ASNAU SENATE MEETING TWENTY-NINTH SESSION

OFFICIAL MINUTES

Date: May 2, 2017                     Number on council: 21Date of Senate Meeting: April 27, 2017                   Number present: 18

Prepared by Shanlie Blair

Lauren L’Ecuyer, Vice President of Academic Affairs, called the Senate meeting of the 2016-2017 Associated Students of Northern Arizona University Senate to order at  pm in the Havasupai Room A and B, University Union.

Roll Call

Senators:Senator LeeSenator CarpenterSenator BrownSenator O’ReillySenator AndersonSenator CarrSenator HolditchSenator ClausSenator NielsonSenator OlasSenator MartinezSenator BeghtolSenator DavisSenator Overturf

Senate Clerk- Shanlie BlairParliamentarian- Alyssa Cox

Late: Senator Anderson

Executive:President PomeroyChief GavinVice President SchrandtVice President L’EcuyerVice President Stogner

Absent (class conflict): Vice President Schrandt, Vice President Stogner, Chief GavinLate: President Pomeroy

Approval of MinutesSenator Martinez: I move to approve last week’s minutes. Senator Overturf: I second.Chair L’Ecuyer: Any discussion? All in Favor? Unanimous, last week’s minutes are approved.

Call to the AudienceItem A- CIO ReportSpeaker: “I would just ask that you extend to your student representatives/senators that I’m committed to working closely with you to make improvements. You might mention that we’re working with students to improve My.NAU and access to web services like a new library system in the fall. I’m also excited to be working on improving about 60 more classrooms for next fall- including the technology, furniture and other aspects of our learning spaces. I greatly respect the input provided by students on the TechQual+ survey and will use that to make improvements. My door is always open and I look forward to finding other ways of working with the ASNAU on behalf of students. Congratulations to our graduating seniors and graduate students and I look forward to supporting your success.”

Unfinished Business

New Action Business

Lauren L’Ecuyer: For all the clubs that are here today when I call your item. Come to the podium and if you are here for recognition tell us about your club: number of people, what you do, what you wish to accomplish. If you are here for funding come up and tell us what the funding is for, how much, how will this impact the college.

Item A- Club Recognition: Alpha Sigma PhiSpeaker: Absent.

Item B- Club Recognition: Kuwaiti Student FutureSpeaker: Absent.

Item C- SB 29-151: Catholic Jacks/ Catholic Newman ClubSpeaker: We are requesting funding to help cover the costs of transportation to a conference we attended in January. We took 86 students, and the conference itself had about 13,000 college students there. It was five days long in San Antonio and we took a bus. I was a way to grow in our spiritual development and also a way to develop more friendships and work and connect with each other who were Catholic and non-Catholic.

Item D- SB 29-152: Astronomy Astrobiology Club Speaker: We had an event on Monday and a closing event. We had food provided by Sudexo and we had the elections for positions for the next term, introduced new members, and said goodbye to leaving members. So it was a really nice exchange experience and event.

Item E- SB 29-153: Society of Physics Students Club Speaker: Absent.

Item F- SB 29-154: Fellowship of Catholic University StudentsSpeaker: We went to the same conference as the Catholic Jacks Club and we are also requesting reimbursement for transportation to our conference in San Antonio.

Item G- SB 29-155: Sigma Chi Speaker: Two Friday’s ago we threw a charity concert on campus for all students to attend. We’re just asking for funding to help us reimburse some of those fees so it doesn’t take away from the donations to help our organization instead of having to take money that people thought was going to our national philanthropy.

Item H- SB 29-156: Mackenzie KuyperSpeaker: I am going to Haiti over the summer for two weeks to work at a local orphanage there to help take care of neglected and malnourished infants and children. I will be feeding them, taking care of them, and giving them the love and care that they need. I’ll also see what it’s like to live and work in a third world country and I would like to bring that back to the NAU student body to encourage others to serve as well, whether it’s in their local community or in a different country.

Item I- SB 29-157: NAU Softball Club Speaker: This year, a majority of our funding was out of pocket and it was very tight for many weekends. We’re just asking for support to help us and cover our reenlistment this next year.

Item J- SB 29-158: NAU Cycling Club Speaker: Absent.

Item K- SB 29-159: M.E.CH.A. de NAUSpeaker: Absent.

Item L- SB 29-160: NAU Men’s Rugby Speaker: We are asking funding for our four away games for transportation of 40 members. That includes gas and rentals.

Item M- SB 29-161: Hospitality Sales and Marketing Association International (HSMAI) Speaker: Last week we attended a spring fling that our parent chapter hosts annually. It was a networking event where students got to meet new people who work for different companies and subsections within hospitality. We had the opportunity to tour several hotels and companies where we also got to meet general managers, group coordinators, and salesmen. We’re requesting $200 for the event’s registration and gas. This was a great opportunity to get real experience in the professional setting.

Item N- SB 29-162: NAU Swing Jacks Dance ClubSpeaker: We’re requesting funding for 10 passes that were purchased for the annual dance weekend event. This is a fantastic weekend, we have professional instructors that are coming in from out of state and country. This is a tremendous opportunity for our students, both in the Swing community and the students all together to get to experience more dance.

Item O- SB 29-163: Men’s Club Volleyball Speaker: About two weeks ago, we participated in the NCVFC tournament that is the nationals of all collegiate volleyball. We’re asking for partial reimbursement for cost of flights which was the bulk of the cost of the tournament. It was a really good tournament to see our progress from the beginning of the year to the end of the year and to get out there and see all the other colleges that compete in club volleyball too.

Item P- SB 29-164: NAU International Club Speaker: We’re requesting funding for an event that was called the International Foods Festival that is done every year and was held about two weeks ago. We had about 460 people attend this event, and got permission from Rita Chang with a food waiver. So we partnered with Sodexo and we had about 11 countries who were represented and had food for more than 200 people and they each had two recipes, so it was a great event and we are asking for funding for the purchase of all those ingredients used.

Item Q- SB 29-165: NAU Gospel Speaker: This was a bill submitted for our first tour out of Flagstaff and the partial reimbursement for the students who ran for hotel and vans. So we’re asking on behalf of the four students who went to the tour for any of their lodging and transportation fees.

