ASWSU election voting for 2024 is scheduled to start March 7 and end on March 8. 

The schedule for the next elections was approved by the Senate. The senators briefly considered moving the days of voting earlier so more people would be on campus before spring break, although they eventually agreed not to move the date.

The senators heard from Director of Communications Sydney Berger and Travis Luther, deputy director of communications. They announced they are promoting the election for next year, in hopes of spreading awareness and encouraging students to apply.

Berger said they are currently looking to order apparel for graduating seniors. There are three new positions to fill: Chief of Staff for the executive team, three senate positions and members for the judicial board, Berger said.

The senators mentioned that the deadline was last week to get every budget in, and they did not receive them all, which violates the bylaws. The timeline of presenting the budgets is in 25-minute increments and all affiliated auxiliaries have to present at least once a semester according to the bylaws, which the Senate will go over next meeting. 

The next guest was Luke Deschenes, director of Community Affairs. He gave an update on a few things the department has been working on in the last few months, including the tree lighting in December 2022 and the most recent Pullman Chamber of Commerce meeting. 

The City of Pullman is going through a rebranding right now and an update will be given Thursday at 4 p.m., he said.

Deschenes said he also went to the College Hill Association board meeting last week and will be launching an initiative sometime in the future to encourage increased residence on College Hill. 

The joint senate and Pullman City Council meeting will be held in March, Deschenes said.

The senators then discussed that they are currently working on a few resolutions, one of them is meant to help improve mental health in the residence halls and the other is meant to re-establish the end-of-the-year clothing haul to the residence halls where residents can donate clothes as they move out for the year.

The senators also considered the upcoming meeting of the budget council to hear from the registered student organizations about their requested budgets for the next school year. This meeting will be held on both Feb. 4 and 18.

In addition, the senators considered the resolution that was passed last week meant to increase security within the residence halls. They considered a possible solution to the problem of security, which would be placing cameras on the outside of the side doors in the buildings.

The Senate took a vote to see how they feel about further exploring the possibility of putting cameras on the inside of the buildings. The senators voted unanimously to consider this option.

The senators next presented a letter from All-Campus Senator Carlos Romero, where he announced he would be resigning from his office in order to focus on improving his grades and preventing burnout.

“I am grateful that I have had time to work with the 52nd senate council,” Romero’s letter read.

The meeting ended with the reaffirmation that both Chancellor Elizabeth Chilton and Police Chief Gary Jenkins will be coming sometime during the fall semester and the senators were encouraged to prepare questions for them.