Bylaw change put on hold

Bylaw change put on hold

Council waits to vote on proposal after much criticism

By Phillip Carter

Daily Bruin Staff

The undergraduate student council tabled a proposal Tuesday
night to redefine the contingency-funding procedure for student
groups after lengthy debate and heavy administration criticism.

The proposed bylaw change would require student groups to turn
in typed and itemized proposals two days in advance. Student groups
would also have to go through a formal hearing process.

Currently, no set application deadline or formal hearing
procedure exists.

An administrative representative challenged the suggested bylaw
change, arguing that its wording was too specific.

"I’d remove language like ‘must,’ ‘shall’ and ‘will,’" Lyle
Timmerman said. "These are things that you should be very careful
in using."

Timmerman went through the bylaw change line by line, finding
fault in almost every one of the proposal’s clauses.

Finance committee Chairman Matt Bianco, who sponsored the
motion, defended the proposal by saying that the strict language
was necessary to clarify the funding process.

Critics at the meeting said that the bylaw change could result
in abuses of finance committee power.

Critics added that the proposed two-thirds requirement for
overturning finance committee decisions could result in a council
minority being able to block the action of the majority. Currently
a simple majority is required.

Undergraduate President Rob Greenhalgh argued that a stricter
procedure would allow for less political bias to be introduced by
Finance Committee and council members.

The proposed bylaw change contains several additions and
deletions to current policy, which the proposal sponsors say is
inadequate.

"Groups aren’t really aware of how the finance committee comes
up with these numbers," Bianco said. "In the past, hearings have
not been open to members ­ it’s been a very executive
session."

One representative from a student advocacy group argued before
the board that the majority of the changes were beneficial, but
that some of the rule changes would be detrimental to the student
body as a whole.

"(The new protocols) would make a progressive step into
clarifying the process," said African Student Union spokesman J.
Jioni Palmer. "(But, item) i. challenges the authority and
integrity of this institution."

Item i. is the proposal’s section that would limit student group
appeals to issues of procedural fairness and due process, instead
of the group’s merit and activities.

"I do think we should keep in mind the intent of the appeals
process, however we shouldn’t limit it," Palmer said. "What’d be
the best way of remedying this is by using the current appeals
process."

Agreeing with Palmer, Timmerman also said that the appeals
process should remain at least partly based on merit.

"I’d be careful about taking (the undergraduate government
council) out of the loop when it comes to merit," he said.