Regents get final say on secession

The UNM Regents will determine whether or not the School of Law will secede from GPSA.
Of 343 law students, 110 voted from March 24-26 by e-mail ballot on whether they should leave GPSA. More than 70 percent voted in favor of succession.

Othiamba Umi, president of the Student Bar Association — the UNM School of Law student government — said 110 students is a high turnout.
“Essentially, when you have over 300 students, it’s hard to get that many to vote on anything because they’re so busy,” he said.
The SBA will now begin collecting signatures for a petition in favor of secession that they hope to present to the Board of Regents, said SBA President-elect Corinne Hale.

“We’re hopeful that there will be a secession from the GPSA, but we can’t make that binding decision. The Board of Regents has to,” she said. “Unfortunately with secession there’s not really a set pattern. No one has done it since the GPSA started.”
Hale starts her term as president of SBA on Thursday.

She said that if the law school waits to present its request for secession at the Regents’ next official meeting in the summer, it may be too late to keep student fees within the law school.

The law school gives $17,300 in student fees to GPSA each year, Hale said.
“We don’t feel that our funds are being appropriated correctly; we think that we’re putting in too much money and not getting enough back in return,” said law student Jonathan Turner.

Turner said that if SBA is the only student government representing the law school, then law school students will have more control over where their funding is spent.

Law student Stephen Ochoa said many law school students were frustrated that GPSA included a question about confidence in Athletics Director Paul Krebs’ handling of the Sept. 20, 2009 altercation between UNM football coach Mike Locksley and assistant coach J.B. Gerald on a special election ballot.

“That’s just not GPSA’s position,” Ochoa said. “We don’t think they’re a professional organization, so why would a professional school be a part of it?”
SBA Rep. Moses Winston said he thinks GPSA membership is useful to students.
“I see the value GPSA has for the law school,” he said. “I think they provide services for the law school. I think a lot of the current and future students would benefit from the services provided by GPSA.”

Winston said he has heard many students say that GPSA is more geared towards graduate programs and less toward professional programs, like the School of Law.
Winston said there is still a possibility that the law school won’t secede.
“I don’t think the SBA is dead set on either seceding or staying with the GPSA,” he said. “More so we’re going to respond to the student interest.”

Umi said SBA conducted the e-mail vote to gather information, and it’s up to the incoming council to decide where to go from here. He said law students have been talking about leaving GPSA for years.

“It’ll be up to the new students to keep this up, rally behind it and make sure we have a committee to gather information,” he said. “It’s going to be a lot of work.”

Umi said the SBA would be able to fund more students who travel for mock trials and conferences if its money wasn’t going to GPSA. He said he isn’t sure how secession will affect the law school’s relationship with graduate students.
“It might sever relationships between graduate students and law students, but it might not,” he said. “You really can’t project that until it happens.”