By Matthew Pennekamp
Staff Writer
On Mar. 19, DCGA Senate met to discuss mostly procedural issues. At the top of the list was an effort by Rules Committee Chair Ian Shapiro to formalize Senate procedure and institutionalize it for subsequent generations of senators. Due to the fact that senate operations had never been officially codified, this was considered an important undertaking in order to ground the DCGA with the sense of officialdom which other elected bodies enjoy. However, it should be noted that this formalization does not deviate in any way from the procedural rules that have been understood as a fait accompli.
However, a small point of contention regarded the presence of outside observers (including the representative of this publication, in the interest of full disclosure) during debates. While some senators are pleased with the fact that the public eye has been turned onto the important deliberations being forged within the DCGA, others feel that the intimate environment of Denison, a school of roughly 2100 students, would make for a greater propensity toward hurt feelings and would thus like to see a distinction drawn between inclusion in policy debates and debates regarding the nominations of candidates for positions, which obviously involve airing out positive attributes as well as concerns.