During a Student Senate meeting marked by division and bickering between parties, senators from the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences expressed heated disapproval of decisions that have kept them out of all Senate committees.
Four members of the Orange and Blue Party, all representing the college and who applied to different Senate committees, were rejected by the Replacement and Agenda Committee in a meeting Sunday night.
The committee appoints members to each of SG's five committees: Budget and Appropriations, Allocations, Judiciary, Rules and Ethics, and Information and Communication.
Mark McShera, CLAS senator and Orange and Blue Party member, said the decision leaves the roughly 12,000 students in the college without representation on any of the committees.
McShera encouraged all the senators to support fairness and reconsider the committee's Gator Party-only appointments - or else.
"When we relegate the Gator Party to the dust bin of history, we will not forget those who crossed us tonight," he said.
To "appease the chambers," Senate President Kellie Dale decided to allow Senate members to approve the nominations individually rather than as a block.
Still, all the senators named by the Replacement and Agenda Committee were confirmed.
The CLAS representatives were left out.
Ben Cavataro, Orange and Blue Party Senate leader, said he was most disturbed that the Replacement and Agenda committee held its meetings on Good Friday and Easter Sunday behind closed doors at the Reitz Union.
He said minutes were not taken of the committee's deliberations.
"There is no record of the discussion there, and with that void, no accountability," Cavataro said.
Mary Grace Bell, Senate president pro-tempore said she was "new at this position," and from now on, "all Sunshine laws will be followed."
Sam Miorelli, Orange and Blue Party president, took the podium to give the senators "the first of a long education series" about Florida Sunshine Laws, which call for open government meetings in the state. He handed Bell a copy of "the important pages" of the Sunshine laws, and Bell thanked him.
