The seventh Associated Students of UCR (ASUCR) Senate meeting took place on Wednesday, Nov. 29, 2023. All senators were present, excluding Senators Alex Lu and Kevin Nguyen, who were excused. The meeting began with a land acknowledgment to the local indigenous tribes who lived on the land before and was called to order at 7:06 p.m.
The first item covered on the agenda was approving the previous meeting minutes for Senate Meeting Minutes #6. The meeting minutes were approved 16-0-0.
Public Forum began with the External Affairs Department’s head of staff delivering a message on behalf of the Vice President of External Affairs. Here they announced to the UCR community that UCR will no longer be participating in the University of California Student Association (UCSA) due to what they characterized as moments of racial violence at the UC board meeting. They claimed that UC Berkeley External Vice President caused immense harm to the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB) and called for the Associated Students of the University of California, Berkeley’s (ASUC) Vice President of External Affairs to be removed from UCSA, stating that students leaders should not promote values of anti-blackness and racism, and called out the association as a whole for turning a blind eye to moments of racism and racial violence. While External Affairs will not work with UCSA during this time, they state that their campus coordinators will assist with different needs and priorities on campus in the meantime.
Next on the Public Forum was a representative from Hillel, a Jewish student organization. He delivered a statement explaining that the reaction of the UCR administration “and ASUCR to Oct. 7” has made him and fellow Jewish students feel unwelcome in the community.He said that the use of slogans going around, which he claimed called for the destruction of the state of Israel, walkouts, and disruptions to cultural events made many students feel unwelcome coming to school. He said that the alleged intimidation that students are facing is causing harm to the community and that “there is a sentiment that we [Hillel] do not wish to communicate and do not care enough to de-escalate.” He claimed that this sentiment is “not true” and that Hillel had reached out to various individuals in ASUCR and that only one senator had responded or tried to help. He ended his statement by saying that ASUCR serves all students, including Jewish students, and should be working to moderate the situation and ensure that misinformation is corrected. At the end of this statement, both Executive Vice President (EVP) Victoria Nguyen and Senator Viraj Ala thanked the representative for coming to the forum and shared their contact information with him so that he could reach out.
Last on the Public Forum was Highlander News Editor Mamata Elangovan. She said that as of week nine of the fall quarter, the ASUCR website had not been updated with this quarter’s meeting minutes, and other updates to ASUCR were also unavailable on the website. Elangovan claimed that this lack of information could prove “discouraging” to students interested in ASUCR who cannot attend the meetings in person.
Next for the meeting was Ex-Officio Reports, during which the head of staff for the Vice President of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (VPDEI), representing the VPDEI, asked the Senate to ratify the appointment of Rachel Lu to the vacant position of Ethnic and Gender Liaison. Lu was said to have previous experience with outreach and was looking forward to reaching out to contacts at Costo Hall. A motion was made to approve the ratification by Senator Anjana Narasimhan and seconded by Senator Rachit Shah and passed 16-0-0.
During New Business, ASUCR’s Executive Director delivered a Quarterly Report. During this she explained changes that were to be made for student leader advising and reporting, ASUCR operations, finances, and strategic planning. For a summary: primary authors will be more engaged with ensuring that work on resolutions is followed up on post-approval, changes to the website and minute packet will be made for clarity and organization, and finances will include a budget book to explain to the everyday student how different offices got to the number they decided on for each step and what their student fees go towards, and set a long term strategic plan to better serve students. To read more about each change in depth, access this article online and click on the link on Quarterly Report.
Senator Nguyen joined the meeting at 7:58 p.m.
Finance delivered two different reports during committee reports. Finance Meeting Minutes #5 were motioned to approve by Senator Narasimhan and seconded by Senator Nguyen and approved 17-0-0.
