March 7, 2018

2

NEWS

Wednesday, March 7, 2018

The Emory Wheel

SGA

VP of Finance Expresses Concerns About Overspending

By BeliCia RodRiguez Senior Staff Writer The 51st legislature of the Student Government Association (SGA) granted $9,727.50 in funding to some student organizations Monday night. In total, groups requested $14,168.90, but SGA did not fully fund the requests because the legislature was trying to limit spending.

SGA also voted unanimously to clarify the approval process for University-Wide Organizations (UWOs) and amend the Elections Code. Both bills passed unanimously.

The bill to fund the Residence Hall Association (RHA) and Residence Life “First Year Farewell” event was in first readings and was not voted upon on Monday. In total, SGA considered nine bills, including one first reading, and passed all eight with amendments to some. Six of the bills requested funding from SGA. SGA Vice President of Finance Javi Reyes (18B) expressed concerns about SGA’s spending. The legislature currently has about $84,000 in its contingency account but cannot go below $53,000. The contingency account “funds University-wide programs or events that are sponsored either by the SGA or by organizations chartered under the SGA,” according to SGA’s Finance Code. The minimum is in place because the $50,000 covers overdraft protection from divisions and UWOs, and the $3,000 is a security fund, “which will pay for security at high profile and/or controversial programs or events,” according to SGA’s Finance Code.

Speaker of the Legislature and

Senior Representative William Palmer (18C) echoed Reyes’ concerns about funding.

“Even though it seems like we have all this money, we’ve actually been running down what we’ve built up over the years pretty quickly.”

Suri President Isha Kumar (18C), Suri Vice President Kavya Sundaram (18B) and Suri Musical Director Tejal Pandharpurkar (18C) requested $740 to pay for registration and hotel room fees for a national a cappella competition.

College Council (CC) funded only $325 toward Suri’s registration fees due to restrictions in their monetary policy. CC could not pay the hotel fees because Suri received the total amount for the hotel after its CC hearing, Pandharpurkar said.

Legislators unanimously passed an amendment to the bill that would fund up to $740 if Suri meets with CC again to request funding for the hotel cost and CC declines Suri’s request. The bill passed with nine votes.

Bill 51sl51, proposed by The Complex President Lori Steffel (21C), requested funding for Emory RHA and Residence Life’s “First Year Farewell” event according to the bill. All undergraduate students would be invited to the event, which is set for April 20 on McDonough Field. The bill is set for a vote in the next meeting.

Association of Caribbean Educators and Students (ACES) President Zariah Embry (20C) proposed Bill 51sl52, which would allocate $3,168.85 to purchase materials for ACES’ “Island Delight” event. Junior Representative Madelyn Zapata (19C) proposed an amendment to lower the requested

Fraternity to Return Fall 2019 to Historic House Continued from Page 1 back is because Emory is allowing it, I don’t think that’s OK especially because we already have a really small art scene.”

MLAO President Nicholas Alvarez (16Ox, 18C) declined to comment, citing his busy schedule. Cione said that the return marks an exciting period for the chapter. Cione also said that the fraternity has created a “brand-new

relationship” with OSFL. “Being able to restart gives us the opportunity to set whatever culture we’d like in the right direction,” Cione said.

Cionne said that the chapter understands the importance of following all national and OSFL policies regarding Greek life behavior.

— Contact Emma Simpson at emma.simpson@emory.edu

The Emory Wheel Volume 99, Number 19 © 2018 The Emory Wheel Alumni Memorial University Center, Room 401 630 Means Drive, Atlanta, GA, 30322 Business wheelbusinessmanager@gmail.com Editor-in-Chief Julia Munslow julia.munslow@emory.edu Founded in 1919, The Emory Wheel is the financially and editorially independent, student-run newspaper of Emory University in Atlanta. The Wheel is a member publication of Media Council, Emory’s organization of student publications. The Wheel reserves the rights to all content as it appears in these pages, and permission to reproduce material must be granted by the editor-in-chief.

The Wheel is printed every Wednesday during the academic year, except during University holidays and scheduled publication intermissions. A single copy of the Wheel is free. To purchase additional copies, please email emorywheelexec@gmail.com.

The statements and opinions expressed in the Wheel are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the Wheel’s Editorial Board or of Emory University, its faculty, staff or administration.

The Wheel is also available online at www.emorywheel.com.

