The campaign manager for The Daily Californian’s fee initiative said Thursday that she will file charges against the executive order issued recently by ASUC President Vishalli Loomba that invalidated the initiative.
After meeting with former ASUC attorney general Kevin Gibson — who previously filed charges against former ASUC president Noah Stern for campaign violations — and the current solicitor general Erin Delaney, campaign manager Lynn Yu said she will file charges with the ASUC Judicial Council to overturn the order issued by Loomba on Wednesday morning. The ASUC Senate voted by a significant margin to uphold the order at its Wednesday meeting, but Yu said she thought the order was unconstitutional.
The V.O.I.C.E. Initiative would allocate around $93,800 — almost half the Daily Cal’s about $200,000 annual budget deficit — for the newspaper if passed by students. At Wednesday’s senate meeting, Loomba said her executive order was enacted to stop a precedent of student fees going toward nonuniversity entities without proper policy in place. In the order, she referenced UC policy that does not allow for student fees to go toward nonuniversity organizations.
Without the student fee, the Daily Cal could cut more days of print, among making other possible cuts. Daily Cal Editor in Chief and President Tomer Ovadia said the paper is already pursuing many alternatives to increase funding but that the next fiscal year budget — dictating if more days of print will be cut — will be made in May and June.
The initiative has been met with criticism from some members of the student body. Senior Andy Nevis said at Wednesday’s senate meeting that he thought the executive order was “a good faith attempt to represent the fact that there is simply no way that this fee can be implemented in a way that is consistent with the UC guidelines.”
In addition to Loomba’s executive order, ASUC Attorney General Deepti Rajendran filed a charge sheet with the Judicial Council seeking to disqualify the initiative. Rajendran’s charge sheet cited similar concerns with the initiative as those cited by Loomba — that the Daily Cal is a nonuniversity entity that cannot be supported by student fees.
But in an email Thursday, Judicial Council chair Erica Furer said the council rejects the charges by Rajendran due to Loomba’s order, which she said “makes this case moot.” Both Loomba and Graduate Assembly President Bahar Navab said they believed that the Judicial Council should hear the case.
Cooperative Movement Senator and presidential candidate Elliot Goldstein said in an email that he has been “extremely disappointed by the precedents that the Judicial Council has set in what I view as weakening its own powers to decide important matters.”
The council also will no longer hold a scheduled Friday hearing on alleged campaign violations due to a “settlement reached independently by the parties,” Furer said in an email. The charges were brought against the initiative’s campaign by CalTV Director of Business, Advertising and Marketing Elizabeth Kopaskie, who was acting in her individual capacity.
Many senators said at the Wednesday meeting that they wanted to work with the Daily Cal to establish a new fee initiative, and some suggested a special election for the Daily Cal in the fall, but Yu said that passing it then was unlikely.
According to ASUC bylaws, 20 percent of the student body needs to vote in order for a referendum to pass.
Ovadia said the newspaper was still considering the special election and that the “most unfortunate part is losing the chance to hear what students think.”
Chloe Hunt is the lead student government reporter.
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Why doesn’t the Daily Cal follow a CalPIRG model and simply ask students to pledge funds to it. That it the illegal referendum won’t be a concern and those student’s who do not want to pay to the Daily Cal would not be forced to?
Only GDIs care about the daily cal. We bros of Sigma Alpha Mu don’t care at all .
This is an incredible diversion from the dire issues that are facing students at Cal today, namely tuition hikes, budget cuts, and systemwide privatization. The DC should seek austerity measures (like everyone else) and stop looking for a bailout. End of issue. Now can we please get back to protecting our education?
Hey Daily Cal!
I’m an alumni, and I’ve talked with a bunch of other alumni and we’re horrified by the possibility of the Daily Cal loosing print days. But as alumni, we can’t vote. Nor are any of us super rich (we just graduated, after all). However, I bet you could get a bunch of us to donate 2-10 dollars. Have you thought about doing a kickstarter? You can give donor prizes like hand drawn doodles from the daily cal cartoonists (I was one, briefly) or important back issues (any presidential election ones?) or old merch lying around in dusty boxes (I know they are there!). Think about it! I’d donate at least ten bucks.
-an alumni!
