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President Dan Gordillo at the Student Senate meeting in Walter Hall, Ohio University, Nov. 20, 2024.

Student Senate passes all but 1 resolution Wednesday

Student Senate convened Wednesday evening, failing to pass a resolution on balancing executive power but passing a bill on student mental health. 

The subjects discussed early in the meeting were primarily related to internal matters, such as updating "personal day" verbiage, budget approvals, appointing a new social media director and Senate Appropriations Committee commissioner, and removing the position of director of research.

Resolution 2425-96, a resolution intended to balance executive power, was the only bill that failed to pass during the session. The current Senate rules and procedures grant them the power to remove senators under Appendix A which could result in an abuse of power. Misconduct and discipline of Senate members are already overseen by the judicial panel under Appendix B. 

Academic Affairs Commissioner Maggie Giansante voiced her reasoning for the proposition.

“I believe that this is way too much power for the execs and that all members of the Senate have the right to be heard by J.P. (Judicial Panel) and have an official investigation done if execs believe that their job performance or conduct has been poor,” Giansante said.

“Although we have great execs this year, we do not know what could happen in the future and we need to ensure Senate and J.P. have strict balance of power,” Giansante said.

Treasurer Johnny Susany spoke in opposition to the passing of the bill.

“I believe this resolution will disrupt the current dynamic of checks and balances within the Senate body,” Susany said.“Without the ability of the group due to its removal, all disciplinary and performance reviews fall solely to the judicial panel, concentrating practically all power of review into one break.”

Though some in Senate voted in favor of Resolution 2425-96, the majority voted against it and the bill did not pass.

In recognition of the ongoing mental health crisis in schools across the country, Senators Jayson Smith and Mark Vitelli proposed Resolution 2425-07. 

Students enrolled in the Honors Tutorial College have access to free mental health counseling from the Psychology and Social Work Clinic, a service HTC pays for. This is different from the free Counseling and Psychological Services available to all students at the Hudson Health Center. 

This bill seeks to provide equal healthcare to all students, no matter which college they are enrolled in.

”This bill asks that the university reevaluate its funding structure to address this disparity and allow all students equitable, adequate, and necessary mental healthcare,” Governmental Affairs Senator Jayson Smith, primary sponsor of this bill, said.

One of the plans this bill would put into place would be the forming of a mental health task force. Assistant Chief of Staff Landen Hensel asked for clarification on how the sponsors would envision this task force working "in a perfect world."

“In a perfect world, It would just be a group of folks that are very passionate about mental health, ideally like psychology majors, and just set aside some time every week to get together, talk about what’s going on on campus, look through the policies,” Governmental Affairs Senator Mark Vitelli said.

After discussing and amending position title wording, the bill passed unanimously.

There was some lively debate over a resolution for the revising of chapter five powers. Several senators voiced their disapproval of one of the sections of Resolution 2425-99 which allowed for the Judicial Panel to subpoena text messages from the Senate’s Slack channel should they require them for an investigation. After much back and forth, it was decided to be tabled until next week’s meeting

After this Senate moved into delivering commission reports and then adjourned after nearly 2 hours.

ab773723@ohio.edu


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