The Student Services Finance Committee voted unanimously Monday to cut next year’s allocable segregated-fees budget by grouping organizations into three parts and taking cuts proportionally.
SSFC was forced to reconsider general student segregated fees recently when Chancellor John Wiley mandated a $140,000 budget cut from the proposal. Wiley said he wanted the general student segregated-fees budget to reflect cuts that are taking place in other organizations across campus.
The new budget splits the 18 student organizations with increased proposals into groups depending on their requests. Groups with less than 20 percent increases, such as the Campus Women’s Center, will see a 2.2 percent budget cut. Organizations with a 20 to 100 percent increase, such as Sex Out Loud, will see cuts of 4.4 percent. Budgets that are over 100 percent, such as Diversity Education’s, will be cut 6.6 percent.
Rebecca Pifer, Finance Chair of the Associated Students of Madison, said after considering different options, they found this method of cuts to be the most reasonable.
“Clearly, an across-the-board cut didn’t seem to make a lot of sense,” she said. “A proportional cut didn’t make sense either. Opening budgets and looking at line items seemed, at least to myself, a nightmare.”
Most SSFC members agreed with Pifer, viewing the cut as a necessary evil.
“This was a decision that was difficult to make under the circumstances in which it came up,” SSFC Chair LaMont Smith said. “I think [the solution] is a pretty good one.”
SSFC member Andrew Wallmeyer said the cuts were unnecessary. He found fault with the chancellor and said Wiley does not trust student governments.
“I find the whole process very frustrating because I feel as though we’ve been asked to make cuts for the political purposes of the chancellor,” Wallmeyer said. “We’re a student government asked to make student decisions. But we were asked to make changes because of the state budget when we don’t have anything to do with that.”
Groups are allowed to distribute cuts at their discretion, providing they do not increase individual line items. They have until May 1, 2002, to submit their revised budgets to the Dean of Students Office.
The ASM Bus Pass Program, which will make up over $1 million of the allocable segregated fees next year, was exempt from a large cut for contract reasons.
