The student newspaper, Talon Marks and Go Green Task Force funding were the primary topics discussed at the Wednesday, April 27 ASCC Senate meeting.
Talon Marks’ budget was on the brink of becoming reduced at last week’s senate meeting, but due to lack of time to review the subject, the item was pushed forward to the April 27 meeting.
The recommendation to decrease the printing budget was for environmental reasons, but many of the students involved in the making of the newspaper spoke on behalf of Talon Marks.
The student journalists mentioned the benefits of having the print edition around, so the budget of $27,000 dollars was approved.
Go Green Task Force’s denied budget request was for $29,000 dollars. Senate only approved $6,000 of that amount.
Synnikiu Avalos, Chair of go Green Task Force stated, “We were actually asking for $29,000, which is the completion of the recycling bins. Initially the chair before me asked for $90,000 dollars which was to complete the recycling bins.
“The adviser before Aline Gregorio didn’t know that the money was going to go away, we just assumed that it was going to be there the whole time, so unfortunately we are just asking for that money back; not even the full amount that we [requested] before, but just enough to complete the recycling bins.”
She stated that part of the program is to add recycling bins around the parking lot.
Saul Lopez and Enrique Rodriguez were inaugurated as the new ASCC president and vice president.
Lopez stated, “I felt a little nervous because I was chairing the meeting and it was my first time so it felt like they just threw me in there but I felt like I did alright. I was nervous and afterward I was a little relieved that it was done.”
As the new president, he stated, “There are a lot of different things I’d like to achieve. A lot of what I ran on, I’m already working on [like] safety, and the Falcon Kids program;
“They are already in the works. As far as the endowment fund, I’m looking forward to working on that in the summer. My goal is to finish that as quickly as possible so I can get on with other things on campus.
Lopez continued, “The endowment fund is a way of giving back to the students. We have some money in the reserves [so] I would like to take a small portion of that and make the money work for the students [by] putting it in a separate account to generate interest. That interest would [come] back with more grants and scholarships.”
During Public Forum, Hugo Gonzalez, architecture and technology major, mentioned that Lopez used a homophobic slur toward him during campaign week.
According to Gonzalez, during presidential elections Lopez implied one of Gonzalez’ campaigners was talking bad about him.
“From that point on he got more and more aggressive with his words so I pulled out my phone and I had enough of it. Part of the elections code is if there is something bad that is happening, you better alert one of the Court Justices, so I did.
“As I’m pulling out my phone, he says “So you’re gonna call Trent? Alright then, let’s go get Trent.” He said that statement 3 times and then he called me [expletive].”
Lopez declined to comment.
