The Student Services Finance Committee heard one budget proposal and approved two other organizations’ budgets with frequent debate and relatively few cuts in a Monday-night meeting.
SSFC members quickly, and with very little debate, approved WSUM campus radio station’s proposed budget with no amendments, allocating them $285,581.
WSUM is the only organization to not have requested a budget increase in four years, and raised their 2005-06 budget by only 3 percent from the previous years’ budgets. Committee members cited this fiscal responsibility as a major factor in the committee’s decision.
“WSUM has bent over backwards to justify every item on this budget,” said SSFC member Kate Quinn.
SSFC also approved Wunk Sheek’s budget after a lengthy debate and more than $6,000 in cuts, finally allocating the organization $93,732.
Wunk Sheek, a Native American student organization, requested an additional $1,490 tonight, after proposing their original budget last Thursday. SSFC members inquired as to why the organization did not allocate any funding for printing costs and this discussion led them to reanalyze the budget.
At their budget presentation members of Wunk Sheek told members of SSFC that their printing costs were already incorporated into their program supplies funding, and this confusion raised heated debate between committee members.
Some committee members said Wunk Sheek’s tardy raise of $1,490 to their budget should not be approved, because it was in direct violation of rules governing SSFC.
“I think it would be ridiculous to accept this,” said SSFC member Eric Saar. “There are specific rules … it’s a waste of our time.”
Saar added other organizations might take the hint by requesting more money from the committee after the fact.
“Other organizations might say, ‘Hey, look at what they did with Wunk Sheek. Let’s request another $3,000,'” Saar said.
Other members were concerned with the misunderstanding between the committee and the organization and felt not approving the amended budget proposal might adversely affect the organization’s services.
“This was presented because we had doubts. We had questions about the money for printing, because there was a misunderstanding in the budget,” said SSFC member Adriana Barboza.
Eventually, SSFC members went through individual items of the newly proposed addition, cutting most of them and adding other things, such as money for printing flyers instead of money for newspaper advertisements.
The Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Campus Center staff, including SSFC vice chair, Kevin Otten, presented their 2005-06 budget, totaling $59,112, an increase of $8,215 from this year’s working allocation. Increases to staff salaries and program supplies are the largest aspects of the budget increases.
The organization requested more salaries to keep the LGBTCC open for more evening hours.
Presenters also emphasized the need for $1,000 to purchase a new computer to replace the organization’s oldest computer.
“[It’s] still running on Windows 95, cannot be networked with the organization’s newer computers and is really, really slow,” Otten said.
The committee will debate and decide the LGBT budget in a meeting Thursday.
