ASUNM sets sights on housing early

ASUNM’s first meeting of the school year commenced Wednesday evening, with senators tackling subjects including printing costs and new student housing.

Kim Murphy, director of Real Estate, discussed new student housing projects on main campus. Murphy said graduate students are working on designing the new residence halls, and it’s possible an older residence hall will be torn down, though he didn’t specify which one.
ASUNM President Lazaro “Laz” Cardenas said student input is needed to help come to a decision on the building plans, the construction location and additional parking lots.

“These residence halls are going to be here when we’re old,” Cardenas said. “This is something that’s going to have huge impact for decades to come.”

Besides new housing, UNM students might begin seeing New York Times paper stands pop up, with free daily newspapers for students.
Tod Halvorsen, an education manager for the New York Times, pitched the idea to the undergraduate student government. He said his plan would cost the University 50 cents per paper, and he offered a pilot program that would provide the newspaper on campus free of charge for four weeks.

“The New York Times really energizes the room,” Halvorsen said. “It provides a living textbook.”
If picked up by ASUNM, the program would also provide recycling bins next to every newsstand, Halvorsen said, and a student intern would be hired to distribute the papers on campus.

Joseph Colbert, vice president of ASUNM, said that if ASUNM runs with it, the cost would probably come to about $5,000 a year and would be funded with student fees.

“I think it’s a really good program,” he said. “I want to have the pilot program ran because it’s free.”
The printing limit installed last spring was another issue discussed at Wednesday’s meeting.

Jaymie Roybal, ASUNM attorney general, said ASUNM passed an emergency resolution Saturday calling for an increase in the amount of free printing students are given to all transfer unused printing credit from semester to semester, and for faculty to reduce the amount students have to print. The resolution was tabled in the Faculty Senate.

“We are advocating for some professors to not require as much printing of their students and make documents like your syllabus available in more electronic forms,” Roybal said. “We’ve had a lot of student input and a lot of students expressing their concern about the printing.”