The senate also awarded 10 scholarship awards and heard quarterly reports
By VINCE BASADA — campus@theaggie.org
ASUCD Internal Vice President Aaminah Mohammad called the Jan. 30 senate meeting to order at 6:12 p.m. before reading the UC Davis Land Acknowledgement.
First, the table awarded the recipients of the ASUCD Scholarship, worth $1,000, open to all undergraduates and awarded based on merit and an essay. The recipients are: Adeena Rahman, Rocio Luna Ayala, Noelle Law Huynh, Catherine Pham, Katherine Luong, Kailee Meade, Meher Khan, Gary Wang, Helen Januar and Michelle Feng.
Later in the night, the senate heard from the Center for Advocacy, Resources & Education (CARE), which provides crisis counseling, safety planning and other support services related to sexual assault, harassment and similar exploitation. Prevention Education Interns Deepa Bhat, a third-year design and cognitive science double major, and Ragavi Goyal, a second-year sociology and anthropology double major, provided the table with information on accessing resources and led a short training exercise.
The table also unanimously confirmed Karla Carranza, a fourth-year political science and sociology double major, as deputy head justice of the Judicial Council.
The Ethical Spending Committee, an ASUCD body created in February 2024, then presented on efforts to divest from companies on the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) list. Senator Siddharth Jasthi and Ethnic and Cultural Affairs Commission Chair Reem Suleiman reported on continuing efforts to research alternatives and possible future outreach and events.
After, the Entertainment Council gave its quarterly report, with Unit Director Jonathan Ng, a third-year political science major, stating that their Brain Freeze concert with headliner Luna Li sold out in 18 minutes.
Unitrans General Manager Jeffrey Flynn also gave a quarterly report, stating that with expanded service this winter, the system is now back to pre-pandemic operation levels. He also noted that with the arrival of four new buses in April, Unitrans will achieve its goal of making one-third of its fleet electric.
Public comments were then heard, with several students voicing support for Senate Resolution (SR) #6, scheduled to be heard later that night. The resolution asserts the right of ASUCD and its many entities to free speech and comes after instances between students and members of the community over political expression.
At last year’s Whole Earth Festival (WEF), a member of the Davis Oct. 7 Coalition confronted festival workers for hanging a Palestinian flag, refusing to leave when asked to do so by WEF staffers.
“It’s really important to the staff at [WEF] that we’re able to take stances about the oppression of voices within our nation and the world,” Navya Bhakta, a fourth-year English and psychology double major and WEF co-coordinator for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, said. “Our desire to create a safe, inclusive and welcoming festival for everyone needs to have support through protective rights within a [resolution] like this — to hold political opinions and stances that differ from the stances of the university.”
SR #6, introduced as emergency legislation, was discussed for around 40 minutes, with several members of the table voicing concerns that the resolution would force immigrant and undocumented students to be associated with political movements that may jeopardize their status in the United States.
“The fact that we, as international students or as undocumented students in the United States, are forced to take a stance puts our migratory status at risk,” External Affairs Commission Chair Henry Rosenbach said. “Forcing students to participate in performative activism is not going to change what’s happening in this country.”
Another issue raised was language in the resolution that would have required units to get approval from the senate to make political statements or to justify past statements if brought into question.
“I don’t think [the] senate should have the ability to oversee what units should or should not be saying,” Senator Umar Shaikh said. “That seems kind of authoritarian and not our job. Instead, we should be focusing on protecting individuals within units instead of units abstractly because units don’t exist abstractly.”
The clause was later removed and SR #6 passed 10-1, with Senator Mia Cohen providing the sole “no” vote. She had expressed concern earlier in the meeting that the association taking political stances may alienate members of the student body.
Then, the table unanimously passed SR #5, calling on the university to provide evidence that it had received an exemption from having to hear bids for its recently signed $10-million pouring rights contract (PRC) with PepsiCo. ASUCD’s Environmental Policy and Planning Commission (EPPC), which authored the resolution, has long opposed signing with PepsiCo.
EPPC Chair Annie Kanjamala said that SR #5 is their “last resort” to get information from the university regarding the contract bidding. A similar resolution, calling on UC Davis to abide by contractual bidding processes, was presented at the Jan. 16 meeting but was withdrawn after President Gaius Ilupeju said that there had been a Request for Proposal (RFP), to his knowledge.
When reached for comment, a university spokesman told The California Aggie that this information was shared with ASUCD at their request on Jan. 17. They also affirmed Ilupeju’s previous statement that there had been an RFP in the contract process.
“For this contract, UC Davis leveraged the public request for proposal (RFP) and resulting agreement executed by UC Berkeley,” the university said in a written statement to The Aggie. “This is very common practice within the UC system, as each campus often takes point on a specific good or service that other campuses also have a need for. It is considered redundant and unnecessarily expensive to administer multiple RFP events for the same scope of work.”
The university also said that there has been much confusion over the contract being a renewal instead of an entirely new contract.
“In the case of the pouring rights RFP process, UC Berkeley conducted a public solicitation,” the statement reads. “Based on the scoring of the bids it received, it awarded the contract to PepsiCo. The agreement was drafted allowing other campuses to join, with locally negotiated terms as needed. We note that this was not a renewal of an existing contract – although that term has been used in some reporting on the topic. Renewals are quite different. The previous agreement expired and ended. This was a new contract.”
More information on the PepsiCo contract can be found on the UC Davis Supply Chain Management website.
The senate also passed Senate Bill (SB) #38, allocating $1,040 to the Office of Senator Wickramasinghe for the ASUCD Sealed with Love event on Feb. 12, and SB #40, allocating $468 to the EPPC to establish a ban on purchasing foodware from sources outside of the ASUCD Coffee House and to buy a supply of compostable utensils.
The meeting was adjourned at 9:03 p.m.
Written by: Vince Basada — campus@theaggie.org
