Some of the first challenges that members of the ASG will face next school year 2024-2025 are to review and modify the Associated Student Government (ASG) bylaws, and the ASG Constitution, and make public records transparent on the website.

One responsibility of ASG officers is to meet once a week to discuss issues that impact student lives. They also are required by the ASG constitution and the bylaws that govern them, though neither has been modified since 2020, leaving gaps in regulations and confusion as to how the bylaws should be interpreted.

Blake Balajadia, Director of Student Activities and Development, also an advisor to the ASG officers pointed out that rules about stipend distribution to ASG members need to be included during the ASG meeting on May 1st, in which members discussed the budget reduction allocated for the following year and how much of the current ASG board’s budget should be allocated to the stipends of the next administration. 

According to Balajadia, the current ASG officers need to decide what percentage of the budget to allocate for stipends. However, the incoming student representatives are in charge of fixing gaps within the bylaws.

“This board will be done in two weeks.  They won’t have enough time “[two weeks]” to do it (…)  The new board will need to decide on what makes sense for them and their first meeting back,” Balajadia said.

To guarantee the transparency and accountability established by the Brown Act, the following Board of Directors of student representatives must facilitate access to any public document and records. This includes agendas and minutes. The Brown Act also states that ASG publishes financial reports, budgets, contracts, and any other document of public interest, safeguarding sensitive data on its website with their exceptions. 

The Chief of Justice and ASG Board Member, Vitumbiko Kambilonje, said all financial reports are done in person but they can be improved.

“In the two cycles that I have been a participant on the Board. We’ve always discussed our finances in public, [we adhere to the] Robin Roberts Rules, [and]  also the Brown Act (…)  so if there’s any deficiency involved, then we should fix it,” Kambilonje said. 

Currently, on the SJCC ASG website, users can only review the agendas and minutes. Dates are not recorded and sometimes the agendas are duplicated. Furthermore,  there is no way to contact ASG members directly because in the contact section of their website the link is broken and there are no emails listed to manually contact them, further blocking accessibility.

Balajadia, who worked with ASG members for ten years, said in an interview with the City College Times that in all his time as advisor of ASG, financial reports have never been uploaded to the website.

“To answer your question. No, the whole time. It’s very much person-to-person, but it’s not necessarily anything that I’ve seen on the website yet,” Balajadia said.

This raises questions about transparency since statutes within the bylaws establish that the Vice President of Finance is responsible for the preparation and presentation of financial reports on expenses, disbursements, and receipts of public resources used – but none of this information has been published on the ASG website for  10 years. 

Part of ASG’s budget comes from the Student Representation fee that is collected from students who enroll in San Jose City College each semester. Because these funds are derived from the student body, their management should be public and accessible information for any query based on the Ralph M. Brown Act, California Government Code.

Juan Cristobal Jacinto, Vice President of Finance at ASG, said that ASG’s failure to publish records is not a lack of transparency, since financial reports are made public in all the meetings and reported to the board, but he does not know why the information was never published.

“I don’t know why we don’t post them (…) But it’s public information. It’s not on the website, which maybe it should be. And that’s something that we can change,” Jacinto said.

 Next ASG is ready to correct inherited errors

Newly elected President of ASG, Priyam Tated, a Computer Science student, committed to working directly with the Advisors of the ASG board to update and correct deficiencies within bylaws before the next semester starts.

“We will be going through the whole bylaws (…) and see if there is any clarification needed (…) So before the fall semester starts, we will have things already ready,” Tated said.

Although he acknowledged that he must learn more about the issue of transparency regulations to make appropriate decisions regarding publishing financial reports. 

For his part, the elected Vice President of Finance, Brian Castillo, admitted that although he “didn’t read in detail” or understand the Constitution or the Bylaws that govern ASG, (which explains the responsibilities of each member), he said he will “review and take charge of”.

“I will create the reports and everything and then publish it on ASG website. I will work with the Vice President of Marketing to publish it,” Castillo said.