The first Associated Students, Inc. (ASI) meeting of the spring semester was held on Wednesday, Feb. 12 at 4 p.m. After the meeting, three executives shared their goals and priorities for the new semester.
Shortly after the routine introductory portion was complete, Peter Robertson, who was heavily involved in the implementation of the Victor. E Bulldog Statue, thanked ASI for their support in the project.
“It’s a project that I was lucky enough to work on in front of the [Resnick Student Union] and [it] took two years to fundraise and fabricate and produce that, and it took another year to get a plaque made,” Robertson said. “I know it’s gonna be there for a long time to come.”
Victor E. Bulldog himself also made an appearance at the meeting.
Following that brief presentation, the senate passed a notion nominating Melanie Mora as the new senate secretary of ASI.
ASI President Faith Van Hoven additionally presented the consent calendar for senate approval, which was passed.
Action Item 7.4 concerned the lack of attendance from Maris Prado, senator of the Jordan College of Agricultural Sciences and Technology, and the issue of whether or not her scheduling conflicts should be excused. If it was determined that her attendance not be excused, then the senate would propose her resignation.
“I do think that this college deserves representation [and] I think Senator Prado has done a great job of that, but I do think that there’s no way that we can allow a senator to stay in this position if she doesn’t have a proxy,” said Carlie Hall, senator of Veteran and Transfer Affairs. “I think that the Jordan College deserves to have somebody there to vote for them.”
After some deliberation and debate, the senate unanimously ruled that Prado is to find a proxy before the next senate meeting and the legal team is to make changes in the bylaws regarding the issue.
The meeting concluded with executive, senator and staff reports. Marco Florez, vice president of external affairs, gave a statement regarding student accessibility on campus.
“We were able to have representatives on every committee, so system-wide legislative and then the board of directors talked about five key changes,” Florez said. “There was a legislative proposal to improve accuracy of costs and of attendance and budget for student success, [to] increase access to the campus and housing for college students with experience in foster care and homelessness, which were both co-sponsored by the CSSA body unanimously.”
After the meeting adjourned, President Van Hoven, Vice President of Finance Guadalupe Zamudio Telles and Executive Vice President Frederick Lisitsa participated in interviews with The Collegian.
“This year, we’re really working on transitioning,” Van Hoven said. “We’re also working on fine tuning a few more details, which you guys will see, hopefully coming forth in regard to each position and how they function.”
Van Hoven also expressed her desire to become more involved with the community this semester at Fresno State.
“One of the main things that I hope to accomplish in the spring semester is definitely getting through budget calls and making sure that the budget is revised and approved for the next cohort,” Zamudio Telles said. “It’s one of my biggest goals to promote as much transparency when it does come to the budget, since this is student fees going into it.”
Last semester, Zamudio Telles was able to award $200 to 15 students who were approved for the grant as a way of giving back to the community. She is extremely proud of this gesture.
“Their applications were reviewed and made sure that they qualified, and they got the grant, so I hope to expand on that,” she said.
Lisitsa discussed his priorities, too.
“We’ve been working really hard on making sure that every college is established, there are some colleges that don’t need that, but there are some colleges that simply don’t have a leadership council active,” Lisitsa said. “At the end of the day, it’s transparency. It’s infrastructure, and then generally it’s student involved events and less work with admin like previous ASIs have done and more student-based events where we’re funding their requests, we’re helping them with making events happen.”
ASI applications to run for office for the 2025-26 academic year are open until Feb. 21, and elections will take place shortly after. All meetings are open to the public to attend every other Wednesday from 4-6 p.m. in RSU Room 207.
