We commend The Daily Orange for its coverage of important budgetary and procedural issues facing the university. We write now to expand certain aspects of that coverage and to correct others. The D.O. described the University Senate as the governing body of the university. It is not; that is the Board of Trustees. But USen does have certain powers in regard to curriculum, and on many other matters it has advisory functions. In regard to budgetary matters it has no authority but participates through its committee structure in the formation of recommendations.

USen serves as a forum for serious, informed deliberation of matters of concern to the campus. It requires a willingness to engage diverse views with an open mind and provide a full hearing to opposing arguments and replies. All senates are committed to carefully reasoned debate, but that is all the more true in a university community. But at last Wednesday’s meeting, USen fell far short of its ideals.

Wednesday’s meeting was called to consider two large topics: next year’s budget recommendation and the administration’s proposal for multiple changes in the university’s benefits program. Both raise major questions about which there is a diversity of opinion, as was apparent in the reports from the various USen committees on the benefits proposal, some of which expressed serious reservations about a few of the proposed changes.

Setting a single meeting to address both issues severely limited the time available for discussing them. It was announced at the outset that the meeting would be limited to 90 minutes and that all speakers should keep their remarks brief and not read written statements.

Given those time constraints, it was surprising that nearly 25 minutes of the meeting were devoted to the chancellor’s reading of two lengthy statements, one on the budget and one on the benefits proposal.

Reports from the Senate Budget Committee on the budget and five USen committees on the benefits proposal consumed most of the remaining meeting time.

When it was finally time for discussion and debate, it was under the very confusing rule that the benefits proposal and the budget issue were to be debated simultaneously. The two are connected but raise distinct issues, and it would have made for a more coherent dialogue to have addressed one and then the other. The press of time supposedly prevented this.

Senators nonetheless attempted to engage in the sort of process that has traditionally characterized the work of USen, and one member rose to move a sense of the USen resolution, which was duly seconded, regarding an element of the benefits proposal on which two USen committees (Women’s Concerns & Budget) had raised concerns in their reports — the extension of health benefits to opposite-sex domestic partners who choose not to marry.

Immediately some members, including administrators, vocally interrupted and asserted that no motions or votes were to be permitted on the benefits proposal — a remarkable assertion about USen on an important issue, on which the senate always has the option of expressing its views by resolution. There should have been an immediate ruling from the chair that the motion was indeed in order. The proposer had been recognized, the motion was properly made, seconded and was germane to the issue under discussion. Instead there was chaotic discussion until it was finally acknowledged that the motion was in order.
 

Given the chaos, the proposer of the motion was never given the opportunity to speak on behalf of his motion as he should have been. Indeed no one had a chance to speak in favor of the motion. What followed instead were only two comments. One member objected to the motion as personally insulting and deeply offensive, a comment which aimed to de-legitimize the motion, which in fact expressed the fiscal concerns raised by several USen committees. Only one other comment was permitted, and it was not relevant to the motion.

At that point the chair abruptly announced that it was time to call the question and proceed to a vote. But calling a question must be done by a motion (not debatable) that itself must be voted on. Chaos then resumed, with many people speaking at once, followed by a procedurally questionable vote. The chair ruled that the motion to call the question had passed, though it was unclear that it had received the required two-third majority. An immediate vote on the main motion followed, and it was rejected without having been discussed.

The issue is not the outcome of the motion, but the total unwillingness of some members to allow it to be debated, by wrongly claiming that motions were not permitted, by attempting to de-legitimize it, and by completely precluding any debate with a premature and questionably counted cloture motion.

Calling the question is a relatively extreme measure intended to limit debate that has gone on too long, rather than to prevent debate from ever beginning. That’s why it requires the two-third majority that it probably did not receive.

Its use Wednesday was an abuse of power and contrary to the ideals of USen that call for open and thorough debate and the willingness to listen to and consider conflicting views.
It was obvious that in the eyes of many, the question was already settled before there had been any possibility for debate. The chancellor had given her judgment in her statement on how she had chosen to balance competing concerns, and no debate was to be permitted on the possibility that the senate might officially express a contrary view on any part of the proposal.

Our concerns have been shared with professor Eileen Schell, chair of the Senate Agenda Committee, who chaired Wednesday’s meeting. She has acknowledged that some parts of the meeting were not handled well, and she has committed to improve the future process. In fairness to Schell, she was placed in a difficult, if not impossible, situation by the timetable that had been imposed.

As part of the response, there will be an additional opportunity for extended senate discussion and debate on budget issues at the next USen meeting on March 24.

Unfortunately, by that point the administration will have presented its recommendation on next year’s budget to the trustees, who will have acted on them. Nonetheless, many remaining issues about the university’s budget and finances deserve detailed consideration by the senate as whole.

We hope and expect that at that meeting the senate will by its actions reaffirm its traditional commitment to fully hear competing points of views and to consider any proposals put forth by colleagues on their merits and the arguments offered for and against them.

Signed the following senators and senators-elect: Douglas Anderson, Patrick Cihon, Steven Diaz, Craig Dudczak, Greg Germain, Samuel Gorovitz, Jeanette Jeneault, Jeffrey Stonecash and Robert Van Gulick
 

Published on March 10, 2010 at 12:00 pm