ASUO President Jared Axelrod has decided to overturn a policy that requires student groups to sign contracts before going on retreats, saying it adds an unnecessary layer of paperwork.
Former student leaders who created the requirement last year, however, said cutting the rules will remove a necessary check on how students behave when on trips funded by incidental fees.
The requirement mandates that groups inform the ASUO of their intention to hold a retreat and sign a contract guaranteeing proper conduct while away.
Axelrod said the policy “added a level of bureaucracy that wasn’t needed” and that it wasn’t furthering the ASUO’s mission.
The retreat policy and a rule requiring groups to get ASUO approval for having alcohol at events that is also slated to be cut were inserted into the Green Tape Notebook, the rules of student government, as an effort by last year’s Executive to show responsibility, former ASUO Programs Administrator David Goward said.
Led by former president Adam Walsh, the 2005-06 Executive created the policy in direct response to the previous administration’s controversial handling of an October 2004 student government retreat to Sunriver, at which some student officials drank alcohol and smoked pot.
Goward, a current EMU Board member, authored both the retreat policy and the alcohol policy. He said the Executive created the policy because the previous year’s Executive, under president Adam Petkun, had a “major meltdown when it came to retreats.”
Petkun’s administration promised to draft a retreat policy or to create a video about proper behavior, but it never followed through, Goward said. One of the goals of the Walsh administration was to make good on that promise.
Walsh said there was a tradition of groups, including student government, to misbehave with student funds.
“Student groups get themselves into trouble,” Walsh said.
Walsh said his administration wanted to “make sure the Executive knows what’s going on during retreats when student groups are going off campus.”
“There are no rules regarding retreats; there are no guidelines,” Goward said. “There should be some guidelines on what’s acceptable and what’s not. Furthermore, there is no mechanism for the ASUO to know groups are going on a retreat.”
Goward said the Executive is incorrect in saying the policy is a burden of paperwork. The agreement takes 10 minutes to complete and is three or four pages in length, he said. Removing the policy could hurt the ASUO because it makes the Executive less responsible for student groups and provides no way to keep groups accountable, he said.
“I think that’s a cover for some other reason they want to revoke it,” Goward said. “That’s not an acceptable answer, for me as a program leader, to remove an Executive rule.”
Goward said that last year the Hawaii Club went on a retreat to Sunriver, “left beer bottles all over and someone puked in a hot tub.”
Goward found out after he was contacted by Sunriver to discuss a bill for the cleanup. He did not know the group had planned to go, or what it was doing while it was there.
“I don’t like surprises in what I’m doing, and I don’t think the ASUO should be surprised by anything that happens,” Goward said.
But Axelrod said the policy “doesn’t solve groups being trustworthy,” and admitted that they do not always behave well. Although the policy lets the ASUO know a group plans to go on a retreat, that doesn’t prevent them from behaving badly, he said.
The policy also gave the ASUO a chance to educate groups on state laws, such as those forbidding the use of state-owned vehicles to transport alcohol, Goward said. It required that groups submit a list of all individuals attending a retreat so the ASUO would have a record of who went, should there be an accident.
The contract prevented groups from coming back after having an issue and saying, “I didn’t know,” Goward said.
Axelrod said he doesn’t foresee the ASUO adding something to replace the retreat policy. The ASUO programs administrator and the ASUO programs coordinator should help groups in planning retreats and in making sure their schedules include enough content, he said.
Goward agrees that one of the responsibilities of the programs administrator is to help student groups plan retreats, “but when student groups break the rules, it’s up to that program’s administrator to deal with that issue,” Goward said.
“I think the general overlying picture of the ASUO Executive right now is not wanting to be accountable for student groups, where I think it needs to be,” Goward said.
Goward said prior to writing the drafts he consulted with many authorities.
“It’s not like I woke up one morning, wrote down these policies and got them passed,” he said. He said the Executive is making decisions with no research and no overarching experience to back them.
“The Executive’s blatant disregard for the informed decision is a big disappointment,” Goward said.
Walsh said the current administration would like to overturn many policies implemented last year.
Axelrod said he does not plan to overturn any other actions of the former Executive.
“The previous administration left us at a good point,” he said.
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