents.  Patrick asked if they were still under contract to print a minimum of 450 books, to which Anna replied that since they were using independent publishing they could print as many as desired. 

 

Ryan commented that the number of Resource Books printed would probably be cut, resulting in a surplus of about $900.  Kenna suggested using this fund for the printing of the Multicultural History Project.  Jimmy pointed out that the Multicultural History Project would not act as a replacement for the Resource Books. 

 

Brett Safford noted that most of the movement in Programming Boards budget had been between individual lines, with some lines such as Equipment Purchase being dropped while the Activities line, as their main source of spending, had been increased by $2000.  The overall net change was a decrease of $400. 

 

Geoff Cromwell reported that Bengal Bus had added an Accident line, the purpose of which was fairly self-explanatory.  Rob inquired as to the status of Andrew’s attempted expansion of Campus Ride; Geoff replied that the money for that program should come from elsewhere.  Erika Johnson stated that the largest change in SAC’s budget stemmed from the expansion of the Disneyland ticket sales, which greatly increased both expenses and income. 

 

Kenna asked Abe Cohen if Honor Board required more funds; Abe replied that they did not.  Abe stated that Club Sports required more funds due to a sharp increase in overall membership in addition to the skyrocketing of dues in some teams.  He told the group that each sport cost an average of $6000 to run, which included league dues, referee costs, and tournament fees.  Ryan noted that Club Sports had a definite need for the floating $2000. 

 

Ryan reported that the Senate Discretionary Fund had received an increase of roughly $4800.  He noted that Ops training had gone down significantly; Kenna replied that this was due to the fact that LEI would be omitted, as staff resources had been stretched thin.  Ryan recommended increasing the Access Fund, while Patrick said that he would rather leave the money in the Discretionary Fund.  Gabriela noted that she would like a new computer next year, and Ryan advised her to submit a request this year. 

 

Ryan opened discussion as to whether the presidency should be a paid position.  Patrick was strongly against the idea; Mike noted that the president could request monies from the Access Fund.  Kenna stated that the basic argument against paying the president was “pay everybody or pay nobody”. 

Kenna stated that she decreased her supply line since part of her salary was paid by ASOC while the Office of Student Life paid part.  Ryan informed that the GA budget had a net decrease of $100, and that supplies went down while training went up.  The absence of a Webmaster line for Senate was also noted, which would most likely detract from the floating $2000. 

 

D.    Committee Updates

 

a.     Multicultural History

Ryan told the Senate that he had been disappointed with yesterday’s meeting, as the amount of information collected was less than expected.  He had made a Master Calendar reservation to book the Branca Patio.  Andrew stated that Santiago’s newspapers should be addressed; Ryan replied that he would like the Fund to zero out, and noted that they had allocated $720 for the project

 

Mike remarked that any remaining Leadership funds should be transferred to club allocations as opposed to being spent.  Ryan told the Senate that he had overbudgeted in his funding proposal to maximize the printed copy of the Multicultural History project, and added that he had been in touch with a webmaster in order to divine the possible cost of creating an interactive web version of the Multicultural History Project.  Ryan admitted that the proposal could not be voted on tonight, but that the Senate should mull it over. 

 

Andrew commented on the apparently high cost of the reception for the Project; Ryan replied that when speaking with SARC and the Board of Governors, they had floated this as a potential cost for the event.  He added that 1000 would most likely be a conservative estimate, as the whole student body would be invited.  Kenna asked how many Reports Ryan was planning on printing, as 1800 seemed to be a high estimate, to which he replied that he would like to distribute Reports to all first years and double that amount to the rest of the student body. 

 

Mike noted that the proposal amount of $3400 seemed a little excessive, considering the year’s largest allocation had been $3700 to APIA.  Andrew agreed that money in the Leadership Fund should be saved instead of spent, after which Ryan told the Senate that Rob had left the Committee, and that Nonda would be assisting in his stead. 

 

b.     Underrepresented Students

Dominique reported that Rozell had a meeting with Nadia and Brandi. 

 

c.      First Year Reading

Andrew reported that he was prepared to meet the Dean. 

d.     Andrew and Campo

Andrew told the Senate that Holly Nieto seemed to be ignoring his e-mails as well as subtly disapproving them through Oxy Digest missives advising students to live “inside the bubble”. 

e.     Fountain Committee

Through unknown means, Rob returned water to the fountain. 

 

E.     President’s Update

a.     Advisory Council Meeting

Ryan reported that the next meeting would be occurring on Friday, and that he would update the Senate concerning its results during next week’s meeting. 

 

V. Forum

 

A.     General Comments

Andrew inquired as to the status of Nonda’s renewable energy efforts.  Nonda said that she had left it to Henry McMillan.  Ryan told the Senate that the faculty member in charge had e-mailed him a list of names for the initial Environmental Fund Committee; The Senate voted to approve these nominations by general consent. 

 

Kenna exhorted the Senators to nominate outstanding faculty, staff, and student leaders for awards. 

 

Mike moved to close the meeting at 8:07, and the meeting was adjourned.