Item R- SB 29-166: NAU Ski and Snowboard ClubSpeaker: “This request for funding will be used to reimburse the competitive members of the ski and snowboard club for the registration fees of our national competition in mount bachelor, Oregon. This contribution from NAU is tremendously helpful in making skiing and snowboarding more affordable for the general student population, and therefore spreading the NAU name across the country.”

Item S- SB 29-167: NAU Global Medical BrigadeSpeaker: This year we’re requesting funding to send 25 members from our club to Nicaragua. It’s to provide public health services, clinical, and medical services to very rural and impoverished areas of Nicaragua. When we went to Honduras on our last trip, we saw over 1,000 patients, so we are expecting the same numbers in Nicaragua. This provides a lot of the clinical hours that med schools ask for students to have.

Item T- FY 2018 Budget Proposal Speaker: This year’s budget proposal, we have to estimate our goal as of course we are not sure of it yet, to about $400,000 in rollover. Again, that’s a really rough estimate. You have the total student wages, so we’ve included one person for public relations, we’ve included one person in front desk which will be our executive assistant, and the sustainability director because they weren’t in our budget this year, so we reflected it to show what our bylaws read. Going through, I’ll just read off what we added. We added $5000 to the uniforms line because we went over this year as is and we’ll be getting more people. Under student services we have our athletic partnership, we put that instead of tailgates hoping that something will change over summer. We special initiatives, which is where the values voting comes in so next year we have our senate go out to poll the students to see what they would like ASNAU to spend their money. The good neighbor initiative is something that we’ve added to build the community such as donation drives and things like that. The true blue books, they’re going to be 50 cents each. For the library, we increased that by about $20,000 just so we can play around with it a bit and get more extended hours than we do right now for the students.

Senator Brown: Can you elaborate on the library hours?

Chair L’Ecuyer: We don’t have anything in the works right now, but our hope is that with adding $20,000 we could potentially have Sundays open 24 hours every week.

Senator Carr: Is there a summary of that financial feasibility?

Chair L’Ecuyer: No. Right now, we spend about half of the budget that we have.Senator Brown: Okay, I just wanted to elaborate on that to make sure that we are asking students as well to work these hours as well and whether it can be done or not.

Senator Carr: As one of the next items on the agenda is looking to increase the hours for a senator to work, is this budget proposal willing to be adapted to fit that accordingly?

Chair L’Ecuyer: If it’s approved, we’ll definitely have to take that up with the budget.

Senator Brown: If approved, how do we plan on reaching out to students about the budget proposal?

Chair L’Ecuyer: Sending out senators to their college around campus, using our iPads to just try and pull as much data as we can.

Senator Holditch: How can we move the sustainability initiatives under the special initiatives?

Chair L’Ecuyer: I don’t see a problem with moving it.

Senator Holditch: Does that include the sustainability director’s pay?

Chair L’Ecuyer: It’s in the $120,000 where you see total student wages.

Senator Claus: You don’t have a line for mental health safety or anything like that in the student safety line, so where would that fall under?

Chair L’Ecuyer: Either the president’s or the SSA.

Senator Brown: Who conducted these rough estimates?

Chair L’Ecuyer: The executive council, our advisors, and our admin assistant. Item U- The Election Code Revision Speaker: At last leg meeting we finished our election code revision and if you saw the email that I sent out, leg wanted it to be read by senate before coming to meeting because it is a lot. So if you have any questions please feel free to share them. Thank you to Leah for taking on this initiative and making this election code a little bit better.

Senator Leah: Hopefully everyone was able to read through it. The biggest changes were talking about what happens when we do something wrong during the election and we changed the expense limits and we also added an important beginning that the election commission will be confirming in-person hearing during senate, so you actually get to see the representatives and meet them beforehand.

Item V- Salaries for Senate Hours Speaker: We’ve talking during leg meetings that we wanted to extend it to more hours just because some weeks are busier than others due to the nature of the position. So we decided to add one more hour to senate meeting, and then four hours of fieldwork. For example during mental health awareness week, taking on the revision of the election code, promoting certain events, etc. we did that out of the love of our hearts which is amazing, but sometimes, especially with the increase of the minimum wage, we want this position to stay important and as competitive. We want people to be able to work these hours and not be discouraged from getting this position because of the pay and the hours. So we want to increase it to 10 hours instead of 6 hours a week. You don’t have to work these 10 hours, but they’re a max of when things get busy where you take on big initiatives that take up more time, you should be compensated for it so you get to the students.

Senator Carr: Some suggestions for how that can be documented, another job I have on campus, we have a Google sheet where you have to log your hours because a lot of it is individual. As of now there isn’t necessarily any log that senators do, because if we are increasing it that would be

a suggestion for recordkeeping so that people can see what senators are doing and if there is an issue where someone is claiming to work more than they really are, they can be held accountable by it and the vpaa. Other staff positions are eligible for working 10 hours a week, so this also levels the playing field and maximizes the impact that senators can have in their college and on campus. I did the math, and it’s maybe an additional $15,000 to the senators line to accommodate this.

Senator O’Reilly: After also doing some math, I did want to say that it would be about a $27,000 increase with the student funds and that’s obviously going to only 14 senators. So I think that draws a line in fairness between the rest of the NAU staff. I also do want to touch on that as senators we voted on our hours, and this new senate was hired knowing that they’d be committing to 6 hours a week, so just throwing 10 hours a week on them, I know it’s a maximum, but I feel like it is kind of a line between that. So I think that it’d be fair to have the new senate vote on their own hours since we did vote on our own hours as well.

Senator Brown: I’d like to say we should take on the consideration of definitions. If there is a 10 hour maximum, it’s pretty plain and blunt that they don’t have to work the full 10. They can work 6, 5, 4, 3, 1- you know whatever they want.

Senator Carr: They were also elected, not hired.

Senator Martinez: I also have something else to say, they were voted into these 6 hours, but you’re also sending them to take surveys for students for whatever the budget was mentioned. That’s going to take time and that’s going to take time out of their day to do what they need and want to do. We are full time students and we want them to give their best, so they should be compensated for that. So if they’re going to get these extra responsibilities, then this current hours set is not going to be enough.

