The Associated Students Inc. is considering a resolution to ask California State University, Long Beach to end relationships with organizations that have been known to discriminate against the LGBT community.
The idea behind the resolution arose when The Campus Pride, a national non-profit organization, informed Sen. Kelsey Reyes that CSULB’s current campus pride score would be decreasing.
The current campus pride score for CSULB is 4 out of 5 stars. The score is based on LGBT-friendly policies, programs and practices, according to campusprideindex.org.
“The score will be decreasing because the campus pride index is changing,” Reyes said.
The Campus Pride aims to create a safer LGBT learning environment on colleges and universities campuses, according to the website.
The senate members said they hoped to increase the score with the resolution that they discussed at their weekly meeting Wednesday.
Within the resolution, ASI will ask to discontinue the sponsorship between CSULB and outside entities that do not follow this new policy.
Chick-fil-A is advertised within the Walter Pyramid. Nearly three years ago, Chick-fil-A President and CEO Dan Cathy made a homophobic remark that stirred up a controversy surrounding the company, according to the Huffington Post.
“We, as ASI, support a non-discrimination policy of our campus, but it doesn’t mention anything about us associating with outside entities as far as them having to follow our policies,” Reyes said to the ASI Senate.
The new index will result in a new pride rating for CSULB that will be announced in March.
“I am hoping with this resolution that if we include this in our policy, then it will help our score,” Reyes said.
The senate tabled the resolution in order to make adjustments, and the members will discuss it further at future ASI Senate meeting.
The senate also discussed for the first time a proposal to change the ASI bylaws, asking for ASI to implement more involvement in promoting and advertising students to vote during general elections.
“[We need a] change in policy, a resolution to make and to do more than we can for students to be represented and for students to be able to vote,” Sen. Jose Salazar said when introducing the idea.
The current bylaws assign the duty of coordinating voter registration and voter turnout for CSULB students to Lobby Corps.
Salazar asked ASI to take more control of this duty in order to drive more voter turnout.
“Since we are all a political institution, we should address this,” Salazar said to the senate.
Salazar also proposed to have student media advertise more about voting in general elections.
The proposal did not have much support from other ASI senators, as many believed that asking student media to advertise on behalf of ASI could violate the first amendment.
The senate tabled the resolution because some senate members thought it might micro-manage Lobby Corps.
