Responding to complaints that Student Government is an "insiders' club," during the recent SG elections, representative Laura Gladney-Lemon proposed adopting accountability guidelines for SG members.
Gladney-Lemon proposed posting attendance and voting records for all SG representatives on the SG Web site. All SG representatives and appointees would also be required to post a written report on the Web site within seven days after a meeting.
"I was talking to a member of the Graduate Students Assembly, and he was actually telling me that we have all these people going to committee meetings on SG's behalf, appointees, but the public can't really access the representatives," she said. "Unless you knew the person or someone on the committee, you have no access to these committees."
Gladney-Lemon said she decided to hold off on proposing the accountability and attendance legislation until after the SG elections because she did not want it to come across as "political grandstanding."
Brian Haley, SG president, said he believes the measures are positive and need to be implemented because there is a general opinion people only participate in SG to enhance their resumes.
"I don't think it's a very fair position, but it was raised during the campaign, and we definitely need to address these issues," Haley said.
While Gladney-Lemon said she does not believe there will be much resistance to her legislation, president-elect Brent Chaney said he does not think written reports are practical.
"I agree with the attendance online and the voting online because students should know what their representatives are doing," Chaney said. "I don't know about the reports, because in order to be a representative, you need to be in a lot of places, and I think it's more important to actually be out there talking to the groups."
Chaney also said although the reports would be "a beautiful thing," he feels representatives are busy enough with school work and SG responsibilities and would feel extra strain if they were forced to write a report after every meeting.
Haley, however, said posting reports on the SG Web site is "very feasible" and would help make SG representatives accountable to the general student population.
"The GSA already requires that on their meetings, so I think we can definitely implement something like this," he said.
Gladney-Lemon will bring the proposals to the floor for consideration at tonight's SG meeting.
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