Senator Anderson: We do have some new senators here for next year, do you think we could get their opinions on it?

Kristine: We’re not in a discussion period. You might want to answer questions and then come back to this one.

Item W- General Intern BylawSpeaker: In your email that was sent out from leg, there was an attachment about a general intern bylaw. We realize that because we do have a handful of interns, that it’s kind of hard to have a separate bylaw for each intern. So I think it was Senator Nielson who came up with this brilliant idea who came up with the general intern bylaw. So I’ll just read off the four points:

1. Holding up to the assigned amount of hours by their supervisor.2. Fulfilling duties given by supervisor.

a. Each department will have a defined list of responsibilities that will be available upon request.

3. Helping with any tasks within the department.4. This will be an unpaid position.

That way it’s up to the supervisor what they want to do, how many hours they want to put in for their intern, and to make it just a little bit easier for all of us.

Senator Overturf: Since it looks like a big part of this job is going to be attending leg and approps

committees, and since those times aren’t decided until the Fall, would you be hiring this person in the Fall or in the Spring?

Chair L’Ecuyer: Sorry, that’s on two separate documents.

Senator O’Reilly: Attendance is separate.

Senator Nielson: When we vote on this, are we voting on striking all of the other intern bylaws?

Senator Davis: So if this were to pass and the other internships would be stricken, then is it just one intern or multiple? Because right now we have multiple interns for different departments.

Chair L’Ecuyer: Yes, so I think the point of writing this is that instead of continuously writing a new intern for every department, we’ll have one general intern. This is a general description for every intern. So we’ll still have interns across a lot of the departments then they’ll have a defined list of responsibilities that will be available for their specific duties.

Senator Martinez: Could we then change the wording to ‘general duties of an intern’ so it’s not ‘a general intern’?

Senator O’Reilly: I think that would make more sense.

Item X- Attendance Police for Legislative and Appropriation Meetings Bylaw Speaker: This is also sent in the email, we thought that it would be beneficial to have an attendance policy because there’s one for senate so make one for the committee meetings as well. This is again for leg and approps:

If a committee member has two (2) or more unexcused absences from committee meetings, they must attend a conduct meeting with the Vice President of Academic Affairs.

Our thought process for a conduct meeting was just sitting down and discussing why they weren’t there, what they’re going to do next time, and a way to avoid this conflict.

Senator Brown: Okay so a conduct meeting, do you have a certain amount of conduct meetings that you reach and then come to the senate, ⅔ vote you’re out? What’s the underlying purpose behind this conduct meeting?

Senator O’Reilly: I guess we didn’t really discuss that further.

Senator Carr: Maybe we should look at adding something like this to various positions that are required to attend senate meetings, because a lot of our team never shows up to senate and if we’re being held accountable to attend our committee meetings they should be held accountable for attending these meetings as well.

Senator Lee: Maybe we should add a general bylaw that says failure to meet the expectations listed above will result in a conduct hearing.

Senator Brown: So to add on to that, so if you all on the exec team don’t show up to x amount of meetings, who holds you all accountable? Do you have a conduct meeting with the senators?

Voting Period

Item A & B- Club Recognition: Alpha Sigma Phi & Club Recognition: Kuwaiti Student Future

Motion to TableFirst: Senator BeghtolSecond: Senator OverturfDiscussion:Senator Holditch: When we table it, does it just go to next semester?

Parliamentarian: It’s up to the senate.

Senator Carr: Since it’s club recognition and not necessarily funding, could we still vote on it? Because otherwise they wouldn’t be able to do anything until next semester.

Chair L’Ecuyer: Yes, if the senate feels comfortable with doing that we could get a motion.

Senator Carr: I motion to vote on Items A and B.

All in Favor: Majority vote noPass/Fail: Fail

Motion to VoteFirst: Senator CarrSecond: Senator AndersonDiscussion: Senator Overturf: Do we know what Alpha Sigma Phi is?

Senator Lee: It’s just a social fraternity.

All in Favor: UnanimousPass/Fail: Pass

Item C- SB 29-151: Catholic Jacks/ Catholic Newman ClubFirst: Senator MartinezSecond: Senator NielsonDiscussion: All in Favor: UnanimousPass/Fail: Pass

Item D & E- SB 29-152: Astronomy Astrobiology Club & SB 29-153: Society of Physics Students Club First: Senator LeeSecond: Senator AndersonDiscussion: NoneAll in Favor: UnanimousPass/Fail: Pass

Item F- SB 29-154: Fellowship of Catholic University StudentsFirst: Senator BrownSecond: Senator DavisDiscussion: None

All in Favor: UnanimousPass/Fail: Pass

Item G- SB 29-155: Sigma Chi First: Senator NielsonSecond: Senator ClausDiscussion: NoneAll in Favor: UnanimousPass/Fail: Pass

Item H- SB 29-156: Mackenzie KuyperFirst: Senator OverturfSecond: Senator MartinezDiscussion: NoneAll in Favor: UnanimousPass/Fail: Pass

Item I- SB 29-157: NAU Softball Club First: Senator OverturfSecond: Senator DavisDiscussion: NoneAll in Favor: UnanimousPass/Fail: Pass

Item J & K- SB 29-158: NAU Cycling Club & SB 29-159: M.E.CH.A. de NAU

Motion to TableFirst: Senator NielsonSecond: Senator ClausDiscussion: NoneAll in Favor: UnanimousPass/Fail: Pass

Item L- SB 29-160: NAU Men’s Rugby First: Senator OverturfSecond: Senator DavisDiscussion: NoneAll in Favor: UnanimousPass/Fail: Pass

Item M- SB 29-161: Hospitality Sales and Marketing Association International (HSMAI) First: Senator NielsonSecond: Senator ClausDiscussion: NoneAll in Favor: One abstention, majority vote yesPass/Fail: Pass

Item N- SB 29-162: NAU Swing Jacks Dance ClubFirst: Senator OverturfSecond: Senator OlasDiscussion: None

All in Favor: UnanimousPass/Fail: Pass

Item O- SB 29-163: Men’s Club Volleyball First: Senator BeghtolSecond: Senator MartinezDiscussion: NoneAll in Favor: UnanimousPass/Fail: Pass

Item P- SB 29-164: NAU International Club First: Senator BeghtolSecond: Senator OverturfDiscussion: NoneAll in Favor: UnanimousPass/Fail: Pass

Item Q- SB 29-165: NAU Gospel First: Senator BrownSecond: Senator AndersonDiscussion:Senator Carpenter: During approps, we weren’t sure because NAU Gospel doesn’t have a bank account.

