The Nevada Sagebrush

This story was updated for clarification March 2.

Festival
– When: 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. March 8
– Where: Joe Crowley Student Union lawn
– What: Students for Liberty will host an abolish ASUN festival with snacks, ponies, bounce houses and a mechanical bull.

The Students for Liberty posted a petition to its Web site on Sunday evening, calling for the abolishment of the student government. The petition, which received about 50 signatures in its first day, states that ASUN spends student money  frivolously and represents the student body unfairly.

“The most ridiculous part of ASUN is that it takes money from all and redistributes it to the most active students,” John Russell, a member of Students for Liberty, said.

The petition also cites six reasons ASUN students should sign the petition, including:

“-ASUN is doubling student fees with no end in sight.

-ASUN justifies this waste through the inexperience of the elected ‘leaders.’

-ASUN is elected by only 12 percent of the undergraduate population, yet controls 100 percent of everyone’s ASUN fee.

-ASUN redistributes funds from the apathetic to the annoyingly active.”

ASUN is responsible for funding and maintaining services such as Campus Escort, homecoming, programming, the bookstore, and clubs and organizations.

Although members of  Students for Liberty have been searching for other methods to improve ASUN during the past year and a half, members said the best thing for the university would be to abolish ASUN entirely.

“No amount of laws or policies that we have found or looked into could ever fix it,” Russell said. “ASUN is an inherently broken system.”

Although Students for Liberty initially began hosting events critical of ASUN as a way to start discussion, club president Mary Hunton said the petition is a serious effort to eliminate the student government.

According to the ASUN Constitution, Students for Liberty would need to have 10 percent of the student body sign a petition for it to become a student ballot question. This year, Students for Liberty would need 1,231 signatures to get the question onto the 2011 ballot (this year’s deadlines for ballot questions have already passed).  The petition  must also be approved by the ASUN Attorney General in order to be placed on the ballot — an approval that has not yet been met. If approved by the students in an election, it would then need to go through the Board of Regents for another round of approval.

Students for Liberty are also hosting an “Abolish ASUN Festival” on March 8, where students will have the opportunity to sign the petition. The festival, which is expected to have two horses, two ponies, two bounce houses, a mechanical bull, 500 balloons and hundreds of dollars worth of snacks, was funded by ASUN club money.

Travis Hagen, UNR Students for Liberty treasurer, said the goal of the festival is to show students that ASUN funds clubs for unnecessary events and often spends student money frivolously.

“We want to start discussion about the accountability of where this money is going,” Hagen said. “The simplest way for ASUN to allocate money better is if they didn’t exist. If they didn’t spend money, then students could spend their money in a way they think is best, not ASUN.”

Hunton agreed, stating that with the shaky state of the university and state budget, students could be spending their ASUN fees elsewhere.

“The fees are a lot of money and with the way budget cuts are going we can’t justify spending in the way we do,” Hunton said.

Tara Verderosa can be reached at tverderosa@nevadasagebrush.com.

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