The Experimental Media Organization has been barred from using their office for the next two weeks, following a Student Assembly vote on Monday. The group, which was accused of violating their constitution and Student Association protocol last week, were originally in danger of being de-chartered and completely evicted from the space.
But the decision ‘ originally suggested by the SA’s Rules Committee ‘ was upheld by the Assembly by a vote of 24 to five. However, debate during the meeting did not include Financial Vice President Chris Powell, who originally brought the charges against EMO.
Powell alleged that EMO and their subgroup, the Student Action Collective, were functioning illegally by not conforming to their own constitution. He said that members of SAC took over the defunct office, that they were in fact not operating primarily as EMO and that they should be evicted for two weeks.
Instead, the Rules Committee deemed the sentence too severe and recommended a brief suspension.
According to Boris Tadchiev, the head of the Rules Committee, the punishment was an appropriate response to the rules broken ‘ the group was found guilty of seven infractions, including not adhering to the goal of their group EMO’s digression from the goal of their group as constitution.
‘We considered de-chartering, freezing funds and taking away the office of the EMO, but we thought these were too severe,’ Tadchiev said. ‘Obviously we’re supposed to protect students and student groups, that’s the job of the SA. But we did want to show EMO that they broke some rules.’
According to Tadchiev, the suspension calls for no publication or activity, and the group will not be allowed to use their office.
‘I personally thought that taking away the room and de-chartering was not a good option,’ Tadchiev said. ‘They have a lot of members and yes, even if you do have a lot of members and you break the rules there should be some consequences. But they have a lot of members and this is something that the students like. They serve the school in my opinion.’
But Andrew Epstein, a member of EMO/SAC, was in fact expecting the group’s punishment to be much graver.
‘I sort of was expecting this result, if not harsher,’ Epstein said. ‘The SA, I feel, is run by a relatively small clique that I feel sometimes gets a little too caught up in the power they do have.’
There were those, like the SA’s Elections chair Michael Calabrese, who thought that the punishment did not reflect what he considered to be the severity of the crime.
‘I personally thought that it was not harsh enough ‘ When a student group is violating the rules like that, that many times, I think they should be punished,’ Calabrese said. ‘They should have to follow SA rules and there’s no reason they can’t.’
Calabrese said that by ‘EMO transitioning into SAC,’ the latter ‘cut the line’ in terms of office space.
But Executive Vice President Joe Danko, who voted against the decision, said that although some kind of penalty was to be expected, the discipline was too severe.
Given the length of a semester ‘ 14 weeks ‘ being suspended for two weeks was too long, he said.
‘ ‘ The one year probation would have been enough,’ Danko said. ‘This group was very quick in giving us a new constitution and worked with us instead of against us.’
On Wednesday the Rules Committee approved EMO’s new constitution ‘ which mentions SAC as a committee under the larger group. The document is now pending the approval of the general body of the SA, said EMO/SAC member Sherry Ashkins.
Ashkins echoed Danko’s concerns and said that the SA should be working with the students rather than penalizing them.
‘I personally feel like we didn’t deserve punishment,’ Ashkins said. ‘I feel the SA was trying to assert the little power they feel they have over people and that the SA should be working with students and trying to make sure they flourish instead of punishing.’