Eight new senators were swiftly added to the Downtown Senate Friday, bringing the total number of senators to 12.
There are only four empty seats now – two from both University College and the School of Letters and Sciences. The Downtown student government has never had a full Senate.
President Joseph Grossman decided that all eight nominated senators would go before the senate for confirmation at once. He said this process was better because there had already been an extensive interview process, so each student didn’t need to answer addition questions from the senate.
In past confirmations, the senate had asked nominated students various questions, including their ideas for helping the Downtown campus and their qualifications for the position.
Friday’s meeting had already lasted more than an hour — the past two meetings lasted 40 minutes each — and confirming all the senators at once expedited the process.
The Downtown student government received 23 applications for senate positions and interviewed 19 of the applicants, said Director of Administration Rudy Rivas.
Also at the meeting, the Senate changed its bylaws to allow for a Senate Leader position.
Senator for the College of Nursing and Health Innovation Zack Lindsay was elected to that position near the end of the meeting.
Two other students were nominated to positions on Friday — Michael Homan as local affairs director and Taylor McArthur as ASA director.
Homan is a nonprofit leadership and management freshman who has lived in the downtown area his whole life. His position is designed to better connect the Downtown campus to the surrounding community; however, there is no position of local affairs director mentioned in the Downtown constitution.
McArthur works with United States Congressman Paul Gosar and said he thinks he is “uniquely qualified” for the position because of this experience.
Student fee money was also allocated to eight organizations on Friday, totaling $6,641.81.
The most money, at $2,020, was given to the Walter Cronkite Hockey Broadcasting Organization for equipment to report on the hockey team with the season approaching.
That was allocated with little discussion, unlike funding for the student organization Downtown Alive!.
At the Budget Allocations Committee meeting on Wednesday, the committee recommended Downtown Alive! receive $1,500 – $340 less than their requested amount.
The committee was concerned that the 2,000 magnets in the Downtown Alive! line-item breakdown was excessive, and senator discussions revealed the same worries.
Representative from Downtown Alive! Vaughn Hillyard was given two minutes to explain to the senate why the Downtown Alive! request should be allocated in full. He explained the magnets would be helpful for students trying to learn the downtown area. He also criticized the senate for granting Downtown Young Democrats their full request of $2,913.04 to send several students on a trip.
“This is all students (on the Downtown campus),” Hillyard said. “This isn’t five students, this is all students.”
In addition, Hillyard addressed the salary increases of members of the Executive Board. However, the salaries of the government members do not come from student fee money, which the allocated funds do, so an increase in salaries does not mean less money for student organizations.
After Hillyard’s plea to the whole senate and a direct conversation with Lindsay and Senator for the College of Public Programs Joey Amonett during a suspension of senate rules, the senate returned to formal discussions.
Senator for the College of Public Programs Cecilio Porras moved to amend the request to $1,600, but it was not seconded.
Immediately after, Senator for the Walter Cronkite School Torunn Sinclair–who also sponsored the request–moved to amend the amount to $1,500. That amendment passed 3-1, and Downtown Alive! then was unanimously allocated the money.
The senators wanted to continue discussions on this allocation, but Director of Parliamentary Procedures Andres Cano said several times they already used as much time as they could on the request.
Every other request was handled with little or no discussion, and only one other request was amended – Active Minds’ request was quickly and unanimously reduced to $1,500 from $1,940.
The Downtown student government now has $77,430.73 remaining for the 2011-2012 school year – less than 30 percent of their original funds.
Contact the reporter at connor.radnovich@asu.edu
