If you hark back to issues of The Badger Herald years ago, you’ll find a little coupon near some of the editorials at the start of the year. This coupon was to be sent by the reader, if he so pleased, to United Council, an organization comprised of UW System students designed to lobby state government for more high quality, accessible higher education. The coupon, essentially, requested United Council refund the student’s $2 contribution to United Council, since that student didn’t find it particularly useful in any way, shape or form.

This approach was in vogue about 20 years ago. This was a time in which United Council was known as a mildly noteworthy force at the state Capitol and in our papers.

Well, now that their notoriety has waned, the folks at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee decided to take a more direct approach.

After the Student Assembly at UWM decided to put a vote through the student body at the beginning of this year to decide if they wanted UC anymore. Despite the fact that they just approved it a year ago.

This didn’t really surprise me. In my five years at this campus, I’ve only heard one thing regarding UC — they don’t do anything.

Whoops, I sound like a broken record, don’t I? Basically, you could switch this column with any ASM bashing affair and paint it a different color and here comes the same old pessimistic critique.

The problem is the people who repeated to me their moans and groans were members of the Associated Students of Madison. Which is a bit odd;sort of like airport securing bitching about long lines at the DMV.

But is it UC that doesn’t work or is it ASM?

Why can’t it be both?.

First off, let’s understand when UC’s mission is to represent all the UW students and campuses. Well, that’s a bit hard because until recently they represented 16 campuses — five four-year and 11 two-year campuses. Well, that’s a bit of a problem considering you’re missing two two-year campuses and a whopping eight four-year campuses.

And it’s more of a problem now that they’ve lost the second largest four-year campus and any funding from its nearly 30,000 students.

So, what pissed off UWM enough to have their government kick UC off their campus and out of their wallets?

If you ask the fine folks in SA, they’ll tell you it’s because UC is a mess. An organizational “beast” according to one SA senator. In an interview with a Badger Herald reporter, former UC President Anthony DeWees said the organization he originally tried to join to reform UC but that it’s now a waste of time.

Of course, UC has responded, saying DeWees threw a temper tantrum andjust has a personal beef. Considering the fact UWM student government isn’t exactly know for it’s decorum, I’ll leave that discussion up to them to sort out.

As for UC, they’ve tried to cite certain victories. On the Chapter 17 and 18 changes, they cite the changes in favor of student representation and definition of a student’s misconduct off campus worthy of sanction. And to their credit, they seemed to snatch victory from the defeat — considering ASM and UC originally dropped the ball on the initial stages of those changes. (Although claiming they soley won those battles neglects the larger picture.)

But then there’s the budget. And while we can’t exactly fault them for falling short on a few goals, there’s one demand that rubbed me the wrong way.

They demanded a cap of tuition at the rate of inflation (currently 3 percent) for four-year campuses.

I’m sorry, who made that decision? Have I ever heard ASM approve a specific tuition increase? Did I hear anyone from ASM tell us what UC was doing or even act like it mattered? Was this on behalf of students like me? Or, more likely, all those other campuses who don’t pay dues, aren’t officially represented and get meager outreach to their campuses?

I don’t know, but I don’t agree with that position.. And I’m not sure ASM’s does either.

But that’s the problem. Over the years, ASM has also regarded UC as a “beast”. Except instead of slaying said beast, they prefer to enter into a strained courtship like it was a fucking Disney movie. They’ve been sending members — often some really interested freshman or sophomore who wanted to take the bullet — to General Assembly, having them come back on report and any other communication between ASM and UC either comes because of some last-minute push for a campaign or because they stumbled into each other on the street.

And that’s the most mind-numbing problem about this: How can an organization that calls home West Mifflin have a tough time building up the courage to work on a near daily basis with it’s pre-governmental soul mate four blocks away? Or vice versa? You’re in the same city and have the same goals!

Well, apparently UC can’t figure it out yet, because relations between ASM and UC are like passing notes in elementary school. They’ve decided to set up a separate UC chapter on this campus.

It’s like putting a Starbucks inside of another Starbucks.

The problem is bigger than UW-Madison, but those on campus should take note: Our last UC referendum passed only by a margin of 120 votes. 1,600 people voted against something they likely didn’t even know existed and 1,700 people voted for something they likely didn’t even know existed.

Either UC needs to finally set up shop with ASM or ASM needs to do what Adam Porton suggested a year ago and take them over.

Otherwise, I’ll be printing 15,000 new coupons.

Jason Smathers ([email protected]) is a first-year graduate student majoring in journalism.