Eminent Domain

I try to avoid most Marquette issues in this blog for a variety of reasons. However, this issue is too bad to ignore.

My friend over at Res Ipsa has a post about his crusade against the somewhat problematic Student Bar Association here at MULS. The enigmatic SBA has been allowed to run without much attention from the students. Every week, they run Bar Review, a Thursday night event at a local bar. But that's about it. Occasionally, they have an SBA sponsored "brown bag lunch", a lecture on a legal issue. Other than that, no one is really sure what they do exactly. Maybe they do lots of other stuff, but no one knows that they do anything else. They have failed to post the minutes of their meetings (as is required) until Mike demanded it. They didn't update their webpage with current members (I haven't met anyone who really knows the roster of the SBA) until Mike demanded it. All of the new "transparency actions" that the SBA has acted on lately have been because of Mike's efforts. He should be applauded for that.

I was also tipped off from a source within the SBA that they were about to pass a resolution a few weeks ago that would've closed their meetings. You see, the SBA's meetings are supposed to be open to the students. However, I don't know a single non-SBA member that knew when the meetings were. That information was not posted anywhere. Some of the members decided to just get rid of that pesky open meeting clause. Only when Mike brought these concerns to light did the SBA post a list of members in the student lounge and send a mass e-mail telling everyone when the meetings were. Before that, they were totally flying under the radar.

Now, this article comes out in The Verdict. I hadn't read The Verdict until Mike showed me the column, but it blew me away when I finally read it tonight...

While I am on the subject of things that do not make any sense to me, I have to add to the list individuals who question the SBA's mission and internal operations. Inevitably, these same individuals follow that question with the statement, "Oh, I don't even know what the SBA is...is that the organization that hosts bar reviews on Thursdays...oh, I know nothing about it." The individual, who most recently had an issue with the internal operations of the SBA, decided to interrogate me and was critical of the organization without even becoming apprised of the facts.

Oh, whatever. Spare me your persecution complex. The SBA has done everything in its power to run itself outside of the view of the students. Not posting the minutes from their meetings is a violation of the SBA's Constitution (according to my SBA source, which is why they were trying to change it). When one student asks "what exactly do you guys do?", you say that he does not "make any sense"? That's just insulting.

No one knows what the SBA does or is because its members have been derelict in their duties. They ignore their Constitutional duties, then try to alter the Constitution to accommodate their apathy. Why do any real work when it's much more fun to have a neat title to put on your resume?

Mike sums up the events nicely...

For calling attention to the deficiencies of the SBA and its members, I have [been] (Me: I'll let that mistake by; he probably typed this while really angry.) publicly criticized in an article endorsed by the SBA. (Yes, there was more than a single person who told me I was in the Verdict, and knew about my Crusade, so the article was readily identifiable). For failure to perform duties laid out in its Constitution, and for general apathy, I get labeled and misquoted to sound like the dumbest student in the law school.

And in closing...

So hat's off to you SBA, this is one person who has a reason to be apathetic. I do not plan to continue to attend meetings, or keep an eye on you.

He's done.

I'm probably not. At the very least, my big mouth is going to spread this around the law school. The truth needs to get out.