“We’re not there to play around. We’re there to be your voice,” Gladys Franco, chair of the ALANA caucus said last night concerning ALANA’s role in the Student Government Association.
“We don’t shut the door on anyone.”
The ALANA caucus and supporters met last night in the New Africa House Library to discuss issues facing ALANA.
“There’s a lot of stereotyping in the SGA,” Aiysha Cooper, ALANA member said. “People don’t think racism exists.”
The crisis facing the ALANA caucus is the elimination of their appointed seats in the SGA. During the meeting, Cooper, Franco, Eduardo Bustamante and Rene Gonzalez spoke to a group of about 75 supporters, urging them to run for the Senate and rally for the ALANA cause.
ALANA is given 13 percent of seats in the SGA Senate, set aside for people that are appointed and approved by members of the ALANA community.
“Elimination comes up every two years because we have one of the strongest voices in the SGA,” Cooper said.
She also said that having appointed seats allows the ALANA community to take a look at who will be representing their community. She said elections are usually based on popularity, which is not real democracy.
“We need appointed seats because there has been a history of racism and exclusion on campus,” Franco said.
According to Cooper, incoming students hear what a diverse school UMass is, but when they get here, they find it is a different story.
“Our first concern is not race, that’s just what some people assume,” Cooper said. The caucus is more concerned with supporting issues that matter, as opposed to motions like the one concerning French fries brought up last year in the Senate, she said.
Anyone can become part of ALANA.
As part of the ALANA controversy, it was said Speaker Jared Nokes had barred the four ALANA representatives entitled to be on the Coordinating Council. The Coordinating Council acts as the greater Senate during the summer and has recently announced the three referendum questions to be on the ballot on Sept. 25. The Coordinating Council started with six members, plus Nokes at the beginning of the summer. It now has four members, including Nokes.
According to Nokes, no ALANA members approached him to nominate someone to the council at the end of the last Senate meeting. He said that if there are vacant seats on the council, they must remain vacant.
“[Nokes] didn’t consult anyone – that’s the definition of a dictator,” Gonzalez said. “He’s taking the law into his own hands, since there is no one to stop him.”
The caucus has existed for over 30 years, according to Gonzalez, and the SGA Constitution approval by the Board of Trustees for about 10.
The three referendum questions that will be on the ballot include an amendment to the Constitution that the trustees must approve that will include ALANA-appointed seats. The second question is to eliminate Area Government appointed seats from the bylaws. The third question is to eliminate the ALANA caucus if the amendment does not pass or if the Board of Trustees refuses to amend it.
“The Board of Trustees will most likely not agree because they don’t, appointed seats are needed – which is funny because they’re appointed themselves,” Gonzalez said.
He said the whole thing is a “catch-22.” If the Board of Trustees does not approve an amendment, then Nokes will get his way and blame the trustees, Gonzalez said.
Another part of the controversy is the problem of a lack of a judiciary branch. According to Nokes, the appointed seats should be a judiciary issue.
Unfortunately, there are now only three members on the judiciary. There are seven seats on the committee, and there must be five present for quorum, or for their actions to mean anything. Nokes was not sure who the three members actually are.
Positions on the judiciary branch are approved by the SGA President and Senate. No one has been nominated for it in well over two years, Nokes said.
“I’m not against their ideas,” Nokes said about ALANA. “I disagree with them sometimes, but I wouldn’t want to prevent them from getting into the Senate – they just need to run like everyone else.”
Nokes also said that personal attacks on him are “just inappropriate.”
“I worked with Gladys on the Ways and Means Committee, and I’ve taken classes with her,” Nokes said. “We were never best friends, but we got along, we worked together.”
He also said that among the signatures on the Ways and Means Committee who signed the budgetary recommendation for this year, there were only two other white men on the committee who signed, besides himself. This included the then-Chair Brian Thompson. Franco had also signed this document.
“I don’t see anything changing that would alter my decision,” Nokes said. “Personal attacks are not going to make me stop upholding my responsibilities.”
