Minutes from April 16, 2008

 ASOC SENATE

Meeting Minutes

April 16, 2008

By Thomas Stringer

Passed: Pending

 

Meeting Chair:  Ryan Bowen                                                                                                                                                                                Meeting Guests:  Spencer Jemelka

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 6:00 P.M.

 

II. Passage of the previous meeting’s minutes

 

The minutes were passed by general consent.

 

III. Old Business

 

A.     SAC Capital Improvement Request

Ryan reviewed the Capital Improvement Request for a new fax machine, which the Senate approved of unanimously. 

 

B.     The Budget-Honor Board Request

Ryan informed the Senate that Honor Board had requested $200, and as the budget had not yet been sent to the GA, it could be modified slightly to fit their needs.  Jimmy inquired as to the purpose of the $200, to which Ryan replied that they required files, handbooks, and other organizational tools. 

 

Kenna reminded the Senate that they still needed to allocate funds for the hiring of a webmaster.  The Senate approved these modifications to the tentative budget to bring before the GA.

C.    Elections Information

Kenna told the Senate of her disappointment with the current state of the elections, as all of the positions were uncontested.  She stated that another election would have to be held and hyped accordingly in the fall to bring a larger pool of candidates.   She also reminded that there were two constitutional amendments on the ballot that required 433 people to validate the results. 

 

IV. New Business

 

A.     GA Update

Ryan and Paolo discussed scheduling conflicts for the next several GAs; once these were resolved, Ryan remarked that the Board of Trustees representatives would be an excellent opportunity for students to learn more about the workings of the Board.  Paolo remarked that the April 29^th would feature the President and John Farmer; this would be the last GA meeting. 

 

Noel told the Senate that this week’s meeting had been a productive one, with Victor Egitto dispensing informative registration tips. 

 

B.     Financial and Public Relations Committee

 

Club/Org	Event/Program	Funding Amount	Vote
Democracy Matters	Publicity Campaign	Funding is pending re-examination of the request	The Senate voted to table the request by a vote of 11-0-1, with Patrick abstaining
Jimmy stated his opinion that this did not qualify as an event, as the club members would apparently be walking around with T-shirts on.  Mike noted that their stance on a certain piece of legislation could be construed as an ASOC endorsement of partisan political activity.
Phi Psi	Chartering Ceremony	$238.27	Mike moved, Jimmy seconded, and the motion was passed 10-0-2 with Andrew and Patrick abstaining
Active Minds Club	Club Kickoff	$256.40	Mike moved, Tilak seconded, and the motion was passed by general consent.
Oxy Wiccan and Pagan Group	Ball	$115.64	Mike moved, and the motion was passed by general consent.

 

Mike informed the Senate that without the Democracy Matters allocation, they were roughly $2300 in the red, but reminded them that there was still $4600 in allocations that had not been spent that could be reclaimed. 

 

a.     PR Update: T-Shirts

Santiago reported that he had received only one e-mail from a student interested in buying ASOC T-shirt, and that he would send out one more campus wide e-mail to ensure that there were no other interested customers.  He also recommended creating a Facebook group for the T-shirts.

 

C.    Committee Updates

a.     Multicultural History

Ryan reported that the committee had met the day prior to compile information, and that he was extending the deadline for the project to a date preceding the end of the school year.  He also detailed the estimates for the total cost of the Project, saying that printing costs would come to about $1500 while the reception would cost $1000.  He also mentioned that the reception event for the Project would be well publicized to the entirety of campus.

 

Santiago moved to pass the Multicultural History Project proposition, Nonda seconded, and the motion was passed 11-0-1 with Dominique abstaining. 

 

b.     Underrepresented Students

Rozell reported that he and Patrick had a meeting with Dean Jones and Nadia on Friday.  He told the Senate that he had been closely examining departments such as the Office Of Black Student Affairs at Pomona that dealt with academic challenges and retention for students of color, and was working on a long-term project to transform ICC into something like these departments.  He would interview the heads of the Pomona departments and inquire as to their current effectiveness, build a Planning Committee, and submit a document to the Board of Trustees. 

 

Jimmy asked how specifically Rozell would be defining “underrepresented students”, to which Rozell replied that he could define this on his own, but would work with others to produce a comprehensive definition.  Jimmy recommended looking at socioeconomic statuses, a sentiment shared by Ryan.

 

c.      Andrew Committee

Andrew told the Senate that he felt ignored by Holly Nieto, and was going to knock on her door on Wednesday.  He had not received any responses from Dean Frank, but understood that he was busy.  Ryan recommended looking into incidents of racial profiling perpetrated by Campus Safety officers. 

 

d.     Newspaper Project

Santiago reported that he had spoken to Dean Avery, who had agreed to split the $4000 per year cost of the New York Times subscription.  Mike felt this was yet another expense administrators were pushing on students, and that he would not support stretching the student body fees further by incurring the weight of these new expenses.   Andrew agreed, saying that funding newspapers would amount to spending student money on newspapers, when it should instead be funding clubs and organizations.  Xochiltl noted that providing newspapers had been one of their greatest accomplishments, and that it may be unwise to jeopardize this.  Santiago told the Senate of positive externalities of newspapers, such as a more cultured feel to the Cooler. 

 

 Dominique noted that she did not depend on newspapers, as she read the news every day online.  Jimmy replied that Santiago’s point was valid, but that administration consistently deprived the student body of things such as cable and newspapers.  Mike offered that though it would be good for Senate in the short term to approve $2000 for newspapers, in the long term it would show administrators that Senate could be pushed around. 

 

Santiago responded that fighting bureaucrats on principle would get Senate nowhere, and no students would ultimately benefit.  Patrick supported negotiating with the administration before deciding to fund the newspapers.  Mike said that only funding no papers would force the hand of the administration.  No clear consensus was reached. 

 

D.    President’s Update

Ryan reported that he had met with Patrick and Santiago to discuss a 3-5 year plan for Senate, which future representatives could carry forward.   He had also met with Dean Frank concerning the issue of Dance Production’s lack of an academic credit; Dean Frank had stated that he supported Dance Production and had hired choreographers.  In effect, the Dean was down with Dance.  Ryan had also asked Dean Frank about the lack of focus on Africa and the Middle East in the curriculum, to which the Dean had replied that this stemmed from a debate within the Academic Planning Committee concerning whether or not to branch out Oxy’s curriculum or to strengthen its core.  It had been a productive meeting. 

 

V. Forum

 

A.     Guest Forum

Spencer Jemelka took the floor, and gave a presentation on the history of the Constitution as well as the deviation of both Senate and GA from their intended roles.  The GA had been intended to be the acting body while the Senate would play the role of the financial body; as Senate filled both roles, the GA had been reduced to an ineffective town hall.  The “voice of the students” was supposed to be heard through GA resolutions; however, as Senate had assumed the active role, administrators either failed to understand the import of resolutions or dismissed them as the opinion of a handful of students.  Spencer recommended revitalizing GA through giving incoming frosh a crash course on its working, and implored Senate to ask active students to aid in drafting GA resolutions. 

 

Ryan notified the Senate that Monday at 6:30 would be the time of the case against him concerning the appointment of Jimmy.

 

Nonda closed the meeting at 7:39 PM.