Senators discuss stipends

By Terran Odell
Online Forty-Niner
Staff Writer

The ASI Senate convened yesterday to discuss, among other items, stipends for Senators.

The issue is something that the Senate cannot vote on directly, although two Senators, Morgan Wheeler and Zaira Tinoco, will be representing the ASI Senate at the next Board of Control (BOC) meeting. But, as Wheeler pointed out, there is a long line of people and bodies that the issue must go through before the stipends can be officially approved.

In a past general election for CSULB students, approval was given by the electorate to allow Senators and other members of ASI to receive financial compensation for their time and effort. "[Students] gave us the power to set our own stipends," Wheeler said.

Tinoco, who will be voting on the matter directly, said she was concerned about the ethical issues involved with voting for her own stipend. "It would be unethical for senators to vote; we need to abstain," Tinoco said. But many of the Senators disagreed with her comment saying that it was not an ethical issue and that it was something that happens frequently in the business world. "This is not an ethical issue," said Senator for the College of Engineering, Uduak-Joe Ntuk. There was only one other Senator who voiced an opinion from the same unethical perspective as Tinoco. Senator-at-Large Hironao Okahana said that he did not feel right in voicing and opinion in support of the stipend. "I do not feel comfortable to reward myself for what I am supposed to be doing," he said.

Another issue that was discussed was the amount that the stipend should be. Wheeler initially suggested $250 per semester. The other Senators agreed that this was a fair amount, but Senator Ntuk suggested raising it to $500 due to the fact that $250 is on the commissioner scale, which is the lowest pay scale of all. "Commissioner scale is too low, we need a reasonable salary," Ntuk said. The rest of the Senators agreed with Ntuk citing the amount of time that they put into the ASI Senate as reason to allow for a larger stipend. "This isn't a paid job, but I think that we should get something … $500 a semester, that's chill," said Senator-at-Large, Estee Sepulveda.

Senator Heidi Chavez summed up the main reason for getting a stipend being the time and resources that the Senators must put into the Senate. "We put in a lot of hours. A lot of us have put our jobs aside because we don't have time," Chavez said.