The EMU’s 2008-09 budget will grow less than the benchmark set by the Student Senate.
The board of directors approved a budget Wednesday that will grow by 6.47 percent over last year, or roughly $260,000, and will have a total incidental fee contribution of almost $4.3 million.
The Student Senate had approved the EMU to grow as much as 7 percent next year.
The budget passed unanimously, but with more debate than is usual for the board. Sen. Billy Hatch attempted to attach two notes to the budget that would have required campus radio station KWVA to form an outside advisory board and conduct a second listener survey.
Board Chairwoman Chess Patricolo opposed adding it because she said KWVA already planned to conduct another survey in 2010. The station was required to conduct a survey with its current budget.
The Federal Communications Commission recently gave KWVA permission to expand its broadcast strength from 500 to 1,000 watts, which could triple the station’s listening audience.
Patricolo said that given the upcoming changes it wasn’t the appropriate time to require another survey.
Hatch said an outside advisory board was necessary for the station in part because of errors on the application for increased wattage submitted to the FCC.
Several years ago KWVA became an EMU program and as a result dissolved its board of directors because the EMU had its own. According to Hatch, before the board was dissolved it and the ASUO recommended having an outside advisory board.
Seven representatives of the station came to strongly oppose the formation of an advisory board.
KWVA News Director Amelia Matier said that “putting together a group of people from outside the station seems illogical.”
“It seems like a waste of time and money,” she said.
The EMU Board voted against requiring the formation of an advisory board.
The board also voted to revoke the office space of the Fiber’s Guild on the third floor of the EMU.
The group has not been active for the past two years. All groups that apply for the space will be considered, board members said. Current groups waiting for office space include the College Democrats, the ASUO Constitution Court and Alpha Phi Omega.
Board member Michelle Haley said the College Democrats have a cubicle in the same space where the College Republicans have a locked office.