University of Virginia Student Council
General Body Meeting
Minutes for March 28, 2017
The Legislative Sessionbegan at 6:35 PM.
Roll Call
Ty: First CIO bill, probably at least 5 more. I recommend all of these get approved. VA21 is focused on lobbying, they are inactive and applying to reactivate. The Iranian Student Association is here.
GenBod1: It is for Iranian students, and most are grad students. We want to tell students about our culture and poetry, while supporting students during hard times.
Ty: Final one is Counselor Education Student Organization, also geared towards student organizations. We will go over CIO qualifications at boot camp next week. I feel confident about these.
Motion to vote. Seconded. SB17-18 passed.
Motion to vote. Seconded. SB17-16 passed.
Motion to vote. Seconded. SB17-17 passed.
Sarah: These are just the standard appointments.
Motion to vote. Seconded. SB17-19, SB17-20, SB17-21 passed.
Alex: This is a bylaw amendment to move the membership committee under the administrative branch, and elevates the chair to an administrative officer.
Motion to table. Seconded. SB17-22 tabled.
Motion to table. Seconded. SB1-23 tabled.
Sarah: Every year the president looks at how the leadership team is functioning, and whether there are positions to be moved around. The City Council liaison position will be split into the legislative advisory board and the community service committee, which will now be the community relations committee. This person will oversee Cville relationships. In addition a new liaison position will be added for entrepreneurship.
Motion to table. Seconded. SB17-24 tabled.
Sarah: The legislative advisory board isn’t replacing leg affairs but gathering a group of people to consult with me and a few others every two weeks to provide info on what’s going on in the local, state, and national newswtih respect to students. We will also bring in Bryanna, and the UDems and College Republicans presidents. This way exec can be on the offensive in advocating for students.
Motion to table. Seconded. SB17-25 tabled.
David: I have a list of the appointments, and can share them now committee assignments.
The Legislative Session ended at 6:55 PM.
The General Body meeting began at 6:55 PM.
Community Concerns
Shivani: I’ve heard that by the Rotunda there have been homeless people on the benches saying racial slurs. It happened to one of my friends and they called the police, who said they couldn’t do anything.
David: I have contacts with the Haven, and can reach out to them. They know about every homeless individual in the city.
Sydney: New Speak up UVA post, and lately there’s been a lot of dog poop around. I was hoping thatBuildings & Grounds could post friendly reminders or have public dispensers for dog bags.
Chris: We can work on it.
Colleen: We can talk to Facilities Management about signage
Chris: Where is it?
Sydney: The courtyard by the game room, and the lawn and everywhere.
Katie: A lot of handicap spots are missing around grounds, which is harmful to those that need to drive to class. Particularly behind Clem and in front of Gilmer.
Taylor: We are addressing that.
GenBod 2: The concern I’ve heard is the railroad fence, and wondered if a bridge could be put over it.
Sydney: A central location for surveys would be helpful because it is so difficult to find respondents.
Leeraz: My idea was a website that you could post surveys, and incentivize students with a point system to get prizes from alumni hall.
Winston: In the past week the wellness committee was working on A school student stress. I was wondering if StudCo had resources or anything to help out.
David: We could reach out with EJ in UPC to direct programming towards the A-school.
GenBod 3:1515 closes and locks, but it doesn’t say that you need swipe access. There’s a light in brown college near Clem that is out, which makes it really dark.
Chris: We can bring it up for lighting tours.
Leeraz: For 1515, I am going to meet with a fourth year involved to talk about it.
Sarah: A lot of people are flying drones over the lawn, and some people want restrictions.
Leeraz: There’s also talk of UNESCO world heritage sites having special laws for drones.
Katie: Drones are against the law in national parks.
Saskia: Some departments are allowed to fly them on grounds.
Sam: Virginia owns the airspace, and can fly its own crafts but a student is different.
Katie: All drones have to be registered with FAA for a small fee.
Sarah: Email assignments from Collab to remind about assignments due were requested. Also a desire for standing desks in libraries. Sitting all day is unhealthy.
Katie: There’s tall tables in1515 with no chairs that people are using as standing desks.
Victoria: There’s no sound on the computers in Alderman. Even if you check out headphones, they don’t work.
Shivani:There’s an engineering workshop behind Ohill but it’s pretty undermarked, so people are walking alone in the dark. There should at least be a blue light.
Taylor: We got it.
Committee Updates
Sydney: We are going to brainstorm ideas about an academic resource fair in the fall semester. There would be a bunch of booths to see resources in one place, instead of scoping the internet.
Sam: We want to stop negative slogans during the UVA song. We want to involve student athletes without backlash on them. Next is changing privacy protections for student athletes who need medical help. We want to promote safe drinking habits for everyone as well.
Chris: We are working on digital prelabeling with the GIS office.
Joy: We had a minority panel, and discussed howStudCo appropriates issues instead of addressing them.
Victoria:We now have voter registration at orientation for first years. We are working on polarization with Crusade Learn and are going to ask the board to use UVA as a case study to give voters the day off.
Taylor: We are going on a light tour. We are going to address UVA alerts, and will work on a campaign to spread awareness on the different types of alerts.
Logan: One of reps said that handicap access was blocked by vehicles, so we will be following up on that.
Anna: One of our initiatives is the Student Arts Fund, which is allocated to student artists. Next Saturday we will have a flash gallery for it at Open Grounds. Feel free to come or spread the word.
Jacob:Each Monday will be Sustainabagels for those who sign up for the newsletter. It’s on the lawn, 10-12.
Officer Updates
Michael: Still working off the old budget, slack me if you need anything. Soon will be working on the summer budget. Next week I will do an overview on how the process works.
Brenna: I manage slack and the website, send me suggestions.
Leeraz: If you were at boot camp, take the survey. Coffee dates are coming up. If you weren’t at boot camp, make sure you get caught up. We also want to be allies with the MRC as a whole, and want to show up, instead of just posting blanketed statements. Be on the lookout for their events.
Katie: Like StudCo on Facebook, and share our stuff. I will be sending out a more concise way to send me requests for CavDaily blurbs.
Liam: I am meeting with you all to structure goals for the year. In the next couple weeks, please update me on your committee meeting times.
Ty: Meeting with Event Planning tomorrow to talk about CIO spaces in Newcomb We have 40 pending CIO apps, and are getting 3 more a day. I will see you all at boot camp, and we can discuss how to more effectively engage with CIOs. I am working with the law school to design better ways to collect receipts from their organizations. We’re doing appropriation recruitment now. Rolling round 3 allocations out this week.
Alex:Discussion 5-7 on Thursday in the Kaleidoscope Room with the presidential search committee. Also send me any administrative questions.
Sarah: Speak Up UVA is our way of communicating with the student body. April 4th we are beginning next structural wave of GenBod meetings. The first concern will be how to dedicate the PAC to being a leadership space. There are freet-shirts and sweatshirts outside my office. My last update is to introduce a presidential order. This is a way to place energy behind a policy we really care about. The purpose would be to pause and say what overall we want this organization to be pursuing. The first one will be to establish vice chairs on the diversity engagement committee. This will ensure that we can devote sustained attention to different diversity needs. We are in the processing of interviewing now. These will allow us to have constant advocacy going on in these areas.
David:It’s DREAM week, check out their events. Send me your pictures. Thank you for sitting through the rep session, it sets a precedent for the skills that we will use later for more real issues.
The General Body Meeting Ended at 7:35 PM.