The majority of the evening's discussion was devoted to the charge of the Ad Hoc Committee for SGO Constitutional Review (see "SGO to rewrite constitution," page 2).
Acting SGO Treasurer and SFC chair Blake Sparrow '04 made a report on behalf of the SFC. "We have finished allocating money to student groups for the coming semester," he said.
He encouraged other senators to sit in on the appeals process, held last night. "We want to make sure that we're operating in a fair manner, so feel free to drop by and sit in," he said.
Eric Osborne '04 asked whether the semester's budget would be publicly available.
"The various subcommittee budgets haven't been compiled into one document," said Sparrow. "But once that happens, yes, they will be available to anyone who requests it."
Osborne suggested making the budget available online. "That's another possibility we're looking into," said Sparrow. "But right now, the SFC doesn't have [an NT] username or an email account. We are working to get one."
SGO president Michelle Oliveros-Larsen '02 announced that the SGO website had been updated. "It's finally got most of the right information up there," she said. "If there's anything else that we think should be up there, let me know."
Corresponding Secretary Anishah Cumber '02 reminded the senate that the special election to fill the vacant SFC chair seat will be held on Monday, Feb. 11. "It is a contested election, so please encourage others to vote on Monday," Cumber said.
After the discussion of the charge of the Ad Hoc Committee for SGO Constitutional Review, Oliveros-Larsen announced the creation of two more ad hoc committees. The first was charged with looking into alternatives to the existing on-campus phone service.
"We wanted to be able to get on-campus phone service in all of the rooms, so that students could call each other or campus police without having to go through Verizon," Oliveros-Larsen said. "I think that this is something that can be dealt with quickly. It's just a matter of finding out some costs that we can report to the treasurer."
Oliveros-Larsen also announced the creation of an ad hoc committee to look into the nature of club sports at Amherst. "This is a more long-term project [than the phone service committee]. We want to look at how we fund club sports here at Amherst and how other schools fund theirs."
Alexandra Linden '04 reported on the meetings that the Trustee Advisory Committee on Student Life had held with the Trustees over Interterm. "We mostly talked about dorm renovations and the meal plan," she said.
"We talked about what the freshman quad would look like after James and Stearns are finished. They'll be more round-shaped dorms overlooking the quad in front of Mead Art Museum," she said.
"We discussed the new location of Pratt Museum and the geology department. The collection will stay intact, we just don't know where exactly yet," she said. "The whole thing should be finished around 2007."
Caetie Ofiesh '02 reported on the discussions with the Trustees about the meal plan. "We expressed some of the concerns of the students who are upset with Valentine's alternative proposal," she said. "The Trustees felt it was important that the 21-meal plan is something unique to Amherst and something that they don't want to see disappear. This might be the only place where every student comes to one dining hall three times a day-theoretically at least."