ASUO senators voted to approve the Riverfront resolution, voted to alter their bylaws and questioned ASUO Vice President Maneesh Arora about issues they had with the hiring process for filling vacated senate seats.
The Decisions
The resolution mandating a public review process prior to construction on the Riverfront was unanimously approved
following its review in Rules committee, but ASUO Environmental Advocate Nathan Howard said this may not be enough.
“(We should be) taking more action than just the two resolutions,” Howard said. “Eventually if the 72 acres is built, the administration is going to wish we had done more.”
Senators also unanimously approved digitizing many ASUO paper records and changing wording in ASUO Senate bylaws. One change in wording was adding a U.S. Supreme Court ruling to the section on senator viewpoint neutrality.
The implementation of last year’s Take Back the Tap resolution, which will not give money from the incidental fee to groups to fund bottled water, was approved with one vote in opposition. Before the vote was taken, Sen. Jeremy Blanchard reminded the Senate body of the original purpose of last year’s resolution.
“Part of the resolution last year was encouraging this body to approve (the resolution implementation),” Blanchard said.
The Tension
Senators were upset with the limited role they felt they had in the hiring of new senators to replace the seats vacated by resignations preceding the academic year.
Sen. Max Barkley voiced concerns to Arora and suggested his desire to see a non-voting senator sit with the committee.
“Those are three people we’re going to have to work with,” Barkley said. “Maybe the rest of the executive doesn’t understand the dynamics of this body like you do.”
When Sen. Chris Bocchicchio said that last year when he was hired, there was a senator on the committee, Sen. Chair Zachary Stark-MacMillan reminded him that last year’s ASUO President Emma Kallaway was the first to try this.
“That was the exception; it wasn’t like that ever before,” Stark-MacMillan said.
Arora said that while he appreciated the feedback from senators, it was not solely his decision to make.
“I would like to talk to (ASUO President) Amelie (Rousseau) on this, because this isn’t just my decision,” Arora said. “Thank you for the feedback; feel free to talk to me tomorrow.”
Next Week
An ad-hoc committee was created to discuss a student proposal for the state legislature concerning University restructuring proposed by University President Richard Lariviere. This committee will be composed of senators Brian Powell, Brianna Woodside-Gomez, Ian Fielding and Grace Hochstatter.
A discussion about group norms regarding speaking times and other rule changes the Rules committee proposed were postponed until next week’s meeting.
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