Nearly two months ago, the Earl Warren College Student
Council approved a referendum to increase the college’s activity fee by $3.
With the referendum election taking place next week, an advocacy group created
by WCSC councilmembers is upping publicity in an attempt to encourage the
student body to vote — more specifically, to vote yes.

Since the inception of its $4 activity fee in 2004, Warren
College has maintained a constant fee without a built-in mechanism to
automatically adjust for inflation. Warren councilmembers proposed increasing
the fee to $7 to both recoup the financial loss of previous years and move
toward self-sufficiency in the event that the A.S. Council eliminates all
college council funding, WCSC Parliamentarian Dan Palay said.

If approved, the referendum would release an additional
$26,199 to WCSC, which will use the funds for groups and events such as the
Warren Transfer Commuter Commission, Warren Live! and the WCSC Events Board.

Though election bylaws require the council to impartially
inform the student body of the upcoming election, individual councilmembers are
free to act in accordance with their individual opinions rather than those of their
council constituencies.

“We can’t as councilmembers say ‘vote for this,’ but as
individuals we’re allowed to say whatever we want,” said Palay, who both
proposed the fee referendum and organized the advocacy group pushing for its
passage. “The election is sponsored by the council and the council’s official
position on this is to vote, but we are allowed to have personal opinions. As a
councilmember I can advocate, no longer speaking on behalf of the council, but
on behalf of the advocacy group.”

Palay’s group is staffed by fellow councilmembers and others
actively involved in Warren affairs. The advocacy group has distributed
pro-referendum posters, encouraged resident advisers and orientation leaders to
discuss the advantages of the referendum with students and asked freshmen to
network within their social circles about voting to approve the item, Palay
said.

Elections Manager Aaron Horning denied that the
councilmembers’ role in forming the advocacy group constitutes a conflict of
interest. Both he and Palay said that if an opposition group is formed, it will
be given the same funding as the current pro-referendum group, which is
mandated by the council’s bylaws.

“I don’t think it’s unfair to not have a negative group,”
Horning said. “I mean, the opportunity is there for them to make it. My
responsibility is to let people know that there is an election on the
referendum and to give them the facts. I can put the opinions up alongside the
facts. If the advocacy group wants to give me the pros and the negative group
wants to give me the cons, that’s great. But I will not make them up myself.”

Currently, neither the weekly council meeting minutes nor
its bylaws are available on the WCSC Web site, a violation of Chapter 2,
Section 2 of the bylaws. The Web site coordinator is required to post all WCSC meeting agendas
and minutes on the student-accessible college Web site, along with its
constitution and bylaws.

Among the mediums currently available for students to
receive election information are the pro-referendum posters made by the
advocates and a Facebook elections group created by Horning. The group contains
the pros, cons, bylaws and other relevant election documents on the Web site,
and as of press time had 139 members. Warren enrolls approximately 4,300
students.

The “pro” argument listed on the Facebook group is currently
108 words long. The “con” argument is currently eight words long. The ballot
will print both “pro” and “con” statements for the fee referendum, both of
which are currently being written by Palay.

“I’ll consolidate the pros and expand upon the cons for the
ballot, but it’s really not that important I think,” Horning said. “I think
that by reading the referendum, the student body will be able to determine on
their own how they feel about it.”

Warren students can vote on the fee referendum from Dec. 3
through Dec. 7 at various locations throughout Earl Warren College and on
Library Walk.