Next, Future Pills Exemption was brought back to the Senate table after being tabled at a prior meeting. In a statement read by EVP Nguyen, the Vice President of Finance (VPF) Brandon Huang responded to concerns raised over the amount of abstentions the exemption received when first passed by the finance committee. VPF Huang explained that “the finance specialist brought up a few things to highlight that made some of the committee members unsure on how to vote,” therefore leading to the abstentions. Senator Haidar asked if VPF Huang stated the specific reasons for which the members abstained, to which EVP Nguyen responded that ASUCR was unable to speak for those individuals. To remind the senators what the exemption was for, Senator Kaden Ho explained that the Future Pills club came to ASUCR asking for an exception on finance, mainly for transportation purposes for an event. It was explained during the meeting that if the Senate tabled the exemption back to finance, nothing could be done, and the exemption would be stuck at the Senate Table, but if it was rejected, it would be sent back to the Finance Committee and the club would have to restart the exemption process. In the end, President Pro Tempore Choy made a motion to reject the exemption which was seconded by Senator Naia Pizzaro, this passed 10-0-7.
Next, on committee reports, Elections Director Alexandra Arias delivered the Elections Timeline for 2023-2024. ED Arias explained that the document presented included the timeline for elections. This included the date for filing candidacy, the date for the beginning of campaigns, the date for publishing election announcements and various other things. Some concerns were brought up as to whether or not the proposed six weeks of campaigning is too many weeks, as campaigning is normally only three weeks long. ED Arias explained that there are a lot of events going on during that time that are not just limited to ASUCR elections, such as presidential primaries in California and other states. ED Arias stated that she is planning voter outreach and registration for those elections as well. She continued by stating that the six weeks of campaigning are not required, and candidates can choose when they want to campaign. Another concern that was brought up was the timing for poll sites; places like Glasgow and the Student Recreation Center were closed at 6:00 p.m. but had more student traffic after that time. ED Arias responded that the people working the poll sites are going to be volunteers and committee members; they do want to keep their schedules in mind, and that online voting will still be available 24/7. A few more questions were asked about the outline of the proposed presidential debates. More concerns were brought up for the length of the campaign regarding finances, campaign fatigue, student fatigue and various other things, to which ED Arias said that everything outlined took into consideration elections from previous years and that her committee set up this plan intentionally not to contribute to voter fatigue but to motivate intentional voting and to hit 25% voter turnout. In the end, after a failed motion to reject the timeline, a motion to approve the timeline was made by Senator Narasimhan and seconded by Senator Pizarro and passed 9-4-3. Before leaving the podium, ED Arias asked anyone who abstained or voted against the timeline in ASUCR to come to schedule a meeting with her so that they can mediate concerns and remedy anything that they are unhappy with and that if anything comes up in the future that Senate will still have the opportunity to amend the timeline.
No one came to the podium during Public Comment.
During Senator Reports, Senator Teesha Sreeram reported that as a CHASS and SOB senator, she has attended all her committee meetings, worked out with her Senate intern on various projects, and is beginning to plan the SOB town hall and is scheduling a meeting with the Dean of the SOB to mediate student concerns that were brought up.
Senator Nadia Colon reported that as a CHASS senator, she has been part of the Legislative Review Committee (LRC), spoke with the TAPS committee on installing cameras in parking lots to deter theft and has reached out to her senate intern to update him on current projects.
Senator Narasimhan reported that the Global Fair planning is still ongoing and that if any Senate members or their interns would like to help, reach out to her.
First for Roundtable and Announcements was the October Senator of the Month award, which went to CHASS Senator Rayhan Khan. EVP Nguyen explained that he was selected because he had been appointed Vice Chair of the LRC, hosted the Breast Cancer Awareness Event, authored statements on the Afghanistan earthquake and a statement regarding the passing of the first ASUCR president, and was the secondary author across multiple pieces of legislation.
Next, SPP Senator Pizzaro announced that she and the VPEA are hosting an event on Nov. 30 to watch the debate between Gavin Newsom and Ron DeSantis.
Senator Narasimhan announced that BCOE just did their Town Hall and that their Dean was excited to be working with ASUCR going forward and working on resolutions and getting student feedback with them.
PPT Choy announced that LRC suggestions were due at the end of the day, Nov. 29 and that LRC meetings will take place the following day.
Senator Ala announced that CHASS Town Hall will be held at HUB 221 at 2:00 p.m. on Dec. 5. Senator Ala said the Town Hall would hopefully have the Dean present, various organizations, and Subway.
The meeting adjourned at 9:40 p.m.
This article was edited on 1/8/24. A mention of UCSD was amended to UCSB.
This article was edited on 3/3/24 to reflect which senator made the motion to approve the Elections Timeline. Senator Narasimhan made the motion, not Senator Haidar.
