STUDENT GOVERNMENT Bridges, Ayer Outline GUSA Priorities By Rebecca Regan-Sachs Hoya Staff Writer

Charles Nailen/The Hoya GUSA president-elect Kaydee Bridges (SFS `03) speaks to reporters after the election announcement in Sellinger Lounge on Monday.

The top priorities of the incoming Bridges-Ayer GUSA administration will be securing increased space for students on campus, expanding the function and use of the Hoya’s/Faculty Club and creating a comprehensive student Web site, according to GUSA president-elect Kaydee Bridges (SFS ’03) and vice president-elect Mason Ayer (SFS ’03).

“We intend to stay very focused with our issues and stick to our platform,” Bridges said. “We’re going to fight for one thing at a time.”

After the conclusion of the Southwest Quadrangle Project in 2003, the cafeteria space in New South will be converted, Bridges and Ayer said. One of their main goals is to ensure that the space becomes “student space,” instead of administrative offices or other non-student facilities.

They are also working to secure the current Ryan Administration Building for performance and rehearsal space when it is renovated in 2003. Arts and theater groups lack such space now, according to Bridges and Ayer. They plan to work with Vice President for Student Affairs Juan Gonzalez, Vice President of Auxiliary Services Margie Bryant, Executive Diector of Facilities and Student Housing Karen Frank and University Provost Dorothy Brown as well as class representatives in order to implement their ideas.

They will continue the efforts of last year’s GUSA administration to revitalize the Sellinger Lounge area and installing computer terminals, print stations, copy machines and vending machines. Entertainment facilities in Sellinger such as a small stage and a permanent screen and projector would also be added. GUSA President Ryan DuBose (COL ’02) submitted a similar proposal last year to Brown and Gonzalez.

Another problem they would like to address is the lack of what Ayer calls “a place on campus that students can identify with.” To do this, he and Bridges plan to open up the Faculty Club during Student Bartender Night at Hoya’s and introduce a Jesuit Bartender Night as well. They are also trying to introduce a Friday evening Happy Hour and discounted food and drink specials during television airings of Hoyas’ basketball away games. The timeline for these plans is this spring, according to their campaign platform literature.

“Georgetown doesn’t really have a student center,” Ayer said. “This provides a place for students on campus . it builds community.”

In addition, Bridges and Ayer are planning to build a comprehensive student Web site based on the University of Oklahoma’s student Web site. This would include a calendar of campus activities, lists of entertainment and restaurant options and online services such as test files of professors’ old exams and perhaps “GBAY,” a student auction house.

Working with systems administrators from Georgetown and the University of Oklahoma, the incoming GUSA executives hope to have the Web site in place “as soon as possible -hopefully before the summer,” Ayer said.

An additional concern is safety, he said. Bridges and Ayer are talking with the newly formed student group Friends – which seeks to reduce the adverse affects of alcohol consumption – about running a weekend shuttle from the Healy Gates to stops around Georgetown. They also hope to hire a coordinator for the SafeWalks program and increase volunteers by making it a work-study program.

Bridges and Ayer also expressed the desire to improve GUSA’s relationship with the student body.

“The student government has a good connection with the administration,” Ayer said. “Where it hasn’t done as well is connecting with the student body.”

“One of the main things is to keep in contact with the students,” Bridges said. In order to do this, Bridges and Ayer plan to meet with 12 randomly selected students every week for dinner and listen to their ideas and concerns. They also intend to open GUSA Assembly meetings to the press to ask questions and monitor the activities of the student representatives.