Hamline Undergraduate Student Congress’s (HUSC) General Assembly meeting kicked off with video footage of otters in nature before Internal President Abi Grace Mart called the meeting to order.
Senior Representative Emely Quintero introduced the first topic of the meeting with a question about potential funding cuts to the Food Resource Center (FRC). Mart, as well as External President Travis Matthews and Treasurer Ollie Engstrom explained that HUSC is attempting to slowly decrease their funding of the FRC so that University funds are required to supplement funding, until HUSC is no longer financially supporting the FRC. Mart and Matthews explained that the ultimate goal is that student fees will go down, and that the FRC becomes an institutionally provided resource rather than one students are being charged to sustain.
Currently HUSC provides the FRC with $15,000 in funding, a majority of which pays the student workers at the FRC, Mart and Matthews said.
“I think it’s really inappropriate to ask students to fund this when [food] is a basic necessity, this is a basic need for students,” Matthews said in the meeting.
Dean of Students Patti Klein-Kersten added that in addition to HUSC’s $15,000 in funding, the FRC is additionally funded by grants and some institutional funding. Kersten also said that she is continuing to look for ways that the FRC could be financially supported, including talking to the university’s advancement team in regards to potentially speaking with donors about reallocating endowment funds to the FRC. Kersten said that supporting the FRC is something that the Request for Proposals (RFP) Committee is also considering as they interview potential future dining service companies.
At the upcoming GA meeting on Apr. 9, the Executive Budget for the 2024-2025 academic year will be presented and official changes to any current HUSC funding will be discussed then.
Official business continued with the presentation of an amendment to HUSC’s bylaws to merge the roles of Student Organizations Committee (SOC) chair and the Political Affairs Committee (PAC) chair. The amendment was presented by Maddie Christensen who currently holds both positions, and has a unique understanding of how the roles can be consolidated.
All the HUSC student representatives who were present voted yes, and the amendment passed with a two-thirds majority accounting for absent representatives.
HUSC GA is hosted weekly on Tuesdays during convo hour in GLC 100E.