The Associated Students of the University of Nevada, Reno’s first senate meeting of the semester saw much debate over small details on Aug. 30. The senate is made up of elected student representatives apportioned from each of UNR’s colleges, and meets weekly on Wednesdays at 5:30 p.m.
A Resignation, Reassignments and Open Seats
At the top of the meeting, Aween Ali, the speaker of the senate, announced the resignation of Carson Fish, senator for the College of Business. Fish sent in his resignation via email.
This, along with other resignations and an empty election this past year, leaves four vacant seats. ASUN is either reviewing or still accepting applications to fill them.
The meeting also saw shuffling for committee assignments — smaller groups of senators who work on something specific.
Roughly an Hour, Two Recesses Over Technicalities
Two bills, both about a potential Department of Campus and Public Relations, were referred to committees.
The only piece of legislation actually debated at the meeting was a Senate Binding Resolution to temporarily suspend two senate rules as listed in the Ninety-Second Session Senate Rules. This piece took the majority of the meeting, owing mostly to confusion over what it would cover.
Normally, senators are required to do four hours of “outreach” every two weeks. They can use volunteering at events to fill this requirement, but each individual event can only count for two hours.
The binding resolution would nix the two-hour limit, allowing senators to count each event for more hours apiece. This would last until Sept. 25.
Speaker Ali said she wanted to fast-track the resolution because “the Department of Programming needs assistance with the welcome week events and other events,” according to a memo in the meeting’s agenda.
Antony Kuhl, Parliamentarian, argued that this would allow senators to do fewer events for longer, which he said wouldn’t help Speaker Ali’s aim.
The most debate came about when Carmina Aglubat, Speaker Pro Tempore of the senate, added that senators would be required to do an hour of recruitment for ASUN’s internship program with the suspension of the two rules. The extra hour wasn’t included in the original binding resolution, and this caused objections from other senators.
“This actually taps into a larger issue that I was about to bring to the next senate meeting,” Parliamentarian Kuhl said. “Having an hour every outreach period to meet with interns should be codified. Because we do have senate rules that there are certain guidelines [for] outreach.”
Kuhl was mistaken, as two hours of meeting with legislative interns is required of senators every two weeks along with regular outreach, according to the Ninety-Second Session Rules. But with no interns yet, these two hours go unfilled, which leaves senators technically violating their stated requirements during this part of the year.
Speaker Ali motioned for a recess in order to fix the binding resolution by adding an extra clause. After more debate, Speaker Ali motioned for another recess to continue making changes.
Following the recesses, Speaker Pro Tempore Aglubat decided to omit the requirement to participate in recruitment from the piece, instead encouraging senators to use a portion of their four outreach hours to recruit interns.
The resolution, as amended to include a temporary suspension of internship meeting requirements, passed unanimously.
During a later period of public comment, Mya Skowronski, ASUN’s Attorney General, criticized the senate’s handling of the piece.
“It shouldn’t have taken that long for us to call several recesses. Please be doing your education ahead of time before the meeting; you guys need to be coming to the table with educated responses,” Skowronski said.
Criticism of Attorney’s Fees Petition
Public comment also featured Marco Moreno, a co-Director of Elections and Democratic Education, using the stand via Zoom to criticize a recent petition.
Moreno argued that the petition, which seeks to cap attorneys’ contingency fees, sounds good but would actually keep Nevadans in need from accessing good lawyers. He urged everyone at the meeting to consider the petition’s chief sponsor through a political action committee, the rideshare service Uber.
Joel Martin, a senator for the College of Liberal Arts, used public comment to call it “a complete scam of a petition.”
The meeting adjourned at 7:49 p.m.
As Speaker Pro Tempore Aglubat said after the binding resolution debate ended, “No matter how short you think a senate meeting is going to be, it isn’t.”
Peregrine Hart can be reached via email at peregrineh@unr.edu or on Instagram @pintofperegrine.
