Intense debate raged over the Big Green Bike program Tuesday night at the Student Assembly's last meeting of Winter term, which garnered attendance by over 85 percent of the Assembly's membership.
The proposal earmarking $2,000 of Assembly funds for BGB passed by seven votes after extended debate that frequently reached a fevered pitch.
Last night's move allows BGB sponsors, including Student Body Vice President Todd Rabkin Golden '06, to implement the program, which aims to provide between 50 and 100 communal bicycles to students, who would rent keys opening all the bicycle locks for $10 per year.
Earlier on Tuesday, Student Body President Julia Hildreth '05 admonished Rabkin Golden for setting up a table in the Collis Center to solicit student support for BGB and sign up students for the program.
"I have already told [Rabkin Golden] that I consider this to be disrespectful to SA and dishonest to campus," Hildreth wrote to the Assembly executives yesterday in a BlitzMail message obtained by The Dartmouth.
Hildreth described Rabkin Golden's actions as an "error in judgment," but noted the problem had been solved.
"If there's a program that Student Assembly hasn't officially endorsed, you can't be taking money in that program's name," Hildreth said at the Assembly meeting.
Rabkin Golden said his efforts were aimed at engaging student interest and talking about the program with students. The 10 or so students who signed up with their DASH numbers would only be charged if the Assembly passed the BGB proposal.
Diana Zhang '06, who ran a trial bike program last summer and helped spearhead the BGB, said she was "very, very offended" by Rabkin Golden's attempts to sign up students before the proposal passed.
Zhang and Kirsten Murray '07, who were on board when BGB was presented to the Assembly a little over a month ago, retracted their support of the communal program and submitted an amendment that would have turned BGB into a rental service.
Zhang cited her experience running the Rides Across Dartmouth program last summer as a prime concern.
The RAD program Zhang ran provided the campus with 10 low-quality community bikes without locks. Only six bikes, severely damaged, were returned at the end of the trial period.
"The RAD program was the absolute laughing stock of our campus," Tim Andreadis '07 said.
Zhang said a program where each bike is rented to one student for the term would create greater responsibility for the bicycles and serve "as a launching pad to see how campus will react to these better-quality bikes."
Jacques Hebert '07 said he supports the rental move, noting that the effort "can be expanded or turned into a communal program."
While high-quality Iron Horse bicycles will be used in this program -- a contrast to the Wal-Mart bicycles in RAD -- Zhang and others said the pricier equipment would generate an incentive to steal the bikes.
Concerns over theft dominated the debate. While Middlebury's communal bike program served as an inspiration for the program at Dartmouth, a recent e-mail message sent to Assembly leaders from the administrator of Middlebury's program warned of pitfalls Middlebury experienced.
"[Over] two-thirds of the bikes were stolen before they had to completely restock them," Brian Martin '06 said.
Murray and Zhang's rental amendment ultimately failed.
The Assembly also adopted an instant-runoff voting system, which asks voters to rank candidates in order of preference and then reapportions votes until a candidate wins with a majority, for spring campus-wide elections.
