ASUCD Senate meetings are scheduled to begin Thursdays at 6:10 p.m. Times listed are according to the clock at the Sept. 29 meeting location, the Memorial Union’s King Lounge. The ASUCD president is not required to attend senate meetings.
Meeting called to order at 6:11 p.m.
Adam Thongsavat, ASUCD president, absent
Bree Rombi, ASUCD vice president, present
Yena Bae, ASUCD senator, present
Miguel Espinoza, ASUCD senator, present
Emmanuel Diaz-Ordaz, ASUCD senator, present
Andre Lee, ASUCD senator, present
Amy Martin, ASUCD senator, present
Mayra Martín, ASUCD senator, present
Tatiana Moana Bush, ASUCD senator, present
Darwin Moosavi, ASUCD senator, present
Matthew Provencher, ASUCD senate president pro-tempore, present Brendan Repicky, ASUCD senator, present
Rebecca Sterling, ASUCD senator, present
Ryan Meyerhoff, ASUCD senator, absent
Appointments and confirmations
Edgar Reyna, Fatima Salman, Somitra Butalia, Laura Murrell, Stephanie Mercado and Jerome Wren were confirmed to the Ethnic and Cultural Affairs Commission (ECAC).
Eva Poon was confirmed to the Academic Affairs Commission.
Loni Coelho as the director of the Aggie ReStore.
Emily Alice Gerhart was confirmed to the External Affairs Commission (EAC).
Martín was appointed senate representative for the Aggie Bound Outreach Committee.
Consideration of old legislation
Senate Bill 103, authored by IAC, co-authored by Meyerhoff, to prohibit the Elections Committee Members from obtaining a Nominating Petition and Notice of Candidacy. Lee said he would prefer that elections committee members not be able to run after they accepted their position for a year, even if they dropped their commission position. Repicky agreed, and said that he wished that they could do more to prevent issues. Moosavi suggested that they would have to resign the quarter prior to the quarter they would like to run for senate. Cano explained that they cannot legally restrict students from running for senate. After much discussion the bill was tabled.
Constitutional Amendment 30, authored by Cano, co-authored and introduced by Moosavi, to require that the ASUCD Court Chief Justice appointment be confirmed by the ASUCD Senate. The bill passed unanimously.
Senate Bill 90, authored by Aaron Hsu, co-authored by Charlie Colato, introduced by the Internal Affairs Commission, to implement the Long-Range Plan for Picnic Day, passed unanimously.
Senate Bill 108, authored by Mei, co-authored by Kabir Kapur, Lee, Melanie Maemura and Patrick Sheehan, introduced by Lee, to improve the transparency of senate bills by storing all documents accompanying bills in records. The bill passed unanimously.
Senate Bill 110, authored by Mei, co-authored by Sergio Cano, Kapur, Lee and Sheehan, introduced by Lee, to amend the role of commission chairs and unit directors during Budget Hearings. The bill passed unanimously.
Senate Bill 113, authored by Kapur, co-authored by Lee, Mei and Sheehan, introduced by Lee, to mandate that ASUCD Controller notify Unit Directors – including Unit Directors of units that have already been removed – Commission Chairpersons and Committee Chairpersons of the Budget Hearing schedule five days in advance of Budget Hearings. The bill passed unanimously.
Senate Bill 112, authored by Mei, co-authored by Cano, Kapur, Lee and Sheehan, introduced by Lee, to remove the requirement to post digital recordings on the ASUCD website. The bill passed unanimously.
Unit Director Reports
Jennifer Mappus, Picnic Day chair, said that Picnic Day will be held on April 21, 2012, and that the Picnic Day Committee had their first meeting two weeks ago. They have not decided on a theme yet, but they are doing a retreat in October and hope to decide then.
Public discussion
Eran Zelnik, a UC Davis graduate student, announced that the UC Davis Day of Action will take place on Oct. 27 at noon at the Memorial Union. Zelnik urged senators to get involved and make their opinions known. Repicky said he thinks it would be helpful if senators and commission chairs took part in the day of action. Thongsavat discussed what ASUCD as a body has talked about doing in the future with regards to fee hikes.
Lee said he wanted to start talking about Ethnic Graduation funding in the near future. He said he didn’t want funding coming through senate reserves and the Club Finance Council is probably not an option. However, the senate could potentially write an amendment to the Ethnic Grad line item.
Public Announcements
Applications for the Students of Color Conference are now available at resource centers around campus. Edd Montelongo, chair of EAC, encouraged everyone to apply.
Lee said that the Library reading room is now fully outfitted with working outlets.
Lee also said that the UC Davis Panhellenic passed a zero waste bylaw within their organization. The Greek community will be working with Project Compost and the Campus Center for the Environment to make it happen.
Meeting adjourned at 9:09 p.m.
Open positions within ASUCD can be found at vacancy.ucdavis.edu. HANNAH STRUMWASSER compiles the senate briefs. She can be reached at campus@theaggie.org.
