Special Business
Tuesday, April 21, the Student Assembly Senate held confirmation hearings for several positions in the SA Cabinet.
Noa Rudisch ’27 was appointed as secretary of sustainability. Tom Chesnut ’27 was confirmed as attorney general. Lyndsie Beavers ’28 was confirmed as the secretary of diversity and inclusion, and Eesha Kulkarni ’27 was appointed as the secretary of student experience.
New Business
Sen. Quinn Clancey ’27, historian of the senate, introduced the OA Appreciation Act IV. If passed, the bill will allocate $1,500 from Student Assembly Reserves to host a coffee bar for Orientation Aides during orientation week.
Clancey also introduced the Bolstering Ethics of Election Fairness Act Part V.
The bill comes after multiple major referendums on campus surveillance and free expression.
The Firewall For Freedom and Flock referendums were submitted via student petitions to SA. The current code allows for students to submit petitions within 21 days of the general election. Clancey argued that this time frame was not sufficient for the Independent Elections Commission to verify the accuracy of claims made on the referendum ballot, as petitions were submitted days before the general election.
The BEEF Act Part IV, which senators unanimously passed on Tuesday, March 3, struck these deadline stipulations for submitting signatures for a referendum.
Chair of the IEC Meagan Kenney ’27 addressed the chamber with her concerns regarding the amendments.
“We had to put them on the ballot without time to verify the language of them, to make sure it wasn’t biased. There’s no time to verify signatures, but we were obligated by code to put them on the ballot,” she said. “So that’s something that we’d like to avoid in the future, because without this clearly defined timeline, we cannot really guarantee a fair, neutral and unbiased referendum in the election.”
The new bill aims to clarify the language in the SA Code to fix the issues of the BEEF Act Part IV. The BEEF Act Part V will amend the Code to say that referendums must be submitted at least 21 days before the general election.
“The [SA] Elections Commission should retain discretionary oversight for the wording of ballot questions to ensure neutrality and to revise or reject language that is misleading or biased,” the bill states. “Advance submission is necessary for the Elections Commission to have proper time to place a well-informed, unbiased referendum on the ballot.”
Clancey explained that the goal of the new elections bill is to further clarify elections processes.
“Clarity is really the name of the game here,” he said.
Class of 2029 President Daria Lesmerises ’29 introduced the CART Act. The bill allocates funding for Alpha Phi Omega, the College’s gender-inclusive service fraternity, to purchase a new golf cart for its campus escort service.
Campus escort provides students with daily free golf cart rides from 9 p.m. to 12 a.m. APO has appeared before the senate before to discuss the worsening quality of thew golf carts and the need for repairs.
The bill, if passed, would allocate $3,500 to purchase a used golf cart.
Old Business
SA senators also overwhelmingly passed a resolution calling on the administration to cancel its contract with Flock, the surveillance system that uses automatic license plate readers to record identifiable vehicle information.
Students have raised privacy concerns regarding Flock technology.
The Deflock William & Mary Resolution, sponsored by Sen. Neha Baskar ’29, calls for increased transparency from the administration regarding the purchase of the contract and to deactivate the cameras already installed throughout campus. The legislation follows a referendum in which students voted overwhelmingly in the affirmative for Flock cameras to be removed.
All but one senator — Chair of the Senate Sen. MacKenna Wyckoff ’28 — voted for the bill.
In a statement to the Flat Hat, Wyckoff wrote that she sees the technology as important for student public safety.
“I believe that the referendum on March 26th ballot concerning Flock was biased in language, nor did it offer perspectives from both sides of the issue, therefore the results were biased as many people were making an uninformed choice,” Wyckoff wrote.
Senators passed the Wren Bell Ready Act, sponsored by Sen. Jenny Wang ’29. The bill allocates $850 to host a career readiness event in collaboration with the Office of Career Development & Professional Engagement.
The event will take place during fall 2026. It will feature free professional headshots, LinkedIn and resume review sessions with career advisors, advice on professional clothing and interactive events such as elevator pitch practice sessions.
Executive Updates
SA President Nico Giro-Martin ’27 announced that a discussion on public safety will take place on Wednesday, April 29 with Associate Vice President for Public Safety Cliff Everton ’96 and Chief of the William and Mary Police Department Don Butler.
SA Vice President Sophie Kennedy ’27 and Baskar will moderate the conversation, and students will not be permitted to ask questions directly to participants. Kennedy and Baskar will be collecting questions through an online form. The event will take place in the Integrated Science Center 1221 from 6-7:30 p.m.
