The Government of the Student Body will debate a bill Wednesday that would compensate the speaker of the senate one-quarter of tuition through a scholarship.

Timothy Reineke, GSB senator and junior in political science, co-wrote the speaker-compensation bill.

Traditionally, the speaker has been compensated $824 per year, but this year was an exception. Because of budget cuts, the speaker has not been compensated.

“It was a place we could lose money and still hopefully get quality,” said Jason Carroll, GSB finance director and graduate student in civil, construction and environmental engineering.

Carroll said if the bill was to pass, the money for the speaker would be part of the GSB budget and come from the same area as the compensation for the president, vice president and finance director.

“It would be allocated to GSB through the regular allocations process,” Carroll said. “It’s not very different than funding an event or than GSB requesting money for an event from [the] senate.”

Carroll also said that the budgets are public so students have the opportunity to review the GSB’s budget.

The new bill would raise the speaker’s compensation and put it in the bylaws, which would mean it could not be cut from the GSB budget, Reineke said. Reineke believes such action is appropriate, given that the speaker’s responsibilities are comparable to that of other cabinet members who receive compensation.

As listed in the GSB bylaws, both the finance director and the president receive full scholarships and the vice president receives a half scholarship.

The finance director answers questions from groups and offices on campus, looks after how GSB funds are spent and manages allocations, among other duties, Carroll said.

In his job description, Carroll said he is supposed to be available to students during business hours, and with his other responsibilities, he works a great deal.

“It’s more than a full-time job,” he said.

Jonathan Richardson, current GSB speaker and senior in chemical engineering, chose not to comment on the bill so he wouldn’t influence the vote.

As a speaker, he said he works about seven to 10 hours a week, excluding senate meetings, which can vary from one to six hours each week.

Richardson said his most important responsibilities as speaker include being the chairman of the rules committee, being the representative to the media, negotiating contracts, authoring bills for other branches, being a mentor to younger senators and working with other branches to work toward a “successful agenda.”

“The responsibilities that take up the most time for the speaker position isn’t really in the specially delineated areas,” Richardson said.

Carroll, who is a member of the GSB cabinet but not of the senate, said he hopes that the senators look at why other positions in GSB are compensated and to make sure this compensation is accomplishing what the senate wants.

Reineke said there are two reasons why he thinks the speaker should be paid. The first reason involves the amount of time involved in the position.

“Just on the basis of all that we expect the speaker to do, he deserves compensation,” he said.

The second reason is to attract “good people for the position,” especially those individuals who need to work.

The speaker, who is elected by the senate, is usually someone that has experience with the GSB, especially with the rules committee, Richardson said.

“Traditionally the speaker’s position is held for one year by someone who is a returning member of GSB,” he said.

Although there may be a number of younger senators who could later run for speaker, Reineke said the results of the bill are too far in the future to worry about a possible conflict of interest.

“We have no idea what the senate will look like then,” he said.

Some were concerned it would be voted on next year so senators could potentially be voting on a pay raise for themselves.

To address the conflict of interest concerns raised by other senators, Reineke said he plans to propose an amendment to change the date in which the bill takes effect.