The Nevada Sagebrush

Thanks for this informative piece, Jay. Keep up the good work.

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“Student Senate criticized.” Wow, this sure is informative news! Tell me a time when the Senate hasn’t been criticized?

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And since when has Gracie Geremia failed to valiantly defend the senate? Way to go Geremia, your comment really served a purpose.

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Gracie, you are correct in that the Senate has always been criticized. That’s just the way it works. Those in power govern, and those who are governed criticize them to keep them on their toes. Independent press, balance of power, whistle-blowing, etc… That said, though, could you name five (just five) things the Senate accomplished during this session that will actually benefit students? Something tangible – behind-the-scenes meetings and redistribution of inevitable budget cuts don’t count.

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It’s ludicrous to judge the Senate, and in turn our Senators, by the amount of legislation that gets passed. “A good government is one that governs least”. I’ve been before the Senate this year, a statement not very many students who don’t hold positions in ASUN can claim, and that’s the real shame. If a student can not name their representatives, and that includes a Liberal Arts student, then you have no right to DEMAND anything from the ASUN Senate. I would be ashamed of my delegation to the Senate if they were passing bills to satisfy some quota. There are real problems and then there are make believe problems and the number of bills being too little is a make believe problem. The State of Nevada’s budget, not to mention the NSHE’s budget, is so complex that there are not too many people who make a living writing the budget or lobbying the budget that can even understand everything about it. I attended Eli’s town hall on the budget and it was a good presentation but it included nothing I couldn’t have gotten from the Department of Administration’s website. Senator Geremia and I, seldom agree on anything but in this instance I do. The Sagebrush dropped the ball on this article and for Eli to add his name and credibility to it only serves to belittle the office of ASUN President. It’s not up to the ASUN President or the Sagebrush to be outraged at the perceived output levels of the Senate. Instead that power is left to the students and they don’t seem to care. The ASUN President can not claim a mandate for action from this Student Body and say it with a straight face at the same time he admonishes the Senate.

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I’d be happy to answer that question for you Grigory.

1. We passed a resolution expressing our intent for alcohol to be sold (if plausible) on campus.

Some background information on that–I conducted a survey around campus and sampled over 300 students to gather enough information to make sure this is what constituents wanted.

2. A resolution was passed to show we approved the SOAR initiative.
Senator Barrett currently sits on the committee to help run the pilot for this program.

3. As you may have heard, we expressed concern over the budget cuts via resolution. Namely stating that we were against a tuition increase.

4. The Academics Committee will team up with the ASUN Bookstore and we are putting together a Texts-Book-On-Time dinner party with faculty members (this should occur sometime early on spring semester). Essentially this will encourage teachers to order there books on time to save students money (Fees are implemented when teachers order their books late or there are not enough of them.)

5. Public Affairs Committee will be hosting a Northern Nevada Legislative Reception in which all of the state legislators will be invited to come and meet/mingle with students and it’s also open to the public.

These are honestly just things off the top of my head. If you go through past minutes you will find much much more.

You are more than welcome to come and hang at any of these committee meetings to help plan some of these upcoming events. I know that all of these things are benefiting students.

I’m honestly sick to death of defending us and urge everyone to personally email your particular senator(s) to VOICE YOUR OPINION!!! That’s what we are here for. We all meet with our Dean’s regularly and sit on various committees on campus. We can help you, I promise. Just tell us instead of having us validate ourselves. I know not all of the senators are up-to-par, but I’d have to say that the majority of us are trying. So please, spread the word. Know who we are, email us. Come to our office hours. Come to meetings! We can only be as good as the voice of the people. :)

Much love,

Senator Purney
College of Education

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Thanks Bryan! We shouldn’t be judged numerically. I agree with your entire statement–weird, because we don’t usually agree.

And Grigory, I totally agree with a balance of power, but many articles aren’t written under proper context and with all information and research. As sentors, unlike state senators, we don’t have city councils or anything comparable that deal directly with colleges, so a lot of what senators do is behind the scences, representing their college, some include: organizing the business school college fair planning journalism week, or being instrumental in voicing student concerns. Behind the scences committee meetings comply w/ Nevada Open Meeting law, and sagebrush doesn’t come to those–they definently count-that’s where most of the work and discussion goes on! Here’s a list of tangible things that we’ve done:
(1) supporting a sports bar and grill, that serves limited alcohol, in the open space and expressing the need to fill the space
(2) meeting with deans to contribute to the vital discussion of budget cuts within the college (that definently counts!)
(3) Having senate reps attend the Special sessions in the winter and summer to become informed for students.
(4) Senators sit on various university committees (parking services, student union, etc.) to advocate and speak on the student’s behalf.
(5) Creating a research committee for budget cuts. Why soesn’t this count! Are students worried about university budget cuts and tuition increase? Hell yes.
(6) Standing up against tuition increase—if there is no insurance that all of the tuition increase in coming back to the university, rather than the state’s general account, we cannot support this. If you cannot gaurantee us an increase in services or bringing back student services, we can’t support it.
(7) supporting an increase in the counseling fee. They haven’t gotten an increase in years, and there’s been an increase in demad from students. People underestimate the amount of students that use it or may use it, due to issues such as eating disorders.