Chair L’Ecuyer: Yes, we talked to Kayli and she said that either we can do an interdepartmental transfer or they can create a bank account.

All in Favor: UnanimousPass/Fail: Pass

Item R- SB 29-166: NAU Ski and Snowboard ClubFirst: Senator NielsonSecond: Senator OverturfDiscussion: NoneAll in Favor: UnanimousPass/Fail: Pass

Item S- SB 29-167: NAU Global Medical BrigadeFirst: Senator ClausSecond: Senator MartinezDiscussion: NoneAll in Favor: UnanimousPass/Fail: Pass

Item T- FY 2018 Budget Proposal Senator Davis: Just a quick question, would it be more appropriate to vote on the hours first since it directly affects the budget instead of voting on the budget beforehand?

Chair L’Ecuyer: Yes, if you wanted to. That’s a senate decision.

Senator Davis: I move to place the Salaries for Senate Hours above the FY 2018 Budget Proposal

MotionFirst: Senator DavisSecond: Senator MartinezDiscussion: NoneAll in Favor: Majority vote yesPass/Fail: Pass

First: Senator Nielson

Senator Davis: Wouldn’t we have to table it since it’s not correcting the correct amounts with the passing of the senate hours?

Chair L’Ecuyer: We can vote and then vote it down if you feel that way. Can I get a second?

Second: Senator Lee

Senator Claus: Was this ever presented the appropriations committee?Chair L’Ecuyer: No, it was not.

Senator Claus: Doesn’t it stipulate in our bylaws that appropriations should have a process in this?

Chair L’Ecuyer: I believe it’s under the appropriations committee bylaw.

Senator Claus: So in that case, would it be possible to table this and have appropriations review it?

Chair L’Ecuyer: We could also vote it down and appropriations would do the same thing.

Kristine: I was just going to say that you could also amend it right now.

Senator Carr: I think if anyone has suggestions for how it should be amended we should make those suggestions now. I’d like to reallocate the library increase funds to the salary line and then next year’s senate can look at it and see if we do need to increase the library hours then.

Senator Anderson: Do we need to move to suspend that bylaw then?

Parliamentarian: You can’t suspend any bylaws. Robert’s Rule of Order say that even with a majority vote, you can’t suspend a bylaw.

President Pomeroy: I just want to suggest maybe if it would be possible to assemble approps during retreat and have them pass the budget the first senate meetings. Because you get into your committees during retreat, and they could look it over then, have everyone look it over the mock senate meeting, and then have it presented for the first official senate meeting.

Cindy: It looks like the ending budget is $64,022, so your $27,000 that you’ve just approved for wages could be taken from this. The senate has been trying over the last year and a half to break a cycle, meaning that the fees that students are paying were not getting spent in that time. If we have more unrealized capital coming in, how does it best serve the student body and we keep funding senate bills.

Senator Davis: I like exactly what you just said. I would like to see this budget passed seeing the new elected exec team spent countless hours on this. So I move to take the amount needed for the new hours from the ended budget to account for that.

Amendment First: Senator DavisSecond: Senator LeeDiscussion: NoneAll in Favor: UnanimousPass/Fail: Pass

Senator Nielson: Amended as is, I’m still on the edge with this whole appropriations thing. How are we going to get passed that? I want the budget to get passed now too for all kinds of reasons, but we can’t just ignore that.Senator Carpenter: Can approps go outside right now? I mean, we’re all here.

Senator Holditch: Appropriations makes up half us, and we’re all reviewing it, so it kind of makes sense to go back. We are approps.

Senator Nielson: I move for a 5-10 minute recess for appropriations to meet and discuss this.

MotionFirst: Senator NielsonSecond: Senator MartinezDiscussion: NoneAll in Favor: UnanimousPass/Fail: Pass

*recess*

Chair L’Ecuyer: The appropriations committee voted to take down the library hours back to $80,000. To add that $80,000 we’ll add $10,000 to the student state affairs line, which will be specifically for the mental health awareness week, and then adding $5,000 to the leadership line to make that $20,000 because we ran out of it this year, and lastly to add the other $5,000 to the rollover that will go towards the values voting.

Senator Holditch: Just a question, what is the student safety line again?

Chair L’Ecuyer: It’s for the student safety week, so advocating for student safety on campus.

President Pomeroy: Just to clarify a little bit, that got added during the year that a president ran on holding a student safety week. But as the years have gone by, it’s kind of been adopted that as someone that has an initiative and creates something in place of it so it’s used more as a president’s initiatives. The year before me it was used as just a general alcohol and drug awareness too. But SSA usually does a lot of the student safety, but that’s kind of the history of how it became a line.

Senator Holditch: I think we should probably change it to the president’s initiatives then, because we have mental health awareness week but that’s not on there.

Chair L’Ecuyer: We can just remove that week because there’s already a president’s initiatives line.

Senator Claus: So then if we’re moving that line, is the money going to the president’s initiatives or somewhere else?

Chair L’Ecuyer: It would go to the bottom line.

All in Favor: UnanimousPass/Fail: Pass

Item U- The Election Code Revision First: Senator OverturfSecond: Senator MartinezDiscussion:Senator Claus: I just want to make this clear, this is really good work but it still needs to be taken up next year again just for the future senators here. This is a really good step and a half, so that’s all. Senator Olas: Was there a reason why executive positions were changed from $300 to $200?

Senator Claus: That was just from looking at how many students work minimum wage jobs who might not have the ability to go up to $300.

