Editor,
On Nov. 11, the ASUNM president sent me a personal email regarding my recent and open critiques of ASUNM and its performance. Specifically, he invited me to schedule a private meeting with him and his staff to address my communications to the Daily Lobo.
The ASUNM president’s invitation to a private dialogue without an audience should come as a shock to all undergraduates, as this proposed cloak-and-dagger affair runs in the face of the transparency, openness and full disclosure that ASUNM alleges it values. This is indicative of a desire to handle ASUNM business in a manner that is hidden from the public eye.
I have never been contacted nor targeted by any ASUNM officers, agencies or entities of their own accord until I spoke out against the financial excesses that unfortunately characterize ASUNM. The second I proposed that the ASUNM president make strides towards fiscal solvency, I was suddenly greeted with the request to not discuss my views publicly as I did in the past, but rather within the comfort and security of his personal office.
While the words used in the email were benign at their face, their underlying message is abundantly clear and self-evident: “Stop exposing us to the press.” This is exactly the sort of behavior that ASUNM must stop if it wishes to truly become a student centered and student-serving agency rather than the self-serving clique that it is now.
To address the elephant in the room, no, Mr. President, I refuse to meet in private to discuss public affairs.
Respectfully,
Tom Stivers
UNM student
