ASUM moves to stop scalping, birth control price increase

Sweeping changes may be in store for student ticketing at football games in Washington-Grizzly stadium.

In light of the recent news about ticket scalping, ASUM passed a resolution condemning the practice and pledging to resolve the issue by preventing non-students from using student tickets.

“Scalping is a capitalization on a flaw in the University’s system,” said Sen. Trevor Hunter, who co-authored the resolution.  “It is taking away other students’ rights to tickets.”

The resolution mentions that the intention of the student ticketing system is to provide students, who pay $137 per semester for athletic fees, a place reserved specifically for them at games.

“Each time somebody capitalizes on this flaw, they are actually reaching in your pocket and taking out money,” Hunter said.  “This resolution is to start the conversation between the departments to resolve this problem.”

Though the conversation has not yet officially begun, Hunter said it has been suggested that the coming stadium expansion will include a gate where students must swipe their Griz Card. 

The ticket would be on the card electronically and no paper ticket would be issued.  This would, in effect, make student tickets completely non-transferable.

Sen. Jedediah Cox was the lone dissenter in a 14-1 vote of the ASUM Senate, saying it is his right to be able to give away his ticket.

“It’s their right, it’s their property,” he said.  “If I want to give it to my sister or to my friend, I think I should be free to do that.”

Usually, there are more ASUM senators present.  The senate has 22 voting members, but only 15 were present to vote on this resolution.  This just barely constitutes a quorum. 

“Attendance was absolutely pathetic tonight,” Hunter said.

Another resolution passed by the senate addressed the issue of rising birth control costs at the Curry Health Center and Planned Parenthood in Missoula.  The Deficit Reduction Act, a federal law passed to control costs, removed the discounts people can receive from these centers effective Jan. 1, 2008.

“This is about affordability and access,” Sen. Shannon Kuhn said.

The resolution expressed ASUM’s support for these discounts and gave a pledge to contact Montana’s congressional delegation about the issue.  It passed by a vote of 16-1.

More senators were present for this vote.

Cox was again the lone dissenter, saying reproductive healthcare should not be a priority for ASUM due to the affordability of condoms. He said that if he can buy his own box, others could too.

But several senators said that women do not necessarily take birth control pills for pregnancy prevention. The pills help with other reproductive health issues.

“So they don’t have to miss class one week a month because they are throwing up,” ASUM business manager Erica Henderson said. 

Henderson said insurance companies make it difficult at times for people to get birth control paid for by insurance, even when it is strictly used to address a medical problem.

During the comment period at the end of weekly ASUM meetings, each senator is given time to express anything they want to bring attention to.  Cox took this opportunity to tie together his disagreements with both the ticket and birth control resolutions.

“You can sell your ticket to buy your birth control,” he said.