A co-director for the Designated Driver Shuttle is accusing the student government’s executive branch of refusing to reopen and push back the hiring deadline for the DDS director position, thereby giving one of the ASUO Executive’s own employees an advantage in his bid for the job.
The Executive may have also broken a rule it says was ambiguous by allowing DDS interim co-directors to head the program for longer than the three-month limit.
DDS Co-Director and Student Senator Dallas Brown asked the Executive to extend the hiring deadline for new co-directors so more students could apply and so the other co-director running for a permanent position, David Goward, could have some competition.
Eleven of the 13 senators signed a petition Wednesday night telling the Executive to extend the application deadline.
The Executive absorbed the program, which gives rides home to intoxicated students, after employees were caught with alcohol in the DDS office several times last year and after another employee took one of the vans to Portland during winter break after damaging it and failing to report it.
“I’m going to bring this to the Senate’s attention because my voice isn’t ever heard or respected by the Executive,” Brown said.
Brown lobbied senators on Wednesday to pressure the Executive into extending the deadline, and, said Goward, who is the ASUO Executive’s programs administrator, persuaded the ASUO president not to because Goward didn’t want any more competition.
ASUO President Adam Walsh and Vice President Kyla Coy denied that Goward pressured them and said there was some political squabbling between Goward and Brown.
“It seems that everyone is making things personal around this time of year,” Walsh said.
Brown, a junior, will not be running for a position in DDS, and said he has no personal interest in the application process except that he wants to see the program run more efficiently.
“There’s really no argument not to do it except that David Goward doesn’t want it reopened because it’s more competition for him,” Brown told senators.
Walsh said he won’t reopen the applicant pool.
“The hiring committee has the ability to not hire anyone if they feel that any one applicant or all applicants aren’t qualified,” Walsh said.
The hiring process is slated to end today, but only two students have applied for the positions.
In late December, the Executive fired and replaced the co-directors with Goward, who hired Brown in early January.
According to the ASUO Constitution, interim co-directors, which Goward and Brown are, may only serve for three months, at which point they must be replaced by new hires.
Goward and Brown have headed DDS for more than four months now, but Goward said the ASUO Constitution Court, which interprets and enforces student government rules, excused him from the rule.
The Executive is authorized to absorb a program if it violates state law or any University or ASUO policy, but it’s ambiguous as to whether it’s bound by the three-month limit on interim directors, Walsh said.
According to one Executive rule, interim directors such as Goward and Brown are limited to serve three months, but another rule says the director positions must be “formally opened” within three months in order to follow the formal hiring process.
“Because we absorbed it into ourselves, we made it part of the Executive,” Walsh said, so technically it’s not its own entity and isn’t bound by the Executive rule.
By his interpretation, the ASUO could keep DDS as an Executive program forever, Walsh said.
“Technically Dallas is part of the Executive, in a sense, right, in a real kind of ambiguous way,” Walsh said. “Once again the rules are kind of open to interpretation.”
A phone call to one of the Constitution Court justices who talked with Goward was not returned as of publication deadline Thursday night. The court has yet to rule on the matter.
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