MSU’s undergraduate student government will meet with the East Lansing City Council Tuesday to discuss issues such as police-student relations.
The meeting will take place in Gold Rooms A and B of the Union at 7:30 p.m., and is open to the public.
ASMSU Director of Community Affairs Kevin Glandon said he will make a number of presentations to the city council, including Toward a Spartan Community, an effort to build a long lasting and healthy relationship between MSU and the city of East Lansing.
Glandon said he also will inform the council about the Spartan Community Partnership, a program to bring MSU students into the polling booths election day to help with the process as polling inspectors.
The money students make from working is encouraged to be donated to East Lansing Education Foundation, a charity aiding education for students in East Lansing.
“We just want to see where we are,” he said.
One issue ASMSU Student Assembly officials will bring up at the meeting will be East Lansing police officers attending parties dressed in plain clothes.
“My feeling on this is students are being asked to behave responsibly, and we just want them to be treated the way they’re supposed to act,” Glandon said.
“But I’m in favor of their statement, if they carry it out the way they say it.”
Glandon said he met with the Deputy Chief Police Tom Wibert to discuss about the issue.
“He was actually very helpful and very understanding of the problem,” he said. “And if we find a problem, I’m going to talk to him about it.”
Glandon said as long as the police do what they’ve originally said - which is plain-clothes officers can only warn the party hosts before uniformed officers come to the party - then he is in favor of it.
Councilmember Beverly Baten said she’s looking forward to meeting with students from ASMSU because of the ideas and relations it builds.
“It’s no longer on a parent-child level,” she said. “We’re on the same level. I just hope we aren’t just going through the social graces, and we can have some good dialogue.”
Baten said she’s interested in hearing the issues and feelings of the student officials about police officers attending off campus parties.
“The week of Welcome Week I think things just got out of hand,” she said.
“We aren’t going to tolerate bad behavior. I don’t care if they party, but we don’t want bad behavior.”
But Student Assembly Chairperson Matt Weingarden said students who show good behavior aren’t appreciated for their efforts.
“We’re seeing this turn into a situation where responsible behavior is being ignored and irresponsible behavior is being questioned,” he said.
“I think there should be some rewards for those folks.”