If you would like to voice your concerns, please come to our meetings or e-mail your senators.

-Gracie

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Thanks for your response, Jessica. :) Just playing the devil’s advocate here, so:

1. What (if any) are the outcomes of this resolution? To the extent of my knowledge, alcohol on campus is still in theoretical (at best) stage.

2. When will SOAR go live?

3. Yes, but it’s still just that – a resolution. A non-binding resolution, unless I’m mistaken. So it didn’t directly benefit students in any way. Now, if the entire Senate were to give up their compensation and make the Board of Regents look bad for not doing the same… ;)

4. Will this merely encourage teachers, or will some new binding rules take effect?

5. That’s actually pretty cool. Major brownie points for all involved, especially if (and that’s a big IF) you guys promote the event and get a high turnout.

I understand how you can be “honestly sick to death of defending” yourselves, but that’s what happens when the Senate doesn’t have good PR. In my experience, (some) students know that there is a senate out there somewhere, but they generally don’t have a clue as to what that senate does or what it has to do with them. In the vacuum of information, ignorance often takes over, and attacks follow. The Senate needs to find a way to get the information across, to explain in layman’s terms what was accomplished every week and why. Posting minutes just doesn’t cut it – it’s too dry and impersonal. A small primitive blog (a time stamp and plain text will do), a quick weekly entry by a designated “Senate advocate” and things should get better. Not a whole lot, but better nonetheless.

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Grigory,

This will probably be my last time commenting back, I hate conversations through the nevadasagebrush..so feel free to just email! But here we go–

1. Yes, the alcohol resolution is just an opinion but that is what the Senate is here for. Expressing opinions through paper. The students want alcohol, so we stated it. Any places that wants a contract with the Joe Crowley will be shown this piece of paper and will second-guess (AKA the Sports Grill) if they want their venue to serve wine and beer. The outcome is unknown for now, but it’s a great start!

2. The SOAR pilot is currently taking place right now! Yep, right now during finals. There are tutors available through designated times and meeting rooms throughout the Joe. The committee will take the demographics from this pilot week and figure out the logistics of this program for Spring.

3. Give up our compensation? That’s a little extreme. Priscilla Acosta calculated how much we actually make during our session and it’s .50 cents a day. So that whole argument is just silly. We’re definitely not in this for the money, I’ll tell you that much! We don’t have much power other than expressing our opinions on behalf of the students. That’s what we’re here for. If you’re looking for implementing law on this campus, it’s going to be a long haul. Faculty and administration look to us for our voice, so yes a resolution is PERTINENT and has validity.

4. The dinner will encourage, there is no “binding”. We cannot force teachers to order there books on time but we can be verrrry persistent. And that’s one of my main goals as chair of this committee.

5. We will promote it to the best of our abilities and budget. We’re working with InkBlot right now on how to go about all of it but be expecting something good!!

Your idea about a blog was awesome! Senator Lee (School of Journalism) is working on a Senate Newsletter actually–kind of the same idea. That way what really happens in meetings can be seen in plain site and now skewed by certain publications…::cough cough:: Anyway! Hope this helps and I like your ideas!!!

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Way to go, failing to address the underlying criticism in this article that “the senators have a misunderstanding of the rules.”

Sen. Purney’s comments to this story provide evidence backing up the Sagebrush’s assertion. She states “A resolution was passed to show we approved the SOAR initiative. Senator Barrett currently sits on the committee to help run the pilot for this program.” The first problem is she confuses a bill with a resolution. Only the former can create law. The second problem is she provides evidence of a possible violation of the prohibition on holding two offices (ASUN Constitution, Art. I, sec. 1(d): “No person shall hold more than one office, elected or appointed, at any one time.”). I don’t think allowing a legislative branch official to serve a capacity in the executive branch is quite what the drafters of the constitution had in mind. But hey, it’s for a good cause, right?

Also, according to Sen. Purney, the speaker of the Senate, Priscilla Acosta, calculated that senators make “50 cents a day.” That’s interesting, because unless the law changed, Senator’s make the equivalent of the cost of six undergraduate credit hours per year, at least according to what’s on the ASUN Web site (ASUN Public Law 75-13, section 8). That’s more like $2.19 a day, for a full year, or $801 per year. The leader of the Senate makes $7,000 per year, according to section 5 of the previously cited law. A tidy sum.

“Sen. Gracie Geremia said the reason the senate has been slow to act on the budget crisis is because the issue is complex and there is little information about the cuts. She said it is better for the senate to wait and make informed decisions rather than rush judgments.” There is tons of information available on the budget cuts, from past senators to university administrators to even news accounts on the budget crisis. I say the senators are being lazy.

