SGB revises assembly bylaws, announces start of election season

Following board member Alison Linares Mendoza’s resignation last month, Student Government Board President Danielle Floyd encouraged students to run for the spring election. Floyd said SGB will post the election timeline to its website in the coming days.

“I really want to encourage everyone at this point to run for Student Government Board,” Floyd said. “Being a board member is such a unique and enriching experience to add to your leadership experience.”

SGB held its first weekly meeting of the semester in Dining Room A of the William Pitt Union on Tuesday evening to discuss progress on several initiatives and to vote on two bills.

The board heard bill BB-2022-3 named “The New Assembly,” which revises assembly bylaws regarding electing new members and conducting meetings to “create a truly representative body to listen to and advocate on behalf of student constituencies.” The bill passed with no objections and one abstention from the bill’s author, board member Derek Dressler.

The board also heard bill BB-2022-4 which makes minor amendments to the reconsideration processes of motions. Now, for any motion passed by a vote, only a member of the prevailing party may vote to have the motion reconsidered. If a motion is not passed by a vote, any member of the relevant voting body may push for reconsideration. The bill passed with no objections and two abstentions from board members Corbin Makar and Sophia Shapiro.

The board heard no new bill proposals.

Ciara Markoski, the SGB Elections Chair, announced that SGB will start distributing election packets on Jan. 23 — two weeks later than planned due to “unfortunate scheduling issues” with Pitt Day in Harrisburg. Election day is March 21. 

Board member Makar announced that since the dining ad hoc committee charter passed on Dec. 6, he will now focus on looking into LGBTQ+ resources on campus. In the meantime, Makar said the dining ad hoc committee aims to “improve dining locations.”

“I have more plans this semester looking into LGBT resources on campus for LGBTQ+ students,” Makar said. “I wanted to focus on it last semester, but dining was more of a critical issue at that moment since we didn’t really have a charter or anything set up for the [dining ad hoc committee] as a whole.”

Floyd announced the allocations committee has spent roughly $500,000 of its $900,000 yearly allowance so far. 

“It’s really great that we’re already at that point in the semester,” Floyd said. 

There were no new allocations or allocation requests. 

A previous version of this story noted that Kanika Vaghela said SGB will start distributing election packets on Jan. 23, it was not Vaghela who said this, but SGB Elections Chair Ciara Markoski who did. The previous version also noted that Danielle Floyd encouraged students to run for the current vacant board position, instead of the upcoming spring election. The Pitt News regrets these errors.