Associated Students, Inc.’s new Senate Resolution 2017-17 tries to put pressure on the California State University Board of Trustees to “freeze initiatives and the tuition increase for three to five years.”
ASI Senator-at-large Daniel Gomez introduced the resolution, dubbed Opposing Payment Peaks, on Wednesday.
“A portion of the resolution is for the ASI board of directors to urge the CSU BOT to stop the graduate initiative for 2025,” said ASI Senator-at-large Hilda Jurado. “The Board of Trustees should reevaluate the priorities of where they’re spending their money.”
One of the initiatives the BOT is pushing is the Graduation Initiative 2025, a plan to “improve six-year completion rates and halve achievement gaps” by establishing “new campus and system targets for 2025.”
Gomez cites Proposition 13 as one of the main reasons the university is stuck in the tuition-increase conflict. In the late 1970s, Californians passed the proposition in favor of low property tax rates. As a result, higher education lost funding as the state relied previously on property tax for funding.
The resolution began with frustrations with the CSU Board of Trustees. ASI officials spoke with Assemblyperson Anthony Rendon to “put pressure on the CSU BOT to freeze the tuition increase,” said Gomez. Rendon said he supported this action.
The name O.P.P. pays homage to rap group Naughty by Nature’s 1991 single of the same name.
“People under 23 usually don’t know the song,” Gomez said. “When younger people think of O.P.P., I want them to think of the resolution that would help freeze tuition and bring the funding back to higher education in California.”
The current deadline for the BOT to vote on the tuition increase is March 21. Gomez said he hopes for the possibility of getting the BOT to extend the decision to June or a revisit of the tuition increase at that time.
But, ASI Vice President Logan Vournas and ASI Executive Director Richard Haller are cautious of the timing of the resolution.
“We don’t know if a trustee will wait to move [the vote] until June unless the chancellor says so,” Vournas said.
Haller was concerned that the resolution wasn’t on the agenda as a first, second or third reading, meaning that it was intended to be passed Wednesday.
“The public hasn’t had an opportunity to see [the resolution],” he said.
ASI officials motioned to approve the first reading.
“This is radical change,” says Gomez. “We’re asking for a Prop 13 reform. The time is now for something like this. The political climate in this country is waking people up in this generation. We’re as woke as we’ve ever been.”
Secretary of City Affairs Alex Bellenger also warned of signs on different campuses from Identity Evropa, a white supremacist group that has canvassed universities with its posters.
According to the ASI Media Board of Trustees, College Beat TV is in the process of becoming a YouTube partner. This gives video creators the ability to monetize their content through ad revenue, paid subscriptions and merchandise.