March 22, 2007
To UW-Madison Students:
As students of UW-Madison, we pay over $600 a year in segregated fees and we are deeply disappointed that over $25,000 of those fees was granted by ASM (Associated Students of Madison) to fund WASB's (Wisconsin Alumni Student Board) concert for the annual All-Campus Party. This year the concert will take place off campus and will only be able to be seen by approximately 1,300 students, even though all students are funding it. In previous years, All-Campus Party, which was started by ASM and WASB, has held their concert events in large venues on campus such as the Terrace, the Fieldhouse, and the field near the Natatorium. This has enabled a diverse population of students to see the concert and feel that their segregated fees are being spent wisely. This year, however, due to the poor organization and miscommunication from WASB, the majority of students are not going to benefit from this event. WASB has had a year since the popular and well-received Common concert of 2006 to plan for another big name artist and venue. They instead waited until February to start contacting agents for musical artists and applying for funding and grants. One of the largest student programming organizations on campus (Wisconsin Union Directorate) was not asked to be a part of the planning process even though the Music Committee within WUD has brought big name artists to campus, has ample knowledge about working with agents and booking venues, and would have been a great resource for the WASB planners. This reckless spending hurts all future music programming on campus, for artists will expect that all student organizations will be able to pay such large amounts of money. To put this into perspective, WUD's Music Committee could have programmed about six months' worth of concerts for the price that WASB is paying to bring one solo artist to Madison. Again, we express our disappointment with WASB for asking for over $25,000 in segregated fees, and in ASM for granting it, for a concert that is only going to be seen by 1,300 students. We urge you to look into this problem and express concerns and voice your opinion to WASB and ASM so hopefully they will be more responsible with our money and this will not happen again. We hope that next year we will see student dollars being spent wisely for All-Campus Party, and that a concert will be at a large venue on campus with student organization collaboration and input, rather than at a small venue which few people can attend.
Sincerely,
Dylan Heaney, Danielle Lindenberg, Rachelle Stone, and Jayme Zwerling
