Funding for the Elections Committee (EC) during the 2013-14 budget period has been cut to $3,500 as opposed to the $6,000 budget from previous years. The EC is currently preparing for the November senatorial election.

ASUCD Budget Controller Eric Evans said that some of the money that previously went to the Elections Committee has been redirected to a new marketing department for ASUCD.

“Last year, the Elections Committee had a lot of money floating around,” Evans said. “Some of the previous marketing was not used efficiently.”

The EC was not the only ASUCD committee that had its funds cut this year. Those that did have funds cut agreed to defer their funding in order to finance the new marketing department.

Senate Bill 6, passed two weeks ago, allows the EC to decline placing sample ballots in The California Aggie should funding prove thin. Chair of Elections Eric Renslo commented on what the EC will be doing to advertise for the Fall 2013 elections even with the loss in funds.

“We are still going to run half-page ads in The Aggie,” Renslo said. “We don’t have enough money for a full page.”

Renslo also said that the committee is going to try to utilize polling stations and try to gain last-minute voters. Last year the committee was able to give out prizes, such as iPods and iPads, to people who voted.

“We have less money for prizes and even for t-shirts for our interns. It’s a lot tougher because of the lack of funding,” said Renslo.

Nick Dias, co-director of the new marketing department said that the department still aims to have raffles and prizes for voters, but on a smaller scale.

“We’ll still be doing a raffle at the poll stations,” Dias said. “We might have spin-the-wheel activities and we will be offering smaller raffle options. The prizes will be more immediate this way.”

During the Winter 2013 ASUCD elections, voter turnout was at 24.91 percent, the highest it has been since winter 2009. Renslo addressed what he thinks will help increase turnout for the Elections Committee this year.

“More candidates equal more votes because each candidate is working to increase voter turnout,” Renslo stated. “We’re also working with Creative Media to make advertisements targeted towards last-minute voters.”

Similarly, EC intern Helena Wong said she thinks voter turnout will increase if the they utilize all of ASUCD’s media sources.

“We need to help people get to know the candidate’s platforms so that there are no uninformed decisions,” Wong said.

Creative Media, the design and programming unit of ASUCD, now contains the new marketing department. Part of the advertising campaign that will be run by Creative Media and the marketing department for the elections committee will be to create an instructional piece for social media about the elections.

“This will give students an idea of where their funds go and it will bring awareness to ASUCD,” Dias said.

Dias said that the marketing department is also working to generate digital assistance for the Elections Committee. Last year their website was redesigned and this year it will be easier to vote online or from an iPod or iPad.

“It won’t be so hard and time-consuming to vote,” Dias said.

Evans said that Creative Media is already showing great results with advertising they have done in other areas and units, such as the Experimental College and KDVS.

“We are looking to the marketing department because they create great advertising that is as cost-effective as possible,” Evans said. “The marketing department will help grow the visibility of ASUCD on campus.”

Evans stated that he is especially supportive of the marketing department and Creative Media because of the similar, coherent design they put into the advertising for ASUCD units. Creative Media Director Alex Park said that the Elections Committee will also be advertised in a way to show that the elections and the candidates are part of ASUCD.

“We want to connect the units and the Elections Committee back to the ASUCD government,” Park said.

Renslo said that the goal for voter turnout this quarter is 15 to 20 percent. He hopes to keep up with the voter turnout of the past few years.

Park said that since this is the marketing department’s first time working with the Elections Committee, they will need to see what works in order to gain the most voter turnout and continue creating successful advertising for the Elections Committee in future elections.

“This is a starting point for us,” Park said.

Voting for the Fall Quarter senate elections happens on the seventh week of every Fall Quarter. This year, voting begins on Nov. 12 at 8:00 a.m. and ends on Nov. 15.

ASUCD Senate is performing maintenance on last quarter’s bills and hoping to dive back into writing legislation. Several roadblocks have slowed down Senate progress, resulting in only four enacted bills of the five that have reached decision. According to ASUCD senators, this quarter has started off slower than usual.

