The ASUO Executive will recommend that the ASUO end its contract with OSPIRG in a budget hearing this afternoon, sources close to the executive said Tuesday.
The Athletics and Contracts Finance Committee will decide the dollar amount of next year’s contract between student government and OSPIRG, a student organization founded in 1972 to fund lobbying and research on behalf of students, at a hearing scheduled for 3:30 p.m. in the Straub 154 classroom.
Oregon Student Public Interest Research Group is a statewide organization with chapters at colleges across Oregon. The University’s is the largest in the state and currently receives more than $100,000 for the services it provides. The student PIRG shares an acronym, mission and staff with the Oregon State Public Interest Research Group in one main OSPIRG office in Portland.
The objections of many fiscal conservatives within student government could lead the ACFC to cancel its contract with OSPIRG unless group members can prove the program’s effectiveness. Campus conservatives have long targeted OSPIRG funding as an excessive example of misuse of student fees. Students voted in 1998 to defund OSPIRG in a campus-wide referendum. OSPIRG won back its funding a year later through another ballot measure.
“If they lose their funding, I think it could be the end of OSPIRG,” ASUO Sen. Nick Schultz said.
Several within student government said they object to the amount of money the group sends off campus. “If we pay them $120,000 in fees, we should get $120,000 in benefits to the campus,” ASUO Vice President Johnny Delashaw said, later adding, “In order for us to recommend full funding for OSPIRG, they would have to show some benefit to campus.”ASUO President Sam Dotters-Katz will be in Portland on Wednesday because of his work on the University’s presidential search committee. He said Delashaw will attend the hearing.
On-campus expenses, including events, publications and the group’s voter-registration drive, make up only about a fifth of OSPIRG’s statewide budget. Delashaw said his objection is to the amount the group spends on paying its lobbyists and funding the statewide organization.
OSPIRG members said the group’s lobbyists have influenced legislators to create several initiatives that benefit students. OSPIRG campaign organizer Michael Reagan said the group is currently focusing on making textbooks affordable and lobbying for environmental initiatives and affordable health care.
“These issues are huge,” Reagan said. “They’re complex. They take an expert to advocate effectively.”
In a letter sent to OSPIRG in October 2008, U.S. Rep. David Wu credited the group with an important role in the creation of the Textbooks Disclosure Law passed by Congress in 2008, which requires textbook publishers to disclose the cost of their products to professors. Wu lauded OSPIRG lobbyist Luke Swarthout’s role in influencing the legislation.
“Luke played a major role helping me educate members of Congress and the media about the root causes of this problem and the best ways to solve it,” Wu wrote. “He is an essential advocate for students, giving voice to the millions of students who cannot be in Washington, DC on a day to day basis.”
ASUO communication director Andrew Plambeck described Delashaw’s relationship to the group as a “sordid love affair.” Delashaw questioned some of the issues the organization chose to target, in particular health care and environmental initiatives, which he said have no direct effect on campus.
Schultz said he hoped the content of OSPIRG’s initiatives would not influence the ACFC’s decision.
“The way it’s supposed to work is any student can come to them with a campaign,” Schultz said. “So for instance, you could come to them with a campaign, like say for greater use of fluorescent bulbs. They would help you with it.”
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