The Student Senate will discuss three resolutions at its 7 p.m. meeting today in the Arcola-Tuscola Room of the Martin Luther King Jr. University Union.

Members will discuss a resolution asking for the April 13 senate meeting to be pushed back because of its conflict with the Greek Week awards ceremony.

Senate members Ashley Hoogstraten, Ed Hotwagner, Tommy Nierman, Rebecca Johnson, Jenna Mitchell, Kyle Scherle, Blake Pierce and Holly Henry are the eight authors of the resolution and are all members of Greek life on campus.

If the resolution passes, Scherle would notify the senate members that the April 13 meeting would start at 8:30 p.m., after the awards ceremony.

A resolution written by Hotwagner, Student Body President Michelle Murphy, and Alex Boyd, a Student Senate member, is being presented to change a bylaw that says student government has to plant a tree around campus and put a plaque under it saying that it donated the tree.

“We are dealing with budget cuts and we had to make changes, we are cutting down on our expenditures that aren’t operational,” Hotwagner said.

Student government is presenting its re-worked budget to the Apportionment Board on Thursday.

“The bylaw has to be cut by this meeting otherwise we won’t receive the money,” Hotwagner said.

The resolution for Illinois Board of Higher Education – Student Advisory Committee was presented and tabled at the last meeting and is asking for money from the student government’s budget to send Christy Anderson, the student executive vice president, and Brad Saribekian, a junior accounting major, to the IBHE – SAC conference in April.

The senate will appoint a new chairman of the Panther Express committee after senate member, JR Patton, who held the position, resigned.

Senate member John Griffin, a senior communication studies major, will be appointed to this position.

According to Griffin, Blake Pierce, a senior finance major and a Student Senate member, was also nominated for the position but could not meet some of the time requirements.

Two weeks ago, the Panther Express committee added suggestion boxes with surveys for students to fill out on Panther Express shuttle buses.

“I’m waiting for more students to fill out the surveys before the committee and I read them to see what improvements and changes could be made to the Panther Express,” Griffin said.

Griffin said he wants to make the shuttles as efficient as possible.

“Depending on the results, smaller changes may even be done before the semester is over,” Griffin said.

Erin Riedl can be reached at 581-2812 or at edriedl@eiu.edu.