The Leader

Legislation that would shift $100,000 in segregated fee funding in the Student Association budget drew the ire of critics at the last senate meeting on March 12.

For the past several years, the Student Association has had a varying amount of funds that are left over as part of their budget. Unused funds rollover from year to year and the un-allocated funds are typically appropriated throughout the year into various initiatives brought to the senate that are in need of funding. This year, however, there has been a particularly large amount of un-allocated funding.

This large surplus was largely because of issues with the student court and senate itself, said Stacy Van Kleef, senator at large and deputy speaker of the senate.

According to Van Kleef, it all began when the student court attempted to appoint two extra members which would have brought the membership from five to seven members. Along with the two extra members it was decided that the court would be granted an additional $15,000. But when the court wasn't able to appoint the additional members the $15,000 was scheduled to be sent back to the senate.

The senate had also initially allocated $45,000 for a paid advisor position as a sort of institutional memory for the organization, Van Kleef said. When that position became vacant this year and a replacement failed to materialize, the funds were scheduled to be sent back to the senate.

In light of the excess in un-allocated funds, three members of the senate drafted legislation reallocating $100,000 in funding. The author, SA President Russ Rueden, and co-sponsors of the legislation, Senators Neal Michals and Matt Franson, proposed a number of efforts as part of the legislation that would use the funds.

One effort was an emergency student loan fund, which would grant short-term loans to those in situations of financial emergency. Another initiative on behalf of the legislation would be an expansion of the existing bike loan program on campus. Other initiatives that are a part of the legislation are the creation of a student organization programming center, additional support of the campus's "Welcome Week", construction of additional student organization office space, and additional support for the university's "Spring Week".

On March 12 the senate convened and discussed the issue. The first and foremost concern in regards to the legislation was the problem of funding. The legislation calls for $100,000 in funding. $80,000 is scheduled to come from the senate reserves and $20,000 from the student courts. $15,000 was scheduled to be sent back from the courts already in June of last year. An additional $20,000 was requested from the courts to be sent to the senate. $45,000 is to come from the vacant senate advisory position and the remaining $35,000 is to come from other un-allocated funds. The problem is that although the various funds are scheduled to be re-allocated to the senate this has not yet occurred. A few senators were concerned that the funds simply were not there at this time to be allocated.

"My feeling on this is that I don't want to appropriate it without having that money to spend," Van Kleef said.

Also of concern was the reasoning behind the legislation.

"People were trying to figure out where these initiatives came from and why they were important to fund," Van Kleef said.

After a lengthy discussion with Michals fielding questions on the legislation it was decided that because of the absence of the president and others that the measure would be tabled until the next meeting. Rueden was attending a summit in Washington, D.C. and did not return in time for the meeting.

According to Van Kleef, if a decision is not reached on the measure in the next two meetings of this administration this year, the issue will be moved to the next administration which will convene sometime in June. It is also possible that someone else could author another piece of legislation that would attempt to utilize the un-allocated funds.

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