News > October 30, 2003

By Monica Belford

Old Gold and Black Reporter

Passing out every penny of the $514,249.80 allocated to the Student Budget Advisory Committee by administration, the finalized appeal hearings on Oct. 29 produced mostly positive results, even though the same amount of money as last year was divided among more organizations.

Originally granting organizations and clubs $482,075.78 for 2004-2005, the SBAC distributed the remaining $32,174.02 among nine organizations and five club sports. Included in the appeals held Oct. 22 and 23, the Old Gold and Black, Gospel Choir, Three to Four Ounces, PREPARE, The Student, Volunteer Service Corps, Unified Rhythms, WAKE Radio, Campus Crusade for Christ, men’s lacrosse, rugby, the running club, tennis and ultimate Frisbee all asked the SBAC to reconsider their funding requests.

In describing the appeal process, junior and SG treasurer Robert Wolfe said, “Organizations try to further clarify their budget, perhaps providing further information or info that the SBAC overlooked, in order to explain the necessity of the items not funded.”

Demon Divas and PREPARE are two organizations that also supplied the SBAC with reasons for their appeals.

“We did not make it clear enough in our first hearing what we were asking for,” said PREPARE co-chair Paris Ball of the initial PREPARE budget requests.

“We explained our increase in funding requests, and the new funds we got, we are very happy with. I am very confident that we will be able to put on all our basic programs after the appeal,” Ball said.

Ball further explained the group’s appeal by highlighting the failure of the initial budget in covering the basic needs of the group. Spending $1,500.00 each year to produce informational pamphlets for every freshman and other students, the initial budget of $1,800.00 would have only funded minimal needs. However after the appeal process, the group budget of $3,895.00 will permit the group to fund other projects.

The Demon Divas also persuaded the appeal board to increase the group’s funds from $1,135.00 to $1,950.00, citing needs to pay for a $4,000 loan, a soon-to-be-released CD, and an upcoming a cappella festival.

Demon Divas’ co-business manager, Alison Reynolds said, “This year we asked for $3,825 to cover the additional production costs of the CD, booking venues, participating in off-campus events, touring, and promoting our second-annual a cappella festival, Acappellooza.

“We decided that an a cappella festival would be a great way to show off the incredible talent of the different groups on campus, as well as to foster good rapport with other university a cappella groups, and the money we received from SBAC for next year will definitely move us in the right direction,” she said.

Unlike the Old Gold and Black, PREPARE and Demon Divas, who all felt their final budgets would be satisfactory for the upcoming fiscal year, the Amateur Radio Club, was a dissenter among the organizations. The club, which can only receive funds of less than $500 from the Appropriations and Charter Committee because they were denied funding from the SBAC for 2004-2005, said the SBAC decision was questionable and “irresponsible”.

Chris Plumblee, president of the Amateur Radio Club, said the club was not particularly pleased with the results.

“The Amateur Radio Club is a small organization, and to the best of my understanding, one of the primary factors SBAC looks at in evaluating organizations that do not play a prominent role on campus, like the Howler and OGB, is membership.  As a club with only five student members, I didn’t expect to get much of a budget from SBAC.”

Plumblee said although he thinks the SBAC has a difficult job in meeting the needs of the many student organizations, he was disappointed that the Amateur Radio Club was the only club that was denied their request for funding.

“I sometimes wonder about a possible conflict of interest when SBAC, which as I understand it is a part of Student Government, decides how much money Student Government gets … I think it’s irresponsible and extremely inconsiderate of SBAC to refuse to fund my organization in the first round of requests merely to see if we were serious enough to come back on appeal.”

Of all the organizations and clubs, the Old Gold and Black received the highest amount of appealed funds.

The SBAC appeal board, including the Student Government treasurer, an elected student from each class and three appointed members, maintained the same members that initially decided the allocations last week.

Persuading the eight-member appeal board, the Old Gold and Black received a $10,700.00 budget increase from $99,000.00 to $109,700.00.

“Our entire final budget of $109,700 is dedicated to the production of the paper in some form or another.  However … $74,000 of the budget is devoted to printing the paper — that is, to pay our printer for 6,000 copies of the paper each week.  The remaining $35,700 of the budget is for organizational expenses (such as) postage, film, photography development, reporter and photographer remunerations, telephone and cable TV fees, copies, computer hardware and software, syndication fees, etc.,” senior Austin Harris, the Old Gold and Black business manager, said.

Harris also gave reasons for the organization’s participation in the appeal process.

“In SBAC’s original decision, it chose to fund the weekly production of the Old Gold and Black, but not our monthly Life tabloid.  We appealed to SBAC to have the tabloid funded, since we believe that it’s important not only to the Old Gold and Black’s long-range plan, but also in ensuring that students have a monthly resource for student life in and beyond the university community. Though initially SBAC was not receptive of the idea of the Life magazine, I believe that they ultimately were able to understand its value to the university community,” Harris said.

Though Harris said several essential areas of the paper’s budget were still cut, he expects the funding to be sufficient for the 2004-2005 budget.