An Associated Students of Madison committee unanimously approved SPILL’s budget proposal and heard an eligibility presentation from F.H. King’s Students for Sustainable Agriculture.
Student Services Finance Committee members approved SPILL’s budget for $40,869, an increase from their proposed budget of $40,731.
This was due to a raise from $9.19 an hour to $9.69 an hour in the webmaster wages because of the skill required for it.
Rep. Andy Stoiber brought up the webmaster’s wage for debate because there were concerns about the club being able to hire someone qualified for that position.
Rep. Jessica Franco-Morales voted for it despite her original opposition to raising the wage, because she said she believed the club would know the position description the best.
The committee originally considered raising the wage to $13 an hour as that is a standard in other clubs with the same position. However, Morales said she talked to a representative from SPILL and they said the position only required upkeep, not the creation of a website, so the committee agreed upon a $9.69 per hour wage.
The committee also heard F.H. King Students for Sustainable Agriculture’s budget proposal.
“Our mission is to establish the relationship between land, food and community on the University of Wisconsin campus,” Sunil Misra, the club’s financial director, said. “We do that through the use of core programs.”
For this fiscal year, the group requested $70,884, which is a slight increase from last year’s budget.
The student-run farm is the centerpiece of the organization, Misra said. They also use the budget for workshops in food preparation and experience-based education programs.
Their full-cycle freight program, which is a compost collecting program that uses bikes, is also taking off, Misra said. The club’s most well-known program, Harvest Handouts, serves between 75 and 200 people a week, Misra added.
The past fiscal year, F.H. King Students for Sustainable Agriculture used 82.9 percent of their budget, producing a return of $12,722, Misra said.
“The more networking we do, the more community building we do, can lower our costs,” Misra said.
Portions of employee salaries were returned last year due to extended absence, summer housing issues and improperly filled out time sheets.
A total of $2,888 was returned for supplies because of low cost workshops, discounts and longevity of office supplies, a change in advertising away from print and a well-maintained inventory, Misra said.