Corrections • In last week’s issue, “Art’s Not Dead: ‘Festival of Insignificance’ Lives” incorrectly stated that the dates of the showcase were Feb. 25 and 26. The dates of the showcase were actually Feb. 24 and 25.

• In last week’s issue, the correction about “Four Emory Seniors Win Bobby Jones Scholarship” misidentified Leah Neiman as Lisa Neiman.

• In last week’s issue, the headline for “Pike Loses House; DTD, Sammy Join Eagle Row” incorrectly stated that Delta Tau Delta was joining Eagle Row. The fraternity has already been occupying 15 Eagle Row. The headline has been updated online.

• In last week’s issue, the author of “Five-Win Streak Spurs NCAA Bid”, Joseph Oh, was incorrectly identified as a contributing writer. Oh is a staff writer.

• In last week’s issue, “Emory Acquires Harper Lee Letters” incorrectly stated that the Rose Library was planning to open an exhibit for the Harper Lee collection. The collection will open to students and scholars for research purposes, but the Rose Library has not planned an exhibit or display yet.

amount from $3,168.85 to $2,157.50.

The amendment and bill passed unanimously.

African Students Association (ASA) President Clementina Nyarko (18C) presented Bill 51sl46 for the third consecutive SGA meeting to help fund ASA’s “Taste of Africa” event. Attorney General Elias Neibart (20C) recommended that SGA fund $3,000 because only half of the attendees would be Emory students, but Sophomore Representative Ngozi Ugboh (20C) recommended adjusting the amount to $4,000.

Ugboh said that ASA has exhausted all other spending resources.

Freshman Representative Austin Graham (21C) proposed an amendment to change the amount allocated from $6,059.30 to $3,030. The amendment passed, with Ugboh abstaining because she is an ASA member. The bill passed unanimously.

Bill 51sl54, proposed by SGA President Gurbani Singh (18B) and Oxford Continuee Muhammad Naveed (17Ox, 19C), would fund $3,000 for spring break 2018 airport shuttles.

Singh said the bill was proposed late and wished there was a Campus Service committee to handle shuttles.

Spring break begins this Saturday for undergraduate students.

The bill was passed with eight votes and one against. Palmer voted no, citing low funds.

“I just feel like we’re running low on money,” Palmer said. “I personally just thought it wasn’t necessarily an essential, but I really hope that because we funded it, that people use it … [but] it’s not a time many students go home.”

Singh and Graham proposed Bill

51sl56, which amends the Elections Code to reflect updates to the voting systemc. The legislature passed it unanimously.

In the Election Code’s Part III Article 1 about general elections, the bill added that the Elections Board will send voting notifications to students before voting opens and should inform students of the voting periods three days in advance.

The bill also added a section that states that candidates have until three business days before voting period begins to withdraw.

Each undergraduate division must determine voting form text for the final ballot one week before campaigning starts and email them to the platform organizer. The text must also be approved by the attorney general and elections chair.

In case of technical difficulties with voting, SGA and the Elections Board will have a hearing to determine if the voting period should be extended.

The bill removed section D in Part III Article 2 regarding general elections that stated that SGA will no longer keep a physical copy of the sample ballot in SGA offices. There will only be an electronic copy of the ballot.

The bill removed the joint candidacy section of Elections Code Part IV Article 3 to reflect SGA’s Feb. 20 vote to prohibit joint candidacy in SGA elections.

SGA’s joint session with Graduate Student Government Association (GSGA) was canceled. Some GSGA legislators were off campus due to Goizueta Business School’s MBA spring break. GSGA did not have quorum. The two legislatures were set to

vote on Bills 51sl53 and 51sl55, but they were proposed and voted on during the SGA meeting instead.

Shannon Anderson (20C) and Sophomore Representative Johnna Gadomski (20C) proposed Bill 51sl53, which allocates $1,200 for shuttles to and from the March 24 “March for Our Lives” event to protest mass shootings and gun control laws. Anderson said that in the first 36 hours of creating a Facebook event, about 100 students expressed interest in attending and using the shuttles. Only undergraduate students can use the shuttles that SGA funds. Gadomski amended the bill to fund $800, and the amendment and bill passed unanimously.

