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Ticket to ride

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by Badger Herald Editorial Board

Tuesday, December 6, 2005

The fate of the SAFE Nighttime Services — which provide escort, cab, and bus services for UW students — has been in limbo over the past semester as UW Transportation Services and the Associated Students of Madison squabble over who should be paying for such services.

While this board strongly believes that the segregated fee system amounts to welfare for student organizations who have no problems padding their pockets with the hard-earned dollars of the student body, we feel that out of all seg-fee-funded groups, SAFE Nighttime Services is among the few that have the potential to benefit everyone on campus. The same cannot be said of others.

Earlier this semester, when the Student Services Finance Committee debated the funding for SAFEwalk, they cut half of the budget from the program. They left the budget for SAFEcab alone.

Last week, SSFC's budgets received final approval from ASM. But instead of rubber-stamping the budgets of these organizations like they did to most groups, ASM zero-funded SAFEcab after UW Transportation Services announced they would no longer continue to subsidize the program in the next year and a half.

SAFEwalk, as well, suffered from ASM's red pen, and was zeroed out. Luckily, UW Transportation Services decided to pick up the tab.

Both UW Transportation Services and ASM need to realize that the vitality of the SAFE Nighttime Services program depends on the existence of all three services. Together, the service is economically efficient and decreases the overall cost of the program.

If students truly had a choice in the matter, we feel confident they would chose to continue using segregated fees to fund the SAFEcab program. However, that choice has been left to ASM and the erratic whims of SSFC.

We urge ASM to reconsider the funding decision in regard to SAFEwalk and SAFEcab.

With the outrageous budgets of organizations that cater to a select few approved with little more than lip service to fiscal responsibility, how can ASM claim to represent all students when one of the few truly all-campus initiatives has been killed by their own hand?

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Anonymous (December 6, 2005 @ 10:24am):

Wow, quite a game of poker going on with ASM and Transportation Services. Everyone has went all in, and now we see both sides frantically trying to get some of their chips back...It would be a tragedy if SAFECab was eliminated...

Anonymous (December 6, 2005 @ 4:05pm):

SafeWalk is the problem. UW Trans must owe somebody somethin' fierce to defend that program.

It is necessarily inefficient, very limited geographically, and expensive.

Anonymous (December 6, 2005 @ 7:15pm):

Not much ASM could do but try to save students money... Transportation Services said that SAFEcab would only exist this year if ASM covered all of the costs (it's usually split 50/50), and even then TS would eliminate it after next year.

Anonymous (December 6, 2005 @ 7:21pm):

No suprise here but the Badgerherald Editorial Board gets it wrong again. For some reason it seems as if they know what they are talking about, time and time again they have printed false information and incorrect logic to prove a point (send APACING article as well as Render unto MCSC). They seem to believe they know whats going on in SSFC better then the SSFC members themselves. If they knew anything at all they would know that even if we had not pulled the funding to Transportational Services for Safecab that SAFEcab was still going to be eliminated and not by SSFC but by Transportation services, the University does not want to fun SAFEcab becuase its bad PR, so rather then give them almost 100,000 to sit and waste and send back to the reserve board (which that money never goes back into students pockets) they instead decided that ASM itself will take on putting together a Cab program because YES it is an important service even though the University doesn't seem to think so. And don't worry SAFEwalk will still be funded in full by the University so no use getting upset about that.
Transportation services tried to fool SSFC members and told them that the SAFE program was a comprehsive program and all three services were completly necassary to keep this campus Safe, and then a few weeks later told us they lied and that no matter what SSFC did they were not funding SAFEcab. Transportation services is in direct violation of Shared governance, and should not be taken seriously.
So I hope the badgerherald does some real research and gets their facts straight before they continue to provide students on this campus with false information and lies to get across their own political agenda.

Anonymous (December 6, 2005 @ 10:21pm):

Well, it isn't on ASM's conscience if SAFEcab is eliminated. SSFC originally funded it in full and was told that it would be eliminated by UW Transportation no matter what after a year. As for SAFEwalk, ASM knew UW Transportation was planning on picking up the entire tab for it. With that knowledge, why wouldn't they save students some money?