According to three Student Association members, it’s time the SA became more accountable for the money it allocates.

SA speaker Robert Batey and senators Dion Smith and Andre Ramsey are co-sponsoring a bill that would amend SA bylaws to require the SA speaker and senators to monitor time sheets and progress reports for SA members. Batey, Smith and Ramsey will present the bill to the Senate at Sunday’s 6 p.m. meeting at the Holmes Student Center’s Clara Sperling Sky Room.

“There isn’t an efficient checks and balances system for the amount of work that the directors of the SA produce,” said Ramsey, a first-term senator who has worked in the SA for four years.

When asked if he felt corruption was present in the Campus Activities Board or the SA, SA Senator Josh Alvarado declined to comment. He did, however, say he felt the bill was necessary because the SA and the CAB were “closed off from the student population.”

“A lot of these guys schedule office hours, but they’re hardly ever there,” Alvarado said. “That’s a big issue because they’re still clocked in and being paid through student fees. Nobody’s holding them accountable.”

Ramsey, a former SA mass transit director, said he and his colleagues plan to add the CAB to the bill Sunday. In the future, Ramsey hopes the bill can be expanded to include additional SA groups.

“We want to send a message to the student body that the Senate is going to hold these groups accountable,” Ramsey said.

Smith said the bill began in 2005 when he and Ramsey were both SA directors.

“We were both thinking of all the stuff we were doing, and none of it was being documented,” said Smith, who was formerly a student life director. “If there’s nothing like this [bill] in place, there’s a temptation to take advantage of that.”

If the bill passes with the CAB tagged on, Smith, who is also president of the CAB, would be sponsor of a bill that would hold his staff more accountable.

The provisions for accountability – sign-in sheets and weekly reports – have already been put into place within the CAB, Smith said.

“He’s very open,” Ramsey said of the CAB president.

Alvarado feels the bill comes at a time when the SA and CAB’s integrity has been called into question.

“It could be, in large, due to some articles that have come out calling for CAB to be accountable for their expenses,” Alvarado said. “I’ve heard several students ask, ‘What are you guys doing with your money? How is it spent?’ “