Twenty-Third Senate Session
April 17th, 2018
Stern Center Ballroom
Call to Order
The Twenty-Fourth Session of Senate was called to order at 4:33pm
Roll Call
●Absences
○Senator Pitts
Minutes
Motion to waive the reading of the minutes.
●Passed
Executive Council Reports
●President Alexandra Helfgott
○Welcome to last senate!
○Guest speakers from Public Safety: Deputy Chief William Herkert/Captain Mike Figueroa talking about opening lines of communication and collaboration
■Big priority is maintenance of lighting around campus
■Over 700 video camera on camera to monitor campus
■RADC (Rape aggression defence class)
○Banquet at 7:15
■Go over initiatives document. Everyone gets paper with initiative to show diversity of all of the initiatives this year
○Veto Public safety resolution and replace it with resolution made with public safety
○Thank you all for a great year!
●Secretary Emily Ramsayer
○Thank you for an amazing year
●Treasurer Sara Graham
○Finalized budget bill will be presented today
○Thank you for a great year
●Chief of Staff Runzo
○Two awards for dodgeball MVP: Kat and Kelly
○Last dodgeball game is tomorrow at 7:45
●Deputy Chief of Staff Eney
○Banquet tonight
○Directors - bring your paper plate awards
●Pro Tempore Palacios
○Reminder to engage in conversation and fight for change
○Thank you Alexandra
●Vice President Tripp Keefe
○Advisor duncan coordinates LeaderShape program. Has helped president helfgott and I develop our leadership skills so we highly recommend it
○Applications for the program are due this Friday
○It’s been awesome to work with all of you this year, especially freshman committee
Unfinished Business
None
New Business
Motion to move SR-19-2018 to the front of the docket
passed
1. SB-88-2018— A bill to amend the bylaws of the Student Government Association
First Rights
●Chief of Staff Runzo
○This bylaw says that you will receive one-half absence if you are late but you could come 14 minutes late to each meeting
Period of Discussion
●President Pro Tempore Palacios: What if member of senate chooses to arrive 4 minutes late?
○I would rather them be four minutes late than fourteen
●President Pro Tempore Palacios: Do you think it might be better to have it that people that arrive at the end of roll call get half an absence?
○I wouldn’t want to make it that harsh, especially if someone was coming from class
●Senator Green: Why did you decide on 10 minutes instead of a full absence after fifteen?
○We discussed this in executive council and that is what we decided
●Director Conti: What is the incentive to come if they get a full absence?
○Point of Information - President Helfgott: if you have an emergency then you can let Ethan know but we can’t have people coming in late every week
●Senator Hicks: When was this bylaw edited?
○I don’t know
Period of Debate
●Motion to pass by unanimous proclamation
Objection
Speech in Opposition
Director Conti: There will be no incentive to come if they are late
Palacios: I have an issue with the time limits because it should be here by roll call as they do in classes
Point of Information - President Helfgott: These are very different points
Speech in favor
Senator Rothstein: If they come late they can meet with Chief of Staff to explain why they were absent and have that absence removed entirely if needed.
Director Lifchez: This would incentivize people to come if they are still intending to come, especially if there is the possibility to have it removed
Point of Information - Vice President Keefe: We have laws in place if a person is consistently late
Point of Inquiry - Senator Hicks: is Olivia’s point written anywhere in the bylaws?
●Point of Information - President Helfgott: No but executive council can deliberate on absences
Senator Rothstein: People sign up to be senators not for an attendance
Voting Procedures
Passed
2. SB-89-2018— A bill to amend the bylaws of the Student Government Association.
First Rights
●Chief of Staff Runzo
○No representative of Senate/Senator can be the representative of a club while they are on senate. Cannot go to allocations meeting or defend their club in senate to eliminate bias.
Period of Discussion
●President Pro Tempore Palacios: This is saying that senators cannot be the representative to start club?
○Yes
●Deputy Chief of Staff Eney: If that person is on exec can they represent their club?
○No
●Senator Laport: What was the original bill?
○Point of Information - Vice President Keefe: Currently a senator cannot represent their clubs outside of senate, this is extending it to senate as well
●Director Lifchez: I it possible to ensure the people who are coming are just as prepared as a senator would be?
○Point of Information - Secretary Green: We always prepare out club representatives
○It’s a matter of you know me, not preparedness
○Point of Information - Treasurer Graham: We tell them in the budget workshop what questions they are asked. They have to be prepared
●Senator Feinstein: Would this apply to someone requesting funding?
○No they could still represent themselves
●Director Conti: Would you be open to a friendly amendment to change from senator to all of SGA?
○Point of Information - President Helfgott: The bias is still there with the liasons so they should not be allowed to represent either
●Motion to propose a friendly amendment to remove “whereas the members of senate...”
○Point of order: that would be mentioned during the debate period
●Motion to propose a friendly amendment to change to “all members of student government”
○Passed
●Motion to extend period of discussion by 2 minutes
○passed
●President Pro Tempore Palacios: Do you not think that this bias exists within student outreach as well?