“Kealy said he plans to spend winter break doing research on everything from the senate rules to the state budget in order to come back more educated on issues facing students and the processes used to address them.” Nice, but by then you’ll be only nine months late, with respect to learning about the rules.

Judging the senate by the quantity of legislation may be harsh, as Sen. Geremia points out, but it’s just one metric that, when taken with others, backs up the Sagebrush’s conclusion that the Senate is pathetic and without reason.

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Mr. Lupus “aka-member of the 75th session”- MOVE ON.

The budget cuts issue is complex, it’s constantly changing. What info are we going to use from lazy year’s session? The petition? We made a select committee to research it further and we went to the summer special session and the one in early December. Laziness is definitely NOT the issue.

We also just passed a bill allowing for the executive board to create advisory boards. So, the resolution supporting SOAR is legitimate and Purney is absolutely correct.

In closing, I think the pathetic ones are the people who can’t move on, the people who use what I call “selective research” to back up their claims, hence not knowing about the advisory boards or what we have done regarding the budget cuts, and the people who use their knowledge of the senate rules to try and manipulate the outcome of things. I’m a firm believer that if you truly care and that’s why you’re so interested, than you would reach out to the new senators and help to explain things. You’re pathetic because you only care about rules rather than the true betterment of campus and university community.

I hope you finally realize that criticizing us does nothing, come directly to us with your concerns, or if you think you’re more knowledgeable— why not spread the knowledge?

-Gracie

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P.S. TYPO- It’s supposed to be last year’s session not lazy year’s. my bad.

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Sen. Geremia,

I hesitate to respond to your comments, as clearly your emotional attachment, and your need to be completely defensive of indefensible deficiencies, is clouding your better reason and judgment. You write, “I’m a firm believer that if you truly care and that’s why you’re so interested, than (sic) you would reach out to the new senators and help to explain things” and “I hope you finally realize that criticizing us does nothing, come directly to us with your concerns, or if you think you’re more knowledgeable— why not spread the knowledge?” These statements show a lack of perspective that’s so pervasive that I don’t even know if any response is worth my time—if it will be accepted or if it will be spat upon, just like you and your colleagues have spat upon some of your more distinguished predecessors who have tried to do exactly that—to “come directly to [you]” with assistance and knowledge, to “help to explain things.”

I would have to be a complete fool to actually believe that any expertise I could offer would be taken well, given how poorly this Senate treats its past, and complete strangers to boot. Perhaps one day you will reach a degree of maturity that you will recognize that you can’t expect people to respect you without showing some degree of respect in return. So perhaps you’re right, providing helpful criticism “does nothing” because you won’t take it, even if it comes from persons of better qualification.

As to your accusation that I am a former member of the Senate, I appreciate your compliment, as it would have been an honor for anyone to have served with that group of senators. But assuming, for the sake of argument, that your accusation is true, your remark that “[y]ou’re pathetic because you only care about rules rather than the true betterment of campus and university community” demonstrates resentment on some level. I think the record of the 75th Senate, available to anyone, shows that that Senate was more interested in campus improvement that your group has proven to be.

Finally, process matters, and your remarks continue to lend credence to the point that the Sagebrush made. SOAR is not an advisory committee within the executive branch. As far as the Judicial Council is concerned, it doesn’t even exist yet; it’s only an advisory committee within the executive branch to make a policy recommendation for eventual legislative action by the Senate, in the Council’s view. (The Council’s ruling defies the reality of the matter, but I won’t go into it further here as I have already commented about this elsewhere on this site.) The fact that the Senate passed a nonbinding, non-legislative resolution supporting SOAR is meaningless. Resolutions do not make law. And neither does the executive branch, or at least that’s how it usually works—or is supposed to work.

You and your colleagues appear to have much still to learn. If I was the leader of the Senate, I would seek out the assistance that the Senate needs, and I’d seek it out from the veterans who have already offered it, but whose efforts to provide help have heretofore been uniformly rejected–rejected in a grandly rude fashion as well (at least that’s how I view it, just listening to your meetings and reading the press accounts). You’d be lucky if they are still willing to give you all the time of day. All hope is not yet lost. You are a part of an institution of higher education, and much can be learned from the people around you, and from those who came before you. If anything is certain, your Senate has produced a lot of teaching moments. Wouldn’t it be bold of you to take advantage of those teaching moments, of the experts who came before you, to make yourselves that much better for those who elected you? It would demonstrate a maturity of decision making sorely lacking at the moment.

Oh, by the way, just so there’s no gender confusion: it’s Ms. Lupus, Senator.

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Ms.Lupus, I would love the opportunity to talk with you about many of the points that you have raised, please e-mail me anytime you’d like to discuss these issues further. Of course, you can still keep your anonymity. Thank you for your comments and truthfulness, I am always willing to seek outside counsel and listen and you seem to have some very worthwhile things to say. Looking forward to hearing from you–

Respectfully,
Jennifer Richards
Senator for the College of Business

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