DIVERSITY page 3
SCENE page 4
OPINION page 8
SPORTS page 9
NEWS page 10 October 12, 2022
Vol. 123 NO. 3
ASCWU President resigns following motion for recall election The Andayas dominate CWU Petition and months of publicly expressed concern spur action
Rachael Medalia (left) resigned as ASCWU President while Luis Reyes (right) took over the position. Photos courtesy of the CWU website and Reyes’ LinkedIn profile.
Katherine Camarata Lead Editor Former ASCWU President for the 2022-2023 year Rachael Medalia officially resigned from her position on Sept. 19. Luis Reyes, former executive vice president, was appointed the new ASCWU president following Medalia’s letter of resignation. A motion for a recall election was made by Senate Speaker and Interim Executive Vice President Brady Smith five days earlier on Sept. 14, that was met with a majority vote from the ASCWU board. Smith’s statement motioning for a recall said Medalia’s actions were, “limiting the students’ access to ASCWU, their student representatives, and excluding our student population, especially those who belong to traditionally underrepresented communities.” A petition began circulating last spring to remove Medalia from office as the student body was concerned Medalia was “abusing her power,” according to Smith. The change.org petition has at present garnered 426 signatures to impeach Medalia. The petition was started by alumna and former Student Senator Bianca Sanchez and read in part, “Staff members are aware of behavior and the reports against her [Medalia], but they have opted to not take action, allowing her without penalty or discouragement to harass colleagues and create hostile work environments in the office.” In the petition, Sanchez also outlined a scenario in which voices of marginalized identity groups were silenced. In interviews last spring, Sanchez and Presidents United to Solve Hunger (PUSH) former
President and current Wildcat Pantry Coordinator Jaeda Nelson described incidents of intimidation and disagreement with Medalia. Sanchez said she quit her job on the Student Senate in June because she “didn’t feel comfortable working in that environment anymore.” Sanchez later created the petition and protested Medalia’s presidency at ASCWU board meetings. Sanchez also made a public statement at the final ASCWU Board meeting on June 6 that was shared on her Instagram account. In Sanchez’s statement, she said, “I am not a learning experience for you to do better. Your lack of accountability has shown the whole school that you are not the leader for them.” Deleted comments and motion to recall According to Senate Speaker and current Interim Executive Vice President Smith, the petition was created too late in the school year for the Council of Probity to verify the signatures as would have been required. The Council of Probity will review the signatures in coming weeks once their first meeting is scheduled, according to Smith. Smith said there are three ways to initiate a recall vote: through a student petition that must be verified by the Council of Probity, the student senate needs a majority vote or the ASCWU board needs a majority vote. Neither the Council of Probity, a student group appointed by the president to oversee activities or misconduct claims in ASCWU, nor the Student Senate were in session at the beginning of the school year, so the ASCWU
board took matters into their own hands when Smith made the Sept. 14 statement. According to Smith, working with Medalia over the summer opened his eyes to some of the concerns students had mentioned. Smith said Medalia exerted power over him in an inappropriate way during workplace interactions they had over the summer. According to Smith, after the ASCWU board posted new photos of their staff on Instagram on Sept. 9, students left comments asking about the status of the petition and why Medalia was still president. Smith said Medalia had access to the Instagram account information as is standard practice for the ASCWU president, and she was deleting comments on the post that were about the petition. At the time of the comments being deleted, Smith said Medalia was the only ASCWU member with access to the Instagram account until later that day. Comments on the Instagram post currently read, “Why does ASCWU government continually silence the voices of students on campus?? Zero accountability,” and “If this account is funded by public money in anyway it is not in anyway shape or form ok to block or delete comments.” Smith said Medalia’s actions went against their board values of increasing transparency “to the fullest extent.” The Observer reached out to Medalia and the rest of the ASCWU Board for comment and did not receive a response by the date of publication.
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volleyball for nearly three decades
Tia (left) and Mario (right) Andaya during their club volleyball days. Photo Credit: Andaya Family
See Story on Pg. 6
City of Ellensburg hopes to combat rising rent prices and housing shortage shortage Omar Benitez Staff Reporter The City of Ellensburg is currently facing an ongoing housing crisis says Community Development Director, Jamey Ayling. And the city has wasted no time enacting a housing action plan aimed at trying to combat the shortage. This includes plans to increase production of housing. According to Ayling, the City of Ellensburg needs to produce about 281 housing units annually until 2037 to properly deal with the shortage and the growth the city has experienced. ”The City of Ellensburg needs to produce 281 housing units annually from 2020-2037 to address both the growth target and the undersupply of housing units, representing a 162% production increase over current annual net product of 107 units per year,” Ayling said. Ayling said this means that Ellensburg needs to increase its production of housing units by 162 percent from the 107 housing units they are currently producing. With the current undersupply of housing units, that means that rent has increased throughout the city further reducing the number of affordable housing units available. According to the City of Ellensburg, about a third of the households in Ellensburg are cost burdened, meaning that the amount
of rent paid exceeds over 30 percent of the household’s income. The housing action plan hopes to address the lack of affordable housing by building more affordable units with about 57 units planned. According to Ayling, they still need more if they really want to make a difference. “It’s not enough,” Alying said. “We’re probably only hitting 5% Maybe right now, and I think that needs to increase.” Ayling said he is hopeful the housing plan will be able to address these issues, but he said he knows right now there are certain obstacles getting in the way of the plan getting done. “Time is the biggest obstacle, there’s just a lot of pressure for development” Ayling said. Ayling said that even if Ellensburg can manage to increase its production of housing, things are going to take time until the city is fully. “There’s probably a five year minimum to look at catching up, and that’s just catching up,” Ayling said. Housing action plans have become much more common now since the Biden administration has aided with helping small growing cities across the country. The housing action plan currently underway in the city was put together by the Ellensburg Affordable Housing Commission.