More students with voting power will soon have representation within Student Government Association forum meetings, thanks to three bylaw changes from SGA Forum members at their April 19 meeting.
In future meetings, up to five members-at-large could become members of the forum if confirmed by existing members of the forum. Traditional residence halls will also be allowed to have one student representative, and there will be representatives from Campus Entertainment Commission, Campus Ministry Commission and Campus Service Commission.
“Our rational behind (adding members-at-large) was that we just wanted to make sure that anybody that wanted to be on…SGA had an avenue to serve and get involved,” said Austin Keller, chief of staff.
He gave the example of a student studying abroad as someone who wouldn’t be able to serve all year but may want to be involved while they are on campus. According to the new bylaw, members-at-large must take classes at Concordia’s campus, and they must be nominated and confirmed by current members of the forum.
Each traditional residence hall will also now have the opportunity to appoint one residential hall representative to have voting power at the forum. The halls will select this person using their own methods. In the future, forum members intend to approve the opportunity for campus apartments and townhouses to also have representatives.
A representative from each of the three commissions, CEC, CMC and CSC, will also now have voting power within the forum next year. In the past, members of these commissions attended meetings but did not have voting power.
In other news:
The Executive Assistant position held by Emma Connell was amended and renamed “Chief of Operations.”
“We felt (the new title) reflected the roles and obligations more,” Connell said. “‘Executive Assistant’ sounds a little demeaning.”
The budget proposal of $26,148 for 2013-2013 was approved by forum members. This is the same total as last year with some funds moved around, according to Connell.
Future forum meetings will require a quorum of currently seated SGA members to pass business.
A bylaw proposal to change the approval process for requests from the Special Project and Initiatives Fund was tabled for a later date. The bylaw would have changed final approval power from the executive team to forum members.
SGA President Levi Bachmeier said this change would invest power into SGA as a whole instead of a select group of people, and it would make funding more transparent.
Colin Sullivan, elections and credentials commissioner, said the Elections and Credentials Council had serious reservations about the quickness of this proposal.
“The forum at this point doesn’t have the background knowledge to approve a bylaw change like this simply because…the necessary conversations have yet to take place,” Sullivan said. “I think it’s most important that we just don’t rush into a decision about how to allocate those funds.”
