The Government of the Student Body senate Wednesday night ruled out of order a bill to revise the selection process for the GSB finance committee.

The way the GSB constitution and bylaws are written, the process of choosing the committee is not specified, said Jeremy Williams, GSB finance director.

“Technically, it doesn’t say anything,” he said.

When the bylaws were rewritten two years ago, the text specifying the process of choosing the committee was inadvertently left out, Williams said.

If the designated process had been included, the bylaws would state that the finance director is responsible for nominating four senate members and four at-large members for the finance committee, who then would be approved by the senate.

“It’s been done this way for years and years, and I don’t know why it came up now,” Williams said.

The new bill proposed that the senate appointments committee should choose the four senate members, and the finance director should choose the four at-large members.

Williams said there is more to selecting a finance committee than producing eight eligible members.

“There’s a lot of factors you’ve got to consider,” he said, specifically balancing schedules, gender, financial ideals and the residential constituencies represented by members.

“If the senate selects half the committee, and the finance director selects half the committee, you’re not going to get that balance,” Williams said. “It’s a hard job already — you don’t need anything to make it harder.”

The bill’s late introduction also made it controversial — Williams said he didn’t know it existed until he read it on the senate agenda Tuesday.

“I just don’t think that people really talked to each other before this [meeting],” said Christian Edmiston, graduate, who actively opposed the bill.

Supporters of the bill, including Mike Pogge, off-campus council, argued the current process for appointing finance committee members does not allow sufficient senate input.

“You never see a funding body where one person has the sole discretion to select all the members,” Pogge said, adding that the committee annually appropriates about $1.2 million.

Pogge called the situation an issue of “checks and balances.”

Edmiston argued that the senate had several opportunities to express disagreement with Williams’ appointees.

“You need to speak up for yourself,” Edmiston said. “Each bill passed with unanimous consent … An entire meeting later, now you come to say something about it.”

Pogge also said GSB President Matt Craft’s executive order deeming the bill out of order was unconstitutional because its action would go against Robert’s Rules of Order on selecting a finance committee. If there is no specified course of action in the bylaws, GSB is supposed to turn to Robert’s Rules for direction.

“The constitution gives me the power to do executive orders, so I did one,” Craft said. “I’m not taking away any power from the appointments committee here because they don’t have it yet.”

Craft said several legislative and executive checks and balances already are in place.

“The finance director is seated by the senate — they should be able to trust him or her to make a very educated decision of who should be on the finance committee,” he said.

The senate also must approve the nominees in order for them to be appointed, he said. “They have ample opportunities to do it the current way,” Craft said. “If it’s not broke, don’t fix it.”

Craft and Williams both said they would like to see a bill introduced at next Wednesday’s meeting outlining a better way to clarify the bylaws in regard to choosing a finance committee.

“There’s a hole in the bylaws that needs to be fixed,” Edmiston said. “I think it’s our duty to take care of that.”