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News

SGA session gets heated 

O'Brien claims Senate ignoring graduate students; Forward also discusses possible student radio station

by JENNIFER EARLY
The Daily Cougar

Swift bangs of a gavel could be heard throughout the University Center's Mediterranean Room as the Student Government Association Senate faced heated discussion over open seats at Wednesday's meeting.

Graduate-at-large seat No. 2 nominee Tim O'Brien addressed the Senate about a lack of response to his application form for filling an empty graduate student seat in the SGA.

"I filled out the form in the office, and (President) Francisco (Zelaya) came in and said he would bring this to the executive committee and then appoint (me)," O'Brien said. "That never happened. … The only conclusion I can draw is the student government doesn't care about graduate students."

Ryan Free, speaker of the Senate, told O'Brien the issue did not involve the Senate as a whole.

"That doesn't have anything to do with anyone but Francisco. The appointment process is entirely his, and then you will be confirmed by the Senate," Free said. "If you have an issue with that, then you have an issue with Francisco, not the Senate."

O'Brien said he had asked Zelaya -- who was unable to attend the meeting due to an arm injury -- for his appointment to be put on Wednesday's agenda. 

David Rosen, UH4U presidential nominee, said he would not speak on behalf of Zelaya about the issue, but stressed the difference between filling a seat for representation purposes and filling a seat to better serve UH.

"I can't help but wonder why Tim brought this up today during the election," Rosen said.

Students for Fair Trade also addressed the Senate to encourage a quicker response to pass a resolution in support of selling 100 percent fair trade-certified coffee at UH.

Ross Barnard, an English junior and SFT member, said an e-mail was sent to all SGA members regarding the resolution.

"(SFT) is asking for this resolution to be put on the next agenda to be voted on. I think the senators are obligated to research this issue," Barnard said. "We presented this information a month ago, and there has yet to be any action on this issue."

During Rosen's vice president's report, he said there had been no problems reported about the online election process.

"The last count we had was 427 people had voted by 12:30 p.m. today. That's an increase from last year," he said. "Using the HA number instead of the 16-digit Cougar 1Card number has appeared to solve the problems we saw last year."

Gus Forward, College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences senator and UH4U CLASS seat No. 1 nominee, spoke about the current efforts to get a UH Internet radio station running, a preliminary step in the process of establishing a student-run radio station at UH.

"I've been working with the School of Communication specifically. They have been doing a lot of work," Forward said. "In the next month, we will be holding a town hall meeting for (CLASS) as a whole, and we will be talking about the student-run radio station."
 

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