Student Assembly

MINUTES
Cornell University Student Assembly
August 30, 2007
4: 45 — 6:30 p.m.
Memorial Room, Willard Straight Hall

I. Call to Order

The meeting was called to order at 4:45 p.m.

II. Roll Call

Present: Mazdak Asgary, Chris Basil, Daniel Budish, Mark Coombs, Adam Gay, Elan Greenberg, Ryan Lagin, Ian Lesyk, Steven Matthews, Carly Miller, Arjun Natarajan, Austin Redman, Ahmed Salem, Christopher Sarra, C.J. Slicklen, Sanjiv Tata

Excused: Vincent Hartman, Ashley McGovern, Rammy Salem

Others Present: Kate Duch, Ari Epstein

III. Open Microphone

C. Slicklen asked if any members of the audience wished to speak.

No one came forward.

IV. Approval of the Minutes

There were no corrections to the 4/26/2997 minutes. There was a call for acclimation. It was seconded. There was no dissent. The minutes from the 4/26/2007 SA meeting were approved.

There were no corrections to the 5/3/2007 minutes. There was a call for acclimation. It was seconded. There was no dissent. The minutes from the 5/3/2007 SA meeting were approved.

There were no corrections to the 8/23/2007 minutes. There was a call for acclimation. It was seconded. There was no dissent. The minutes from the 8/23/2007 SA meeting were approved.

V. Announcements/Reports

Committee and Staffing Update — Ryan Lavin

R. Lavin said that all committees will be 100% staffed by Monday and that he will email out rosters. Committees should schedule their first meetings for the week of September 9. If anyone has any logistical problems, please contact the executive board.

Byline Funding & SA Budget Update — Adam Gay

A. Gay said that there was a very productive introduction to the Appropriations Committee on Monday, August 27. The SA will begin hearing groups at next weeks meeting. They will be hearing one group in regards to eligibility and two groups for funding. Secondly, the SA budget will be discussed at the executive board meeting next week. The budget will be presented to the assembly at the September 6 meeting.

M. Asgary said that during the last byline funding cycle, it was somewhat difficult for representatives because they did not have the Appropriations Committees recommendations for a group prior to the meeting at which the group’s budget was discussed. He feels that the process would be better if the representatives had the committee’s rationale beforehand. He asked if this was possible.

A. Gay said that the Appropriations Committee would discuss releasing their recommendations to the entire assembly prior to a group’s presentation of their budget at the committee’s next meeting.

A. Salem asked what groups would be meeting with the Appropriations Committee at their next meeting.

A. Gay said that he would be emailing out a schedule of which groups are presenting when some time in the next few days. At the next meeting, Cornell Minds Matter will be heard for eligibility and CU Tonight and Haven will be heard for funding.

Public Relations Update — Arjun Natarajan

A. Natarajan said that ClubFest took place on Sunday, August 26. Many students expressed interest in running for the vacant seats. Currently he is working on advertising for elections which will occur September 18–20. He is also working on placing advertisements in the Daily Sun telling students which groups will be heard for byline funding each week. He and K. Duch have also discussed her upcoming Daily Sun Trustee Column.

M. Asgary asked if A. Natarajan could comment on the efforts to advertise the upcoming elections.

A. Natarajan said that besides ClubFest, there have been advertisements in the Daily Sun almost weekly about the election.

E. Greenberg said that the Office of Assemblies has been placing ads in the Daily Sun nearly everyday encouraging students to check out elections materials. As the elections draw closer, there will also be advertisements encouraging students to vote.

D. Budish asked if anything special was being done to encourage individuals to sign up and run for the Human Ecology seat.

A. Natarajan said that a good number of people from Human Ecology signed up to receive information at ClubFest. He made a point to let them know that the seat is open when he emailed them.

Elections Committee Update — M. Coombs

M. Coombs said that the Elections Committee is composed of all the seniors on the SA and UA. When the Office of Assemblies closed the night before, only five elections packets remained indicating that broad interest has been generated. Candidates must have signatures submitted to the Office of Assemblies by 12:30 p.m. on September 4. He needs people on the Elections Committee to volunteer to help validate these signatures. He asked those willing to please contact him.

M. Asgary said in the past the Office of Assemblies has been responsible for validating signatures. He asked why Elections Committee members were suddenly being asked to do so.

M. Coombs said that he was contacted by the Office of Assemblies and asked to solicit volunteers. If there are objections to helping validate signatures, assembly representatives would need to go and talk to the office.

M. Asgary said that the SA Charter dictates that the Office of Assemblies is responsible for validating signatures.

E. Greenberg said that he would speak to the Office of Assemblies to learn the rationale behind asking the Elections Committee to help validate signatures. For now, he asked members of the Elections Committee to try and volunteer some of their time.

