Twenty-four down, about 100 to go.
The ASUO Programs Finance Committee hearings, which decide student groups’ budgets for the 2010-11 school year, have been underway for nearly a week.
The PFC committee uses a model to determine growth eligibility, retaining the right to deviate from the model when it see fit. ASUO Sen. Lyzi Diamond said the committee has been “mostly sticking to the model.”
Diamond said her thought process while conducting budget hearings is to first grant the groups the growth they qualify for under the model and then allocate the leftover growth at the end of the hearings through the recall and appeals systems.
Under the model, a group that spends at least 85 percent of its ASUO-funded budget is then eligible for growth in the next year’s budget. The PFC factors in the fundraising money the group has spent and the amount of budget growth required to maintain the same activities while factoring in increases, such as inflation and price increases, when deciding future budgets.
Diamond said her goal for the upcoming Programs Council meeting is to hold a panel for the programs so that students within the programs can ask questions and have an open discussion about the process.
Ethos Magazine, whose hearing was last Tuesday evening, asked for a large sum, which the PFC found contentious but eventually granted in part.
“I’m happy with the compromise that they came up with,” Ethos Magazine editor-in-chief Kevin Bronk said. “However, I don’t think the increase is really a match for what our program needs.”
The PFC decided on a budget of $7,600, which they determined by assuming the total cost of a magazine was $2, then agreeing to fund half of the year’s printing costs. Bronk said that the actual costs end up being around $2.50 to $2.75 per copy, which makes the intent of the final decision underfunded.
“The compromise was fair but underestimated, which limits what our program is able to do as a result,” Bronk said.
His main problem with the process is “that increases are based more upon how long your program has been around than what your program has been accomplishing.”
Sen. Nick Schultz said when deciding growth for the incidental fee, he likes to give the growth to student-run programs.
“I would love to see most of the growth come to the PFC because it has the most direct impact on students,” he said. “I mean, I love contracted services, but I say grow it in programs – they are the heart of student government.”