After a week of budget hearings for the more than 100 programs on campus, some of the largest proposed increases have yet to come before the ASUO Programs Finance Committee.
Many increases so far have been a result of the new stipend model approved by the Student Senate last year.
Stipends are the monthly pay some students receive for their work in ASUO programs, and in past years, amounts have varied from group to group. Under the new model, however, the stipends will be standardized for all ASUO groups.
Last week, the new model increased the ASUO Constitution Court’s budget more than 140 percent when stipends for its justices jumped from $30 a month to $75 a month.
Both the PFC and the senate will propose larger budgets because of the stipend model, PFC Chairwoman Mary Elizabeth Madden said.
But student government groups are not the only ones that might receive increases in payroll.
Some of the Multicultural Center’s increase will be for payroll expenses, but the amount is still substantially less than the $31,000 it received last year to bring MCC Director Erica Fuller to the group.
A larger increase this year appears to be the $12,500 the MCC is asking for in its programs funds.
In recent years, the MCC has not received large boosts to its program accounts. But if the PFC grants the group its budget in full, it will have more than double what it has received in the past.
Members of the MCC declined to discuss the specifics of the increases in their proposed budget.
“We currently, at this time, have no comment,” said Brandy Alexander, public relations coordinator for the MCC.
The PFC will also consider a large increase for the Designated Driver Shuttle, which received $63,157 last year. In addition, DDS went to the ballot and asked students for an additional $31,843 to cover maintenance and operating costs. Added together, DDS had a total budget of $105,000 last year.
For next year, DDS is asking for about an additional $14,000, much of which is for payroll.
“Payroll is our biggest budget, and we’re still going to be really close to being in the hole at the end of the year,” said Jeff Salchenberg, co-director of DDS.
In contrast, the Executive will actually spend less on stipends than it has in previous years. ASUO Finance Coordinator Jonathan Gray said that funds for Executive stipends will decrease from $35,000 to $31,000.
Aside from that decrease, the Executive is still hoping for a 3 percent increase of about $7,500.
“We tried to keep everything down because we knew a lot of other groups need increases,” Gray said, but added that $4,500 of the increase would be impossible to avoid because of higher dues for the Oregon Student Association.
Some substantial percentage increases for next year result from ASUO rules that limit first-year funded groups to $300.
The Oregon Future Lawyers Association will be asking the PFC to grant it $5,357, nearly a 1,700 percent increase from its first-year $300 budget.
Jennifer Greenough, the OFLA’s executive vice president, said that much of the increase will be to help publish the group’s undergraduate journal, the Oregon Advocate. Each issue costs about $500 to publish, and the OFLA wants student fees to cover half the cost while the group raises money for the rest.
The PFC will treat groups that are asking for large increases the same as others, Madden said, taking into account how much they spent last year, how well the groups used their funds and how the additional funds will be spent.
“There is no set formula,” Madden said. “Some may get all of their asked increases, [and] some may only get a portion. We won’t know until the hearings.”