Last week, Finance Committee Chair Parsa Sobhani and I brought a rough draft proposal to the Undergraduate Students Association Council to start a conversation about our system of governance. The heart of the proposal was a change to our current system by creating a senate structure for our student government. We would like to clarify the motivations for and the planning of the proposal.
Currently, USAC is comprised of 13 elected officers ““ executives like myself, commissioners and general representatives. All 13 of us are tasked with two jobs: running our offices and spending Tuesday nights as legislators, voting on various proposals. These proposals are of the utmost importance and have a great effect not only on USAC, but also, more importantly, on the 800-plus student groups on our campus.
There are several problems with this system of government which a senate could fix. First, these two jobs ““ running an office and legislating ““ have almost nothing to do with each other. What if you think one candidate is a more capable executive for an office, but the other one has a better ideology about how to vote on legislation? As a student and a voter, it is unfair to make you choose between competence and ideology; you should be able to get both.
With this plan, there would be an entirely new body of senators ““ perhaps 20 ““ elected to focus solely on the voting aspect of USAC. This would free up the executives and commissioners to spend time doing what we were elected to do: programming and advocacy for the student body.
A second and equally important change that the senate would bring would be proportional representation. Currently, because there are only 13 seats elected by “winner take all,” it makes it impossible for anyone not affiliated with a slate to be elected. If you are an independent or want to run for student government without choosing a side, currently your chances of winning against two huge slates is close to zero ““ it’s just the way our system works. We think this is not only unfair but against the interests of our government, which should be encouraging participation from a broader array of students, not shutting out those who don’t pick a side. The senate system would allow independents or third parties who can represent a constituency to run and have a good chance at winning a seat, thereby increasing their voice and connection to student government.
Of course, there has been much criticism of this proposal, which I completely welcome. Only through thoughtful critiques and ideas can we create something that best serves the student body.
I do want to clear up a misconception, which is that this proposal came up “too late” in the year and was worked on “in secret.”
Although it was only brought publicly to the table last week, Parsa and I have been having private conversations with almost every member of council, as well as non-councilmembers, since early winter quarter. External Vice President Jesse Melgar, a frequent critic of the proposal, was the first person I sent our rough draft to so we could hear more criticisms and ideas from him. I recognize the importance of public participation and will continue to solicit opinions from every councilmember as well as the general student body.
What I ask of my fellow councilmembers and students is to give our proposal the same chance that I am giving your criticisms. The senate system certainly has some shortcomings, but I believe that through hard work and thoughtfulness, we can create a new government that is better than our current one. USAC does some great work, but it has many problems and often fails to best serve the student body. I hope that we can look past partisanship and work together on a way to bring about positive change for our campus.
Rose is the current president of the Undergraduate Students Association Council. He is a fourth-year communication studies and political science student.