“We had a bunch of really contentious bills last spring, and now we’re kind of living in the aftermath. We’re fixing all the little issues … so we’re basically cleaning house and prepping for a new year of legislation and bigger bills,” said ASUCD Senator Ryan Wonders.

The biggest issue preventing Senate from staying on track has been the matter regarding a remodeling of the Memorial Union.

“We also haven’t really gotten into more of the nitty gritty stuff … we’re dealing with some bigger non-partisan issues about renovations and the future of the association in regards to our space,” Wonders said.

Five bills are still pending legislation but the other five have already been determined.

Bill 1

ASUCD President Carly Sandstrom introduced a bill to enact an operational budget of $713,920 for subsidies for the 2013-2014 fiscal year. A 9-2-1 majority vote allowed the bill to pass as amended.

Bill 2

Internal Affairs Commission recommended a bill to “reallocate $3,000 within the 2013-2014 Lobby Corps fiscal budget” to office supplies, transportation and for establishing two positions for an Assistant Internal Director and another Legislative Aid. The Assistant Internal Director would help the Lobby Corps’ legislative process run smoothly. An additional Legislative Aid would work together to conduct research and compare results to better legislation analyses. The bill was passed as amended by a 10-1-1 vote.

Bill 3

It was proposed to sing the Aggie Fight song at the start of every ASUCD Senate meeting. Bill 3 is the only one so far to not have been passed by a 3-8-1 vote. ASUCD Senator Maxwell Kappes agrees with the Senate’s decision to not pass it.

“I did not like that bill. As much as I have written bills that would be considered jokes, that bill just seemed entirely ludicrous and meaningless. We immediately failed it,” Kappes said.

Bill 4

Senator Felicia Ong introduced a bill to clarify ASUCD scholarship application dates, allowing application deadlines to be announced earlier in the quarter in order to increase the applicant pool. Applications are to be posted the Sunday of the fourth week of the quarter and the deadline to be Sunday of the sixth week. This would allow scholarships to be awarded sooner and specific dates would provide more time to advertise scholarships. This bill was passed by a 11-0-1 vote.

“This bill will definitely benefit all students. There’s no more grey area and definite dates will only further help us in preparing for applications,” said third-year business major Nate Villegas.

Bill 5

Introduced by Senator Ryan Wonders, Bill 5 proposes a change in name from ASUCD Unit City and County Affairs to City and Community Relations. The change would change to accurately represent their work after having to adjust their mission to reflect changes in the community. A majority vote of 11-0-1 passed the bill.

I hear UC Davis wants to implement a new free speech policy, supposedly to make sure another pepper spray incident doesn’t happen. But I read in the Davis Enterprise that there was some controversy at the public forum where the draft policy was discussed. What’s the problem?

– Bryan B. Davis, CA

First of all, let’s clear up a misconception. This proposed “freedom of expression” policy does not protect free speech. It limits speech.

The First Amendment to the Constitution protects freedom of speech from government overreach. If we erased every law passed by our government other than the Constitution, all speech would be permitted. That’s because until a government acts to limit speech, there aren’t any bans on speech at all. Freedom is the default.

We don’t live in this default world, though. Governments have indeed limited speech, usually with justification. Most people would agree that the phrase “give me all your money or I’ll kill you” should not be uttered with sincerity, for example. Statements like that, when used with intent to deprive someone of their money, are banned by state and federal criminal laws. In the absence of a university policy, your speech is thus limited only by existing law — county ordinances, state law and federal statutes.

The only way the university’s speech policy could expand your rights to free speech would be to override these existing laws limiting speech. But a university can’t override federal law. So since the university’s policy cannot override real world laws, there’s nothing that the university could do to “expand” or “protect” free speech. It can only restrict it. All attempts at implementing speech policies will necessarily result in less speech, not more. (The primary exception would be if the university released all its valuable research into the public domain, free of copyright or patent restrictions).

