Cheng: Richmond underminded SGA

Student Government Association Gov. Ron Cheng called fellow governor Taylor Richmond a "poor student representative" Wednesday night after organizing a non-sanctioned Speak Up event.

Cheng made the remarks at the group's weekly meeting.

Cheng felt Richmond organized a Speak Up event, an SGA sponsored forum to listen to students' concerns, without notifying the rest of the Board of Governors. Richmond said he did not organize the event but did invite himself to attend.

The Speak Up event in question was an open meeting of the Resident Assistant Council Wednesday evening.

Richmond sent an e-mail the day of the event urging governors to attend, saying he had tried to make RAC issues a Speak Up topic in the past, but his idea had been shot down.

"It's our responsibility to hold each other accountable and police each other on behaviors that are inappropriate," he said. "If (Gov. Cheng) thinks I did something wrong, that's his job. I saw that something wasn't getting done, and I took steps to address it."

Richmond said he was in contact with RAC because last year his SGA platform revolved around RAC issues. Richmond said he was continuing work on his platform by attending the RAC meeting.

Cheng felt Richmond was acting as SGA's sole representative because he wanted to gain RAC votes for his presidential campaign.

"Taylor Richmond is not SGA," Cheng said. "I tried to give him the benefit of the doubt, but don't lie to me because I will call you out. He was undermining this administration, and it's absolutely despicable."

SGA already planned to consider RAC issues at next month's Speak Up Event, said SGA Vice President Whitney Rae Peters.

She called Richmond's actions "transparent" and was upset that he did not consult with her or SGA's outreach directors.

Richmond apologized to the board and said his actions were misconstrued. He added later that if he had known a Speak Up event was planned for next month, he would have suggested that RAC issues be the focus.

During reports, Gov. Cameron Taylor announced that SafeRIDE had resolved a lot of issues and established a budget.

Presented by Ric Hogerheide, a freshman environmental protection major, the SafeRIDE program would provide a shuttle for intoxicated students to decrease the number of drunken-drivers on campus.

Issues concern whether SafeRIDE's liability would fall on the city or the University.

"One of the issues raised was this program could encourage student drinking," Hogerheide said. "I made it clear that we are facilitating people who decide to (make)this dumb decision. We're there to keep them safe. It's Mountaineers helping Mountaineers."

Hogerheide said the budget for the program was in the range of $50,000, and the SafeRIDE board has found a way around the liability issue.

"We talked about renting vans from Enterprise and purchasing insurance for individual drivers," Hogerheide said. "That way, the liability is not on the University."

Currently the program is looking for sponsors and does not have an official launch date, but it is in the "foreseeable future," Hogerheide said.