Burial
grounds still cause debate
By
Joseph Serna
Online Forty-Niner
Assistant City Editor
For the second week in a row, the Associated Students Senate heard public comments
and concerns regarding the Puvungna burial grounds Wednesday.
Jeb Sprague, a history graduate student and member of the Campus Progressives,
said President F. King Alexander’s statement last week regarding Puvungna
was a “thin veneer of political geniality.”
Sprague said within Alexander’s comments, he omitted the possibility
of leaving the grounds undeveloped and spoke only of partially developing the
land or using “misinformation” as a veil for leaving possibilities
open.
Alexander was unavailable for comment as of press time.
At next week’s meeting Sen. Mike Emenhiser, College of Business, and
ASI Vice President Hironao Okahana will introduce a resolution urging open
communication about the burial grounds.
Agreeing with Alexander’s statement last week about a prevalence of misinformation
on the issue, Emenhiser and Okahana said they hope there will be open communication
between all parties involved in the fate of the land.
The purpose of the resolution is to “get the avenues of communication
flowing and to make sure that students are at the table,” Emenhiser said. “We
want to make sure students know what they have on campus.”
Okahana emphasized the resolution doesn’t advocate one position or the
other, pointing to the fact that by the time the whole issue is resolved, he
will have already graduated.
Sen. Amin Km, College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics, spoke about the
need for a resolution of hate speech condemnation he will bring before the
Senate next week.
Km said the cartoons of the prophet Mohammed published in Danish media is equal
to the propaganda and bigotry aimed against Native Americans, blacks, Latinos
and the Jewish population by the media through American and European history.
“
The European media is intentionally targeting Muslims, saying you are this
and you are that, and yet the media is talking about the freedom of speech.
But when someone makes an anti-Semitic remark, 99 percent of the time they
say that is not right, we condemn it,” Km said. “But very few Western
governments have yet to condemn [the cartoons], and even when they have condemned
it, it is two to three months later, after the big roar from the Muslim world.”
The resolution would be condemning speech and media that clearly labels a group
in a negative way.
The Senate approved a resolution requiring “all funds and money collected
by or on behalf of a student body organization, except funds and money collected
from commercial services,” be channeled to the appropriate, pre-approved
accounts.
The Senate also elected Sen. at large Guido D’Onofrio to the Board of
Control and Sen. JuanCarlos Mariano, College of Business, to the Campus Planning
Committee.
The Senate amended the bylaws in accordance with an executive order from Chancellor
Charles B. Reed of the California State University system that takes away its
power to approve student organizations from ASI.
ASI approval of student organizations was a redundancy in the system because
the organizations must first get approval from the university and any benefits
from ASI approval have become obsolete, according to ASI Executive Director
Richard Haller.
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