Bill 51sl55, submitted by Singh and GSGA President Mark Neufeld (18B), clarified SGA and GSGA’s approval of UWOs after the undergraduate and graduate split last year. The bill states that UWOs must meet requirements of both the UWO and graduate-wide organization, and the Joint Executive Council reviews and approves UWOs. The Joint Executive Council, formerly known as the Joint Governance Council, is composed of executives from SGA and GSGA that convenes to address University-wide issues. The bill requires UWOs to submit a report to the Joint Executive Council annually that includes information about “their historical activities and use of the student activity fee … [and] their projected budgets,” according to the bill.

The bill passed unanimously with nine votes.

— Contact Belicia Rodriguez at belicia.rodriguez@emory.edu

Univ. to Work With Peer Institutions on Procedure Continued from Page 1 Duke University (N.C.), Vanderbilt University (Tenn.), Boston University and Georgia Institute of Technology to develop procedures regarding locking doors in case of an armed aggressor.

Emory does not currently have individualized building or room plans for an active shooter situation due to the fluidity and unpredictable nature of those emergency situations, Shartar told the Wheel. CEPAR recommends the “run, hide, fight” active shooter guidelines issued by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS). After the collection phase recommendations, Emory might modify the policy in the next few months, according to Assistant Vice President for Public Safety Craig Watson. “[The guidelines] are intentionally designed to give individuals a basic understanding of their options so given the uniqueness of whatever the situation is for wherever they are that they can make that choice depending on what’s available to them,” Watson in Emory’s Division of Campus Services said. “There’s no one blanket response that’s correct for everything.”

Shartar said that after the University’s Jan. 1 annexation into Atlanta, the Emory Police Department (EPD) has been working closely with the Atlanta Police Department (APD) and DeKalb County Police Department to ensure that different emergency response agencies understand how to respond to an active shooter.

EPD officers currently undergo annual training, and CEPAR conducts annual full-scale exercises using the Homeland Security Exercise and Evaluation Program (HSEEP), according to Shartar.

“We’ll … test certain objectives, and they’ll evaluate how people perform, looking for gaps in performance,”

Shartar said. “And then we’ll go back and say, ‘How do we need to adjust this plan? How do we need to provide additional training?’ [Then] we’ll go back and test it again in some other way.”

After the April 2007 Virginia Tech shooting, CEPAR established preventative measures including the Threat Assessment Team, a multidisciplinary unit that consists of counselors, psychologists, attorneys, police officers and human resource professionals who assess reported behaviors that indicate an individual may be on a pathway to violence.

“It’s very common if you look back at all of these instances, including the most recent incident in Parkland, that there is a clear pathway people follow when they become violent like this,” Shartar said. “We are able to do what we can in the constraint of the law to intervene to stop that.”

After CEPAR recognized the need to proactively recognize signs of potential violence, over the past year, CEPAR created a video designed for workplace managers to identify these preliminary signs and report them accordingly.

Emory’s staff and faculty are set to view a similar video, as is the student body, according to Shartar.

CEPAR has also been calibrating the language used when disseminating emergency notifications and the activation of sirens.

That development is in response to the Sept. 20, 2017, incident, when Emory Alert and EPD issued a “shelter in place” alert after Atlanta VA Health Care System police attempted to arrest an unarmed individual for probation violation.

During the nearly-hour long search for the individual in Lullwater preserve some professors barricaded their classroom doors, while other

spaces simply advised students not to leave the building, the Wheel previously reported.

“We’ve changed the language [of the emergency notification system] to make it a little more prescriptive and a little more deliberate,” Shartar said.

The updated system will clarify the nature of the threat, where it is occurring and the specific steps one should take. Furthermore, the system will only activate sirens if the situation poses an imminent danger to human life. Shartar said that CEPAR plans to develop extensive emergency preparedness material and mandatory videos to show incoming freshmen during orientation and update the “Just in Time” guide available on their website.

A full-scale active threat exercise designed to test Emory’s response to an active threat is scheduled for March 14 from 6 a.m. to noon. The drill, coordinated by Emory, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and Atlanta Urban Areas Security Initiative (UASI), will serve as a complex training initiative to test Atlanta metropolitan jurisdictions’ regional response to large-scale crises situations, according to a March 6 University press release.

Shartar stressed the importance of downloading mobile application “LiveSafe” for students, faculty, staff and non-Emory employees. The application, which was released last year, allows users to report tips, contact and immediately receive assistance from EPD, see emergency alerts and virtually escort other users, according to CEPAR’s website.

Alex Klugerman contributed reporting.

— Contact Cecillia Bae at cecillia.bae@emory.edu