Student Government held its sixth senate meeting of the semester April 7, racing through a packed agenda that covered emergency contraception access, immigration legal services, a new student leadership council and discussion of tensions in Student Media. All the while, senators nominated dozens of members for end-of-year superlatives and awards and waited for the annual spring SG election to wrap up.
Green Initiative Chair Colton Rupe and Diversity, Equity and Belonging Chair Nivedha Maniv — both of whom were appointed to serve on the Committee on Student Media after the March 24 senate meeting — provided a report to SG regarding their first COSM meeting, which was held April 3. The two senators said the meeting was held to appoint next year’s Mercury Editor-in-Chief and Managing Editor, but they found that under the current set of COSM bylaws, no one had published in enough issues to be eligible for appointment. Rupe said members of Student Affairs staff proposed conditional appointments based on future publications, but neither Rupe nor Maniv voted for this measure, because the bylaws require previous publications for appointment.
Maniv said that after the vote, Karen Fiortetti, the director of Student Media, asked who voted no in what Maniv and Rupe described as an aggressive tone. During the senate meeting, Rupe raised concerns over the committee’s inability to follow its bylaws, non-voting members being counted during votes and a failure to follow the procedure of Robert’s Rules of Order. Rupe and Maniv said they walked out of the meeting.
After this, the senate introduced a bylaw amendment replacing references to The Mercury with The Retrograde in SG’s governing documents. Baker said that this action was meant to bring the senate into alignment with various resolutions it had passed in fall 2024.
For over a month now, SG meetings have been dominated by discussions of constitution and bylaw changes to promote senate efficiency. The Retrograde has previously provided coverage of the sweeping initiative, spearheaded by SG Vice President and president-elect David Baker and Secretary Fatimah Yousaf. The Retrograde has attached PDF versions of all the constitutional change resolutions under consideration. SG voted to hold a special election for the student body to determine which constitutional changes go into effect. The spring special election will be held April 27 through April 29.
A resolution creating a new Student Leadership Ad-Hoc Committee passed with a supermajority of the senate. Baker, who was the author of this resolution, said that the ad-hoc was part of a broader effort by SG to involve student groups across campus in the on-campus decision making process while facilitating discussion and cooperation between different organizations.
The senate approved two allocations this meeting. The first allocation received $68.89 to purchase prizes and candy to incentivize UTD housing residents to fill out a survey on the quality of housing. The second allocation set aside $310.13 for an immigration attorney tabling event held April 13 at the chess plaza.
Regarding health access, senators announced that the Student Health Center is now offering emergency contraception confidentially for $10. The Diversity, Equity and Belonging committee also won a grant that will cover 130 units of free emergency contraception to stock a planned vending machine at the start of the next school year.
SG meetings are open to the public. The next senate meeting will be held at 5:30 p.m. April 21 in the SU Galaxy Rooms.