Call to Order 4:04pm

 

Attendance

Committee: Chairman Bertel, Senator Hazen, Senator Strassfield

Non-committee: Senator Howard

Absent: Senator Ashamu, Senator Hollingworth, Senator Quinn, Vice-Chair Bailey

 

Bertel:  Thanks for coming to the cleanup last weekend.  It went very well.  I talked to Al from the 2100 yesterday, and he mentioned that he might want a social media person.

Hazen:  I might be interested in that.

Bertel:  Darien mentioned she also might be interested.  This would be paid part-time.  They’re trying to become more public.  Al also mentioned the Ordinance stuff, the town’s rebuttal and judge’s decision will be out soon.  There is speculation that it will go in favor of ACLU.  Al is also looking for more communication and collaboration from External, such as other events or coming to each others’ meetings.  Anyone have any ideas?

Strassfield:  What else are they trying to do?

Bertel: Student rights publicity, among other things, but trying to take a stance in favor of student renters without making it a war against the town.

Strassfield: You mentioned in General about police posting things online.  What was that again?

Bertel: I have heard that they post online where they will be on a given day, and students don’t know about this.  The new chief of police is very aggressive with orange stickers and underage drinking and noise complaints.  Also, the 2100 would like us to be very active in Narragansett.

Hazen: 2100 is not the same as Property Management, right?

Bertel: Correct.

Strassfield: will we be looking into the rumors that Property Management isn’t very responsible?

Bertel: We can talk to them, but I need something more concrete than rumors.  I can look into maybe publicising that we are looking for information.

Hazen: We can probably promote 2100 as student-oriented if we tried, and it would help them out.  A lot of people only think of Property Management and Durkin when they think of renting.

Bertel: One of my goals is to inform students of available resources and rights, because a lot of people don’t know what they are and aren’t allowed to do.  There have been problems with building inspectors in the past.

Hazen: What are we doing about that, and is it related to the 2100 social media position?

Bertel: That is a piece of the strategy, but we have done other things in the past.  We have magnets with little snippets of information on renters’ rights that we give away.  Does anyone else have any ideas about this?

Hazen: URI communications emails seem like a pretty good idea, but not many people read those.

Bertel: We do have a commuter affairs office, but they’re not very efficient to work with.

Strassfield: Can you explain  the student rights magnets a little more?

Bertel: I’ve heard that they weren’t accurate, but I haven’t found any problems.  I’m not planning on ordering more.  They have some useful tidbits of information on them.  I used to see them a lot in Durkin houses.  We have about one of our original five boxes.  We talked about commuter events to let people know that Senate doesn’t only work with student organizations, we also think about off-campus people.  We also talked about having a coffee day, but we don’t have money.  How would the money work.

Howard: This would probably come out of Committee Expense, but if we can get a student organization to work with us it could also maybe be done with Cosponsorship.  Committee Expense is gone this year, but there is more in it for next year’s budget.

Strassfield: Maybe we should do it next school year so we’re not interfering with exams.

Howard: People also won’t forget everything over the summer if we do it next school year.

Strassfield: Would right after First Night work?

Bertel: If we were to do that it would also be more organised than something we pull together at the last second.

Strassfield: Should we have pasta?  I can get is pasta.

Bertel: If it’s on the quad or somewhere similar then there can be pasta.

Howard: Where would the pasta come from?

Strassfield: There are pasta boxes from Rhody Outpost that they toss because of sell by date.  Same with sauce.  The pasta isn’t spoiled or anything, it’s just policy.

Hazen: We could help inform people at these events, just have the information available.

Strassfield: We could have a social media promo there as well, maybe a QR or similar scannable code.  Would the coffee be in a parking lot?  That would help target the off-campus students.

Hazen: The Library would also be good, because commuters go there a lot in between classes.

Bertel: Could we do it at the bus circle for people who don’t use cars?

Hazen: There wouldn’t be as many people, but there are people who do that.

Strassfield: If it’s at the library, we should do it around midterms or at the end of fall semester.

Bertel: Moving on, this term has mostly been continuing old projects, Summer is for new things for next year.  I will be researching how other external committees are run by myself, and I want you all to think of/work on projects for next year.  You all make events happen, I’m just the chair.  We’ve done successful projects this way in the past.  I can point you towards resources.  Does anyone have any questions?

*cricket*

Bertel: There will be a Narragansett Town Council meeting on May 1st.  It’s their equivalent of a General Senate meeting, and they have loads of committees.  It’ll be long, but there’s good information.  ACLU info should come out in a municipal report, I’ll ask Sam where that comes from.  Final decision will be in the newspaper.  I’ll send it to you all when I get it.  Any other ideas?

Hazen: (to Senator Strassfield) Have you talked to Al about the website?

Strassfield: Not yet.

Bertel: I will talk to him later about both of you and throw in some good words.  He might ask to meet with you guys.  It’d sort of be like their DOC.

Adjournment 4:29pm