June 4, 2024

Senate Business

President, Adriana Garcia called the classified senate meeting to order on June 4, 2024 at 2:09 PM. Both the current meeting agenda and previous meeting notes were approved by consensus.  

Affordable Housing 

Eric Reed, Affordable Housing Task Force Facilitator, spoke to senators about his committee's work. They are researching how other colleges handled affordable housing and wish to responsibly plan the spending  $200 million appropriated from measure G towards this endeavor. He also covered the feasibility studies the district has done. The current recommendation, after consultation with the board, places employee housing on the Foothill campus and student housing near the De Anza campus.      The task force wishes to enter a public-private partnership to enable a developer to use land purchased by FHDA for the housing because they believe $200 million is not enough. Details of these plans are in handouts whose links appear at the end of these notes. Eric also answered questions from attendees. He noted the specific types of housing has not yet been decided. 

Elections 

Alex reported the runoff election was successful and he listed all the winners for next year's Senate membership.  They are: 

• Dennis Shannakian – Classified Senate President 
• Deborah Armstrong – Secretary 
• Juan Diaz – Communications Officer 
• Adam Contreras - Senator Lead - Operational & Facilities Area of Focus 
• Andre Meggerson - Senator Lead - Operational & Facilities Area of Focus 
• Chelsey Taniguchi - Senator Lead - Student Services & Technology Area of Focus 
• Adriana Garcia - Senator Designee - Equity, Inclusion, and Recognition Area of Focus 
• Margarita Hawthorn - Senator Designee - Operational & Facilities Area of Focus 
• Gulzhan Alieva - Senator Designee - Planning & Budgeting Area of Focus 
• Sushini Chand - Senator Designee - Student Services & Technology Area of Focus 
• Connor McGill - Senator Designee - Student Services & Technology Area of Focus 

Vacancies include: treasurer, Vice-President, president-elect for 2025-2026 and second senators for equity plus operations and facilities and planning and budgeting.   

Asks 

Adriana is recruiting people for planning the summer leadership gatherings and asked for volunteers. She is also hoping to form a professional development committee focusing on the ongoing needs of classified staff, planning activities  that Senate can manage. Stacy offered to help with professional development, and Maritza with passing the torch. 

she also announced the need for a eqquity action council tri-chair, and Debee volunteered for that. Additional the senate has been asked to find a classified person to serve on the hiring and search committee for the next college president. 

Upcoming 

Adriana announced next week the senate will hear a presentation and be able to ask questions about the proposed medical facility. 

Committee Reports 

Maritza gave updates on DASG activities. Lisa Ly reported on the governor's May budget revise  which has a larger than expected deficit. However, she reported fuding for community colleges appears at this time, unchanged. She also reported the in-person visit for reaccrediting the college will commence in October. She said senior staff will be preoccupied preparing for that visit. 

Juan announced an ongoing form that people can fill out to give commendations “flowers” to staff. People receiving these appreciations will be noted in the Senate Signal. 

After affirmations and announcements of upcoming events, the meeting adjourned  at   3:02 PM. 

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 Links Mentioned in the Chat 

• Current Agenda with previous meeting notes attached: Agenda for June 4th
• Affordable Housing Task Force Information: Google Form
• Leadership Reports: Word Document
• Current De Anza Financial reports
• Share your shoutouts/flowers!