By Johnathan Masters–

After a question and answer session with Kurtis Frizzell, the new student body President, The Louisville Cardinal discovered his many plans for the future of the University of Louisville. Some of these include his goal of reducing college costs plans and his “President’s Council” idea.

He also talked about getting sued in last year’s campaign, and his thoughts regarding his anticipated roast at the end of this school year.

Kurtis Frizzell, class of 2013, is a 21-year-old progressive from western Kentucky.  Frizzell is majoring in Political Science, and triple minoring in Social Change, Humanities, and Philosophy.  Frizzell’s future plans are to be in politics, to be a social change journalist and to work with University Advancement.

Kurtis has been sued several times working in student government. Last spring’s election, U of L’s student body’s Supreme Court disqualified several hundred votes of Frizzell’s supporters “because of a posting on a website.”  Those who were on Frizzell’s “slate,” or his team of candidates, also had votes taken away from them as well.  This reduction in votes made sure no candidate had 40 percent of the vote, and forced the Presidential election into a run-off.  Frizzell believes that the university’s current student body Judicial Branch will be less inclined to step in under the direction of newly-appointed Brandon McReynolds.  McReynolds is “highly qualified,” Frizzell said.

This year, the Executive Council – Puja Sangoi, Jody Heil, Cara Monaco and Frizzell – ranked 5 overarching ideas to push for, and 3 major goals are underway.  One goal is the construction of a campus walkway.  Another goal has been to make student government groups more accountable.

Student Affairs is being revamped with a different operational system.  Frizzell is currently working on getting a President’s Council organized, where all of the RSO Presidents can come together to talk about mutual self-interests.  “It would be a first meeting of that kind,” Frizzell said.

Frizzell’s Executive Council has also been working several revenue-generating actions that are helping to make college more affordable.  He has been in Frankfort, working with Kentucky’s representatives and senators, in order to get more grant money and to develop legislation designed to help ease the burden on U of L’s students. Frizzell encourages students to go to the Student Government Association’s website, Uoflsga.org, and click on the scholarships link to find a comprehensive list of scholarships available.  Frizzell did not want to comment about the possibility of having fixed 4-year tuition rates.

President Frizzell believes that the inevitability of U of L’s Board of Trustees, a 10-member board of which he is a member, raising tuition rates in June 2012 to the maximum 6 percent was a foregone conclusion, because, as he said, “we need to stay competitive with UK, and other universities in the region.”

Frankfort has cut state funding for U of L 1.4 percent this year, and will cut 2.4 percent of the funding for next year.  While tuition costs continue to rise, according to Frizzell, SGA has had to make due with the same amount of funding it has been allocated since the 1960s: $600,000.

To help offset that obstacle, Frizzell has cut the SGA’s staff pay by nearly 50 percent.  Frizzell is also pushing for an initiative to get the student body senators to step up and vote themselves a 10 percent pay cut in order to give SGA more resources.  Frizzell’s clarion call for frugality is evident when he’s cut money out of the budget for T-shirts and inflatables.  “If any organization wants those things,” says Frizzell, “they would have to beg me.”

Frizzell is also working on a revenue-generating plan called “University Mobile.”  Under this plan, SGA would receive 5 cents for every text sent out to the students.   Frizzell said “this plan can generate $180,000 for SGA,” which is 30 percent of what SGA is currently receiving.

Frizzell has roasted the last two acting student body Presidents, Rudy Spencer and Sana Abhari, and therefore expects a roast to be held for him at the end of this school year.  But he is not sweating the roast too much, because, “at the end, the roastee gets the last word.”

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PHOTO BY MICHAEL BALDWIN/THE LOUISVILLE CARDINAL