The ASUO Programs Finance Committee controls more than $4 million in incidental fees every year and gives the money to student groups during budget hearings held winter term. But the group, led for the past two years by senior political science major and ASUO Student Senator Mary Elizabeth Madden, has made procedural mistakes and held illegal meetings — during the Emerald’s hearing process alone — that bring into question the group’s competence and its members’ ability to handle their tasks responsibly.
It may sound like sour grapes on our part — because the PFC did not give us the full funding we requested — but we believe there are legitimate concerns with both the leadership of the PFC and the process it uses to fund student groups.
One problem with the process is the blatant disregard for adhering to Oregon Public Meetings Law, both in letter and in spirit. The group did not adequately publicize their meetings, a necessity under the law.
The PFC held at least one meeting without having a true quorum and without giving even 24 hours’ public notice — a bare minimum for even an emergency meeting of a public board under Oregon law. “Adequate” may be a subjective term, but less than 24 hours is not adequate by any standards.
This illegal meeting occurred as the Emerald was appealing its original budget decision to the PFC and trying to get minutes from previous meetings to strengthen its case. After waiting three hours for someone in the ASUO office to locate those minutes, the Emerald filed an appeal form asking for a deadline extension of one business day after the minutes were found and photocopied. That night, Madden met with fellow PFC member Nadia Hasan at the student senate meeting. The pair talked, and they agreed the extension shouldn’t be granted. They then reached another, as-yet-unnamed PFC member by phone who agreed with them. Madden said she believed this constituted a quorum (although it does not under Oregon law). Madden came to the Emerald office to speak to management about the decision they had reached. When she couldn’t reach anyone at the office, she called Emerald managing editor Jeremy Lang at home about 10 p.m. to inform him of the decision. No formal notice was given to the Emerald of the PFC’s decision, however, so management filed their formal appeal with the PFC the next day.
We have several issues with this process — including the fact that the PFC held an illegal meeting — but the main one is the PFC’s back-room dealing. If the PFC made such major decisions about the Emerald’s budget outside of an actual public meeting and without giving public notice, who is to say they didn’t do this to other student groups? We still have not been given any explanation or justification for the decision on our budget, and we have been derailed in every attempt to determine why.
Another issue concerns viewpoint-neutrality. PFC members are expected to examine every budget from a viewpoint-neutral stance, without letting their own biases cloud their decisions. But this often does not happen. One clear example of a PFC member’s bias was evident during the Emerald’s budget hearings. PFC member Joe Streckert did not disclose that he had applied and been turned down for a position at the Emerald in May 2001, but he continued to vote on budgets and voice his opinion that the Emerald’s budget should be cut during the paper’s appeals. And it was an evidently agitated Streckert who practically bounced back and forth on the balls of his feet as he vehemently (and successfully) lobbied the Student Senate to deny hearing the Emerald’s appeal to that body. We heard much from Streckert and Madden about why the Senate should not hear our appeal, but nothing that would indicate why other senators at the meeting also voted not to hear the appeal.
It is both puzzling and frustrating to us that a student government body would have an appeals process in place yet become enraged when a student group attempts to use that process. We understand the PFC’s desire to meet their deadline — our entire operation is deadline-based — but the board has a responsibility to ensure the process is fair and complete. Shutting programs out of the appeals process without even allowing them to present their case makes one question what the PFC has to hide.
The University administration has been a staunch supporter of the incidental fee-funding model, but we have yet to see high-level administrators checking in on the process. University President Dave Frohnmayer and representatives from the Oregon University System approve the total PFC budget. But the final numbers do not reflect the flaws in the process that the Emerald — and certainly other groups — have faced and continue to face each year.
On the surface, it sounds like a good idea — students deciding how to disburse student fees — but really, the current model is flawed. There needs to be more members on the PFC, more administrative oversight of the process and more students paying attention to where their money goes. There are simply too many problems when $4 million is being allocated by four people.