In his own words: Kelly looks back

Druids, elections, San Diego, the Student Activities Fee, the Order of the 87, Student… Druids, elections, San Diego, the Student Activities Fee, the Order of the 87, Student Government Board, a paper cutter, basketball tickets, the United States Student Association –

Only one man is tall enough to encompass all of these things, and his name is Brian Kelly.

The 6-foot-7-inch two-term SGB president is both hard to miss in a crowd and not easily forgotten.

He has become a recognizable figure in the Pitt community during his years on campus as a Pathfinder, president of the Resident Student Association, member of the Blue and Gold Society, a brother of Lambda Chi Alpha and SGB member and president.

“I think one of the most common misconceptions about me is that a lot of people get surprised when they see me out at bars having a great time. I am a college kid just like anyone else,” Kelly said. “Also, people think I am real shady because I’m political. I’ve backstabbed people, sure, but just ask my friends: I am just a goofy outgoing kid who’s here to have fun.”

Kelly began his political career at Pitt serving as an SGB board member under President Liz Culliton.

“I didn’t really like being on board, but it was a huge learning experience,” he said. “It was a short term. I was elected in April and then ran for president the following November.”

The term was short that year because the election cycle changed to reflect the calendar year, rather than the school year.

Kelly ran for president his first time with Joe Pasqualichio and Liz Blasi on his slate.

“The first campaign was cool,” Kelly said. “I was a better public speaker so I had the advantage.”

He had fond memories of campaigning with board members Blasi and Pasqualichio, who is replacing Kelly as president in January.

“Every year it changes, but that first year I think that’s how it was supposed to be done,” Kelly said. “Very old school. Liz and Joe were great and we worked our asses off, but we had a great time.”

He said that the first board he was president of was his “biggest struggle” because it was “a very divided board.”

“My first week was very stressful,” Kelly said. “We voted to create a Traditions Committee and the vote was split four and four. I had to break the tie to create the committee and I don’t even know why they were against it to this day. Traditions is one of our best committees now.”

Kelly was pleased with the final results of his first board, however.

“We all respected each other by the end, though,” he said. “It was a good year. We got the Student Activities Fee raised and we dealt with USSA.”

The Student Activities Fee was increased from $60 a term to $80 a term for all full-time undergraduates in the School of Arts and Sciences. It’s used to cover some of the cost of activities run by Pitt’s many student organizations.

SGB allocates Student Activities Fee money to student organizations for programs or trips. Kelly saw a need to increase the funding to better accommodate student organizations.

“Every year we were running out of money,” he said. “Every five of six years the fund had been increased and it had been like six years since the fee had been raised, so we put together a resolution and went to the Board of Trustees. We got the increase and also changed the way money was allocated out.”

The United States Student Association – a national student-lobbying group that came under attack in 2004 for what some Pitt students saw as a liberal agenda – was removed from SGB’s budget in a private planning session in Kelly’s first term as president.

“USSA had a list of radical mission statements and while I, a pretty moderate person, may have agreed with some of it, I was not willing to attach the student body to it,” Kelly said. “USSA was not willing to compromise and they made it into a race issue. It was not a good organization for Pitt to be in. When Pitt dropped out, a bunch of other schools did and that sent a message.”

When the vote to approve funding finally came before the board, after a few weeks of anticipation, Kelly chose not to vote, letting a 4-4 tie stand. Then-board member Todd Brandon Morris would later attempt to exploit Kelly’s inaction, in a failed bid for the presidency.

Kelly said that board members Dilinus Harris and Monica Higgins went to the USSA conference this year and helped to change the organization.

“Now I think it’s a good organization because they are solely educational based and I can sleep at night with that,” he said.

At the time, Kelly and his board took criticism – even from some members of the board – for removing Pitt from USSA’s list of members.

Then-board member Lauren Evette Williams said to her fellow board members, “I can’t trust you to make decisions. We were pressed to make a decision. Where was the compromise? What happened to the teamwork? All of you guys know that certain things were not discussed.”

During Kelly’s first term, he also worked on the basketball-ticketing program. It was a process he wasn’t pleased with.

“I had a blowout with Athletics,” he said. “We had a forum and a group of hard-core fans showed up – not representative of the student body at all – and they suggested that Athletics should raise ticket prices drastically to like $200 or $300 so that only the ‘extreme’ fans would go.

“I can’t afford $300, so does that mean I’m not a good fan? In my experience with Athletics I feel that they were very profit-based. I found it difficult to push student initiatives without profit issues coming up.”

Monday’s paper: Kelly speaks on his second term, secret societies and paper-cutter-gate.