As you know, at last week's meeting, Social Committee came before the Senate with a special funding request for new automated VCR's to run the movie channel on campus. The initial request was for $7000, which over the course of the meeting was changed to $3500. The reason that the amount was changed, was that SocComm did some further pricing, and had determined that $3500 would be sufficient. The motion to grant SocComm the money was passed then later reconsidered and tabled. It has come to the Senate's attention that there is a great deal of confusion as to why this happened. We would like to share with the student body our reasons for this action.
The Senate has heard from various parts of the constituency that they feel that the motion to reconsider was unorthodox. The motion to reconsider is a tool of any organization that uses Robert's Rules and is not at all uncommon. The SocComm motion was reconsidered because the Senate felt that it did not have all the information it needed to make a good decision. Also, the Senate felt that Social Committee needed more time to better frame its argument for granting the request. We did not, and do not make the motion lightly. We did it because a majority of the Senate felt that there was insufficient information about various aspects of the bill. Also, we wished to provide adequate time for constituents to provide the senators with their input.
In this case, the funding proposal needed to be clarified. An explanation as to why money from other parts of SocComm's budget could not be used to pay to replace the VCR's had not be completely answered to the satisfaction of several Senators, making it impossible for them to to make an informed decision.
The Senate also has to weigh the good of all student organizations in making the decision to appropriate funds. As the elected officials of the student body, we must make sure that this decision is in the best interest of not only movie channel viewers but the student body as a whole. We are not trying to be unduly harsh with SocComm, nor do we want to see the movie channel disappear. The Senate is just trying to do our jobs as the students' representatives to the best of our abilities. Hopefully, the issue of funding for the equipment that the movie channel needs will be successfully dealt with at tonight's meeting.
SGA Secretary Jennx Yambert
Senator Chris Mello, Public Relations Chair