Great idea/alternative to the imposed student fee! Maybe the Daily Cal could also hold one of those case competitions. I don’t know much about them but I would imagine that it would interest a lot of people and would help bring in fresh ideas financially to the Daily Cal. The winners could claim that they’ve financially saved the Daily Cal which seems like a big deal.
Not saying anything one way or another here, but an EX-ASUC Publications Advisor should be asked opinions about student money being used for publications. When I was there, despite any financial obstacles, the Daily Cal was independent. Other pubs had to operate under a certain mandate w/ASUC money. Don’t change stuff now.
to think after all that eliot goldstein couldn’t even muster up the paper’s endorsement
I still don’t understand why the Daily Cal endorses candidates if they want to be a respectable news organization… You don’t see CNN endorsing candidates (well at least not flat out) and you definitely don’t see BBC endorsing candidates in Britain.
Newspapers and their EDITORIAL BOARD have always played a historical role in endorsing candidates during elections.
That’s why you see the Washington Post, the Economist, the New York Times, etc, endorsing candidates during presidential elections.
Newspapers and TV News are completely different, because the former has the space to dedicate to an endorsement and explain why, whereas the latter, due to time constraints, does not.
This is something that the DC can do as an independent group. If they are going to accept student fee money, they should not be allowed to endorse candidates.
That is why the Daily Cal itself does not endorse candidates. It’s EDITORIAL BOARD does.
At any rate, the Daily Cal does not currently receive student fees, so, according to your reason, should they not be able to endorse candidates?
A distinction without a difference. They have a stake in the outcome of the ASUC election. They are attempting to get student fee money. The Daily Cal doesn’t endorse? Oh ok, the editorial board endorses and the Daily Cal prints those endorsements in thousands of print and the online editions. Give me a break.
And, actually, while the Daily Cal does not receive student fee money directly, they do receive in kind donations of rent in Eshleman Hall (a student body / ASUC resource). Look at how much money the ASUC has forgiven or foregone for the Daily Cal.
I just find this whole situation a bit ironic, considering the Daily Cal also pushes this model of the student government as a body of “representatives.” Well, this is what happens when you unrealistically empower a small number of “representatives” to represent and make decisions on behalf of the student body. This is only another reason why we must move away from this idea of “representatives” and push for a more open, direct democratic model so people can make decisions for themselves.
Vishalli here foreclosed on a possibility of there even being a democratic decision made by the student body. Well, if only there were certain folks pushing for a model where the people themselves could decide…hm….
Why waste your time voting on something that’s already against the rules?
Just because 10% +1 votes in favor (majority of 20%) does not mean they should be able to bind the other 90% to pay a mandatory student fee to a private organization. The AC transit pass should be the same way. The “student body” is not some overarching governing body like a city or county…it is just a transient group of people who go to school at the same place.
Thats how a democracy works!
That’s why we are supposed to have “representative government” instead of “democracy”. Even the minority has rights, something you shallow thinkers who bleat “democracy” like some pull-string toy have yet to figure out.
If you want to parse semantics, then the ASUC would be a “constitutional republic”. The ASUC Constitution enshrines and codifies the rights of the student body, who are represented by the executives and senators we elect.
HOWEVER, the Constitution simultaneously enshrines a form of direct democracy: the referendum.
The issue of referenda (and the number of votes required to pass them) versus the legislature is, of course, different than the matter of whether the Daily Cal qualifies for student fees.
Instead of being both condescending, and inaccurate in your parsing, why don’t you contribute in a positive manner?
I do contribute in quite a positive manner, you petulant little child, by calling out your trite little one-liners.
That’s how a democratic government works. The student body is not a government, it is just a group of transient individuals studying at the same institution. If I go shopping at a grocery store, does the majority in the store at that time get to decide how much my taxes should be? If I go to a restaurant, does the majority in the restaurant get to decide how much I am going to tip? Can a high school student body pass a mandatory fee? How exactly is it that the group of students at Cal at one particular time get to bind the rest of the students to pay a mandatory fee (tax)?
The student body is not a governing body, it is not a municipality, a state or a federal government. It is simply a bunch of young adults, some recently removed from high school, who decided to study at a certain school.
lmao kg’s back