Tempe Undergraduate Student Government Sen. Daniel Martin explains Senate Bill 54 at a Senate meeting, Tuesday, Nov. 18, 2014. (Photo by Ben Moffat)The Tempe Undergraduate Student Government rejected an amended version of Senate Bill 54, a proposal that would explicitly define senatorial jurisdiction, in its legislative session Tuesday night.
Daniel Martin, junior senator for Barrett, The Honors College and a backer of the bill, cited senators having conflicts of interests in pushing the views of their constituents as the primary reason for the bill.
He said that senators should represent their specific colleges, alluding to impeached senator Isabelle Murray.
“I, as a senator, should not be listening to the concerns of others, unless they are also the concerns of my constituents,” Martin said. “I need to put the needs of Barrett first. We need to put the views of the entire college before other commitments.”
Tempe USG president Cassidy Possehl opposed SB 54.
“We are set up like the federal government in that we have a legislative branch, but we do not have electoral voting,” Possehl said. “It had nothing do with making sure senators were representative of just one college. We wanted to make sure we had a diverse senate that represents the entire student body. ”
Navy veteran and senior College of Liberal Arts and Sciences Sen. Andy Mandwee was one of the more outspoken critics of SB 54.
“As a veteran, a lot of my ways of thinking comes from the Navy,” Mandwee said. “For me to put that aside, I don’t think it’s fair and I don’t think it’s right.”
Computer science freshman Alex Arena, a senator representing the Ira Fulton Schools of Engineering, said the bill needed to be reworked before it would be a practical addition to USG’s existing bylaws.
“It tries to artificially limit the perspectives of senators,” Arena said.
CORRECTION: A previous version of this article incorrectly stated how the Tempe USG Senate voted on Senate Bill 54 and how Tempe USG president Cassidy Possehl felt about the bill. This version of the article has been updated with the proper information.
Reach the reporter at smodrich@asu.edu or follow him on Twitter @StefanJModrich
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