○The fund is for all student including student government members
●President Pro Tempore Palacios: Do you think the student outreach fund could come under fire for bias?
○No because there is no feasible option to not give them student outreach fund
●Point of Information - Director Conti: Pablo edited the wrong bill
●Motion to pass by unanimous consent
Objection
Period of Debate
Speech in opposition
Director Lifchez: The wording of it makes it sound not exactly what it is intended to be. Can it be scratched?
Friendly amendment: to take out this clause
●President Pro Tempore Pablo: Do you think it’s necessary to change it?
○I think our reasoning behind that clause is wrong and taking it out wouldn’t be that big of a deal
●Motion to pass the amendment
○Passed
Motion to pass by unanimous proclamation
Passed
3. SB-90-2018— A bill to add bylaw 904.008 to the bylaws of the Student Government Association
First Rights
●Chief of Staff Runzo
○Campaign material and literature cannot be edited after being approved
Period of Discussion
●Motion to pass by unanimous consent
Passed
4. SB-91-2018— A bill to add bylaw 904.001c to the bylaws of the Student
Government Association.
First Rights
●Chief of Staff Runzo
○Materials can only be posted on bulletin boards in order to respect the facilities
○Point of Information - President Helfgott: This is pulled from the campus posting policy. The language is the same.
Period of Discussion
●Parliamentarian Rizzo: Would this prevent posting in Cougar Mall or is this just inside as stated? Could you clarify?
○In campus posting policy it also says zip ties can be used
●Director Conti: Would this make the candidates think they can only hang fliers?
○This is in the posting policy
○POI Senator Hicks: This is only for indoors
●Motion to pass by unanimous consent
Objection
●Senator Green: Could you clarify about posting to non-painted areas?
○Says that in posting policy and I know that others don’t follow these rules but we must follow them and it does not give us an excuse not to
●President Pro Tempore Palacios: Banners rules are not explicitly stated. Should we add one of those?
○Let’s hold that until next senate
○POInquiry Roller: Can we add this as a friendly amendment?
○POInformation: Adding this specific bylaw would raise more problems
Motion to pass by unanimous consent
Passed
5. SB-92-2018— A bill to add bylaw 904.002c to the bylaws of the Student
Government Association.
First Rights
●Chief of Staff Runzo
○During elections, handouts must be distinct from posters in size or content
○We encountered problems with this this year; we couldn’t distinguish which ones he could hang up and ones he would hand out
○This is just to eliminate that confusion
Period of Discussion
●Senator Rothstein: The hanging posters have the stamp and the handouts aren’t, wouldn’t that distinguish it?
○Yes, but people aren’t going to look at each one around campus
●Motion to pass by unanimous consent
Passed
6. SB-93-2018— A bill to amend the bylaws of the Student Government Association.
First Rights
●Chief of Staff Runzo
○To say that any member of election commission cannot interact with candidates via social media
Period of Discussion
●Motion to pass by unanimous consent
Passed
7. SB-94-2018— A bill to add bylaw 905.006 to the bylaws of the Student Government Association.
First Rights
●Chief of Staff Runzo
○Candidates should email the election commision instead of interacting personally with members of the election commision
Period of Discussion
●Motion to pass by unanimous consent
Passed
8. SB-95-2018— A bill to amend the bylaws of the Student Government Association.
First Rights
●Chief of Staff Runzo
○The head of the election commision should be appointed by an interview and appointed by senate
○
○For the last two years the president has served as the election commission chair
○It is a lot of responsibility for them to take on
○The intent is to have someone interviewed that would work closely with VP and President during freshman elections and then run spring elections on their own
Period of Discussion
●President Pro Tempore Palacios: For next year, how would the chair be selected?
○We will have time before school starts next year and train them then
●President Pro Tempore Palacios: They would be the chair for the whole year?
○Yes they would be the chair for bothe freshman election and spring election
●Motion to pass by unanimous consent
Passed
9. SB-96-2018— A bill to add bylaw 903.001c to the bylaws of the Student
Government Association.
First Rights
●Chief of Staff Runzo
○Candidates may not solicit votes via cofc email addresses
Period of Discussion
●Motion to pass by unanimous consent
Passed
10. SB-97-2018— A bill to approve the finalized budgets for student organization for the Fall 2018 semester.
First Rights
●Motion to make a friendly amendment to change number from 50 to 51
○Passed
●Chief of Staff Runzo
○Bill to approve the budgets. Yield time to treasurer graham
○Graham: We had four groups come through and ¾ of them were recommended for more funding and the last one did not have further cost estimation
■Director Conti: what is the one?
●Women in business, real estate club, Collegiate Curls
●We had CHAT come through but we could not recommend funding because they did not have the necessary cost estimates
Period of Discussion
●Motion to pass by unanimous consent
Passed
11. SB-98-2018— A bill to amend the bylaws of the Student Government Association.
First Rights
●President Pro Tempore Palacios
○Bylaws govern how SGA operates. Yield time to President Helfgott
○President Helfgott: It makes more sense to leave discretion of attendance of President Pro Tempore at executive meetings
Period of Discussion
●Senator Hicks: What was initial policy for attendance for this position?
