The Student Government Association Senate overturned a presidential veto Wednesday, passing legislation that creates four more seats in the organizational caucus.
Steve Geraci, president pro-tempore and co-author of the bill, said the concerns of President Ben Tietz were not relevant to what the legislation was trying to accomplish.
Along with creating more seats, the legislation also allows organizations to apply for a seat year round. Before, the organizational caucus was the only one that required nominees to submit applications by the first full week of October. The other caucuses have rolling applications throughout the year.
The organizational caucus also had the fewest seats in the Senate, despite the presence of more than 300 organizations at Ball State University.
The override required a two-thirds vote by Senate to overcome the veto, which SGA President Ben Tietz gave Nov. 16.
Tietz said although he agreed with the changes the legislation makes, he was worried about how future SGA bodies would interpret the legislation.
"The executive branch feels that the legislation is much too ambiguous and that there are some processes that need to be clarified," Tietz said to the Senate Wednesday from a prepared statement.
The legislation needed to provide guidelines for the Credentials Board to follow when interviewing candidates for the organizational caucus, he said.
Sen. Liz Stephan, who voted against the override, said interviewing guidelines should be created because applying organizations would have a permanent seat on SGA. All other senators must reapply each year to keep their seat.
However, Geraci said he thought the legislation was as clear as it needed to be and adding further rules would have encumbered future SGA bodies.
Geraci also pointed out to the Senate that none of the application processes for a Senate seat are clearly defined in SGA bylaws.
Geraci said he and co-author Chris Kurtz would not have rewritten the legislation if the Senate had not overridden the veto.
"We would be vehemently opposed to going through that process again for minor changes," Geraci said.
Tietz said he still felt he made the right decision but would try to work with Senate leaders to create legislation that would address the problems the executive board had with the bill.
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