The ASSU Undergraduate Senate (UGS) held a closed, informal session before an abbreviated formal meeting Tuesday evening. In the informal session, the senators discussed recent money disbursements from the ASSU student fees buffer fund.
Senate chair Rafael Vazquez ‘12 asked The Daily to leave for the informal meeting, which was attended by senators as well as Nanci Howe, director of Student Activities and Leadership (SAL), Stephen Trusheim ‘13 and Cameron Henry ‘12 and Ashley Lyle ‘13. Trusheim and Henry are both responsible for independently acquiring significant funding from the ASSU buffer fund through Senate bills for a spring concert series and Blackfest, respectively.
Senator Dan DeLong ‘13 said that the meeting was to discuss the lack of guidelines about how the buffer fund should be used and the perceived inequity between giving the spring concert $35,000 in funding while deciding to loan Blackfest $40,000 and require repayment.
For each of the events, revenue will be used to help fund future concerts at Stanford, DeLong confirmed.
Trusheim wanted an assurance from the Senate about the $35,000 grant he received because the concert organizers are currently working on booking artists and need an exact budget.
The Senate assured Trusheim that the $35,000 allocation would remain, and also agreed to re-examine the $40,000 loan to Blackfest in light of the inequity.
The official meeting started with a brief update from ASSU Executive Michael Cruz ‘12. Senator Ben Laufer ‘12 asked Cruz about how the governing documents commission is progressing.
Cruz said he did not feel comfortable sharing details of the provisional plans for the new constitution in a public forum; however, he said he hopes to have a private version available to the Senate and several other individuals in two weeks.
When Howe raised concerns about the ASSU elections schedule and how it may conflict with the new constitution, Cruz assured her that the constitution would go into effect after this year’s elections.
DeLong updated Senators on his recently launched One-on-One Advocacy Program, which he said has already fielded and resolved a few concerns.
The only bill passed at the meeting was to approve three representatives to the Vaden Advisory Council. Tara Trujillo ‘14, Lily Fu ‘14 and Baffour Kyerematen ‘15 were approved to the positions. Trujillo and Fu are both Senators, and Kyerematen is a mentee in the Leadership Development Program (LDP), a mentorship program organized by the UGS.
Contact Brendan O’Byrne at [email protected].