De Anza College President Brian Murphy explained to DASB Senate on Feb. 8 he would not support the decision to cut over $200,000 from the Office of College Life and asked that senators come to him to negotiate a solution instead. The senate’s Feb. 15 meeting was cancelled for lack of quorum.

“You did not intend to disrespect, you do not intend to lay someone off, but there are processes beyond your intentionality that have been precipitated,” Murphy said on the Feb. 8 meeting.

The DASB budget has to go through shared governance, such as the Foothill-De Anza Board of Trustees. Murphy said he would not support the budget cuts if they went to the board for approval.

“If you’ve got this problem here and you got to solve it, then let’s have a conversation about it, goodness sake,” Murphy said. “It’s not all one bag of money.”

Senator Chi Tran said the senate had tried to contact the administration through email and in person multiple times.

Murphy said, “It takes time to respond to people and even with the urgency, we don’t know what the urgency is.”

Vice president Stephanie Rigsby said when Senator Sara Elzeiny contacted administration, the senate didn’t know the budget cut would happen.

“Nobody’s operating in bad faith,” Murphy said. “Clearly a lot of things hadn’t been adequately talked about.”

Rigsby said although the budget goes through shared governance, other groups don’t come to Senate meetings.

Murphy said he and Susan Cheu, vice president of finance and college operations, would be willing to walk any senate member through the maze that is funding.

“The process to make changes on this campus takes a very long time,” Murphy said.

Murphy directed the senate towards its existing reserve fund. The DASB has a reserve fund of $400,000, and the administration already pulls from its own reserve.

“This is a chronically underfunded, deeply underfunded, state institution,” Murphy said. According to Murphy, enrollment has dropped steadily regionally, due to immigration fears, housing crisis, transportation, racism and President Donald Trump.

The senate voted 15-2 in favor of reconsidering the budget cut. The motion to reallocate funds to Office of College Life and Accounts failed 8-10.

Senator Dara Streit said she was in favor of allocating the costs to their reserve fund. Vice President Stephanie Rigsby said she was in favor of doing that as well.

“This year’s senate has had a lot of conflict and it’s disappointing,” Student Trustee Elias Kamal said. “Although I supported their decision last week, it seems that the circumstances have changed.”

Kamal said some senators accused him of leading them to believe that the administration would be willing to cover the cost.

“This was a very last minute issue, and they had done no work prior to last week’s meeting,” Kamal said. He said senators were not attending joint governance meetings regularly and it was common for senate members to expect him to provide them with all budget related information.

“[Kamal] is the liaison between us and the district. His role is to remain impartial,” senate president Matthew Zarate said. “The reason senators were upset was that they believed he would support them, but in the end he didn’t.”

Zarate said most senators attend joint governance meetings, but there was a lack of communication between the senate and administration before making the decision.

“The issue falls on us because we did not properly engage with administration, although some of us have attempted to,” Zarate said.

Courtney L.Cooper, student trustee at Foothill College, attended the meeting and said she was distressed about the perceived lack of attendance of shared governance meetings.

“When we run for these positions we try to make sure we are able to take on what’s being asked of us,” Cooper said. “Be cognizant of the demands. If you can’t meet therm, delegate your role to someone else.”

Senate Vice President Stephanie Rigsby said, “One thing that Foothill fails to realize is that social justice work takes time and money, and a lot of people who are in that kind of work don’t have either.”

De Anza senator Joshua Alfaro said different circumstances of senators should be kept in mind. “I live pretty far away, which affects my duties as a senator, as well as my classes,” Alfaro said.