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| Hello, open meeting law |
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| Written by J.R. -Argonaut | ||||||
| Friday, 14 October 2005 | ||||||
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The Argonaut commends the ASUI senators who voted against senate Bill
F05-30, a bill that would have removed language referring to Idaho’s
open meeting laws from the ASUI bylaws. If passed, the bill would have allowed ASUI to hold executive sessions, meetings that would be closed to students, for certain “sensitive matters,” which were outlined in the bill and can be found on The Argonaut’s Web site. The bill was struck down Wednesday in an 8-4 vote. It is refreshing to see that the interests of open government easily prevail when challenged by misguided, but well-meaning student politicians. The Idaho Open Meeting law applies to all governmental agencies in the state, providing that meetings of these agencies must be open unless there is a specific law forbidding it. The law includes narrow exemptions, including one for personnel discussions. The meeting laws are mentioned in the ASUI bylaws. Putting this bill into law would have reduced the ASUI senate into a Playskool government. Without the open meetings law, senators — in effect — would simply be going through important motions, but would not be learning anything. Remembering that many ASUI leaders participate in the government to gain political experience, The Argonaut believes that it is in the body’s best interest to make student government much like government outside university grounds. If the ASUI bylaws had been gutted of any mention of the open meetings law, the senate would have been saying that it does not want real world experience. Some senators who voted to kill the bill are up for re-election. The Argonaut would like to strongly suggest, in order to maintain the integrity of future generations of senators, that students support these people in the coming election. Sens. Eric Everett, Lindsey Harris, Molly Curfman, Ryan Marsh, Whitney Strong, Travis Shofner, Julio Alvarez and Nick Slater represented the votes against F05-30. Eric Everett is the only one who has officially applied to run again, but Marsh and Harris are also up for re-election. While The Argonaut believes these candidates will uphold an open ASUI, there are some senators who have shown their disregard for the law. Some care should be taken before voting for these representatives a second time. Presidential Policy adviser Chris Dockery introduced the bill after The Argonaut reported ASUI’s violation. This action is reprehensible. Travis Galloway, who sponsored the bill, didn’t vote Wednesday, but said after the session that if given the chance, he would have voted for the bill. Galloway will be likely be running again for ASUI president (he ran for the office during his freshman year) and he has flagged Kirsten Cummings, who voted for the bill, as a potential political comrade. When this transpires, students should think long and hard before voting for the duo. Jimmy Fox and Zach Olson also voted for the bill. Of course, the hero of the entire ordeal is sen. Travis Shofner. When ASUI broke the open meetings law by discussing whether to cut Vandal Taxi in an executive session, Shofner did the right thing by telling The Argonaut about ASUI’s indiscretion. For his whistle-blowing, Shofner was formally reprimanded and a censure was in the process, but it was struck down. If Shofner had been booted, he might have been turned into an open government martyr. Former sen. Tom Callery also showed up to express his distaste for the bill. As the fighting comes to a halt, Shofner and Callery emerge with a strong enough political morality that they should be voted into any office for which they may run. J.R.  Add as favorites (36) | Views: 1475
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