All in Favor: UnanimousPass/Fail: Pass

Item V- Salaries for Senate Hours First: Senator NielsonSecond: Senator MartinezDiscussion:President Pomeroy: So I just want to know what the downside would be for waiting for next year’s senate to pass it just for the purpose of knowing that each senator submits an end of the year report with recommendations to the new senate, and that is given to those senators during retreat before the school year starts. My reason for saying that is because no data has been collected to my knowledge asking the students what they feel about using their few dollars for wage increases and I just feel that that’s a subject that the new senate may feel want to collect data on just because they’ll be the ones held accountable to the new decisions since we only have one senator here that will be returning so I think it’s odd to make that decision on behalf of them when they might get questions from their constituents when there’s no data collected this semester. I just want to know what your thought it on that.

Senator Martinez: So two things on that: we just changed the description of other positions, and we did not collect data on that either, and we did increase the hours that they could work based on the supervisor’s opinion. So if we’re not going to hold other positions for the same standards, then I don’t understand how senate is going to need to collect data on the students’ opinion. Also, we’ve been talking about this since last semester, so we feel like for next year it’s not going to be taken upon.President Pomeroy: The only reason I say for senate specifically is that since it’s an elected position, they’re held accountable to the student body as opposed to staff positions where it’s

hired within ASNAU, which is my reason for wanting to bring this up so we think about this before we vote on it.

Senator Carr: A few thoughts on that. One, salaries are paid by all students that pay the fee, even though our positions are specifically elected. Those other positions that Fernanda is referring to, which we did change around the hours a little bit, they’re all being paid from the same fee. So I understand that that’s an important factor of getting students’ opinions, but as a senator for two years, this is something that I’ve seen as a necessary improvement to the position because I personally have been putting in more than 6 hours for the past two years when the times are necessary for it, and I think recognizing student senators that want that ability since it’s saying a maximum and is not requiring they work 10 hours, I think that it allows for that flexibility in the future for senators to decide if they want to put in the extra work and be recognized through it by wage.

Senator Lee: Just on previous conversation about polling the students, I know that for a lot of the weeks as a senator, I didn’t have a bill. So my office hour was spent kind of just hanging out in the office, helping Kayli or whatever, and that hour could be used polling and then your field hours, that’s two hours a week that senators would be out polling students and also working on their research opportunities. Yes I believe there are some weeks where I believe we work more than 6 hours a week, but it’s kind of few and far between.

Senator Anderson: With those points being raised, can we now turn to the next year’s senate and hear what they’d like to see?

Chair L’Ecuyer: We’ll here from these two first and then we can.

Senator Nielson: I’m going to go ahead and say that this bill is not about the fact that we don’t have enough paid hours in the week to do what we should be able to get done, as response to Kailey we can use those hours to do what we’re expected to do. Here this bill is intended to make them do more, it allows them, gives them the power to do more. I am the opposite of Stella, Stella goes ahead and works more than 10 hours a week probably for ASNAU. I didn’t. After 6, unless I was volunteering for one of your guys, I stopped. I didn’t care, but maybe with the four hours, if I had an incentive to go out and actually really do this job, I would find ways. I would find ways in order to be useful to my school, to HHS, in ways that I wouldn’t of thought of before. And, also, this position, at $90 every two weeks is not worth the pain of elections. It is not worth it and I want it to be. I want to market to the best that NAU has to offer for this position.

Senator Overturf: I think if we pass this it might be a good idea to put a provision in that would be a requirement for senators to document their field hours and that way we’re not wasting all this extra money that we’re appropriating.

Senator Olas: Would fieldwork in this case count as attending events within ASNAU?

Chair L’Ecuyer: That would be up to the senate for next year.

Senator O’Reilly: I’m just looking at the hiring docs that we did edit, and we did not change any staff’s hours and also, if we did change staff hours, it would’ve changed in the budget.

Senator Holditch: Can we let the audience go since they’ve been voted on already?

Chair L’Ecuyer: Yes, if you’re bills were approved you can feel free to leave.

Senator Carr: We did look over when we were looking at positions three weeks ago in leg, we looked at adding a bylaw that changed the position to say ‘supervisor’s discretion’ because special events for example works more than 10 hours during the carnival and certain events. So we did address that issue. And also, if you’re worried about getting student feedback from where we should put the money, then I don’t feel comfortable voting on a budget assigning more money to library hours when there was never a survey conducted saying that we need more library hours on Sundays.

Senator Nielson: In the budget, remember we gave the Chief of Staff the power to up 5 hours? How do you account for that?

Chair L’Ecuyer: Yes, because technically whatever is in the bylaws they can’t be paid over what’s in the bylaws.

Senator Nielson: Even though we said they could and the Chief of Staff allows it?

Chair L’Ecuyer: I spoke with Paula and she said whatever is in the bylaws, she can only pay that person that much money or whoever our next person will be.

Senator Davis: From my perspective, this bill isn’t really about giving senators more money. It’s more about you get what you get out of it, it’s all about what you decide to do. And this provision really allows those senators that have the ability and don’t have the restrictions to go above and beyond, it kind of gives them that leeway to get paid a little more. And if you don’t want to, you don’t get paid that much. I would say also that if this bill does pass, Section 5 would also need to be amended because it says holding a minimum of three office hours per week, where Section 4 says one office hour per week.

Senator Martinez: Yes that was in there. I forgot to mention it during leg, my bad.

Kristine: Just a general question, how long does it take you to write a bill?

Senator Lee: 15 to 20 minutes.

Senator Davis: With that said, I would also argue that one hour in the office isn’t enough, I would say two hours just because we’re the direct face of the students and when they come in, we already have staffing issue with covering the front desk. So this would also kind of eliminate that.

Senator Martinez: Sometimes it takes me a couple of days for people to get back to me and for me to reach out to them, for me to ask front desk, for me to ask Lauren, for me to ask other senators how to write the bill because sometimes it’s more complicated than it seems. So yes, spread out times.

Senator Holditch: I don’t think that writing bills is the only thing senators are supposed to be doing. Our job, it goes beyond just allocating student funds because we represent our college and we’re supposed to go get feedback from students from our college and take that back to the dean, and I know it took me a while to do that just asking students around in classes and asking professors with issue going on within our college to actually have things to talk about with the dean. I think that can be used as fieldwork and also just emailing people during office hours isn’t just simply about funding, and I think that’s what senate has become a little bit. But there’s a lot more to the job than that.

