The IU Student Association Congress failed to pass a resolution Tuesday that would have potentially bolstered the IU Safety Escort service and worked with IU Police Department to create a service that would allow police officers to walk students home during the service’s hours of operation.
Several Congress members said they were concerned the resolution did not include any concrete action besides a monthly update from the committee on its progress. Some said it could flounder and be forgotten about because the committee had not yet contacted Safety Escort organizers.
Under the resolution, IUSA would have worked with the Office of Student Affairs and Culture of Care to add more cars to the Safety Escort fleet and employ more drivers. They cited student wait times of an hour or more for a car as a reason for the resolution and planned to model the updated program after similar safety services at other Big Ten schools.
“It acts as a Band-Aid,” said Justice Eiden, who presented the bill on behalf of the Student Relations committee. “It’s kind of useless. If someone feels like they can’t get home safely and they’re looking for a ride and the service takes an hour plus to get to them, why use it?”
Representatives on other committees who had worked with Safety Escort services in past years said administrators had resisted expanding the number of cars even when offered three times the budget.
Some said they felt services are currently inadequate and were willing to vote on the bill in the hopes of amending a more concrete plan of action later. Rebekah Molasky said IU services were lacking compared to the ride services from her freshman year at Clemson University.
“The fact that IU, with 40,000 students, doesn’t have it is ridiculous,” Molasky said. “Paying out-of-state tuition, this should be provided to us. Our number one goal is safety.”
Other representatives said they felt it was a duty to pass bills that would benefit the student body and could be revised rather than vote them down and forget about the issue.
“Right now, our two options are to pass a bill that are going to hold us accountable to do this or we don’t and who knows what will happen,” George Pearcy, IUSA Congress parliamentarian, said.
The bill failed to pass with 15 votes in favor and 17 votes against.
Pearcy also brought forward a resolution that would work with Protect IU, the dean of students and several cultural centers to develop more comprehensive resources for reporting and recovering from hate crimes.
The resolution would work to create programs similar to other Big Ten schools’ resources and could potentially include things like a list of all hate crime reports from IU records and the Bloomington Police Department and a peer mentorship program for those who had been victim to a hate crime.
Like the previous resolution, representatives said they were concerned about lack of a concrete action plan because few cultural centers had been contacted before the bill was brought to a vote. The bill was tabled with no vote until it could be amended to include responses from student groups and the administration.
