At last night’s A.S. Council meeting, a proposal to change student-media regulations — which would have mandated administrative supervision of council-funded publications — was shelved indefinitely after representatives from student publications such as the Koala, the Muir Quarterly and the Sixth Sense showed up to protest. They argued that the guidelines would impose on free speech and hinder the growth of new media.
The proposal’s failure did not come as a surprise to Campuswide Senator Adam Kenworthy, who helped draft it along with Marshall Senator Brian McEuen, Revelle Senator Jaclyn Storey and Associate Vice President of Student Organizations Andrew Ang. At an open forum held Jan. 26, Kenworthy suggested that media representatives focus instead on the more realistic possibility of a media review board.
“I think we’re pretty certain this is going to fail,” Kenworthy said at the forum. “I don’t think we should even be talking about this right now. My favorite part of this legislation is the media review board.”
Kenworthy and Ang announced their plans to begin drafting a new proposal that would eliminate the faculty sponsorship aspect entirely, and prioritize the creation of a media-specific board to handle funding.
As it stands, all campus organizations — including newspapers and magazines — receive their quarterly funding from the Student Organization Funding Advisory Board. The media review board would consist of A.S. members, students and representatives from publications who would determine funding for media orgs.
The media guidelines weren’t the only pieces of legislation to hit a roadblock; a referendum that would have granted the Loft around $810,000 in funds was tabled for later discussion after it was rejected by the Graduate Student Association on Jan. 25 and councilmembers were forced to rewrite the proposal.
The GSA was unwilling to ask graduate students to vote on a mandatory fee of $3.82 on the Spring Quarter ballot. Councilmembers felt that they needed more time to review the new legislation, since the quarterly fee for undergraduates would now be $4.47 instead of $3.82.
“I am not one of the privileged ones who’ve seen the new language [of the Loft referendum],” Vice President of Student Life Ricsie Hernandez said. “I’d like to at least see what changes were made and offer amendments.”
Readers can contact Hayley Bisceglia-Martin at ucsd.edu.
