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Fulfilling required office hours at issue during SGA hearing

By Geronimo Rodriguez
Senior Staff Writer

The Student Fees Advisory Committee questioned whether the Student Government Association deserves more than $119,000 in student fees, particularly if some of its executives fail to maintain the required 20 office hours per week, during the SGA's fee hearing Friday.

"As much as I've been down there, I know certain student government executives work about five hours -- less than 10 hours a week," SFAC student member Kassaye Kassaye said. "It's certainly not fair to the students."

The requirement is written into the SGA Constitution. About $30,000 of the SGA's $119,004 request will go toward executives' salaries in fiscal year 2005.

The Senate's executive board members -- the president, vice president, student regent, director of finance, director of public relations and speaker of the Senate -- are required to submit time sheets and monthly reports indicating whether they've fulfilled their obligations, to Director of Campus Activities Zach Coapland.

"This is supposed to work in an ideal world, but no one's there to watch over you to see what you write," SGA Vice President Jon Quintanilla said.

Quintanilla said it's frustrating when "you put in your time and you see others who aren't," adding that the committee should devise a system to hold student leaders more accountable.

Although no individuals were named during the SFAC hearing, student committee member Claudia Chairez, who is also an SGA Senator from the College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences, said that "the Senate has discussed this problem, and we're trying to find a solution."

Coapland, who did not attend the hearing, said it would be ideal to incorporate a better system to record how many hours the executive members spend in their offices, but he said he "expects the SGA Senate to enforce" its constitutional powers.

Asked by SFAC student member Alberto Morales what the Senate has accomplished in the past year, Quintanilla said it has done numerous things, including getting textbooks for core courses held on reserve at the M.D. Anderson Memorial Library.

"We're hard at work, but one of our downfalls is we don't articulate some of the things we've accomplished," Quintanilla said.

It was the second hearing for SGA; the group's first, on Tuesday, was cut short when SFAC members found problems with the budget the SGA submitted.
 

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