[media-credit name=’DEREK MONTGOMERY/Herald photo’ align=’alignnone’ width=’648′][/media-credit]The Associated Students of Madison reacted to an earlier SAFE Nightime Services funding decision at a meeting Wednesday.

In response to the UW Transportation Service's announcement to eliminate its portion of SAFEride cab funding within the next year and a half, ASM College of Letters and Sciences Representative Zach Frey motioned to amend the SAFE Nighttime Services budget passed by the Student Services Finance Committee.

Frey proposed zero-funding the SAFEwalk escort and SAFEride cab aspects of SAFE Nighttime Services and restoring $28,617 to SAFEride bus.

Jennifer Knox, an ASM College of Letters and Sciences representative, along with support from a few other representatives, advocated the continued funding of SAFEwalk and SAFEride cab.

By a vote of 9-5, the amendment to the SAFE Nighttime Services budget passed.

ASM also considered other SSFC budget decisions Wednesday.

Frey said the Tenant Resource Center budget had been controversial in previous SSFC meetings and requires sufficient time to be debated in order to make a good decision.

"This was, to the best of my recollection, the closest vote we had," he said.

ASM representatives began debating the TRC budget, but tabled further discussion for the next meeting due to time constraints.

The budgets of Collegians For A Constructive Tomorrow and the UW Roman Catholic Foundation were excluded from discussion or debate pending Student Judiciary consideration.

Aside from the tabling of TRC discussions and the budgets of CFACT and UWRCF, ASM passed the SSFC budget package.

ASM Professional Representative Stuart Bray said the process of going over SSFC's budget package takes a great deal of time because of the debate between representatives who have already seen budgets of the student organizations and representatives who are seeing them for the first time.

"So you get people who like to hear themselves talk, who like to try to make some sort of impact on the amount of (segregated) fees that are spent (and) who really had nothing to do with the initial reading of the budget proposals," he said. "So, initially, it's going back and forth, rehashing stuff that had been decided probably weeks ago."

Bray said by appreciating the time spent by SSFC in looking over the budgets of the student organizations, the budget package should be able to be passed as a whole with little or no alterations.

"I think you could save a lot of time if you appreciate the work that SSFC has actually done in the first place," he said. "If you appreciate the work they've done and respect the fact that they've gone through it [and] they've come up with the final decision, ASM should be able to pass the budget as a whole without having to rehash each organization and each line item in each organization."

By a vote of 17-0, UW sophomore Leah Moe was voted in as a member of ASM.

Moe expressed her excitement for her position as an ASM representative and confidence in her abilities to serve the university.

"I'm really relieved that the confirmation process is over and I'm excited to start making a difference on this campus," she said. "I have a lot of experience in student government. It's something I've done for about eight years, and I've really wanted to get involved here on campus."