Budget cuts have overshadowed most of SG President J Hudson and Vice President Dani Borel’s administrative goals as they near the half-way point of their tenure and the SG Senate ends its semester term this week.
Hudson made national headlines after newspapers in states where Gov. Bobby Jindal was fundraising published letters Hudson wrote urging the governor to come back to his home state.
“This project was not supposed to blow up,” Hudson said. “It was supposed to be to get Gov. Jindal’s attention.”
Hudson and Borel used the letters as launching pads for the SG letter-writing campaign and the “WhatNow Lsu” event.
“It proves that a letter makes a difference,” Hudson said. “It becomes about having not just one letter but 30,000.”
The letter eventually got Hudson and Borel a meeting with Jindal, which Hudson described as unsatisfying.
All in all, Hudson and Borel have completed nine of their 32 StudentsFIRST campaign pushcard initiatives, according to Hudson. Hudson said that 12 initiatives are “in progress” while 11 of them he described as “to-do.”
Completed initiatives include strengthening dead week violations, spotlighting organizations on campus for achievements, reforming towing Fridays before gamedays, increasing seating in the Student Union and putting a Redbox kiosk on campus.
“One of my favorites is the Redbox because it’s very visual,” Borel said. “It’s something we do that students can see.”
One initiative, reducing LSU Dining receipt printing, was completed in a different way, according to Borel.
“We couldn’t decrease [the printing] but we did get little recycle bins by every cash register for LSU Dining,” Borel said.
Incomplete initiatives include the extension of the initial class drop date, creating an online test bank, ensuring recycling bins are in every classroom, extending library hours and establishing covered bus stops.
Hudson said he and Borel spent a lot of their time working on initiatives students want but were not on the pair’s pushcard during their campaign, like placing more power outlets in the library. He said budget cut issues have taken priority over many pushcard initiatives.
“At the end of the day I think the students would rather see a strong academic core … than these initiatives completed quickly,” Hudson said of those issues that have fallen by the wayside.
The Senate, which will meet for the final time Wednesday night, was not as active as in semesters past because leadership from previous semesters had been lost, according to SG Senate speaker Brooksie Bonvillain.
“There were really big shoes to be filled this semester. We started a little slow,” Bonvillain said. “It’s very much been a learning process.”
Bonvillain said the new Senate has had time to learn, and she hopes to start next semester strong.
“Although we haven’t had a high volume of legislation passed, we’ve had a lot of quality legislation,” Bonvillain said.
“I do have the goal of having 10 pieces of legislation in place to start the spring semester.”
The Senate did their part to fulfill several of Hudson and Borel’s campaign initiatives, including passing a resolution urging Faculty Senate to allow students to withdraw from classes on the eighth class day of the semester without receiving a W, which is the last day students can add a class.
The resolution has been referred to the Faculty Senate’s Admissions, Standards and Honors committee.
SG Senate also approved a resolution urging Faculty Senate to request Academic Affairs restrict the kinds of graded work given by instructors during the concentrated study period.
Most of the senators did not run on Hudson and Borel’s ticket last spring, which created some initial tension between the executive and legislative branches, according to Borel.
Hudson has also vetoed some Senate legislation this semester, including a change to the SG election code that will allow campaigns to hand out “trinkets” — items worth less than $2 — to students.
The veto is expected to be overridden, according to Bonvillain.
“Some people are afraid of [vetoes], but I think it’s exciting,” Bonvillain said. “It shows the balance of power.”
 
 
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Contact Frederick Holl at [email protected]