SG Braces For Litigation, Makes It Easier to Create Meaningless Titles
But even as Ted Kennedy is mourned, the work of an activist is never over.
Frank Bracco, a former Chomp the Vote director and SG politico down in Florida, has filed suit against the UF Student Government for its failure and refusal to comply with Florida’s public records laws. Coming as it does after a year in which SG argued that a constitutional amendment is unconstitutional and that Government in the Sunshine laws don’t apply to them, it’s hardly a surprise that these yokels want to keep their dirty secrets where the public can’t get to them. We can’t have another “Green Means Go” scandal, after all, can we?
And speaking of bizarre arguments, how about the one where a supposed GDI argues in favor of giving the executive branch the power to creat whole agencies subject only to a 2/3 veto by the Senate as a “decentralization of one power” when it in fact does the opposite? Or how about that this same Progress Party had at one point argued against the proliferation of SG resume-making titles and is now actively making it more difficult for anyone to reign in such practices?
I haven’t talked to Alden, but given that
“During the bill’s debate Orange and Blue Party Sen. Alden Gillespy voiced his concerns.
He said SG’s legislative branch should not be able to overreach the executive, and the president should not be able to do something without the approval of the Senate.”
seems to contradict itself, I’m inclined to withhold judgment for the moment.
The way I see it, the bill changes SG from requiring 2/3 to override a veto of a new agency to requiring 2/3 to stop the President from creating one. This in a Student Government that is already over-burdened with duplicate, do-nothing agencies.
We’ll see, but given that FBK rarely has less than a 2/3 majority in the Senate anyway, the idea that they need even fewer barriers to get stuff done (and don’t forget their precious parking decals!) lacks a certain credibility.
Hey I’ve never commented here but I believe that the quotes from Alden and Dave in the Alligator article were taken from debate on an amendment to the bill that would have changed it to a simple majority (this amendment failed), thus the reasons they cite are not reasons for the whole bill, but rather for individual amendments. It is the first meeting for a new reporter and she’s still getting the hang of this stuff and it was a particularly confusing meeting for somebody who has never attended before.
There were three amendments to the bill from the floor, all of which limited its power, only two of them passed. As far as I know, Senator Gillespy, and many members of the Orange and Blue Party opposed the bill because it gave powers of the legislative to the executive branch. Senator Schneider championed the bill, agreeing with the majority that it would streamline things and that Senate still had oversight with the 2/3 override provision.
Thank you for the insight, TJ. The limitations of the SG beat reporter and the lack of a sustainable SG-blogosphere makes getting the full facts of a meeting pretty difficult without actually being there.
To be clear: the paper misquoted me. My actual opinion is presented in my editorial letter today.
http://alligator.org/articles/2009/08/28/opinion/letters_to_the_editor/090828_let5.txt
I’m a staunch proponent of separation of powers, not of unconstitutional actions or of a godlike executive.