To clarify The Office Party’s platform and address some concerns about who we are and for what we stand, Nicki, Keri and I first would like to say we are a party equally devoted to all students.

Some discontent seems to come from the Milledge bus aspect of our platform.

Our platform includes maximizing our campus transit system, but the idea of a “chapter bus” was brought to us by another campus organization. You can loosen the grip on your pocket books – the instatement of this proposal will not cost unaffiliated students a dime.

Rather, the proposal is to be headed up by Greeks, and, as we promise to represent any organization seeking our support in offering student services, The Office Party takes this on as the next step in campus safety and improved neighborhood relations.

Our stance on expanding the operating hours of the Milledge bus is threefold.

First, we want to improve campus safety, and in order to alleviate this, we want to ensure that students do not have to walk home from campus after dark.

Second, Athens-Clarke County officials have painted curbs and street sides, designating them as no-parking zones. A further goal of this initiative is to relieve tension between the University and our neighbors by decreasing traffic.

Finally, many students living on or near Milledge – including apartment complexes occupied by Greeks and non-Greeks alike – are involved in campus organizations, whether they are debate societies, philanthropy groups or media outlets.

The Milledge bus serves our students until 7 p.m. on weeknights, approximately when the latest classes are released. Our hope is to provide safe transportation to and from campus for organizational meetings, studying and otherwise. Other bus routes including Family Housing and East-West run as late as 12:29 a.m. Extending the Milledge Route is a comprehensive solution.

Our campus transportation plan does not end here. Our proposal for a 24-hour campus transit is well under way as we now have three proposed maps of a night route drafted by a campus transit employee.

Other key issues include removing the C- or instating the A+ to balance the grading scale – amendments administrators, including Jere Morehead, vice president for instruction (as cited in a Jan. 31 article) are considering.

We also would like to see our UGAMail transferred to Gmail – this program has been successful on other campuses and will allow nearly 1,000 times as much memory, chat options and calendars while maintaining UGA logins.

Finally, we’re ready to see the end of Ramsey waits. Online sign-ups with more hours and increased floor space will remedy this problem.

Each of these has run through key administrators including the provost and the vice presidents for Student Affairs and Instruction.

For the rest of our initiatives, check out the entire platform at http://ugaofficeparty.com/platform/.

- Connor McCarthy is a SGA presidential candidate.