Those sitting in during the joint Associated Students of Cerritos College and board of trustees meeting witnessed both the president of the school and the president of the student body sitting almost side by side tossing ideas back and forth for the better of the college.

The meeting took place Wednesday, Oct. 21 and it is the second time both governing bodies of the school have met in an open meeting.

The most talked about points on the agenda were: the inclusion of student opinion in the construction of the Student Union Building, improving WiFi connectivity and the budget.

Each item was allocated, or at least attempted to allocate, 10 minutes for discussion.

A time constraint that associate justice Andreas Junior felt did not allow senator Gloria Sedano, present in the public, to fully express her comments.

He said, “I feel like she was cut off fast she still had a lot of things that she needed to address but she wasn’t able to, Dr. Shin Lu kind of cut it short.”

Aside from that comment usually the topic items received over 10 minutes for discussion, a point that Eduardo De La Rosa, ASCC president, enjoyed talking about the most with the board was the Student Union Building.

De La Rosa said, “We wanted to see if we could have representation from the students and have student government in these meetings.”

The building is the last one to be built according to board president Dr. Jose Fierro and De La Rosa believes conversation about the building could take place three years from now.

He said, “We want somewhere for massive conversations to take place.”

The Student Union Building, in his eyes and in the eyes of ASCC Vice President Ivan Oyarzabal, will look similar to a city council where students could gather and talk about issues. The outside will be artistic given the fact, according to De La Rosa, that it is the building that will be seen from the street.

Green initiatives and solutions were brought up by the ASCC to try to make the campus more sustainable.

De La Rosa admitted that the recycling programs are costing more than what money they make off the program.

Board member Bob Arthur asked if the problem about people taking recyclables out of the bins and making money off of it has been looked at.

He said, “I’ve seen it about a dozen times, scavengers, has that been considered.”

De La Rosa responded by saying that the issue has not been looked at but solutions are being considered.

He said, “we were thinking about talking with the welding department to help us find a cheap solution.”

De La Rosa and Oyarzabal then asked if the board could do something about increasing WiFi connectivity.

Fierro responded by saying that the board has purchased 300 WiFi hot spot enhancers and should be in the school’s hands in two weeks to replace the one being used on campus.

He also applauded the ASCC for doing extensive research into the WiFi situation, but he urged them not to over do the solution process because new technology is already being brought to the school.

When the budget was brought up everyone chuckled, and board vice president Dr. Shin Lu said it was a talking point everyone had interest in.

The main point the ASCC wanted to ask the board, in regards to the budget, was which is officially the student’s and what are hands-off.

Fierro said, “It’s not so black in white […] eventually the money is invested in student needs.”

Fierro went on to say that $1.1 million is allocated for student use, but ASCC uses approximately $400,000 from collected revenue like student fees.

Senator Daniel Flores said, “I thinks it’s a good idea to have all the stake holders [in the budget] to be involved in the budget. But I feel like we are told just what to do.”

Processing the budget takes to long according to a member from the audience that said the long processing time caused a club to not be able to go to an event because the expense then fell upon the club members to pay and not all could afford it.

De La Rosa said that the ASCC building gets jammed with paper work, that sometimes things don’t get processed.

Vice president of business services David El Fattal said that from January to March, they will work on making the process better.