Battle of the budgets - Senate, SUFAC
Karen Meyer
Issue date: 5/7/09 Section: News
A new amendment was passed granting student senate the final say regarding the Student Government Association's budget, solidifying a system of checks and balances within student government.
"This opens up a door that I don't know if I feel comfortable with," said Matt Kehl, vice chair of Segregated University Fee Allocation Committee. "It's all a question of control."
SUFAC, the organization within SGA that handles the distribution of segregated university fee money to various orgs and services, has up until recently held the power to approve SGA's budget, but now must receive final confirmation from senate.
This decision stemmed from a series of conflicts and court decision within the past few semesters.
Last year, SGA had an excess of funds due to two vacant positions, the chief of staff and press secretary, which normally receive honorarium payments. Former President Sara Duginski wanted to move money within the allotted honorarium fund to establish a ninth committee, Quality and Diversity, to senate.
Any unused org funds normally goes back to the main SUFAC account.
Duginski, after still having an excess of funds once adding the Quality and Diversity committee, sought to distribute it within the association rather than having it absorb back into the SUFAC reserve.
Traditionally, SUFAC must be consulted before moving any funds around within a budget. With any change in the allocation boundaries, such as hiring a guest speaker instead of throwing a concert, the formality of asking SUFAC must be abided by.
"With this, the argument was that money was moving within the same pot so the president didn't see the need to seek SUFAC's approval when they are using money already allocated for basically the same thing," said Joe Tyrrell, SGA president-elect.
The student court ruled changes needed to be made. The two groups in question both vested interest in the budget money and could possibly have biased views one way or the other. The solution: seeking out neutral territory.
"This opens up a door that I don't know if I feel comfortable with," said Matt Kehl, vice chair of Segregated University Fee Allocation Committee. "It's all a question of control."
SUFAC, the organization within SGA that handles the distribution of segregated university fee money to various orgs and services, has up until recently held the power to approve SGA's budget, but now must receive final confirmation from senate.
This decision stemmed from a series of conflicts and court decision within the past few semesters.
Last year, SGA had an excess of funds due to two vacant positions, the chief of staff and press secretary, which normally receive honorarium payments. Former President Sara Duginski wanted to move money within the allotted honorarium fund to establish a ninth committee, Quality and Diversity, to senate.
Any unused org funds normally goes back to the main SUFAC account.
Duginski, after still having an excess of funds once adding the Quality and Diversity committee, sought to distribute it within the association rather than having it absorb back into the SUFAC reserve.
Traditionally, SUFAC must be consulted before moving any funds around within a budget. With any change in the allocation boundaries, such as hiring a guest speaker instead of throwing a concert, the formality of asking SUFAC must be abided by.
"With this, the argument was that money was moving within the same pot so the president didn't see the need to seek SUFAC's approval when they are using money already allocated for basically the same thing," said Joe Tyrrell, SGA president-elect.
The student court ruled changes needed to be made. The two groups in question both vested interest in the budget money and could possibly have biased views one way or the other. The solution: seeking out neutral territory.
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