Student Groups Across Campus Enter Discussion

With tensions mounting between student protesters and University officials, campus political groups have entered into the debate over the salary of Harvard’s security guards.

Seven members of the Undergraduate Council (UC), which passed legislation two weeks ago in support of security guards, fasted on Wednesday in support of the ten students currently hunger striking. The politicos that fasted included UC President Ryan A. Petersen ’08 and Student Activities Committee Chair Mike R. Ragalie ’09.

But participation has stirred controversy within the council. Petersen sent an e-mail to the UC open-list on Tuesday urging a “day of fasting by the Undergraduate Council” to legitimize the body’s support, sparking a debate over whether it was the place of student government officials to take part in political protests.

Among the most vocal dissenters was Adam Goldenberg ’08, a former UC representative and current Crimson editorial columnist, who said in an interview last night that he did not believe the UC’s legislation should provide any grounds for council participation in the hunger strike.

“There is nothing wrong with members of the UC as individuals doing a hunger strike to show their solidarity with strikers,” Goldenberg said. “But to do that in their official capacity as UC members violates their mandate and breaks the trust that has been put in them by undergraduates.”

For his part, Petersen said yesterday that the ultimate source of the confusion about the propriety of UC participation stemmed from larger ambiguity about how the student body can make its voice heard on labor issues.

“What we were all struggling with was the simple fact that there is no legitimate means of influencing labor relations as students within the community,” he said.

The Harvard College Democrats have also rallied in support of the student protesters. The Dems have delivered letters in support of the strikers to Interim President Derek C. Bok and participated in a day of fasting last Friday, according to Legislative Director Jarret A. Zafran ’09.

Zafran added that the Democrats have also encouraged their members to attend the daily 1 p.m. support rallies in the Yard.

The Harvard Republican Club (HRC), however, has not given its endorsement to the security guard wage movement, Colin J. Motley ’10, a vice president of the HRC, said last night.

Motley added that the HRC was skeptical about the pay discrepancies that are listed on the Stand for Security Web site.

“What the whole question is based on is whether there is this disparity that’s being alleged by Stand for Security,” Motley said. “If it is in fact true that there are ‘poverty wages’ for these workers, then I don’t think anybody in our club would disagree with this.”

—Staff writer Christian B. Flow can be reached at cflow@fas.harvard.edu.