‘Buttongate’ debate questions role of precedents

A debate over funding buttons led to tensions between transparency and equality during the Jan. 25 meeting of the Northern Iowa Student Government senate in the University Room.

The debate, which some senators have dubbed "Buttongate," centered around a bill to allocate $260 to the Black Student Union for buttons to be used during a period of silence in honor of those who fought and died to end segregation. The Organization and Finance Committee's guidelines say nothing about denying funding for buttons, but, as Senator Jared Parker noted during the meeting, NISG had previously denied funding for buttons and ribbons during the current budgetary year.

Senators debated back and forth for more than an hour, with some against denying funding when the guidelines don't prohibit it and others arguing that funding buttons in this case would be unfair to organizations that were previously denied funding. After a recess, the senate denied the funding on a vote of 8-11-3.

"To fund BSU for buttons would basically say to those other student organizations that we value BSU more than we value that other organization," said Spencer Walrath, student body president. "We have to be impartial when it comes to funding student organizations."

For some senators, the debate highlighted a lack of transparency and communication between NISG and student organizations, which must follow currently unwritten precedents that the relatively young Organization and Finance Committee wasn't even aware of.

"I think it was a debate over a changing of the guard in senate," said Ryan Alfred, speaker of the senate. "I think it was precedent vs. a new Organization and Finance Committee, new ways that we want to fund."

To remedy this, the committee will work on revising the funding guidelines during their meeting Monday evening, presumably to explicitly define what they will and will not fund.

"We have to right the wrong from this point forward and put in our guidelines, yes, we're gonna fund buttons, stickers, ribbons and all that… instead of just agreeing upon and never putting it in black and white," committee chair Darvel Givens said.

Givens hopes to have the revisions ready in time for the senate to discuss them during their meeting Wednesday, with the intent of getting senate approval in time for the budgetary process for student organizations, which must submit their budgets by Feb. 15. Such bills normally require two weeks of discussion by the senate, but the by-laws have been waved in the past on pressing issues, "which is what we hope to do, but we can't put our hopes in that. We just have to remember that there are regular deadlines as well," Givens said.

Givens is also considering the possibility of pushing back budget hearings if the revisions aren't passed in time, "because the changes that will be made will benefit student orgs."

Senator KaLeigh White, who voted against the bill, thinks it's important for the committee to follow the explicit guidelines and to ensure that they match the committee's decisions.

"I think, in general, those unwritten rules shouldn't exist," she said. "… Obviously, you're not gonna be able to account for every single circumstance, but I think there's too much gray."

For Walrath, the heated debate was invigorating in a senate session full of unanimous votes with little discussion.

"It reminded me of the senate days of old, in that we had a lengthy debate over something that was, from the outside perspective, significantly small… but the idea behind the debate was of very great importance, because it had the potential of impacting so many previous and future decisions," he said.