ASUCD Senate meetings are scheduled to begin Thursdays at 6:10 p.m. Times listed are according to the clock at the Oct. 27 meeting location, the Memorial Union’s Mee Room. The ASUCD president is not required to attend senate meetings.
Meeting called to order at 6:10 p.m.
Adam Thongsavat, ASUCD president, present
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 senator, present
Brendan Repicky, ASUCD senator, present
Rebecca Sterling, ASUCD senator, present
Ryan Meyerhoff, ASUCD senator, present
Presentations
Amaan Shaikh did a presentation about the Davis Honors Challenge. He said that it is doing a survey of students to find out how they feel about existing study space and what improvements need to be made to the study spaces on campus. They will be researching other universities to find successful models, and hopefully will be revamping study areas for students on campus.
Student Regent Alfredo Mireles and Jonathon Stein, Student Regent Designate, did a presentation for the table. There are over 230,000 students in UC. The UC Regents said that what is diving our costs are enrollment, compensation, post-employment benefits, other employee benefits, capital renewal and other non-salary cost increases. This year is the first year that students pay over 50 percent of their educational expenses, with the state paying only 48 percent. There is currently a $2.5 billion budget shortfall within the UC system. The system has filled about $1 billion, however we still have a $1.5 billion budget gap. The table asked questions and talked with the student regents.
Appointments and confirmations
Ryan Lockwood, Artem Trotsyule, Taylor Holland, Eddie Truong and Katherine Chen were appointed to the Business and Finance Commission.
Consideration of Old Legislation
Senate Bill 13, authored by Lee, co-authored by Amelia Badish, Shell Sumerel and Robert St. Cyr, to allocate $8,555.88 from Capital Reserves to fund capital costs for a new Bike Barn retail location in the Memorial Union called the ASUCD Bike Hub; and to make amendments to the Bike Barn annual operating budget to reflect new income and expenses. Lee said he likes it a lot because it will provide new positions for students and make more money for ASUCD. Lee said the Bike Hub would be in the T-Mobile space. The bill passed unanimously.
Senate Bill 19, authored by Maemura, co-authored by Barnett, Sharon Coulson, Salman and Schluep, to implement the Long-Range Plan for the ASUCD Coffee House, passed unanimously.
Senate Bill 20, authored by Kapur, co-authored by Chen, introduced by Lee, to add the position of Historian to the Bylaws. The senate table decided that it did not agree with the bill, and would like to rewrite it. Kapur withdrew the bill and said he would rewrite it for next week.
Unit Director Reports
Jeanna Gindi, director of City County Affairs, said that it has posted hiring for renters’-rights committee. Furthermore, she said that all staff and interns have been hired. They are planning a dinner between city council members and senate and the goal for the year is a student leader and city leader casual banquet in the spring. They are working on Davis Model lease.
Public discussion
Lee said the table needs to take unit director reports more seriously. He said that it is the table’s job to keep track of how the units are doing.
The table discussed whether or not it should be able to ask people it is confirming different questions.
Closed Session
Meeting adjourned at 10:36 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.
