Wednesday’s ASUC Senate meeting dissolved into a discussion of party divisions and deficient communication after debate on a standard finance bill sparked controversy among senators.
SB 19 planned to allot funds from the Contingency Fund — a procedure the ASUC Senate routinely goes through — to the campus group Volunteers Around the World. But this bill, sponsored by Senators Ryan Kang, George Kadifa and Emily Chen, all of the Student Action party, prompted a debate on financial negotiations that was split between party lines.
“I’m so concerned that after this meeting that you aren’t going to be able to do anything together,” said Office of Executive Vice President Justin Sayarath at the meeting.
The student government — made up of 20 senate seats and five executive offices — is dominated by Student Action, which holds 11 senate seats as well as four of the five executive seats. The fifth executive seat is the Student Advocate, which is a traditionally nonpartisan position. CalSERVE, the second-largest party, holds six senate seats. Third parties SQUELCH! and the Cooperative Movement each have one senator representing it, and one independent senator was elected last year.
Senators from the various student parties and independents disagreed on the amount of money being allocated to the student group and the procedure through which the ASUC was distributing funds.
CalSERVE Senator Daley Vertiz pulled the bill from the consent calendar for discussion on the senate floor after two weeks of debate within the Finance Committee, which is made up of four Student Action senators, two CalSERVE senators and one independent.
CalSERVE Senator Nolan Pack said the bill was brought to the senate floor as a last resort and as a response to what he called the Student Action senators’ inability to compromise.
“I can’t speak for everyone, but partisanship had little impact on my decision to vote yes on the bill,” Student Action Senator Rosemary Hua said in an email. “I chose to vote yes on SB 19 based on content-neutral scrutiny of the budget.”
Discussion eventually led the senate to a compromise and vote to allocate $450 to Volunteers Around the World — the bill originally requested $875.85 — but the negotiation only came after significant debate on the ASUC’s management of finances.
After SB 19 was resolved, the senate ended the meeting in a discussion about bettering communication among senators beyond party lines.
“Party lines are there,” said Student Action Senator Mihir Deo to the senators. “If you know someone is interested in a bill, don’t just stick to your party.”
Deo further mentioned the importance of open communication between senators.
“This party bullshit isn’t appropriate, and I’m saying this as a third party,” said Senator Jorge Pacheco of Cooperative Movement Party. “What (the two major parties) are doing is damaging to our communities.”
Correction(s):
A previous version of this article incorrectly stated that Student Action holds all five executive seats. In fact, it holds four of the executive seats. The fifth position is the Student Advocate, a traditionally nonpartisan position filled by Stacy Suh, who was endorsed by both CalServe and Student Action and serves independently.
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Unfortunately, this isn’t news within the ASUC Senate. Partisanship will continue as long as Senators continue to think they are serving as de-facto representatives for certain campus communities instead of representatives for the entire school.
If this is a trend of partisanship that follows from issues concerning Cal’s involvement in Israel and its affect on Palestine, then our senate is dumb.
By dumb I mean the actual definition of dumb – not being able to speak. A forum is a search for the truth, and we elect these people to run this forum with 1.6 million dollars of our money and they can’t let go of the anger that follows from our investment in foreign lands to make real change that affects our local communities is total bullshit.
This article doesn’t even tell you what Volunteers Around the World does or why the fuck it needs $400 dollars less than requested. Where is all the other money going? Is the budget transparent?
We should Gov. Walker these people and recall them. That’d be fun.
What is the vote required to approve a funding bill? It would seem that Student Action has the simple majority to pass anything they want.
Convenient that the article leaves out that in the Constitution, Contigency funds are ONLY supposed to be used within Berkeley (Guatemala and the DR are not anywhere near the campus). Additionally, the senator taking notes left out MAJOR quotes from numerous senators, which was also pointed out on the floor but not in this article.
What didn’t Calserve like about Volunteers Around the World anyways? Does it have something to do with the mostly Asian pre-med membership of the club?
Can someone explain why ASUC is not debating a resolution urging a Cal boycott against Israel? Such a resolution had big majorities a couple years ago, and should not be dropped so easily.
It’s not like Israel has stopped killing Palestinians or robbing them of their lands.
It’s not like pro-Palestinian apologists have stopped lying.
Because the ASUC knows about the murder of Cal alumnus Chris Stevens at the hands of radical Muslims which shows militant Islam is the problem, not Israel.
In Pakistan, a government-declared “special day of love” for the Prophet Muhammad has seen violent clashes and at least one death in the northern city of Peshawar, and clashes elsewhere.
Protesters attacked and ransacked two cinema buildings. A driver for a Pakistani TV station was killed when police opened fire to disperse protesters, seven of whom were reported wounded all in the name of “love for Muhammad.”
Clashes between police and protesters are also being reported from the cities of Rawalpindi, Lahore and Karachi with many reported hurt all in the name of “love for Muhammad.”
Evidently the Obama administration’s scapegoating of free speech, appeasement tweets and apology ads on Pakistani television did nothing to calm the mob on this heart-warming “special day of love.”
By now, we recognize that all you do is spread lies.