SGA meetings will be held through zoom until further notice due to the coronavirus pandemic. | Screenshot from meeting
The SGA Senate unanimously approved on Wednesday to appoint four students to the Senate during the last meeting of the semester.
The appointments capped off an uneventful meeting that focused on appointments for the Senate and committee chairs and discussing two internal affairs bills
Bryan Medrano, who was the director of outreach for the last administration, was appointed as an Undergraduate at-Large senator, Zachary Fulce was appointed as a College of Business senator, Robert Gil was appointed as a College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences senator and Garrett Shuping was appointed as a College of the Arts senator.
The “Student Government Association Standing Rules” authored by Speaker of the Senate Julian Cheng proposes for a new set of meeting rules to be used at Senate meetings in addition to Robert’s Rules of Order.
The rules would give the presiding officer leading the meeting to call on whoever has spoken the least first and not let a single person dominate a discussion.
The presiding officer leading the meeting may strike down a question or comment made by a member of the Senate, executive, or judicial branch if they see the question or comment as damaging to the presenter. The presiding officer’s decision can be overturned by the Senate if the majority of present legislators vote for a “consideration to reconsider the previous motion.”
“If there’s a presenter for legislation or a nomination going up and somebody is asking them an oddly specific question that I deem harmful to the speaker … I can strike that question,” Cheng said.
The Senate also discussed the “Supreme Court Efficiency” that would allow the minimum number of supreme court justices needed to conduct a hearing to be lowered to five from the current seven required.
“I know that it’s been previously really hard for (the court justices) to meet due to the amount of justices that are required to meet in order to meet a quorum, so this bill is just reducing the number of justices required so they can actually meet,” said College of Natural Science and Mathematics senator Chiamaka Chukwu, who authored the bill.
Both bills were sent back to internal affairs before they will eventually be voted on by the Senate.
