A bike-powered concert at the Concordia is not a good use of student money. But that didn’t stop the Student Association from wasting 2,500 of your dollars to help bring the environmentalist brainchild to La Crosse. You, the student body, paid a high price for the lovely symbolism of proving human legs can power light bulbs.
This isn’t the only reason The Racquet is endorsing Eric Schmidt and Kyle Dill rather than their opponents to represent the UW-La Crosse student body as president and vice president for the next year, but it perfectly symbolizes our reasoning.
Karly Wallace, currently vice president, and environmental sustainability director Missy Ruplinger, a champion of the leg-powered concert, have done plenty more to indicate that their stand against rising student fees gets wobbly when real decisions are needed.
At last night’s debate, Ruplinger derided Schmidt for once asking about the cost of converting the power plant on campus from coal to biomass. That Schmidt even asked about the cost was “telling of his position on green initiatives,” Ruplinger said.
Maybe, but it’s also telling about Ruplinger’s position on frivolously spending student and state money for causes that sound good but have little or no tangible benefit for students at UW-L.
The Student Association shared governance director is a crucial position responsible for keeping the student voice heard by the decision makers. But after the spot was abdicated several weeks after the start of the semester, neither the current president nor Wallace thought the position crucial enough to find someone for the position, which will take on new significance as future biennial budgets bring more big cuts.
When we asked Schmidt how he’d deal with the looming possibility of cuts, he immediately rattled off a list of local and state legislators he’d contact, all of whom Wallace no doubt knows. But she errs when she glosses over Schmidt’s experience as UW-L’s representative on the City Council, experience Wallace and Ruplinger don’t have.
Schmidt and Dill have demonstrated that they understand leaders of a student body are bombarded with new ways to spend money. Both sit on committees that deal with budgets and both have stridently questioned attempts at new spending at these and other meetings.
“Students aren’t awash in money,” Schmidt told us, his voice unsteady with the passion for which he’s known.
Wallace and Ruplinger, who have added up how many Senate bills they’ve authored and committees they’ve chaired, returned to experience many times, just as Wallace and Erik Kahl did last spring in their campaign.
Voters who get a warm feeling when they hear the term “career politician” might find this argument to carry weight. But it doesn’t with us.
Nor does the claim that Wallace and Ruplinger will enthusiastically welcome student opinions that contradict their agenda. Wallace’s heavy-handed approach to conducting public relations is unbecoming of two organizations occupying the same mezzanine.
The Racquet isn’t in La-La Land about student fees; we’ve expressed our belief that the trajectory for tuition is upward and practically unstoppable.
But that doesn’t mean student leadership should be asleep at the switch. Like taxes in real elections, student fees should be a deciding factor in this election. Don’t vote for the candidates who promise to cut fees, because student leadership doesn’t have that much power. Don’t vote for the candidates who seem to think small fees don’t add up. Death by paper cuts is still death.
We support the candidates who have demonstrated they will act on their rhetoric and who will use common sense in managing student fees. Because we firmly believe this pair is Eric Schmidt and Kyle Dill, we endorse Eric for Student Association president and Kyle for vice president.
Schmidt and Dill will use common sense in representing students
Published: Thursday, April 8, 2010
Updated: Thursday, April 8, 2010 17:04
17 comments
I think some Senators are also upset over the concert since we were told it would initially be in the Witich Lawn, that it would be free and open to all students, and that it would be heavily advertised. I think the fact that none of these things turned out to be true shows evidence of the rushed nature and poor decision of spending $2500 to rent bikes.
In regards to why Karly was getting a rough time at the debate about not reaching out to organizations is that one of her top 5 goals listed under her UW-L Vice-President bio was to do just that. I think Schmidt was giving her more so of a rough time for not accomplishing any of her goals she listed on her bio page in September.
Lastly, Erin seems a little confused about Schmidt and Dill's calendar idea. It isn't the printing of paper calendars of events. I believe their intent is to keep a more accurate digital calendar of all events on UW-L's homepage and make sure its available resource for all organizations. So Erin, you are right in agreeing that it is a great idea in better utilizing the current event calendar. That is precisely what Schmidt and Dill have stated that they would do.
Schmidt gave Karly especially a hard time about not reaching out to student orgs or the dorms. But I never saw him or any other senator at a student organization meeting, so why is it all on Karly or Missy? The senators can choose to go to meetings on their own if they wanted to. Missy was quetioned about her and Karly's campaign signs and the waste it was. But Schmidt and Dill want to but an all-campus activities calander in every dorm and academic building? That sounds like a waste to me since we all ready have a calander that could be utilized better.