During nearly two months of budget hearings, the ASUO Programs Finance Committee doled out more than $2 million for next year — in the process almost doubling funds for the YWCA and substantially hiking the budget for the Designated Driver Shuttle.But many of the heated controversies plaguing the PFC during the hearings spree last term dealt more with issues and rules than with dollars.
Early on, PFC members noticed groups were using fee money to put on events in which they sold tickets and put the revenue into their fundraising accounts. The Green Tape Notebook, which lays out the rules governing the ASUO, says that incidental fee money cannot be used for fundraising efforts.
“When it’s used to write fundraising letters or to put on events,” PFC member Lawrence Gillespie said, “then they’re just making that money and they’re making it off the students and that’s not right.”
As a result, the PFC began telling groups they could not use incidental fee money to generate fundraising money — at least for the next year until the issue is resolved.
There were some student groups that were not happy about the decision.
“I believe all the unions will either die or reduce the quality of their programs,” said Andreas Georgiades, co-director for the International Student Association. “You cannot provide high quality programs with a menial budget.”
But the ticket revenue issue was only one of many crackdowns.
For years, groups have offered students work study in place of the more commonly-used stipends. As paid-hourly positions, someone must verify that the students worked the number of hours they said they did. But without an official supervisor to sign off on the students’ hours, there is a chance cheating can take place.
As a result, the PFC decided to take away the work study option from every group that does not have a faculty supervisor — leaving only a few groups, such as the Women’s Center and the Multicultural Center, able to take advantage of the program.
In the meantime, the PFC is working on a “checklist” to standardize how work study is distributed.
The PFC implemented another standard this year — this one is for the stipends that groups pay their student workers. The stipend model splits student positions into different categories and designates a certain amount for each.
With the standardization came a one-year freeze on adding any more stipend positions to student groups.
Most were happy about the change, PFC Chairwoman Mary Elizabeth Madden said. But there were a handful that could not get the extra position they wanted or were not happy with the amount they were allotted.
PFC member Arlie Adkins disagreed with the new stipend system, claiming it took away control from student groups and was too rigid in determining amounts.
“It increased spending by so much this year [and] it wasn’t worth it,” Adkins said. “When I saw us cutting programming budgets and increasing stipends, it just seemed not that right to me.”
Exiting the budget hearings and entering a hearing of its own, the PFC was asked to defend some of its decisions before the ASUO Student Senate.
When the PFC presented its budget to the senate in February, Sen. Andy Elliott questioned the spending habits of several groups. One was the purchase of blankets for speakers and graduating students of the Native American Student Union.
“If they genuinely want to know [why NASU gives away blankets], rather than just complaining about it, then they need to show up at a few NASU meetings,” Multicultural Center Director Erica Fuller said. “Don’t complain about it if you don’t understand it.”
But Elliott said that the purpose of the gifts was not the issue.
“I understand why they’re doing it. I think that it’s worthwhile,” Elliott said. “I just don’t think the student body should be paying for it.”
Elliott also noticed misuse of fees by the Chinese Student Scholar Association, which last year used leftover money to buy gifts for its officers. In addition, the CSSA bought tents and flashlights with student incidental fee money.
Even with the questions, the PFC budget passed quickly through the senate, with only three senators opposed.