In the wake of Student-Run Television’s February broadcast of pornography, the A.S. Council approved a media services grievance procedure last week, which allows students to voice complaints about Associated Students-run campus media.
“The proposal addressed concerns at each level, ensuring a process that would allow for students to voice their concerns,” former A.S. President Jenn Pae said. “If students are dissatisfied with an A.S. media service, then they should be able to address these concerns and have them dealt with appropriately.”
The procedure includes three ways of dealing with complaints, to be followed successively: the media service level, an informal resolution and A.S. Judicial Board. Complaints may be against specific content or simply questions over general governance.
At the media service level, the general manager of the specific station must receive the complaint within 30 days of the incident. After that, the manager has five academic days to meet with the service’s heads to decide on a response to the complaint. Their response is due within the next five days. Both a copy of the complaint and response are sent to the A.S. executive assistant.
An informal resolution may also resolve the complaint, but only after an informal grievance group — composed of the general manager of the media service facing the complaint, A.S. commissioner of student services, A.S. commissioner of communications and the producer of the broadcast — meets and decides on an informal resolution.
If the filer of the complaint is not satisfied with the informal decision, a formal grievance may be reported to the A.S. Judicial Board, which makes the final decision on any complaint concerning A.S. media services. The board’s assessment of the situation will be based on “the guidelines for programming in the media service’s governing documents,” according to the grievance procedure. After consideration, the board will suggest appropriate sanctions to the “principle members of the media service.”
Koala editor Steve York, who starred in the pornographic video, said he appreciates the need for the procedure, but is wary of any infringement it might make on free speech.
“I feel that the procedure needs to be there, but I don’t want to see UCSD go the way of censoring content,” he said. “Reactions from students are great, but I wouldn’t want to see any student group, whether it’s the Koala or anything else, be ostracized because it’s not popular with the majority.”
Publications such as the Koala, which are funded through the A.S. communications office, are not subject to the new grievance procedure, according to Pae. Rather, publications are subject to procedures previously established under the media charter, which reimburses dissatisfied students with the fees they were charged for A.S.-funded publications, she said.
In March, the A.S. Council approved a resolution that both condemned the broadcast of pornography on SRTV and stated a need to establish procedures for responding to future grievances.
“It had come to our attention that a formal procedure was not in place if a student had a complaint with an A.S. media service,” Pae said. “Therefore, we thought it was necessary to have this process in place so that we could avoid further confusion.”
However, some councilmembers said they believe that the grievance procedure would only add more confusion. Newly-elected A.S. Vice President of Academic Affairs Harry Khanna voiced his concerns during the A.S. Council meeting on April 20, saying that the procedure would only add on “layers of bureaucracy.”
“I felt that I wasn’t able to fully articulate my concerns,” Khanna said. “There already is an avenue to be heard, and it is called the A.S. Judicial Board. Introducing all of these levels of informal [and] formal grievances does nothing because it will ultimately end up at the A.S. Judicial Board on appeal.”
Khanna said that he would have preferred that A.S. senators clarify the charters of the media organizations in order to explicitly define what the council considers acceptable content.
“We should have … reiterated the fact that, if someone felt that there was a violation of their charter, they should take it to the A.S. Judicial Board,” he said. “I feel like there is this pattern of making people feel good through bureaucracy. Let’s keep it simple, and only add procedures when they need to be added.”
Pae and SRTV officials, however, said they were fully satisfied with their procedure. During the A.S. Council meeting, SRTV engineer Andrew Tess praised the council for its collaboration in drafting the plan. In addition, Pae said a proper procedure of complaints should always exist for media services.
“There should always be a decision-making process, rather than one avenue for complaints to be addressed and final decisions to be made,” she said. “This will efficiently and appropriately address complaints with SRTV and KSDT because of the steps taken in this process.”
