Minutes of the MIT Dormitory Council meeting of October 2, 2008 The meeting was held at Burton-Conner. All dorms were present. Guest: Donna Denoncourt, Associate Dean for Residential Life. Treasurer Election (moved up) Treasurer candidates: - Danny Katz, freshman 14/15, Baker, class treasurer in high school 4 years, interested in finance as a career, UA senator - Cyril Lan, sophomore 6/15, Baker, UA senator, Baker exec, TechFair - Michael Poon, sophomore 6, Random, "knows how to add and subtract", Random RAC - Carrie Keach, junior 21M, Random social comm *white ballot, all nominated* Dormitories vote, Michael wins Updates HSG (Housing Strategy Group) meeting. There wasn't too much talk about anything undergraduate; probably the newest thing that came up is ripping up the sidewalk on Dorm Row. This will be a yearlong project. They'll get to the end of Burton-Conner by this semester, and finish off up to Next by next term. They're putting in ... new sidewalks. Donna: It's a beautification campaign, funded in part by the FSILG alumni. Kristen: If any of you have read the Tech, you know the ATO guys have been living with us. We've been informed they're living with us the rest of the term. We are being compensated through the house budget... Joe: We had a house team meeting at the beginning of the term; they said it was an emergency housing situation and mid-October it will be re-evaluated. This Wednesday we heard they're staying to the end of the term. Aziz: The decision to get the house back has been approved; they just need to do the construction to be able to move back in. Joe: We're sympathetic to ATO and realize it's a complex issue, but we feel we're not being represented. Four of our entries are significantly impacted. I was trying to find common space in the dorm yesterday and there wasn't much. Joe: We're not upset at ATO. We know they need a place to live. We just were told that this was an emergency and we could negotiate later, but now we've just been told that they'll stay with us for a whole term and we'll get monetarily compensated, and we weren't aware of the decision until after it's done. Preeya: Is there a way that you can go to the housemaster and housing dean and ask to renegotiate? James T.: I don't know if that will necessarily be productive at this point. Vinayak: The point is we don't want this to happen again. Kristen: It's not a problem between the ATO guys and the students in Macgregor. Donna: As a person from the administration, I know that at the time it was a crisis, and it was the only building that didn't have crowds. At this point, I don't know what happened, except that the emergency somewhat continues. We thought October 15th was what we heard from the construction overseer, but that's not what happened. Vinayak: Did you hold the construction people responsible? Donna: I don't know. Dining James: There was a blue ribbon meeting. There is a lot of data ... a packet of data. Hundreds of pages of PDFs of data. The person from the survey company could answer any question. We'll get a public report about the incredible survey that was done. Dining chairs, did you get any of the e-mails from blue ribbon dining? (them): No James: OK. I'll ask Donna to update the lists. Brittany: How many student representatives were there? James: Me, Colleen from Dormcon, a couple of people from UA - Noah, Bennie, Erin, Martin, and then reps from three of the dorms. Vinayak: How old is the Blue Ribbon committee? What decisions have been made? Donna: October 27 of last year. We haven't made any decision, but we've put the focus groups together, ran the survey, and did benchmarking with some other institutions. We've just done data collection so far Risk Management Vinayak: First, the online party registration system is hopefully back. We think we've gotten all the requisite approval. So we'll try it for East Campus and Burton-Conner, and if it works out well, we'll extend it to all the dorms Vinayak: There's a new drug abuse committee. Donna, Danny, Erik Fogg, I'll hopefully be on that. Vinayak: There's a SLOPE subcommittee meeting, where we discussed the aftermath of REX. We talked about the philanthropy event and came to a verbal agreement about making it after the lottery closes. Vinayak: Apparently the IFC rush chairs think there were a lot of violations by dorms. I asked them to send me a report. James: Yeah, they e-mailed me. Baker had a "mandatory house meeting". It turned out it wasn't mandatory. Vinayak: The other issue was floors taking freshmen off campus, into Boston, etc. James: If it's "free-flowing" and "non-mandatory", it is in fact allowed. Just as long as they can leave at any time and it is not mandatory. If you take them to J.P. Licks, as long as they can leave... Vinayak: There was also reports of alcohol in the dorms. They named Baker, BC, EC, and SH. I know at EC we found one violation. It was technically before the agreement kicks in, but we did catch them. Vinayak: I've asked them for more documentation or evidence. Vinayak: Also, the agreement has no penalties for violations, so if it breaks down, apparently it becomes a free for all. Perhaps we can have some penalties enforced by DormCon and IFC against their members Preeya: DormCon is a loose confederacy; we can't actually fine dorms. Kip: I'll talk to the JudComm from IFC. Fraternities can bring cases through DormCon JudComm against DormCon or any dorm. James: I think that's more coming from Dave Kennedy's office. Vinayak: The last item on the SLOPE committee meeting is the Daily Confusion. People wanted a clause about the language. JudComm Keri: At the last house meeting, residents of Senior House voted not to have a representative to DormCon JudComm. Student Engagement Committee James: This is really new. It's the four presidents of the undergrad student body, the four exec members of GSC, a whole bunch of administrators like the Chancellor, the Dean for Graduate Students, the Secretary of the Corporation, etc. etc. It's a way for the entire student government groups to say things to the administration that we so often whine about. It's a way to get more collaboration between other presidents. There was a meeting this Tuesday to set up what we're going to do this year. The most important thing we talked about was police, most importantly having to do with hacking. There are a few brutality cases from the IFC, too. We're basically concerned if this is a shift in policy. We'll appoint a subcommittee to talk to John diFava and other leaders of MIT police. Because that was the only agenda item, Phil Clay said he's hoping for more agenda items, that we can discuss some bigger things. Preeya: Dining? James: that was like the second thing that came up. The RIAA, also. W1. Other Business James: Should we have a retreat? We had one last year. If there are specific agenda items, then sure. Otherwise, it doesn't seem like a good use of money. Preeya: It's a good way for new presidents to meet and stuff Brittany: It was useful last year. We talked a lot. (someone): Maybe not, if it's not going to be immediately after elections. Aziz: I volunteer to host the next meeting Budget Tony: There will be no house tax, because we have so much surplus. Donna: ...Does that mean the person who takes house taxes needs to not take them? Because I just spoke with her today... Tony: Also, we have a lot of event budget, because we have so much surplus. Vinayak: I'd like to add $500 to the food line item, because we always dip into reserves / discretionary for food. Motion to vote *everyone seconds* *all dorms vote in favor* REX -> $6500 Exec Discretionary -> $1000 Attendance Incentive -> $0 Meeting Food -> $1000 Events -> $18000 GPI Kathleen Li: We want $1000, $200 each for 5 study breaks during Poverty Week, to have discussions in the dorms. lots of people: Wait, that's not enough. $2000 *so moved, white ballot*