The ASUO Senate decided Wednesday how it will spend roughly half of the money it raises through student fees in the 2010–11 school year, allocating the money student government will spend on the EMU and on student programs.
Combined, the budgets amounted to more than $6.5 million of the ASUO’s roughly $12 million budget. It’s an increase of almost $200,000 from the amount budgeted for programs and the EMU in the 2009–10 school year. It’s a roughly 3 percent increase on that portion of the ASUO’s budget.
The two budgets make up half of the ASUO’s budget, with the remaining money spent on partially funding University departments, student tickets to football and men’s basketball games, and contracts between the ASUO and outside organizations such as the Lane Transit District and the Emerald. These budgets are decided after the ASUO’s subcommittees meet with representatives from every organization within the EMU and every student program.
The larger of the two budgets passed Wednesday night was for the EMU’s funding. Maintaining the building will cost the ASUO about $4.8 million, about $225,000 more than it cost this year.
More than 60 percent of that increase will simply cover increasing costs for the EMU’s existing expenses. The remaining part of the increase, however, will fund expanded services at the EMU.
About $27,000 will fund the Bike Loan Program, which gets permanent funding from the ASUO for the first time this year. The rest will increase the pay of Craft Center employees and allow the director of EMU Scheduling to work during the summer.
The ASUO decreased the total budgets of its 110 student programs by 0.81 percent, low by the ASUO’s standards. Members of the Programs Finance Committee, which allocates funding for student groups, said the low increase was a result of several programs asking for decreases in their budgets.
Three of the ASUO’s largest programs in particular asked for decreases. Programs and Assessments, in charge of administering the ASUO’s budget, is the student government’s largest program but asked to decrease its budget, made up mostly of accountant salaries.
The Child Care Subsidy, the ASUO’s second-largest program, pays for day-care for students’ children. It decreased its budget after asking for more money than it needed in 2008.
The ASUO Executive cut a graduate teaching fellow position that went unused this year out of its budget, saying the Oregon Student Association’s campus organizer could do the same job.
The Senate will approve the other half of its budget at its next meeting.
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