Like most university speech policies, this one is particularly offensive to the First Amendment.

Here’s the first problem. This comes straight from the draft policy:

“All members of the University community should recognize that freedom of expression includes a responsibility to respect the dignity of others, to acknowledge the right of others to express differing opinions, and to maintain civility at all times.”

Have you seen Congress recently? Or talk radio? Freedom of expression does NOT include a “responsibility to maintain civility,” whatever that means. A “civility” requirement is unconstitutional on two grounds: it’s both void for vagueness, and because it’s overbroad. It’s vague because “civility” varies depending on the listener. No one can determine whether the administrator enforcing this policy watches R-rated movies or instead cringes at every “fuck,” “shit” or “damn” uttered in public.

It’s unconstitutionally overbroad because although this ban might prohibit genuinely unprotected speech (“your money or your life”), it would also bar speech that is definitely protected. The Supreme Court already ruled that statements like “fuck the draft” are protected speech in most contexts.

Next, the policy tries to “provide reasonable protection” for “involuntary audiences.” At the public forum, a student asked what this meant. Provost Hexter responded that it was supposed to help staff members who aren’t free to leave their jobs, who, in the past, have said they felt “threatened” by student protesters. There is no absolute right to be free from hearing offensive speech when you’re in public. If the protesters genuinely threaten the staff, then the staff should call the police — like I said, true threats are already banned by state law. But an employee working at the MU does not have the right to censor people on the Quad without a good reason. “Involuntarily” encountering unpopular beliefs is one of the risks we run living in a free society.

The policy also states that “expression guaranteed by the federal and state constitution does not protect speech or expressive conduct that violates federal or state anti-discrimination and other laws.” Actually, it does. The Constitution does protect speech that might violate laws; that’s the whole point of the Constitution. Unlike the university, the constitution can and does override federal and state law. If the university interprets an anti-discrimination law as banning speech that offends a certain ethnic group, for example, that interpretation of the anti-discrimination law would be unconstitutional.

And that brings me to my final point. The Davis Enterprise quotes Provost Hexter: “There’s no desire to control any speech based on its content, apart from hate speech. None whatsoever.”

Hate speech is protected speech. I know that makes people uncomfortable, but that’s what the Supreme Court says. Most famously, the Court held in National Socialist Party of America v. Village of Skokie (1977) that the Ku Klux Klan has the right to hold anti-Semitic rallies in public areas, even if those rallies are located in towns with a large population of Holocaust survivors. You can’t get much more hateful than that. If the university intends to “control” hate speech (again, a vague term), it’s going to find itself on the wrong end of a federal lawsuit in a hurry.

Of course, I’m assuming that the university actually intends to enforce this policy and punish students for disobeying it. If this is simply another version of the UC Davis Principles of Community (which are an unenforceable mission statement), then there’s no problem. Administrators have free speech rights, too, and they’re perfectly within their rights to write stories about a fictional world in which the First Amendment does not exist.

Vice President Bradley Bottoms presided over the meeting, and Senators Liam Burke and Yee Xiong were absent.

The meeting started at 6:20, ten minutes later than posted.

Administrator of Diversity Education with the Office of Campus Community Relations Michael Villalobos announced the Neutral Observer Program, a new program set to launch in Winter Quarter. The program will provide a volunteer team of neutral observers to events, protests and demonstrations where a possibility for conflict exists. This staff will be community-owned and will consist of both students and staff.

CALPIRG Chapter Chair Donna Farvard announced the Global Frackdown, an anti-fracking event to take place on Saturday, Oct. 19th.

Paul Medved, a 1978 alumnus of UC Davis, gave a presentation about changes to Intercollegiate Collegiate Athletics at UC Davis. He urged Senate to hold Administrators and UC Davis Athletics Director Terry Tumey accountable for four team cuts in 2010 and rising debt.

The Senate then moved to a closed session to discuss a possible fee referendum for a new ASUCD building.