Tuesday night the Student Senate met once again to discuss matters affecting the student body. Among others on the docket was a resolution revisiting the issue of club sports having a delegate seat.
Student Body President Jelani McGadney chaired the meeting as a result of the prescheduled absence of Student Body Vice President Jeff Chicoine. A section of the bylaws allows the president to chair the meeting if necessary, and the chairperson’s absence was preplanned.
Rachel Darrow, a graduate student and Graduate Assistant at the Rec/IM, took the floor to speak in favor of the resolution that would prevent the Student Senate from adopting a delegate seat for club sports.
After the brief period when the Senators were free to ask questions of Darrow, the resolution was put to vote. To remove the seat, Darrow needed three-fourths majority, or 18 votes. The support was overwhelmingly in favor of the delegate seat remaining despite its current vacancy.
A club sport, according to the Senate Agenda, is not clearly defined, though is “generally defined as a non-varsity sport that is instructional, recreational and competitive in nature.”
A delegate for club sports would “[sit] with the Student Senate and exercises all the rights and privileges of a Senator…” They would also not answer directly to the president or the senate; rather they would answer directly to the organization they represent. They would, however, be held to the same standards of dress and attendance as a Senator though they would not have assigned seating.
Darrow said since she took over this past February, she has helped institute changes which made it possible for teams to have free access to indoor practice facilities as well as helping to educate students on liability insurance, its purposes and costs and eased many other concerns.
Ultimate Frisbee, Bass Fishing and other sports like these were required to pay upwards of $100 for field time and carry liability insurance.
One of her concerns is there would be a conflict of interest if there were to be a delegate seat on the Student Senate. The delegate would be involved in club sports and could sway the vote if it affected his or her sport.
She also said having a delegate seat could equate to the dissolution of the G.A. program because her job would become extraneous.
“In my eyes, the delegate and I would serve that same purpose,” she said. “The university is run like a business. Why would they pay someone to do a job which could be done by a volunteer?”
People can bring issues to her and she would bring them to the Senate, she explained. If there were a need, such as parking for an event, which needed discussion, she could bring it up to the proper channels.
Darrow finished her petition to the Senate and the senators were then allowed to ask questions for clarity. One question posed to her:
“Why don’t you run for the seat?”
She later said, “It is not something that I have thought about and not something I am ready to think about yet…”
With the tabled issue form the previous meeting now resolved, the Senate moved to other resolutions. One dealt with updating the set of rules by which all delegates were governed, another was “a resolution to condemn the University Administration’s 2011-2012 parking plan.”
Meetings will continue to meet in the Student Center room 310A starting at 6:30 p.m. on Tuesdays.