M. Coombs said that he did not know the number of freshman or transfers who had signed out elections packets.

UA Update — Chris Basil and Steven Matthews

S. Matthews said that the most pressing issue before the University Assembly is the Campus Code of Conduct. The code is being finalized and is supposed to be presented to President Skorton by the end of the calendar year. It will be brought before the UA some time in November. At the meeting, faculty expressed their concern for campus planning and the seemingly never-ending construction. Certain faculty members would like to become more involved with the Committee on Campus Planning.

C. Basil said that the UA also discussed childcare, which was an important issue for the GPSA last year. It continues to be important to both the UA and the GPSA.

D. Budish asked if C. Basil could expand on the day care conversation. He asked if the administration was planning on getting rid of the day care established by the Human Ecology Students.

C. Basil said that the administration is getting rid of the Human Ecology Observation Day Care Facility. A 150-child daycare center is being built on North Campus. The center will have full observational areas and will end up being much better than the current facility.

K. Duch recollected that concern had been generated in the past as to how childcare facilities could be divided between faculty and graduate students. She asked C. Basil to comment on this.

C. Basil said that the administration is working to establish ratios between staff, faculty, and graduate students to make the system as fair and equitable as possible.

R. Lavin said that the administration is actively working to address this issue.

D. Budish asked if the UA liaisons knew anything about the affordability of the childcare.

E. Greenberg said that Cornell daycare is pretty progressive and is based on a percentage of income.

SAFC Update — Ian Lesyk

C. Lesyk said that the help the SAFC help sessions begin on September 4, that budgets are due September 11 and that budget hearings start September 13. The P&T Handbook has been updated and is available online. He also said that the SAFC has adopted a new attendance policy that should address last year’s problems.

M. Asgary asked C. Lesyk to elaborate on the new attendance policy.

I. Lesyk said that the previous attendance policy was based on excused and unexcused absences. The new attendance policy is a point based system with commissioners receiving 1 point for an excused absence and 2 points for an unexcused absence. After 5 points commissioners will receive a warning and after 7 a vote will be taken to determine if the individual should remain on the SAFC.

VI. Business of the Day

There was no business of the day.

VII. Unfinished Business

R.1 — Approval of 2007–2008 Standing Rules — C. Slicklen

E. Greenberg said that all representatives should have an updated version of this year’s standing rules and a copy of last year’s for comparison.

C. Slicklen said that Section 2, Rule 8 was changed to read “The Executive Committee (at its weekly meeting) will discuss the agenda for Student Assembly meetings. Items for the agenda must be submitted to the Executive Vice President of the Student Assembly. These items must be in the proper format, as designated by the Executive Vice President.”

E. Greenberg said that the rule previously included a statement required the agenda to be sent out at a certain time. The statement was however in conflict with the charter which states that all members of the community must be made aware of the SA Agenda 24 hours in advance of the meeting.

A. Redman said that Article 6, Section 7 of the Charter states that the SA agenda must be made public 24 hours in advance of the meeting. He noted that the Charter supersedes the Standing Rules. Section 2, Rule 9 currently contradicts the charter reading “The Office of Assemblies must post the agenda to the Student Assembly of the website no later than noon on the day of the meeting.”

There was a motion to amend the Standing Rules by eliminating Rule 9 of Section2.

M. Asgary said that often it would be unreasonable to assume that the agenda could be made public 24 hours prior to the SA meetings. He recommended leaving in Rule 9 of Section 2 and amending the charter instead. Since the charter supersedes the Standing Rules, there is no issue with having them contradict one another until the charter can be amended.

E. Greenberg said that the assembly would proceed with the expectation that M. Asgary and Parliamentarian A. Redman present a charter change at the next meeting. Rule 9 of Section 2 will remain in the Standing Rules.

A. Salem suggested extending speaking time during open microphone from two minutes to three minutes. He feels that two minutes is an insufficient amount of time for speakers to effectively communicate the issues they wish to discuss.

There was a motion to amend Section 2, Rule 5 to strike 2 minutes and replace it with 3 minutes so that the second sentence of the rule reads “Speakers will be given up to two minutes to discuss issues that are not on the meeting’s agenda.” There were no objections. The rule was amended.

There was a call to question. It was seconded. There was a call for unanimous consent. There was no dissent. The Standing Rules for the 2007–2008 Year were approved.

VIII. New Business

There was no new business.

IX. Adjournment

There is was a motion to adjourn. It was seconded. There was no dissent. The meeting was adjourned.