○I haven’t had the need to attend the meetings this year. Executive council has done a good job of discussing controversial bills outside of meetings
●Motion to move into period of debate
Passed
Period of Debate
Speech in Opposition
Motion to change the bill to say “at the discretion of the executive council”
Passed
Motion to pass by unanimous proclamation
Passed
12. SR-17-2018— A resolution to express support for current and future collaboration between CofC Public Safety and SGA to promote safety and to enhance the campus community.
First Rights
●Senator King
○We passed the previous resolution to show support and not to tell public safety to do something
○President Helfgott: We met with public safety to discuss how we can promote their goals. I support this even though I vetoed previous bill, this shows my support
Period of Discussion
●Motion to pass by unanimous consent
Passed
13. SR-18-2018— A resolution to express support of the Preferred Name Project at the College of Charleston.
First Rights
●President Pro Tempore Palacios
○There are meetings on campus and this is just to reiterate our survey results and show that we still support this
○President Helfgott:
■Have been working on this since I was a freshman senator. We need to make sure this is appropriate and make edits.
■GSEC is not incharge, the provos has a committee that is incharge
■It took university of vermont seven years to get this done
■The technology is what is drawing this out
■He has only heard support about this policy from campus
■We just need the technology to catch up
■At the last board of trustee meeting there were people that supported it
■Administrators are very much aware of this issue and supportive of it
■Lets let senate decide if we should still show support albeit make some edits
○We already did pass support but it’s important that we show continued support and that it is still being worked on
○Would like to show this bill during meeting tomorrow with faculty and student leaders from around campus
Period of Discussion
●Meis: What specific parts of the bill do you want to be fixed?
○President Helfgott: We already supported this back in 2015, but physically at this moment we need to make changes. Different group of people are leading
○Don’t see any negative effects of passing this
●Runzo: We don’t know exactly who’s running it?
○No, we just don’t know everyone in it. It’s not a named group, its a task force
●Motion to move into period of debate
Rejected
●Senator Rothstein: If we passed this would it seem like we were trying to rush this?
○No it would just be showing support, not rushing it
○President Helfgott: We don’t know how people would react
●Senator Rothstein: Has there been an example where a resolution has been passed twice?
○No but initiatives have been repeated in the past
○This resolution says that this topic does still matter to us
●Senator Hicks: If we do end up passing this bill, only the first and second whereas lines will be changed?
○Yes
●Treasurer Graham: Who initially presented this bill?
○Danielle Wilson
Speeches in Opposition
Motion to propose a friend amendment to delete the first “whereas” clause and change the wording of the bill about which faculty is working on the preferred name project
Passed
Director Conti: This comes up at every meeting, they don’t need a reminder. Pablo can convey our continued support without the passing of the resolution
Director Lifchez: Echo points of all speeches so far, stay true to what we believe in but we need to maintain diplomatic relation with those we work with. We have already shown support, there is no need to potentially to cause any strife. Maybe we should table this until a better time
Point of Inquiry - Senator Green: How would upper administration see this?
President Helfgot: Some bills are perceived different than intended and it is important to maintain relationships with these administrators
Director Conti: What if we spread the word through other means? Post on social media and provide updates and contact info
Speech in Favor
Senator Hicks: I don't feel that it is our job to protect the campus from resolutions that may be received negatively; I don’t think this would send the message of rushing hte task force but instead serve as a friendly reminder
Senator Green: It’s important to show support for the sake of the taskforce and for the students
Senator Hicks: I recognize this can be seen negatively but it is very important to the LGBTQIA+ community, representation is very important. I hope it isn’t taken the wrong way, but it is still very important
Senator Laporte: Public safety perceived our bill in a bad way but it was expected. It is less likely in this event that there will be blowback. Maybe they feel uncomfortable passing this, but many students have felt uncomfortable their whole lives.
POI Helfgott: This is not about the administration's feelings but that’s why we passed this bill in 2015. We need to focus on spreading the word
Motion to move into voting procedure
Passed
Last rights
Pablo Palacios: I don’t want to say that we did not pass the bill in the meeting tomorrow. I do not think there is any harm in passing this to show our support. These are people’s lives.
Division
Vote by roll call
passed
14. SR-19-2018— A resolution to express student support for the College of Charleston entering into the Tufts University National Study of Learning, Voting, and Engagement.
First Rights
●Senator Rothstein
○National study at Tufts about voting registration
○Yield my time to Jeri Cabot
■Study to compile student data with voter registration data
■Institute for democracy in higher education works with national clearinghouse for student information
■Information is brought back anonymously and can be put into a public release
○Point of Information - Vice President Keefe
■Can show demographics on campus and be compared between school
Period of Discussion
●Senator Hicks: How long will this study last?
○until 2022
●Director Lifchez: How much does this cost?
○It is free
●Motion to pass by unanimous consent
Passed
*suspend swearing in of new executive office for the 2018-2019 academic year*
Motion to reinstate the special rules
Passed
Committee Reports
●Allocations- Treasurer Runzo
○No report
●Student Organization Review Board- Secretary Emily Ramsayer