The Iowa State University Student Government killed a bill, recessed four times and sat 13 Senators to committees in a chaotic final meeting of the semester Wednesday evening.
A perfect storm of a new finance director, a new finance committee and miscommunication led to a bill dying during the Senate meeting.
The Skydiving Club requested line-item transfers to shift funds they believed to be unused to outstanding line items before the end of the semester.
“However, that money was spent and they didn’t realize it, because our software shows both the total amount something will cost, as well as how much the Student Government is allocating … but they used the amount from the total and tried to, put it to different amounts, but the total amount wasn’t what we funded,” Noah Kammeyer, a senior majoring in political science, said.
Kammeyer, the former finance director, noted that this mistake is common, but it is usually dealt with privately within the finance committee, not in a Senate meeting. Due to confusion over the line-items, the Senate recessed four times for deliberation over the bill.
The bill was ultimately killed because the totals on multiple of their line-item transfers were incorrect, and one line item was to pay for something that occurred in January, which cannot be covered by a line-item transfer.
While the president of the Skydiving Club, Mytchell Hagan, a senior majoring in finance, noted that there was confusion on the process due to the treasurer of the club being absent this semester, current Finance Director Luv Saini, a junior majoring in marketing, chastised him for not communicating with the finance committee.
“Next time, please reply to the emails and please show up to the committee. We wouldn’t have been dealing with this over in the Senate and multiple calling for recesses,” Saini said.
An amendment was also needed for funding the Graduate Student Association of Hospitality Management’s trip to Las Vegas for a conference.
While the bill passed 21-0-0, Kammeyer raised concerns about a suggested amendment from the finance committee.
The finance committee’s amendment, with the support of Saini, zero-funded the expense category in their allocation and took $1,834.62 from the Special Projects account to fund the trip instead.
“So, while I understand the record-keeping sense of wanting to have this amendment, I am concerned that trying to mess with the budget, especially after it’s already been approved and we’ve done the whole thing with the Big Picture Bill, might be asking too much and also we’ll make our annual allocation just not look correct,” Kammeyer said.
While the trip was initially included in the organization’s annual allocations for the fiscal year 2027, which begins in July, funding for the trip is needed before that time, necessitating the expense line be zero-funded and taken directly from the Student Government.
Initially, the money was supposed to be taken out of the Senate Discretionary account; however, multiple Senators noted that there is only $1,279.28 in the account. An amendment was passed to use the Special Projects account instead.
While the Senate typically dresses in business casual attire, today most Senators showed up wearing jeans to commemorate Sexual Assault Awareness Month.
“Denim Day started after an incident where somebody was not able to seek justice because their jeans were too tight. So victim blaming has become part of rape culture and everything like that, and that’s something that the student government previously and plans to continue backing,” Vice Speaker Claire Hartley, a junior majoring in political science, said.
In addition to wearing jeans, Brody Norton, with the Student Health and Wellness Office, gave a presentation to the Senate regarding “green flags,” such as how to give and receive consent and how to identify red flags in interpersonal relationships.
The Senate additionally unanimously passed a joint resolution with the executive branch commemorating Denim Day and Sexual Assault Awareness Month.
The following external matter was passed without dissent
- ISU Baseball Club Debt Contract totaling $2,145.68 to be paid over eight semesters
The following internal matters were passed without dissent
- Seating Ethan Fligge, a junior majoring in supply chain management, on the finance committee
- Seating Calder Carroccia, a sophomore majoring in management, on the finance committee
- Seating Amanda Quarshie, a graduate student in civil engineering, on the academic affairs committee
- Seating Emma Vallie, a junior majoring in electrical engineering, on the sustainability committee
- Seating Kyle Rusch, a senior majoring in mechanical engineering, on the sustainability committee
- Seating Grant Pautsch, a junior majoring in urban planning, on the local affairs committee
- Seating Ben Dauman, a junior majoring in mechanical engineering, on the local affairs and legislative ambassadors committee
- Seating Colton Pepin, a sophomore majoring in animal science, on the local affairs and legislative ambassadors committee
- Seating Philip Babatunde, a graduate student in immunobiology, on the health and wellness committee
- Seating Eaon Martens, a senior majoring in aerospace engineering, on the health and wellness committee
- Seating Joey Romare, a sophomore majoring in political science, on the legislative ambassadors committee
- Seating Bayne Bernal, a first-year majoring in agricultural business, on the legislative ambassadors committee
- Seating Grant Pautsch, a junior majoring in urban planning, on the legislative ambassadors committee
This meeting concludes the first session of the current Student Government. The Senate will resume with the second session beginning in the fall semester of 2026.