The Pointer UW-Stevens Point Student Newspaper
This semester, university senators created a piece of legislation that, if passed, would approve of locally sourced dumpster food to be served on campus.
The Student Government Association drafted a piece of legislation proposing the consumption of ‘waste receptacle sourced food’ on campus as safe and environmentally sustainable. All legislature is taken seriously, but this particular piece was written as a fun and entertaining learning experience for new senate members. While the veteran senators knew this statute was not written to be serious, the new senators were not aware.
John Peralta, president of SGA, said, “It gives the new senators a chance to speak out and talk about how erroneous it is – which happened that night.”
The proposal was drafted to be silly rather than serious, but a precautionary email was sent out to assure the public that dumpster food was not something that was actually going to be served on campus.
Veteran senators of the club drafted this to allow for new senators to learn what legislation should be taken seriously and what should not.
Peralta said, “Many parts of it are written a certain way to be taken apart because with legislation, you have to look at it in many different ways to ask the question ‘what does this mean and what does this affect?’ The words are very important.”
The proposal passed into the senate body to be voted on and was received with concern, especially from new senators who did not realize that the act on dumpster food was not completely serious.
Jim Lorrigan, chief of staff for SGA, said, “We do believe that there are first year senators that don’t know about this practice. We try to keep it that way so they can be surprised and learn genuinely.”
The senators also asked the public how they felt about eating dumpster food, which sparked controversy.
“All pieces of legislation follow a role. It is a learning experience to show senators how a piece of legislation goes through our body, both public and senate alike,” said Andrew Glazner, vice-president of SGA.
If somehow it were passed, the president of SGA could veto it. Peralta said that it is extremely unlikely that an act like this would ever be passed. It was, though, exciting to experience for both old and new senators.
Dumpster diving aside, SGA is working hard to ensure that students are happy with their academic experiences here on campus. There are currently student openings for the judicial branch and for the Pointer Partnership Advisory Board.
Alexa Dickson
News Editor
Alexa.S.Dickson@uwsp.edu
