NEWS
SSFC kicks off hearings
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by Joanna Pliner
Friday, September 8, 2006
The Student Services Finance Committee held its first meeting of the semester Thursday night.
The group, a branch of the Associated Students of Madison, is responsible for managing student-segregated fees and registered student organization budgets.
At the first meeting, the Legal Information Center, Wisconsin Public Interest Research Group, FH King Students of Sustainable Agriculture, and Diversity Education Program each made a presentation to SSFC in hopes of receiving eligibility to have its budget considered by SSFC.
According to Zach Frey, chair of SSFC, Thursday night's meeting was held solely for hearings and decisions about eligibility, and budgetary allocation will be made at the SSFC meeting Monday.
If a group is deemed eligible and its budget is approved, the budget is valid for two years.
SSFC also set a schedule for ASM budget decisions at the meeting Thursday.
Student segregated fees are paid by each student in addition to tuition and are used to fund various projects and student organizations on campus — and SSFC decides how those segregated fees are distributed.
Sree Atluru, SSFC member and chair of the ASM Finance Committee said the specific amount of segregated fees each student pays changes yearly, and this year students paid about $360.
According to Atluru, SSFC handles large budgetary requests from organizations that claim they can provide a significant service all students on campus can benefit from.
Atluru added that since SSFC has "the power" from the university, students and state statute to allocate students' money, students should follow SSFC decisions.
"We always try to be representative of what students want and what students need and so they need to tell us what they think … are important organizations and programming to fund," Atluru said. "It's their money, and we just spread it around."
Frey said he was not comfortable talking about which groups or projects he predicts to be particularly problematic in the upcoming semester.
However, Atluru said the changes made to the eligibility requirements for student services by the UW System could potentially cause controversy, though the details of the change are currently unclear.
"We have to figure out how to align ourselves with the policies the university has laid down so that we make sure we are in line with what the university policy is," Atluru said.
