At the Nov. 6 meeting of the College of William and Mary’s Student Assembly Senate, Class of 2021 President David Demarco ’21 decided to table three of his sponsored bills concerning Student Assembly code. In place of further discussion on The Resignation Clarification Act, The Special Election Revision Act and the Constitutional Review Committee Act, Demarco proposed a 10-minute discussion on senator accountability.
This proposition was in response to comments Demarco had received since the introduction of the bills at last week’s meetings.
“Someone has to sponsor these bills,” Demarco said. “I think there is the most controversy around the Resignation Clarification Act … what I did not expect was to be personally and honestly, viciously attacked by my fellow students on the behalf of members of the senate … this is not a precedent we can set.”
Demarco informed the Senate that throughout the week he was told he was unfit to serve as class of 2020 president and was referred to as a “dirty bastard.”
According to the Class of 2020 President Kelsey Vita ’20, Demarco’s statements came as a surprise as she had not heard of these comments from any of the other senate members.
Many other senators expressed their concern about the disparaging comments made to Demarco. Although Sen. Helen Tariku ’21 was concerned over the comments Demarco received, she said that many senators were worried about the rapid pace in which code revision bills were being released and the precision of those bills.
This led to further discussion among the senators about the inclusivity of the Senate’s Code Revision Committee, which meets on Thursday nights from 8:00 to 10:00 and possible changes to the SA constitution.
Sen. Hailey Guerra J.D. ’19 and Sen. Jack Bowden ’19 urged their fellow senators to come to the meetings of the code committee, so that they could provide their own input on code revision bills such as the ones sponsored by Demarco.
Demarco asked for a discussion on accountability at next week’s meeting, as the allotted 10 minutes for the discussion focused more on the Code Committee’s meeting time.
At the beginning of the meeting, Vita announced that there were technical difficulties with the Listserv for the Class of 2020 Special Election that occurred Friday, Nov. 2. Students who had switched social classes were unable to vote or had difficulty voting in the election. The Review Board is currently determining the validity of the election of Cody Mills ’20, Zie Medrano ’20 and JonDavid Nichols ’20.
At the conclusion of the meeting, Sen. Anthony Joseph ’21 brought up the accident that occurred on Monday, Nov. 5 where a College student was hit by a car at a crosswalk on Jamestown Road. Joseph was a witness to the accident and called 911 for the victim.
“There was a lot of talk about lights for the crosswalk,” Joseph said. “I think we need to have that conversation again. I didn’t feel safe crossing the street after that, because 10 seconds ago, that could have been me … it was pretty traumatic. This isn’t the first time this has happened … if there is ever a time for us to take action and stop being slow about this, it’s right now.”
Also at this week’s meeting:
- Class of 2021 President David DeMarco ’21 tabled his Four Picnic Tables and One New ~Benchy Boy~ Act due to the fact that there is ongoing debate about the potential location and design of the picnic tables and bench.
- Sen. Helen Tariku ’21 tabled her APO-h No the Carts Keep Breaking bill because of unanswered questions about who would be responsible for repairing the cart when it is in need of maintenance.
- SA is currently searching for a new Secretary of Student Life to replace JonDavid Nichols ’20, if his election to represent the class of 2020 as a senator is determined valid by the Review Board.
- The executive branch selected Charlie Perry ’21 as the new SA Undersecretary of Web Affairs.
Editor’s Note: The Flat Hat would like to clarify that Jack Bowden ’19 is a Webmaster for the paper. His involvement with Student Assembly is not on behalf of the paper’s interests.
