Associated Students Board of Directors voted against a student advisory measure to ban the sale of single-use water bottles on campus Thursday Nov.15.
A motion to approve discontinuing the sale of plastic water bottles on campus was introduced by AS President Dylan Gray, during a meeting. The motion resulted in a vote of 2-6 by the AS student board.
Gray voted to approve the motion. However, he said that the board of directors has a fiscal obligation to the self-sufficiency of the AS.
In 2016, 2,996 students voted for the ban according to an advisory measure by the board of directors.
Jamie Clyde, Associate Executive Director of the AS, informed the board that $480,000 would be lost over the next five years without water bottles. She said it may result in higher retail prices, reduced staffing and reduced service hours to make up for the net loss.
The board of directors opted for a contract with PepsiCo that includes single-use water bottles.
Christian Solis can be reached at newseditor@theorion.com or @c_alexander20 on Twitter.
Molly // Nov 16, 2017 at 9:24 am
Yet again, AS career staff chose corporate profits over the environment. I thought this was the Associated Students not the Associated Career Staff. I am so ashamed of the AS and to have worked and been apart of the Association. They lie to your face and only care about what interest their pockets. The AS needs some serious reform. Whats the point in having student elections if your not going to listen to the students? Is it our fault the dining is making no money? No wonder you are not making money. They say if approved the ban would cause other prices to raise. Since the ban didn’t go into can you promise us that the price of retail isnt going to go up? Or staffing wont take cuts? I dont think you can. Prices go up every year. You have talked in previous meetings about staffing cuts due to increase in minimum wage. You are liars. You are going to continue to raise prices and cut staff while continuing to sell an product that degrades our environment. A product that our students can get for FREE. But thats the thing, you dont care about the students.. you care about you and your corporate profits. Stop puppeteering our students to get what you want. Let them do their jobs of representing the student population.