A.S. Senate meeting erupts

The Associated Students Senate elected Nicole Drake as senator-at-large and filled several other A.S. government positions during a senate meeting abundant with division.

Things heated up when the senator at large office came up for vote. The position originally had nine contenders but after the first roll-call vote, it came down to a two-person decision between Drake and William To. The second roll-call vote yielded Drake the winner with an eight-to-six majority.

The disagreement centered on how the voting process was being handled and how the senators were casting their votes. Several senators wanted to discuss the merits of each candidate during the meeting, before making their decisions, but a motion that would have enabled them to do so was voted down.

Tempers flared again when alleg ations were made that senators were voting based on race, major and group affiliation.

Sen. Josh Soper of the College of Engineering said the way the meeting was developing was making him ill. "Every single motion should be ... discussed," Soper said.

"We're here to debate things out," echoed Sen.-at-large Robert Lutz. "We're here to make decisions about what's best for the university."

Sen. Natasha Harris of the College of Liberal Arts disagreed, calling the meeting a time for voting. Harris pointed out that the senators had time to review the agenda for Wednesday's meeting, and "knew what was coming."

Sen. Steven Negley of the College of Business Administration said that things were "obviously getting out of control," and it would be better if the meeting was adjourned. But, several attempts to adjourn the meeting were quashed as most senators wanted to finish the orders of the day.

The senate ran into trouble again when Philip Jordan's initial approval as chief justice was nullified because of a technicality; the vote had to be taken two additional times before Jordan was finally approved.

The meeting ended with confirmation of appointments for education equity commissioner (Xochilt Valdivia), a judiciary member (Arash Saremi) and four associate justices (Jennie H. Balderas, Mirta Gaus, Eric Hanson and Khila Strong).