Senator Carr: Going off of that, what we do doesn’t fit in a bylaw, in a sentence. The impact that this position has potential to do on our campus is up to the creativity and imagination of those who hold the position and I think giving them the option to be recognized that they choose to put in, no offense to Senator Lee, but if I have a lot going on during the week, I have to choose whether I’m going to represent the senate on a committee that the senate has asked me to sit on or to go visit a club that I want to speak to. So if I have the ability to do all of those things and get paid for them because it is my job, then I would love to do them all. But those that are using the position to create new things and make changes for our organization and for our campus, can do more than just write bills and attend senate and sit on a committee once a week.

Senator O’Reilly: I just personally don’t feel comfortable passing something that was kind of only formally talked about at one leg meeting. I just feel that it’s not the most responsible when it could’ve been discussed a little bit more when we didn’t get feedback.

Senator Olas: I don’t think we’re doing a very good job of representing the students, because we have very low attendance at most of our events and I think that has a lot to do with us not advertising, not being engaged, not engaging the students. And I think if we make it our job and we are able to be compensated more, there will be more attendance at events. We’re spending a lot of money on events, students should be able to know about it.

Senator Martinez: I don’t remember who said it, but it was mentioned in leg meeting this Monday that we had it in the agenda for February and it was never talked about. It kept getting pushed back. So it was in the agenda and it was supposed to be talked formally months ago.

Senator O’Reilly: I have originally what Stella sent out on March 23rd.

Senator Carr: I made the document in November after the state voted to increase the minimum wage and I wanted to find a way to compensate students somehow whether by increasing their hours or increasing their wage. I did research on that last semester and this has been something I’ve been advocating for for a year and I brought it up, and we can search the minutes, I’m sure it’s been mentioned several times throughout the year whether we had this discussion or not.

Senator O’Reilly: Knowing the email that you sent out that I received on March 23rd and that it was put on the agenda for February 27th and next to that, on the agenda, it said that it would be discussed in the next meeting but it was never brought up again by you or Fernanda.

Senator Martinez: It was, I mentioned it a couple weeks prior.

Senator O’Reilly: But it was never formally talked about and it was never brought to the Chair’s attention that needed to be discussed.

Senator Martinez: We talked about it on Monday, we mentioned it a lot of time throughout the year.

Senator Anderson: It seems that there’s two different discussions going on about whether we should even vote on this or what we think should happen, can we turn to the next year’s senate because if they say they don’t want to vote on this, we shouldn’t vote on this. So I think we need to hear what they have to say.

Sara Lydford: I think it’s a matter of accessibility. By only having 6 hours a week available, that

is automatically excluding a lot of students who may be of low income and can’t afford to have a job that is 6 hours a week. So I think that that’s something really important to take into account, and I think that also as an incoming senator, with the maximum being 10 hours, I definitely would not feel that pressure that I have to work those hours. I think that I could just as well work 6 a week until I need to work more on given week. So I think that I would like to see this voted on.

Speaker: I’m sure many of the students here work full-time hours, so giving the opportunity to put in a little extra time, I would definitely be willing to do that and having it be paid rather than volunteering would definitely be more valuable.

Speaker: I ditto those two views and say that it gives us an opportunity to work more and we definitely need to be compensated for that. I know me personally coming into this, I’m going to want to do as much as I can and push back those 6 hours and be compensated for it. So I would definitely like to see this voted on now, and then I feel like if we some huge problems with it later, we can vote on it again then.

Jack Wilske: I honestly think that having those extra hours is a really good idea because, think of a regular part-time job. If you get the opportunity to work overtime, you will because you want the extra money. In this position, it’s not bsing for a couple of hours because you’re actually doing something for the students and ASNAU. Personally, I may not be as driven to work more if I’m not getting paid for it, but I understand with this job, that’s part of the job description. Getting paid for doing more work makes sense. I understand the argument right now is whether or not to vote on it right now, and I think that there’s a lot of credibility to waiting till next year, but I think that the majority of the senate right now has a good idea of how they want to push this bill forward. I think this makes sense to vote on this bill.

Sara Lydford: I was just going to say along with accessibility, it’s definitely a matter of quality of the work as well. I think that there’s a lot more that can be done through ASNAU that some of you were mentioning. I don’t think that ASNAU as of right now is representing the voice of the students, and a lot of that can be achieved through more time in direct involvement and engagement with the students. So if the work for that is paid, it would incentivize that extra working commitment to the students.

Senator Lee: I think the only thing that we need to consider then before we do vote is think of how many interns we have who don’t get paid at all.

Senator Carr: I don’t think that’s relevant for this argument right now, but someone in the back has something to say.

Speaker: I have a couple of thoughts on this. This is kind of what I signed up for, I knew going into this position that I would be working over 6 hours a week and to have an incentive in terms of money would be nice, but that’s not why I signed up for this job. I think that working only 6 hours a week isn’t going to be enough in order to represent a college who has hundreds of students.

Senator Claus: I just wanted to bring up a point. If we do decide to postpone this bill and the budget is approved, they won’t be able to approve more hours next year.

Chair L’Ecuyer: We can always re-allocate.

Senator Claus: Well that wasn’t the case this semester when Senator Carr and I had been working on this proposal after the minimum wage increase and we were told that once it’s set for the year, it’s set for the year.

Kristine: You can always amend the budget.

Senator Carr: That’s not what I was told when we asked about it. I proposed that we did a test run this semester because I looked at it last semester, and I don’t know if you remember but I did talk to you about that, and you said that we couldn’t allocate more funds to do that.

Chair L’Ecuyer: I think it’s raising your wage in the middle of the semester is what we can’t do.

President Pomeroy: Correct me if I’m wrong but it seems like there’s a difference in increasing wage or hours?

Senator Carr: I had a document that detailed both. One was increasing our wage at the current hours that we have, and one was keeping the wage and increasing the hours.

President Pomeroy: Well moving forward, I don’t think that there’s anything prohibiting you from amending that. If there’s rollover, which there is, it needs to come from that. I’m just trying to get us back on track.

