Forsee meets with Senate
The MSA Senate established guidelines for the Student Fee Review Committee.
Published April 18, 2008
Wednesday’s Missouri Students Association Senate meeting gave UM system President Gary Forsee the opportunity to see the Senate pass several pieces of legislation, including next year’s MSA budget.
Forsee began the meeting by praising the senators and thanking them for their work in the Missouri Students Association and on campus.
“I want to reflect that this is very much appreciated,” he said.
At the meeting, Forsee emphasized the importance of the emergency text message alert system, which has failed to gain widespread use by students at MU and the other UM system schools.
Forsee has said he is considering making enrollment in the program mandatory and told senators he is interested in hearing their opinion.
“We should leave no stone uncovered with regard to the safety of our students, the safety of our staff and the safety of our faculty,” he said.
Forsee then took questions from senators and visitors on a variety of topics.
Craig Stevenson, Associated Students of the University of Missouri chairman, asked Forsee his opinion about a bill going through the Missouri General Assembly that would give the student representative to the UM system Board of Curators a vote.
“To me, on its merits, you could have a discussion of the student curator having a vote,” Forsee said. He cautioned that everyone should consider the implications of the initiative.
MSA President Jim Kelley asked Forsee how he felt about creative ways to help fund the university and how to find them.
Forsee said university leaders should look around the country and “turn over every rock” to find different funding strategies.
Forsee thanked the Senate for hosting him.
“I don’t intend to be an infrequent visitor,” Forsee said.
After Forsee spoke and took questions from the audience, the Senate moved on to considering legislation.
At its previous meeting, Senate decided to wait until Wednesday to vote on the budget so senators would have another week to review the bill.
Budget committee members spent the past several weeks meeting with MSA departments and auxiliaries that receive funding to determine how much money they will receive for the next fiscal year.
Budget committee members stood before the Senate and addressed concern that STRIPES’ budget portion had decreased. They explained that STRIPES leaders had agreed to dip into the organization’s gift account, comprised of donations and grants.
The Senate also passed legislation, with some abstentions, establishing procedures for how the Student Fee Review Committee determines student fee recommendations.
The legislation also establishes guidelines for removal of the SFRC chairman or chairwoman if needed. According to the legislation as passed Wednesday, an SFRC chairperson could be removed from the position with a two-thirds vote from the other SFRC members.
The Senate discussed whether the removal process should depend on the Senate speaker’s recommendation, as the legislation originally stated.
It eventually passed an amendment removing that part of the requirement.