Well over 100 students crowded into 105 Dartmouth Hall for what was expected to be an impeachment debate.
Photo: Teresa Lattanzio/The Dartmouth Staff
By a margin of 90 to 44, an amendment expressing no confidence in Student Body President Tim Andreadis ‘07 failed at Tuesday night’s Student Assembly meeting held in a crowded 105 Dartmouth Hall. The amendment, introduced by Adam Shpeen ‘07, would have been attached to a resolution transferring the responsibility for “Uh-Oh” e-mails to the Office of the Registrar.
The amendment stated that under Andreadis, Student Assembly has accomplished “almost nothing substantive” and pointed to a lack of progress on combatting sexual assault as well as other grievances with Andreadis’ leadership.
In response to the legislation, Andreadis defended himself at the meeting.
“You can’t address the hard issues on campus without people getting upset,” he said. “These are the kind of discussions that Student Assembly and the campus have been needing to have for a very long time. And if I’m going to be impeached over it then that’s something I can sleep with and I can live with. What I can’t live with is having another year of Student Assembly without addressing issues that are important to this campus.”
After extended debate, the amendment failed to garner enough votes to be added to the legislation. The meeting saw a large number of representatives of minority or ethnically affiliated organizations who were present and voted against the amendment.
At the meeting, which, with well over 100 voting members, saw the highest attendance of the year, Shpeen said he was motivated to attach the amendment because the statement of no confidence — which had already passed through the Academic Affairs Committee — was not brought in front of the General Assembly. Under the Assembly’s Constitution, legislation which passes through a committee must be brought in front of the Assembly within three meetings.
“I think that it’s hypocritical to criticize me for introducing this amendment, which is constitutional, and to not criticize the executives for not bringing this [to the General Assembly],” Shpeen said during the meeting.
Andreadis said that this is not the first time the Executive Board has decided to wait before bringing a piece of legislation to the General Assembly for consideration.
“There’s plenty of precedent,” Andreadis said before adding, “Although I can’t cite examples off the top of my head.”
The no-confidence measure will likely be brought to the General Assembly at the next meeting as its own piece of legislation, Andreadis said.
Andreadis also said that he has no intention of stepping down as Student Body President.
“Regardless of a vote of no confidence, I have no plans to resign,” Andreadis said. “If people seriously want to see me removed they are going to have to ask for an impeachment vote. I think there are far too many people on campus who support what [the Assembly] has done.”
Shpeen’s Motives Questioned
Several students, including Andreadis, questioned Shpeen’s motives in reforming the Assembly, contending that Shpeen is acting out of a personal vendetta against Andreadis. (Andreadis reported Shpeen to Undergraduate Affairs after Shpeen served alcohol at one of his committee meetings.)
At Tuesday’s meeting, Shpeen again denied any connection between the two events.
“This has nothing to do with personal conflict,” Shpeen said during the meeting. “What you did to me, Tim, I believe is wrong, But this has nothing to do with me or you. I’m offended that other people would point to a disciplinary issue as the motivation behind doing this.”
Andreadis also addressed the personal conflict during the meeting, noting that he felt justified in reporting Shpeen because his behavior would have affected the organization as a whole.
The original legislation regarding Uh-Oh e-mails did eventually pass through the Assembly.
The first hour of the meeting was spent in debate about membership and voting rights. Under the Assembly’s Constitution, student organizations are allowed to have a voting member within the General Assembly after applying for membership with the Assembly’s Membership and Internal Affairs Committee and gaining approval from the General Assembly.
New members arrive in droves
Many organizations sent representatives to Tuesday night’s meeting. Though these representatives were approved by MIAC, conflict arose when the members were brought in front of the General Assembly for approval.
Michael Herman ‘07, a leader of the movement to reform the Assembly, moved to veto all of the organizational representatives whose membership was pending. Herman based his reasons for the motion on his belief that the representatives were not serious about making a year-long commitment to the Assembly and the fact that the list was only made available to Assembly members upon arrival at the meeting.
Pointing to the serious nature of the issues at hand, Herman called for the representatives’ membership to be delayed for at least one meeting.
“Let’s not turn this into a charade,” he said during the meeting.
The pending memberships were eventually approved by the Assembly.
Shpeen expressed his disappointment with this outcome after the meeting.
“I don’t think that it’s fair to for a student to come to [the Assembly] under the guise of an organizational rep to take a single vote,” Shpeen said. “That’s what the majority of people who applied to be organizational reps did.”
Several students questioned whether these organizational representatives had been brought in specifically in support of Andreadis.
Long-time Assembly member and former Secretary Leslie Shribman ‘08 questioned why these representatives had been invited to come only for Tuesday’s meeting, and had not been contacted earlier in the term.
Herman raised similar concerns.
“There were approximately 70 organizational reps that Tim and his group of supporters brought, and you’ll note that the vote of no confidence only did not pass by 45 votes,” Herman said. “These people only came for one reason: because Tim asked them to come to vote for him.”
Before press time Tuesday night, Student Body Vice President Jacqueline Loeb ‘08 was unable to provide The Dartmouth with the individual voting records on the amendment, or the organizations that provided representatives for the first time at Tuesday’s meeting.
“It was clear that this was just a ploy to bring these people and exercise a loophole that allows them to vote for one meeting,” Herman said.
Shpeen Disappointed With Results
Shpeen also said that he was disappointed he was unable to present reform legislation that he had intended to bring forth during the meeting. One upcoming piece of legislation calls for the creation of a Student Assembly task force which would evaluate how to reform the Assembly. Shpeen hoped to add an amendment to this legislation, which would have called for the suspension of the current Assembly during the time that this task force, elected from the student body and reporting to MIAC, would conduct its investigation. Because of time constraints, the legislation never came before the Assembly.
“I wish we were given a chance to present the reform legislation that we had intended to present today,” Shpeen said. “Our first priority was to reform [the Assembly] and because of procedure we couldn’t bring that reform.”
After the meeting, Andreadis praised the overall tone of the discussion.
“For the most part people did a really good job of letting the meeting run and being respectful,” Andreadis said.
Shpeen disagreed.
“I was disappointed by the atmosphere of the meeting,” Shpeen said. “I think that it turned into a shouting match at times and I don’t think that was healthy for [the Assembly].” At times during the meeting, participants interjected to criticize Shpeen’s political tactics.
Andreadis said he appreciated student feedback, pointing to students who raised complaints about his attempts to focus on sexual assault.
“The message I heard loud and clear tonight was ‘You said you were going to address sexual assault. You’ve done some but you haven’t done enough and we want to see more,’” Andreadis said.
Andreadis Not Miffed
Andreadis said he hopes to move forward with Assembly business this term.
“It’s my hope that our organization can move forward with a lot of things we want to do.” Andreadis said. “Winter term is the time we can make good on a lot of our promises and recommendations.”
The meeting was also attended by Dean of Student Life Holly Sateia, who applauded when Andreadis’ work as Student Body President was defended by other students within the Assembly.
“What I heard was that the students were supportive of the Assembly, that they want Student Assembly to continue the good work they’re doing,” Sateia said after the meeting.
Sateia noted that, though she does not attend every Assembly meeting, as the Assembly’s advisor she does attend meetings on occasion.
A slideshow about the mascot search was also presented at the meeting by Assembly Executives Kapil Kale ‘07, Kenny Brown Klinger ‘07 and Molly Bode ‘09. The slideshow, which featured artist sketches of the proposed new “Dartmoose” mascot, drew both cheers and hisses from the crowd.