Cindy: So as a person who would really like to pay her student workers more, I’m not allowed to. Even though that I think that their work is complicated and requires security background, I’m not allowed to move pass the threshold for any reason except for time in the saddle and performance reviews. So knowing that other departments are like across campus, I think that it feels more comfortable to talk about more hours than an elevation in wage for ASNAU. Yesterday I heard the word transparency more than a dozen times, so I would just say does this feel like a transparent kind of initiative and that might be some of the reasons that some folks are saying they’d rather vote on it next year when I had a chance to vet in front of people.

Senator Carpenter: When was the 6 hours max created?

Senator Davis: It was created 3 years ago.

Senator Carpenter: I just want to say that we’ve had a big increase in students in the past 3 years, and we’re expecting about 15,000 more from Rita Chang. So as there are mores students in your colleges, I could see how more hours would be acceptable.

Senator Carr: I think that because there’s been an issue about wage going on around campus, we decided to look at a viewpoint of hours rather than wage because we can’t necessarily tackle the wage on our side yet. I think that it is appropriate for us to vote on it because none of us are going to be affected by this and we’re unbiased. I’m graduating, I shouldn’t care really what you guys will do but I do care. None of this is going to affect me, I’m not going to benefit from this. I care because I put so much time into this and I think we’ve had these discussions that we do have a relevance to voting on this and making a decision for these students and all of this will be documented in the minutes. I think there’s plenty of justification for why it should be voted on.

Senator O’Reilly: Just to offer more just from thinking that 10 hours is a little high just because it is 14% of our budget, of going to 8 hours instead of 10. That way it’s still more, but not as many.

Senator Anderson: I struggle with that comment because you guys decided that you were going to take $20,000 and put that towards the library when there’s been no student polling. So I think that that should be taken into account as well. We could take $10,000 from the library line, because as you’ve said, we don’t even use half it currently.

Senator Claus: I don’t have an opinion on the hour bit, but I just wanted to say that it’s not about getting more money, it’s putting an investment into the people who do so much for this job and that investment goes right back to the students. The more we get paid the more that is given back to the students. So it’s not really like we just want more money for us, we want more money so that we can do more for the students and that opens that avenue and really makes some changes.

Shanlie Blair: Personally, as a senator for next year, I would personally like to see this passed through. I definitely, for this position only, put in way more than 6 hours. So when I saw that senators were getting paid the same rate and have a max of 6 hours as well, I was really surprised because I know that there’s a lot of work put into these positions more than mine. So I think that 10 hours is definitely enough and I don’t know if 8 hours would be enough of an incentive. I mean we didn’t get enough people to run for the senate positions, and I think that was probably in part due to not incentives. So I would really like to see this passed, personally.

Senator Olas: Kind of to go off what Shanlie and Leah said, we spend thousand of dollars on events that people don’t go to and we could be spending that on the senators and that could increase attendance.

Senator Davis: I would like to motion to amend the bylaw that we were speaking about about Section 5. I’m going to strike Section 5 and change Section 4 to two office hours instead of one with three hours of fieldwork instead of four.

MotionFirst: Senator DavisSecond: Senator ClausDiscussion: None

All in Favor: Majority vote yesPass/Fail: Pass

Senator Overturf: Do we want to add in the logging in of fieldwork hours, I really think that would increase transparency.

Senator Carr: I will gladly share the document that I use for my other job as well and you could replicate it if this was to pass.

AmendFirst: Senator OverturfSecond: Senator BrownDiscussion: NoneAll in Favor: UnanimousPass/Fail: Pass

All in Favor: Majority vote yesPass/Fail: Pass

Item W- General Intern BylawFirst: Senator NielsonSecond: Senator MartinezDiscussion: Senator Nielson: I move to amend it to say ‘general duties of an intern’.

MotionFirst: Senator NielsonSecond: Senator BrownDiscussion: NoneAll in Favor: UnanimousPass/Fail: Pass

Senator Davis: It says by their supervisor, who’s their supervisor?

Chair L’Ecuyer: Whoever their supervisor is in that case. So for the diversity intern, it’d be the diversity director and the vpsa.

All in Favor: UnanimousPass/Fail: Pass

Item X- Attendance Police for Legislative and Appropriation Meetings Bylaw First: Senator OverturfSecond: Senator MartinezDiscussion:Senator Carr: Could we amend it to be attendance policy for all meetings for all positions?

Chair L’Ecuyer: We definitely can, I would suggest to move it up to three to match what the senators are allowed to miss.

Kristine: It sounds like you might want to table this because it seems too complicated of an amendment.

Motion to TableFirst: Senator CarrSecond: Senator BrownDiscussion: NoneAll in Favor: UnanimousPass/Fail: Pass

Executive Reports

A. President- Vanessa Pomeroy Let’s if we can keep these really quick because we have our banquet at 6pm. I just want to say thank you for an incredible year and I’m really excited to celebrate all of your hard work at the banquet. Today’s senate meeting I think was just a great representation of what the senate does. I think that we had some great conversation and really just dove into the purpose of ASNAU and making sure that we discuss all aspects of things. So thank you all.

B. Vice President of Student Affairs - Parker SchrandtAbsent.

C. Vice President of Academic Affairs - Lauren L’EcuyerCongratulations, this is our last meeting. I look forward to seeing you all at the banquet.

D. Vice President of Government Affairs - Sydnee StognerAbsent.

E. Chief of Staff - Jake GavinAbsent.

Staff Reports

A. Student State Affairs - Angela Garvey, Kaylee Clark, Sana MohammedB. Public Relations - Kyra Johnson, Angelica Doan, Laura Edgerton C. Special Events - Taylor Wesner, Madi SowerwineD. IT - Chantz SpearsE. NSG - Morgan DeLoach

So unfortunately Freshman Field Day had to get cancelled because we didn’t have enough members willing to volunteer. But I’m hoping that next year as a senator I can help to push this forward.

F. Diversity Director - Dallas Diaz G. Front Desk - Kali MorrisH. Sustainability Director - Annie

Committee Reports

A. Appropriations Committee Great job, guys. I love you.

B. Legislative Committee Thank you for a great year, I think we got a lot accomplished more than leg has ever accomplished. So good job, and congratulations on the end of the year.

