Slate Refund: freedom, choice

Our message is simple: We will give you the $120 you are forced
to pay the Undergraduate Students Association Council. Our
reasoning is also simple: UCLA’s 25,000 students have rights
that surpass the fetishes of a council of 13. It’s a matter
of freedom and choice.

In short, if you think USAC sucks, this slate is for you. If you
think USAC can be great, this slate is for you. Refunding the USAC
fees can be done ““ and Slate Refund candidates, if elected,
will see that it is done.

Refunding these fees has two steps. The first is to refund your
USAC student fees for next year. If elected to council, our
candidates will work with Student Government Accounting to
determine the most practical way of doing this.

The second step is to decrease these fees to zero for all
successive years. For this, a referendum must be passed by
two-thirds of the general student body. This referendum can be
initiated by the proposal of two-thirds of the council or
signatures from 10 percent of the undergraduate student body. If
all Slate Refund candidates are elected, the referendum will be
immediately proposed.

Yes, the chancellor will have to approve a permanent USAC fee
reduction. But no decent chancellor since the ’60s has
refused the voice of a powerful student majority.

USAC, for all its promises and programs, has done suspiciously
little to benefit you. Every year, candidates make promises. Every
year, they fail to deliver. But even if its functions and
accomplishments were noble, USAC in its present form cannot be
justified. Ends do not justify the means. Your right to choice is
far more important than the projects of a small council.

USAC can continue to promote causes and put on festivals. But if
it wants your support, the council will have to persuade you of its
efficacy. You are both its first source and final beneficiary
““ and it is you who must have the right to direct it.

Slate Refund candidates, like those of the other slates, have
lofty ideals. We are running registered Republicans and Democrats.
Our supporters range from the atheists of the Communist Party to
the religious extremists of conservative ranks. Each of us has a
different concept of the world, of politics and service.

But we are united in saying this: We do not believe we should be
able to force our views on you. UCLA is not about one vision or 13
visions. It is about 25,000 visions.

Slate Refund is, plainly, your slate. You will make of your
refunded money what you will. You can donate it back to USAC. You
can try to change the world. You can get drunk. Our candidates will
be declining our stipends, so you can give it back to us.

Some have said our slate is high in passion but low in
knowledge. But it is these very people who so passionately defend
the hope of achieving a reputable USAC in spite of its morbid
history. Their passion stems from a myopic optimism that ignores
history as it does freedom.

I hope you join Slate Refund candidates in demanding that
freedom and choice be restored to USAC. And after Slate Refund
candidates are elected, I hope you will choose to give back to your
school and your community. I hope we can create a strong and
constructive system ““ one that relies not on force, but on
free will; not on mandates, but on choices; not on my message, but
on your freedom.

Hovannisian is Slate Refund’s presidential candidate
and a former Daily Bruin columnist.