Editorial: Better to receive? Not for Senate

Student Senators currently receive gifts. Is that OK?

By Alex Doherty

Wednesday, April 16th, 2008

In the face of powerful lobbying from special interest groups, the Student Senate has lost some of its autonomy. Senate needs to adopt rules that will increase transparency and limit the amount and type of gifts it can receive.

Last week’s election offered students the opportunity to yield their most powerful check over the governing body that represents them — a vote. Not surprisingly, turnout was low. Only 4,207 students voted for president and vice president. The first step in reviving interest from students is making sure the issues they care about most passionately are the ones their representatives are focused on. Although ethics reform isn’t a hot-button issue, it is the first step in re-centering Student Senate around the students.

All gifts senators receive need to be publicly documented, allowing constituents to evaluate their senator’s interests. The senate could look to the United States Congress for guidance on what gifts are acceptable. Under congressional rules, all gifts must be unsolicited, cannot be valued at more than $50 and congressmen cannot receive more than $100 in gifts per calendar year. Whether Student Senate adopts the congressional guidelines or simply publishes a document of all gifts received, transparency needs to increase to ensure that students are being represented and not special interests.

Starting in Fall 2007, executive leadership in the senate received scholarships from the University administration. Kansas Athletics Inc. has, at the same time, continued to offer senators free tickets to games, with out-of-state trips and access to the chancellor’s box at Memorial Stadium for some executive leaders.

Thomas Cox, senior student senator from Shawnee, deals directly with these issues. Cox sits on the Chancellor’s Advisory Board on Athletics where he meets with Lew Perkins, Athletics Department representatives and the chancellor twice a semester to discuss Student Senate and its relationship with the Athletics Department.

In the past, Cox said he was able to obtain tickets to a football and basketball game through this relationship and that he was “afraid to lose such awesome perks.”

Cox went on to say “it hit me that I was completely failing to serve the student body like I was elected to do, because I put something else before the students.”

According to Cox, none of this is against any current Student Senate rules, as the senate does not have any rules governing gifts.

Cox said these perks and the fear of losing them led him to not think or act independently in regard to the Athletics Department.

Cox is currently preparing to present legislation that would ban any gift from the Athletics Department to senators.

Burdett Loomis, professor of political science, indicated this situation was “definitely in a gray area.”

Although Loomis voiced concerns, he also pointed to benefits that gifts can have. For instance, “it’s not illogical that the student body president or student body vice president come to these [events]. That’s what you do in politics,” he said in regards to executive leadership having access to the Chancellor’s Box at Memorial Stadium.

Loomis pointed out that having student representatives speak to leaders, such as the governor or chancellor at a game, can move the often slow wheels of bureaucracy forward and perhaps bring benefits to students.

Although moving the slow wheels along is important, ethics should not be sacrificed for expediency. A senate that runs on this principle is best-suited to lead itself back to a representation of the students and not special interests.

Alex Doherty for the editorial board

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