C. Diversity Committee

Senator Reports

College of Arts and LettersA. Monica Overturf

No report.

B. Kyle DavisNo report.

College of Social and Behavioral SciencesA. Ashley Beghtol

Great job, it’s been a great year.

B. Fernanda Wolburg Martinez So I’m working on a binder to give to next year’s SBS’s senators and I’m hoping to have it before finals week, so if anyone is interested let me know. It’ll be a binder of information on how to

write emails, how to send surveys, how to make the dinner with the dean, just the basics so they can get the hang of it because I know it took me awhile.

C. Jo Olas The forum was super fantastic. We had more people show up this time and vna was really awesome answering questions and we got a ton of feedback. I’m really excited for all of our future endeavors.

College of Health and Human ServicesA. Leah Claus

My job isn’t done yet, I hope you all have seen my iClicker flyers running around. Please, please, please spread it around. I know one person that is planning on donating, and I’d love more than one. So please, all of you that are graduating and also to spread the word out as much as possible. Thank you.

B. Matt NielsonNo report.

College of EducationA. Kailey Lee

No report.

B. Natalie CarpenterThanks for a good senate, because I’m a senator that didn’t know I was signing up to be a senator. Mackenna told me I was making flyers and printing stuff and making balloons, so it turned out to be good experience after all.

College of BusinessA. Tylor Brown

I just want to say thank you all for today. This last senate meeting was a true representation to show these folks what we are actually really about, this true dialogue that goes on. Even with our difference in opinion, I’d like to see that we can come together with an agreement on things. I just want to personally shout out to Jo Olas for always being super positive, Fernanda for being my running partner, we got the job done and secured the bat. Senator Nielson, you’ve been my brother since day one and I want to thank you, I love you for real. Your accomplishments are like my accomplishments. I’m truly humbled to be a friend of yours. Leah Claus I would like to thank you for all the work that you’ve done for the senate, it’s truly humbling. Senator Carr, been my right hand since this summer and you can also count on her to voice her opinion. I would get to everybody, but Senator Anderson you became a good friend to me so I would like to personally thank you for that. And thank you for the exec team, great job. Everyone knows I have my little critiques to say, but that’s what it is and that’s what makes this student government so powerful. I think this next senate is going to move things forward even more. President Pomeroy, excellent job. That is my report.

B. Tori O’Reilly

College of Engineering, Forestry and Natural SciencesA. Sarah Holditch

It’s been a really great two semesters and I’ve learned a lot. I really value this organization and I’m glad that it exists the way it does, so I look forward to seeing what ASNAU looks like with an outsider’s perspective with an insider’s experience. It’ll be interesting.

B. Alyssa Anderson I’d just like to say thank you guys and I had a great semester. I’m excited for you all to be a part of ASNAU next year, you guys are going to be awesome.

C. Stella CarrRunning of the Seniors was on Saturday and we didn’t have as big of a turnout that we were hoping, but all those that showed up were very eager to participate and pretty excited about the shirts. We still have plenty, so if you know anyone that’s graduating, let them know that they can come pick one up and whatever is left over can be used for the Fall. I’d love to see that event continued in the future. I thought of this about three months ago, and then bam, the event happened and people are wearing shirts that I designed. So you never know what you can do with this position. About the forum yesterday, I would like to thank Jo for planning it. Even though it was a senate forum, I would’ve liked to see some more of the exec members on the panel because a lot of the issues, especially people who will be representing the students next year should’ve been responding because what we say can’t necessarily be held accountable, were for the exec members. In response to the event that we funded for Phi Sig last week, I just wanted to bring attention that in the future, if senators approve events that are on the lot near the Mayor, I did witness people who were underage consuming alcohol in the Mayor during the event. I’m not a cop, so I couldn’t really do anything about it, but that’s something to keep in mind of events held there in the future of just to be careful of approving events at that location. Thank you to everyone for being awesome this year and pushing for their initiatives and making everybody and their ideas feel welcomed. For future senate, I really recommend taking a look at people’s end of the year report of things that didn’t get accomplished this year that they would’ve like to see pushed forward next year. You can accomplish things that we didn’t get to that in addition to all the great ideas that you’ll be able to contribute next year. So put in work and utilize those max 10 hours, make an impact in your college and in your campus.

Advisor Reports

A. Cindy AndersonI just want to say thank you for taking your jobs so seriously. No one will take the student government seriously unless you take the job seriously. Yesterday at the forum, I heard some things about mental health services that were concerning to me. So one of the things I want to let you know was a pretty impassioned statement that said if you’re a student who’s in a mental health crisis, it’ll take you four to six weeks to see a counselor. That is not true. There is a counselor on call 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. So you need to know that by calling the front desk and saying that you’re in crisis, even if it’s 2am in the morning, they can take the call. There are same day counseling appointments, they go rather quickly. So you have to get there kind of first thing in the morning. But if you have something that you want to talk to a counselor that day, you can. If you’re in crisis and you’re at the counseling center, the person at the front desk will hand you a little sheet that says are you experiencing any of the following. You don’t have to answer them and if any of those things there that says you’re in a crisis and you say yes, they will rearrange schedules to get you in to see somebody. So I just want to remind you that I think you have an invested interest in taking a look at mental health support services on campus. But I also wanted to let you know, that if a standard appointment if you’re not in crisis could be four weeks out, but if you are, you can get same day, same hour appointments. So you know this now to use this to correct the record and use for next year. Thank you for this year for those of you who are

leaving.

B. Kristine Heflin This has been a really good year. It’s always nice to leave in a place where I still want to hang out with you all. I think it’s safe to say that I’ve never seen a senate that has made as many bylaw changes as you all have. I think that’s awesome. So I look forward to that continued work next year and seeing what next year’s group brings.

Discussion Items

Chair L’Ecuyer: The Golden Pinecone goes to Senator Olas

Announcements

Motion: Senator Overturf moves to adjourn the meeting at 5:51pm, on April 27th, 2017

Second: Senator Martinez

Vote: Unanimous, meeting has adjourned.